Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

In defence of Douglas Crockford

atom-morgan.github.io

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

271–280 of 450 posts

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#271

Post by coldtea »

madeofpalk wrote: post #136
bsder wrote: post #100

This is becoming increasingly concerning to me. The problem is that there is no way for the person affected to receive "justice", "fairness", or "a day in court". You want to not invite somebody? Fine. You want to disinvite somebody? Okay, but be prepared to be called a jerk. But assassinating someone's professional character publicly? You'd better be standing on REALLY solid ground for a REALLY good reason. Crockfor…

You've kind of just resolved your concerns yourself. > The problem is that there is no way for the person affected to receive "justice", "fairness", or "a day in court". Of course there is. There's 'private arbitration' - just resolve the matters yourself like regular people do. Then then, if the victim feels particularly damaged, there's the courts. > Crockford might just ignore this--it's probably the best course o…

>Yup. He doesn't need 'justice' because he doesn't feel he's been particularly wronged.

Way to prove the parent's point. You have taken this whole "innocent until proven guilty" scheme backwards...

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#272

Post by coldtea »

eli wrote: post #104
rdtsc wrote: post #34

> We will also be removing Douglas Crockford from our keynote speakers list to help make the conference a comfortable environment for all. If they are going to insinuate things about what he said, they should mention exactly what he said or did. The fact that they don't somehow tells me there is not much there to go on. To put it another way, if they have the guts to remove Crockford that should have enough guts to c…

I don't think they insinuated anything beyond that he apparently made others uncomfortable.

That could be because he has smelly feet or because he threatened someone with a jackknife. That's kind of a huge range of insinuations to make.

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#273

Post by tajen »

cryptica wrote: post #235
Tehnix wrote: post #29

I generally feel like there's a kneejerk reaction from people (especially in the tech community) to be "PC compliant", at the level where you almost can't have any discourse because it's such a minefield (can't imagine a rational person whoms first intepretation of the tweets is "that's sexist" to be pleasant having a conversation with). I almost feel in the minority (or just a silent one?), but I honestly don't care…

I can relate to the feeling of being a 'silent' minority. As an introverted white guy who lives in a foreign country, I feel that I am being discriminated against all the time. I literally have to force myself to act extroverted in order to succeed in the workplace. People just assume that if you're a guy, you're just a confident hussler. I know several introverted white guys who are extremely qualified but missed ou…

The quantity of white males who are removed from their position in a possibly career-ending way without trial or due explanation (e.g. Mozilla CEO, GitHub CEO, various conferences, colleagues), plus the quantity of government aid and help that are offered based on people's gender, and not based on people's weaknesses, now makes me uncomfortable. White males who work hard deserve a life too.

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#274

Post by coldtea »

eli wrote: post #224
rdtsc wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They said "We will also be removing Douglas Crockford from our keynote speakers list to help make the conference a comfortable environment for all." Imagine saying that about anyone, to any group (here it was to the whole world). Let's say the invite you to a gathering publicly then wrote a tweet about "We will also be removing eli from list of invited guests, to help make the venue a comfortable environment for all"…

But is it true that other guests have complained about me making them uncomfortable?

So? Those other guests might just hate my gut.

Or they might prefer their pal to come speak at the last few open entries, and Douglas got invited instead.

Or they might be idiots.

Or insane.

Or "professional" touchy-feelers....

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#275

Post by jrs235 »

CrLf wrote: post #237
rtpg wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what? The talk organizers were faced with a dilemma: either keep Crawford and lose a bunch of other speakers or lose Crawford but keep others I do think clarification is needed, but I could see "being a jerk " as a legit reason to not want to associate with someone. People do the same with people like Torvalds Being unliked is also a reason that people won't want to associate with you.

Maybe perhaps they should instead opt to lose these "others"? I'm unsure as to who the "jerks" really are in this situation.

The whole thing feels like "reverse bullying" to me.

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#276

Post by coldtea »

eli wrote: post #262
iopq wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"We have deleted eli's messages from HN because he made others felt uncomfortable."

If the HN moderators wanted to do that after reviewing complaints against me, it's certainly within their rights.

>If the HN moderators wanted to do that after reviewing complaints against me, it's certainly within their rights.

What's legal/within one's rights and what's right is not the same thing.

To be also right, those HN moderators should also have thoroughly investigated (reviewed) those complaints, not just knee-jerk reacted to them (as seems to be the case here).

And even then, they should publicly state the reasons, not just leave an insinuation open.

And if this did had happened to you personally, with all the possible implications in your reputation, job etc, you'll be also demanding this of them too.

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#277

Post by coldtea »

yardie wrote: post #248
cryptica wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can relate to the feeling of being a 'silent' minority. As an introverted white guy who lives in a foreign country, I feel that I am being discriminated against all the time. I literally have to force myself to act extroverted in order to succeed in the workplace. People just assume that if you're a guy, you're just a confident hussler. I know several introverted white guys who are extremely qualified but missed ou…

> As an introverted white guy who lives in a foreign country, I feel that I am being discriminated against all the time. This is, literally, what it feels like to be a minority in the US and most European countries. Everything about you is questionable, you get slighted all the time, and you're the representative of an entire ethnicity. So whatever you do or opinions you hold are representative of the entire group.

Except if you make it to "fame/success status". Then you can use the minority card all the time in your favour.

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#278

Post by calgoo »

eli wrote: post #264
justaaron wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

which begs the questions: 1) whom 2) why and it's rather "put-up or shut-up" time, I'd say. I've never heard of this conference. I've read Crockfords books, and while any given person on earth may be a total bear to deal with, I'm not buying this greasy smarmy "he'd been uninvited for undisclosed reasons but we'll imply lot's of socially-disapproved-of reasons without confirming nor denying any of them" what a kafka-…

They're free to invite and disinvite whoever they please. You're free to not attend. I don't think airing private grievances will help anyone.

Yes but if you are going to give half-assed reasons for uninviting him, then you are going to have to defend yourself. If they had said: " Unfortunately Douglas Crackford will not attend the conference for unforeseen circumstances", we would not be in this outrage. If you are going to publicly shame someone and possible harm their career, you better have proof that he has done some very horrible things or comments. Listing a possible twitter message calling someone stupid does not sound like a reasonable cause too me. That is why we are voicing our concerns, and why hardly anyone here is agreeing with you.

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#279

Post by discordianfish »

I don't know about the reasons either, but if there are multiple, yet hard-to-proof claims (like harassment or just being a jerk), it's something they need to take serious while not being able to talk about the specifics without really doing Crockford wrong.

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#280

Post by coldtea »

eli wrote: post #79
Tehnix wrote: post #29

I generally feel like there's a kneejerk reaction from people (especially in the tech community) to be "PC compliant", at the level where you almost can't have any discourse because it's such a minefield (can't imagine a rational person whoms first intepretation of the tweets is "that's sexist" to be pleasant having a conversation with). I almost feel in the minority (or just a silent one?), but I honestly don't care…

I feel there's a knee jerk reaction from people in the tech community to minimize very legitimate concerns about bias and about making people feel uncomfortable and unwelcome. I think it's easy to look past someone's personal preferences and outrageous comments when you're already part of the club. But respect that that isn't everyone's experience.

>I feel there's a knee jerk reaction from people in the tech community to minimize very legitimate concerns about bias and about making people feel uncomfortable and unwelcome.

Maybe people shouldn't be so precious snowflakes that should always feel "comfortable" and "welcome"? Maybe they should have the courage to be challenged?

I blame it on the BS "you are so special" mode of baby boomer parenting...

Post reply on HN