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ElectronConf postponed until a “more diverse slate of speakers” can be delivered

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Re: ElectronConf postponed until a “more diverse slate of speakers” can be delivered

#191

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

TokenDiversity wrote: post #63
wand3r wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well Indians are over represented in tech so you're views don't matter. Double because you're male. But yes, rather rediculous. Totally agree. It's like survelience and terrorism. Just a stupid excuse to gain Goodwill w/ some groups and avoid a different problem they don't want to deal with. Hope you weren't offended, I just wanted to make a point. Of course your views matter

No I got you, you're saying majority is an automatic disqualification which is ridiculous but happens today nevertheless.

The interesting thing is that this change really happened in the past 10 or 15 years or so. That is, the phrase "under-represented minority" is relatively new, and basically came about because someone decided Indians and East Asians "don't count" anymore when it comes to diversity because we've got too many of them.

I consider myself liberal, but I feel this business of grading everyone by their race and sex is the exact antithesis of liberal ideals. What happened to MLK's ideas of not being judged by the color of your skin, but by the content of your character? Yes, I understand that things like subconscious bias and privilege can complicate this ideal, but at the end of the day, we shouldn't be surprised that anyone gets angry when they are told "Sorry, we don't want anymore of your race/sex, we've already got too many of your kind."

Re: ElectronConf postponed until a “more diverse slate of speakers” can be delivered

#192

Post by naasking »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #53
dragandj wrote: post #21

Give us diversity! There's too much JavaScript code in Electron. Minorities such as PHP, C++, and LISP are underrepresented and opressed!

JavaScript itself is one of the biggest arguments against existence of meritorcracy in tech :).

Against it's reality in tech, but not against it's utility!

Re: ElectronConf postponed until a “more diverse slate of speakers” can be delivered

#193

Post by kaybe »

vemv wrote: post #131

Will we ever accept the fact that women tend to be less inclined to do nerdy stuff (like developing Electron plugins instead of doing your actual coding job)? That doesn't imply that women are worse or unable, it's simply a matter of proportion. It's like saying men are underrepresented at yoga classes.

Not as yoga teachers though, interestingly, from my anecdotal sampling.

Re: ElectronConf postponed until a “more diverse slate of speakers” can be delivered

#194

Post by viraptor »

julianmarq wrote: post #187
viraptor wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if you were told that the organizers did reach out as many different groups as possible? If we were discussing what-ifs, then I'd say - tough, maybe next year they'll have more success. But that's not the situation we're discussing. An organiser responded with "we can do better, we're postponing", so I don't have really a comment to that.

Post hoc ergo propter hoc sure is handy... in this particular situation.

I honestly don't know where do you see an invalid temporal causality here. I can't unsee the organiser's response :)

Re: ElectronConf postponed until a “more diverse slate of speakers” can be delivered

#195

Post by selllikesybok »

muninn_ wrote: post #138
selllikesybok wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe if people stopped flipping out a out having to think about injustice and their relative complicity in institutional inequality... Like, freaking out about having to think about it. About not being able to sail through life without ever having to.

Ridiculous. I think about it all the time. I mentor early-career black and female employees right now, and sponsor on-campus events for groups like NSBE. So don't sit here and assume that because I have a problem with our discussion about equality now means that I don't think about equality, don't support it, or somehow I "sail through life". Did you grow up in a poor family of high school dropouts? Did you go fight…

To clarify, it's not about you. Poor word choice? My bad.

The sailing through life bit was specific to the context of being untroubled by the need to examine ones relative privelege or lack of, and the structures affecting same.

Not to imply that not having to think a out these things means life is automatically easy. You can still get cancer, get hit by a bus, etc.

----

You say that if people were not so quick to call out perceived racism or sexism things would be better.

I say if people were not so quick to be personally insulted when perceived racism and sexism are called out, things would be better.

Did I misunderstand your point?

Re: ElectronConf postponed until a “more diverse slate of speakers” can be delivered

#196

Post by luord »

This is not the way to do things, like literally not the way to do things:

1. They could've reached out to many more different groups if that's what they wanted (and it's not like that's a bad thing anyway).

2. That out of the way, they shouldn't postpone it based on the characteristics of the speakers they got. Now that is a bad thing.

3. They shouldn't have pointed out that it was precisely because of that they postponed it. "Logistics problems" would have worked just as well as an excuse.

Now all this is visible and bad for everyone. I don't care about electron either way, but many people do. Just a cavalcade of errors this thing.

Re: ElectronConf postponed until a “more diverse slate of speakers” can be delivered

#197

Post by protomyth »

viraptor wrote: post #189
protomyth wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm mad because this is a commitment to optical diversity and does nothing for actual diversity in our industry. It is approaching the problem from the exact opposite direction. Instead of giving a diverse audience the best possible information using a blind selection system, the organizers are now going to select based on something that is not part of the lecture. If the organizers actually cared about diversity bey…

> Instead of giving a diverse audience the best possible information using a blind selection system, the organizers are now going to select based on something that is not part of the lecture. You're making an assumption here that the blind selection process will change or that added/substitute papers will not chosen by the same criteria. I'd wait for the followup, before judging the followup ;) I agree it could be do…

> You're making an assumption here that the blind selection process will change or that added/substitute papers will not chosen by the same criteria

Clearly they won't be because now diversity is part of the additional criteria. I don't have to wait for the follow-up as they've already given the information.

Hindsight is 20/20, but we've had enough of these to actually analyze what the problem is. The organizers took the out the will require the least time and money but looks good on a brochure as opposed to furthers a goal. Having grown up and worked on a reservation, I am well aware of the nice photo op versus the effective program.

Re: ElectronConf postponed until a “more diverse slate of speakers” can be delivered

#198

Post by julianmarq »

selllikesybok wrote: post #190
julianmarq wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> relative complicity No, this stuff doesn't belong in HN, I don't accept it; this isn't tumblr. Nobody is complicit of anything just for existing. At risk of invoking Godwin's law, that's exactly what the nazis said about every jew, including children. > About not being able to sail through life without ever having to. Yeah, let's not pretend you aren't a person who's had so much privilege that the biggest thing you…

Straight to Nazis, huh? I'm not talking blood and soil here. I'm talking about benefiting from structural inequalities that favor certain groups over others. And to the degree one benefits, and takes that for granted, and perceives the calling out of those benefits as a form of persecution, then yes, there's a degree of complicity. But no one's saying (well, not anyone on HN, anyway, and not most people on Tumblr) th…

> I'm talking about benefiting from structural inequalities that favor certain groups over others.

Still arguing about complicity just out of existence. Last time I'm replying to you because you won't understand, but at least now my comment is just as visible as yours.

> And to the degree one benefits, and takes that for granted, and perceives the calling out of those benefits as a form of persecution, then yes, there's a degree of complicity.

Again, calling out unfair benefits is not bad. Attacking the people directly based on their race and sex is. But you do you and keep pretending I'm doing the first, it's the only way you can avoid the cognitive dissonance of your narrative after all.

> Just that they shouldn't be accorded undue advantages to the direct detriment of others.

Yeah, no, this isn't what's being argued here, again. Nobody should have inherent advantages over anyone else, that's a non-starter, it's obvious.

What I and the others you replied to here is calling out is a direct snub on a group of people because of their race and sex. If you don't see that as racism or sexism (or are selectively pretending that those aren't bad things) doesn't matter: It is racism/sexism and they're bad things.

Re: ElectronConf postponed until a “more diverse slate of speakers” can be delivered

#199

Post by nobi »

DeusExMachina wrote: post #45

As a European, I keep getting baffled about how out of hand these things seem to be in the USA. I live in the Netherlands, a very open-minded country with same-sex marriage, equal rights and were women seem to me to be even slightly more dominant over men (but this is just my perception). All this without safe spaces, forced quotas at conferences, codes of conduct and people that police every word you say. There are…

"a very open-minded country" cough Geert Wilders is the most popular politician in the Netherlands cough

Re: ElectronConf postponed until a “more diverse slate of speakers” can be delivered

#200

Post by selllikesybok »

julianmarq wrote: post #180
selllikesybok wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure how saying that a non diverse group is inferior to a diverse group is equivalent to saying that the specific elements making up the non diverse group is inferior? Like, saying all-white is inferior to mixed is not the same as saying white is inferior. Also, do recall usages b and c, and that they are important to consider, and specifically see my third link for better explanation of how.

> I'm not sure how saying that a non diverse group is inferior to a diverse group is equivalent to saying that the specific elements making up the non diverse group is inferior? That you don't see it is framed as a question. Ok, look at it harder and come back to me when you have an actual answer instead of a question on your own reading capacity. > Like, saying all-white is inferior to mixed is not the same as sayin…

>That you don't see it is framed as a question.

To restate:

"I'm not sure how saying that a non diverse group is inferior to a diverse group is equivalent to saying that the specific elements making up the non diverse group is inferior[. Could you please clarify]?"

Thought it was implied. Sorry to be unclear.

>Yes, it is, that's exactly what it is. I'd ask you which mental hoops led you to think it isn't but I know every single one of them will be a fallacy so I won't bother asking.

You haven't added anything here, just restated your original thinking that I don't get.

Here's what makes sense to me:

1 + 1 = 2 1 >You don't get to tell me which definitions to use. And I'm not reading some rant rationalizing why racism and sexism is good based on the target.

It's not that there are more than one competing definition. There are several complimentary ones and ignoring the rest does not promote better discussion.

If you read the third link, that's so not an accurate assessment of it's contents.

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