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Jessamyn Smith: Fighting sexist jokes with a Python bot

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Re: Jessamyn Smith: Fighting sexist jokes with a Python bot

#31

Post by unalone »

[deleted] wrote: post #26
unalone wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

She SPECIFICALLY says that she's frustrated with how gendered the TWSS joke is: > I took it for granted that everyone was familiar with the “That’s what she said,” joke, but a recent conversation with a consultant friend made me realize some industries don’t feature it on a daily basis. For those who haven’t heard it a million times, the idea is that when somebody says something that could remotely be turned into a s…

[deleted]

Whoops, I'm sorry. I read your:

> THAT is most likely the cause of the frustration of her co-workers

and thought you said:

> THAT is most likely the cause of her frustration of her co-workers

I'm sorry for calling you out on something you didn't actually say. Although I feel that if one annoying bot is okay with her coworkers, a second, more sophisticated bot shouldn't raise too many hackles – especially if it only ever follows the first.

Re: Jessamyn Smith: Fighting sexist jokes with a Python bot

#32

Post by losvedir »

Huh, it had never occurred to me that some women would be offended by that joke. In my mind, it was sometimes somewhat amusing because it turns the statement your friend just made into one about a penis.

I was going to say that now I'll be on the lookout for statement about clams, things that are wet, and so on, in order to bust out a TWHS, but it seems to me that it could be construed as just as offensive to women, because again it reinforces the idea, apparently, that men just think of women as sexual objects. Lose-lose.

Personally, I don't think either TWSS/TWHS is "sexist", but they're certainly not appropriate for a work environment.

Re: Jessamyn Smith: Fighting sexist jokes with a Python bot

#33

Post by tomp »

unalone wrote: post #13
jtreminio wrote: post #2

sex·ist [sek-sist] adjective 1. pertaining to, involving, or fostering sexism: a sexist remark; sexist advertising. sex·ism [sek-siz-uhm] noun 1. attitudes or behavior based on traditional stereotypes of sexual roles. 2. discrimination or devaluation based on a person's sex, as in restricted job opportunities; especially, such discrimination directed against women. I don't think the bot is exactly sexist. It's stupid…

> 1. attitudes or behavior based on traditional stereotypes of sexual roles [...] devaluation based on a person's sex Here're the categories you could argue the bot falls into. The point of the "that's what she said" is to point out when phrases sound like something a woman might have said in bed or during some sort of sexual activity, furthering the already staggeringly vast perception our society has of women as pr…

> jokes about what women say in bed are acceptable

If they're actually funny (most of the "That's what she said" jokes are not), why not?

I can also totally imagine the following situation:

Coworker: Did I come too early? Another coworker: That's what he said!

Come to think of it, men are also under a lot of pressure in bed, so such jokes are just as in/appropriate as jokes about women in bed.

Re: Jessamyn Smith: Fighting sexist jokes with a Python bot

#34

Post by [deleted] »

[deleted] wrote: post #26
unalone wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

She SPECIFICALLY says that she's frustrated with how gendered the TWSS joke is: > I took it for granted that everyone was familiar with the “That’s what she said,” joke, but a recent conversation with a consultant friend made me realize some industries don’t feature it on a daily basis. For those who haven’t heard it a million times, the idea is that when somebody says something that could remotely be turned into a s…

[deleted]

[deleted]

Re: Jessamyn Smith: Fighting sexist jokes with a Python bot

#35

Post by rmc »

CompiledCode wrote: post #21

So how can I write a bot to fight the sexism in Microsoft's TV ads? You know the ones... where the husband is the bumbling idiot and the wife is the smart capable one who shuts down his plea to play golf on Sundays. I would love to set that bot loose on all TV shows and ads. So often, a flipped situation would cause outrage of being sexist, whereas if the man is put down, it's "funny." It really bothers me, especiall…

Yes, ads (etc.) that portray people as bad based on their gender are wrong. However men are still in an advantageous position.

widespread anti-male laws

They are small in number compared to the widespread anti-female laws and customs.

Re: Jessamyn Smith: Fighting sexist jokes with a Python bot

#36

Post by calibraxis »

[deleted] wrote: post #3

[deleted]

I have a hard time imagining anyone here seriously saying, "Whether or not it's racism related is irrelevant."

But I agree that men generally don't mind Bob with his hourly cracks about women (and maybe gays). That's why men swear up and down that they've never seen sexism in their workplaces. Because we simply can't see it. (And our society is sexist, so sexism is kind of like air.) Hard to imagine that silly ol' Bob is doing anything so impressive as "reinforcing patriarchy."

Re: Jessamyn Smith: Fighting sexist jokes with a Python bot

#37

Post by [deleted] »

unalone wrote: post #28
oskarth wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I find the most fascinating is that she did everything exactly right and people still feel like she did something wrong. She didn't go to her supervisor and she didn't turn it into a drama. Instead she fought the problem in its own arena by making a IRC-bot to combat the problem, and not only that: the IRC-bot is only selectively used in the exact situation that is seen as problematic and it does so by writing e…

Really? What do you want? We want women to shut up and stop telling us that there's a problem with how we behave, because it's rude to tell people there's something innately wrong with their behavior. Also it takes so much time and effort on our parts to try and behave like better people that it hardly seems like we should bother. The problem, for many people, is not that the issue is being handled indelicately. It's…

[deleted]

Re: Jessamyn Smith: Fighting sexist jokes with a Python bot

#38

Post by jasonlotito »

unalone wrote: post #28
oskarth wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I find the most fascinating is that she did everything exactly right and people still feel like she did something wrong. She didn't go to her supervisor and she didn't turn it into a drama. Instead she fought the problem in its own arena by making a IRC-bot to combat the problem, and not only that: the IRC-bot is only selectively used in the exact situation that is seen as problematic and it does so by writing e…

Really? What do you want? We want women to shut up and stop telling us that there's a problem with how we behave, because it's rude to tell people there's something innately wrong with their behavior. Also it takes so much time and effort on our parts to try and behave like better people that it hardly seems like we should bother. The problem, for many people, is not that the issue is being handled indelicately. It's…

> We want women to shut up and stop telling us that there's a problem with how we behave...

> As you can see I've got perfectly rational explanations for why I'm so irritated by women calling out sexist behaviors.

> I want them to stop calling things sexist so that I can stop worrying about their feelings.

> I just thought it was funny that Dave said something that sounds like sex talk, and wanted all of you to know! And don't you know that men are discriminated against just as much as women?

I honestly can't tell if you are being serious or just being very convincing at acting like an immature brat. Considering you're on HN, I'll make the assumption that you are in fact more mature than this, and suggest you update your comment to make it a tad more clear that you are in fact just mocking people that actually think this way.

That being said, it's sad that I could actually see someone really believing this.

Re: Jessamyn Smith: Fighting sexist jokes with a Python bot

#39

Post by AkThhhpppt »

eaten_by_a_grue wrote: post #19
[deleted] wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[deleted]

I agree. And if that was the first bot to respond to a bot, I think it is irritating that men hate equality was the first conclusion. Maybe those guys do hate equality, but from my perspective I would have been irritated by TWSS and then more irritated by the responder, I might then decide to complain before anyone else gets the bright idea to make another bot talking to a bot.

And if that complaint results in the rule "no bots on IRC," she wins.

She has co-workers who are ignoring how their thoughtless behaviour is impacting her, even after she's told them. She'd be entirely justified taking it to HR, but instead she's social engineering a more subtle solution. Nice work!

Re: Jessamyn Smith: Fighting sexist jokes with a Python bot

#40

Post by unalone »

tomp wrote: post #33
unalone wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1. attitudes or behavior based on traditional stereotypes of sexual roles [...] devaluation based on a person's sex Here're the categories you could argue the bot falls into. The point of the "that's what she said" is to point out when phrases sound like something a woman might have said in bed or during some sort of sexual activity, furthering the already staggeringly vast perception our society has of women as pr…

> jokes about what women say in bed are acceptable If they're actually funny (most of the "That's what she said" jokes are not), why not? I can also totally imagine the following situation: Coworker: Did I come too early? Another coworker: That's what he said! Come to think of it, men are also under a lot of pressure in bed, so such jokes are just as in/appropriate as jokes about women in bed.

> If they're actually funny (most of the "That's what she said" jokes are not), why not?

It depends on the audience. I think that sexist jokes are in as poor taste in a workplace as racist jokes would be. I'd also be against black jokes or Mexican jokes or Jewish jokes or jokes about Catholic pedophilia. Even if the extent of the joke was something like "I'm not going to the pub with you all, I'm such a Jew", I'd feel uncomfortable; if somebody wrote a bot that was designed to repeatedly make those jokes, I'd be upset.

As Jessamyn says:

> Now, I admit to having made this joke myself, at times. Once in a while, I even find it funny. What I don’t find funny is a bot we have in our general IRC channel at work, that has some basic AI devoted to determining when to interject TWSS into the conversation.

And the joke is not that women say funny things while in bed. The joke is, "Oh, that thing you just said reminded me of fucking a woman." It's funny in high school when everybody's a virgin, and I've found that as my college friends have gotten themselves laid, it's ceased to become very amusing. The same way I haven't heard a black or Mexican joke in a few years that managed to rise above its racism to become even remotely amusing.

Jokes about people having sex can be funny; "that's what she said" will always be a joke the brunt of which is the faceless fuck-object woman. Maybe that's fine in moderation, especially if "that's what he said" jokes are mixed in, but I think we all agree that if somebody's feeling upset by the jokes, it's not a huge loss to our comedic palettes to have to find another source of humor, right? We're all capable of rising beyond that?

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