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How Basecamp Blew Up

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Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#201

Post by x3n0ph3n3 »

gowld wrote: post #166
seriousquestion wrote: post #148

white su·prem·a·cy; the belief that white people constitute a superior race and should therefore dominate society de·fund; prevent from continuing to receive funds Courtesy of the dictionary. This is not hard. Stop entertaining people who redefine words.

If it's you vs Merriam-Webster, I'll take Merriam-Webster https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/defund > : to withdraw funding from and "withdraw" does not mean "remove completely" https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/white%20supremacy > 1 : the belief that the white race is inherently superior to other races and that white people should have control over people of other races > 2: the social, economic, an…

>> : to withdraw funding from

> and "withdraw" does not mean "remove completely"

It certainly _can_ and usually _does_ mean remove completely. Examples:

- "I'm withdrawing my student from this school"

- "The peer review committee has decided to withdraw this erroneous paper from publication"

- "I would like to withdraw $100 from my checking account" (It means the _whole_ $100)

- "He is experiencing heroine withdrawal symptoms" (after not having _any_)

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#202

Post by [deleted] »

cozuya wrote: post #71
tha0xa1 wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>What is the strawman? "No one sane", and then you build the Tucker Carlson strawman, and continue to use him, after we both conclude he's not "sane". > What is the whataboutism? Bringing up right-wing examples here when they were immaterial to my OP. These are textbook examples of strawmaning and whatabouting. >Tucker Carlson, one of the most popular "conservatives", opposes racial equality Where did he oppose racia…

You're just playing word games to refuse to back down on your ridiculous statement, which, again, was: "No one sane opposes racial equality, conservative or liberal." Do you think Americans and the world really don't remember the past 5 years? Do you think we don't remember The Former Guy coming to relevance specifically because of the racist "birtherism" movement, or calling Mexicans rapists? Are those the actions o…

[deleted]

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#203

Post by xenophonB »

Threeve303 wrote: post #13

This story is so strange. First of all, it has been considered unprofessional to talk about politics at work for as long as I can remember. It's odd how you would need a rule implemented about that. Is this just a generational thing? On the other hand, when did racial equality become an inherently political topic? Especially racial equality inside the workplace. This also doesn't mean that the Basecamp founders are r…

>On the other hand, when did racial equality become an inherently political topic?

Equality vs hierarchy is literally the core of the difference between right and left, that is the definition of inherently political.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#204

Post by kbenson »

Tainnor wrote: post #189
kbenson wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Honestly, in this story everyone looks like a big child. I agree for the most part there. Less so the founders, I think there sin runs more along the lines of being extremely naive (but in a way a lot of people might be, especially when the alternative might be to accept you're screwed). > something must have gone fundamentally wrong much earlier. These levels of tension and distrust don't just arise out of nowhere…

> I think there sin runs more along the lines of being extremely naive [...] which would be maybe more excusable if it didn't come from the guys who wrote several books about how awesomely they run their company. I guess that's why my sympathy for their situation is somewhat limited.

That's a good reason not to be sympathetic to them in particular. I guess you could say I'm sympathetic to some degree to the problem they were presented, but it was definitely of their own creation, so they shouldn't get a pass.

I mean, it's easy to think you're doing well because you got lucky in personnel and timing for how things went, but maybe have a bit more introspection before writing a book about it and how good your ideas were (there's a lot of non-fiction that could be said about...).

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#205

Post by Igelau »

arp242 wrote: post #183
seriousquestion wrote: post #148

white su·prem·a·cy; the belief that white people constitute a superior race and should therefore dominate society de·fund; prevent from continuing to receive funds Courtesy of the dictionary. This is not hard. Stop entertaining people who redefine words.

Dictionaries don't define the meaning of words; they record the usage.

While this is true, we still go back to them to agree on what the words mean.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#206

Post by prepend »

arp242 wrote: post #183
seriousquestion wrote: post #148

white su·prem·a·cy; the belief that white people constitute a superior race and should therefore dominate society de·fund; prevent from continuing to receive funds Courtesy of the dictionary. This is not hard. Stop entertaining people who redefine words.

Dictionaries don't define the meaning of words; they record the usage.

And if enough people use a different definition then the dictionary changes.

That doesn’t mean that I can define words however I like. Since defund has a well and consistently used definition I think it’s going be hard for the connotation to change so that “defund police” means something other than defund police.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#208

Post by vore »

flumpcakes wrote: post #132
vore wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This dismissal of people as "unhinged", "cultish", and "lack of mental balance" at best unsympathetic and at worst callous. As others have pointed out, it's not really possible to compartmentalize yourself from "politics" unless you are represented by the majority and what is and isn't "politically acceptable" at work has always been fluid and changing. The fact that they have chosen these words to describe their fru…

If someone feels like the workplace is hostile then they should speak to HR. Is that not the usual channels for this kind of thing? Of course I'm not sure how HR can help if the base of their discomfort on the fact they work with white colleagues.

HR's job is to protect the company. If the founders are propagating a culture that employees don't like then HR's job is to side with them.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#209

Post by JPKab »

"But Fried and his co-founder, David Heinemeier Hansson, had been taken aback by an employee post which argued that mocking customer names laid the foundation for racially-motivated violence, and closed the thread."

Children understand that calling people names isn't the same as violence.

At some point can we all admit that the most narcissistic, dramatic people are overly-indulged by this garbage?

I'm at a startup now, but left a company in February that got torched by this toxic BS. My favorite moment was sitting there, and having a coworker (US born, but of Arab descent) who grew up in an extremely wealthy neighborhood with immense privilege, lecturing a blind white male employee about how much privilege he had, and then going on to talk about how white people were uniquely tainted by the slave trade that some of their ancestors engaged in. Naturally, he didn't seem to realize that the African slave trade was invented by his Arab ancestors. Nor did he see the irony in the fact that holding a person responsible for horrible action of people who look like them is the same way of thinking that leads bigots to blame all Arabs for the actions of the 9/11 hijackers.

Seeing good companies get torn to shreds by this campus idiocy reminds me of how insulated academia is from the real world. The absurd, essay-driven philosophy masquerading as social science makes it impossible for groups of humans to achieve anything productive. Nobody ever noticed this before, because in the pseudo social science world they inhabit, productivity isn't a thing.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#210

Post by throwaway789256 »

Tainnor wrote: post #124

Honestly, in this story everyone looks like a big child. I would maybe be more sympathetic to DHH if it wasn't the guy who was so opinionated he pushed through Rails features that everyone else disliked or co-wrote several books on company culture that are glorified ads for basecamp (although "it doesn't have to be crazy at work" is still a thought-provoking read, at least in part). I can only imagine that he might b…

This dynamic is playing out in thousands of companies and startups across the US. Many people in the US, the woke, have redefined "white supremacy" and "racism" to mean most inequalities and behavior that they don't like:

They do not accept non-racist environments, only anti-racist ones. They do not accept that businesses be politically neutral. Businesses must take political stances internally and publicly. To do anything less, or to remain silent, is to be complicit in what they see as white supremacy and systemic racism. And if you disagree with those people, you will be accused of being racist, as Singer was.

The irony, of course, is that Hansson and Fried built a reputation around righteousness and wokeness, and then it came for them, because they were two white guys with power.

And when they realized what was happening, they executed their cultural pivot very poorly. They came out with a hard ban on a bunch of people who have the talent to work elsewhere.

Coinbase, at least, had the good sense to focus on the positive, their orientation as a mission-focused company. At the same time, Coinbase was making its employees rich with options and headed for an IPO.

The two companies will be paired case studies at HBS someday about how to screw it up and how to do it right.

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