Having read this today, went home and watched https://skidrowmarathon.com/ tonight. Each of these are a way of showing the power of giving people dignity.
My friend starts her job today, after learning to program in prison
431–440 of 670 posts
Re: My friend starts her job today, after learning to program in prison
#432Meanwhile, I can't get a job because I don't have the typical cult mentality
Re: My friend starts her job today, after learning to program in prison
#433There are a lot of people saying they're in favor of this type of thing. And for non-violent offenses I'd probably also be on board. But this person committed a "serious, violent crime" that sent them to prison for 13 years. Are you comfortable sitting next to someone who is capable of a "serious, violent crime"? Are there certain crimes that cross the line for you? Would you expect your employer to inform you of the…
Let's break this down. Someone commits murder, and gets sent to prison for 13 years. They are out now. How do we deal with them? 1. If everyone says that they will no longer want to work with such a person, especially rich people, who can enforce that want, that person will end up working with poor people. The rich people are making a classist argument. 2. Worse, if that person, cannot even get bad jobs, they will be…
Sure, just not for murders. They can work outside.
Re: My friend starts her job today, after learning to program in prison
#434In Germany I was asked to provide my criminal record while working at a payment processing startup that had to obtain certain certificates. They were probably looking for crimes of a fiscal nature however, which is understandable. Second chances are second chances but security is mostly about trust. Another job at a startup in Germany that worked in less tightly controlled spaces has never asked me to produce my crim…
What crimes are applicable to software engineers, then? I don't think there are any laws punishing you from writing bad code, nor are there laws addressing data theft or security misconfigurations. GDPR applies against companies and not individual people, as far as I can tell. Would the only valid crimes be related to computer hacking?
I would think any crime inflicting bodily harm is relevant, as long as you work near people with bodies.
Re: My friend starts her job today, after learning to program in prison
#435Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the USA, background checks are often just part of the process. There's an entire industry built around providing the service.
Readers from other countries, what is it like there? I remember when I lived in Australia, my friends told me that many crimes do not show up on background checks after 5 years. Also in Australia, the sex offender registry is confidential, and can only be checked for very specific things (jobs involving children, certain types of housing, etc.) In the US, there are ways of getting records expunged for some crimes, bu…
Here in the Netherlands some jobs require you to submit a Certificate of Conduct. It's a document you can request from the Ministry of Justice and Security that declares that you have not been convicted for any crime relevant to the job you request the declaration for.
I have never really thought about it that deeply but it seems like a decent way of doing things. I really like that your employer can't just look it up.
Re: My friend starts her job today, after learning to program in prison
#436In Germany I was asked to provide my criminal record while working at a payment processing startup that had to obtain certain certificates. They were probably looking for crimes of a fiscal nature however, which is understandable. Second chances are second chances but security is mostly about trust. Another job at a startup in Germany that worked in less tightly controlled spaces has never asked me to produce my crim…
What crimes are applicable to software engineers, then? I don't think there are any laws punishing you from writing bad code, nor are there laws addressing data theft or security misconfigurations. GDPR applies against companies and not individual people, as far as I can tell. Would the only valid crimes be related to computer hacking?
I don't know of specific cases where a programmer was prosecuted, but I believe that knowingly and negligently leaving holes in compliance-heavy health technology (HIPAA) could result in prosecution.
Re: My friend starts her job today, after learning to program in prison
#437Earlier quoted context omitted.
> why would I risk my money, time and hard work on someone with a recorded record of making poor choices when there are hoards of others who haven't broken the law? This assumes that your scrappy bootcamp grad hasn't broken the law. In fact the more likely scenario is that they have broken the law multiple times, they just were never caught and charged for it. Unless we are suddenly going to believe that young adults…
Even if you've "reformed your past ways of crime" after serving jail time and "learned your lessons": non-felon > felon Especially in terms of potential risks to my staff or property. Basically, would you hire a babysitter with a criminal record or one without a criminal record and good references? Maybe my employees break the law when they're not at work, but that's none of my business. If one of my employees is ind…
> would you hire a babysitter with a criminal record or one without a criminal record and good references?
I wouldn't hire a babysitter at all because I wouldn't trust strangers around my children. It doesn't matter what their record is.
But for my business? Property can be insured, code can be copyrighted, lawsuits can be filed. I have recourse if one of my employees does something stupid. And on the other side, my employee can quit or sue me if I do something wrong.
> how would you explain repeat offenders?
People choosing to hire everyone else over felons, leaving them no choice but to go back to the same bad people or the same bad crimes. Why would a felon go back to risking their life on a daily basis against other murderers and muggers when they could have a comfy $12-20/hr job in an actual workplace with civilized coworkers?
Re: My friend starts her job today, after learning to program in prison
#438Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does that mean the concept has no value, or that racist tweets do not exist (since they cannot be easily defined)?
He means that there is no racist comment that can be posted on Twitter that he feels should result in affecting one's employment.
No. I mean, I doubt we as a society could come up with a definition that's sufficiently specific and durable enough to apply this level of scrutiny. We can't even agree on the proper term for certain races.
Re: My friend starts her job today, after learning to program in prison
#439In college I worked as a phone dispatcher for a company that had a slick homegrown system for managing accounts, billing and dispatching. It was faster, fuller-featured and more intuitive than the commercial systems I'd seen at the time.
When the dev swung by the office one day I chatted with him and was surprised to learnt that he'd gotten his start coding in prison as well. He hadn't used computers at all before being incarcerated, but got hooked in his first class when he typed something at the command line and got an error in response. He muttered something like "I'll show you, stupid machine" and committed then and there to getting the device to do what he wanted it to. Ten years later he had a successful business building and maintaining systems like the one I was using for small businesses all over the area.
Re: My friend starts her job today, after learning to program in prison
#440Earlier quoted context omitted.
> What's the objective of this comment? It starts off talking about "Chicago = War Zone" and then it devolves into the ground state of HN's favorite whipping children of "cancel culture", "free speech" and how "The well-being of these communities shouldn't be exchanged for free-speech(?)". Chicago isn't a warzone. Last year I bought my first home here. I wouldn't live here if it were a warzone. But it does have probl…
Okay, so tell us what these "unpleasant complexities" that we're avoiding are.
Perhaps things like crime rates amongst different segments of the population.