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Sexism is not funny, let's stop laughing

johannakoll.posterous.com

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Re: Sexism is not funny, let's stop laughing

#41

Post by dasil003 »

flexie wrote: post #7

People laugh when they hear a "sexist" joke because it's funny. Maybe gender related jokes don't have a place at conferences and work places - I am not sure - but there should be room for jokes about genders somewhere, right? I mean, where does this political correctness stop?

Or because it makes them uncomfortable. But in any case, yes, it's true you can make a joke about anything. George Carlin famously proved this with a rape joke. George Carlin was also one of the most brilliant comedians ever to live so he could pull it off.

The simple fact is that "jokes" which reinforce current power structure are not good jokes. As a man you don't get to decide how women should feel about scantily clad ladies in technical talk slides, just as a white person you don't get to tell black people how they should feel about affirmative action. When you make philosophical proclamations about the world from a position of power you're no different from a jock making fun of a nerd because "he looks funny".

Just a modicum of empathy is all that people want in the vast majority of cases.

Re: Sexism is not funny, let's stop laughing

#43

Post by bigsassy »

We see these kind of stories on Hacker News kinda regularly. And you'd think that it's getting a little ridiculous. But time and again, we still have people in our community that just don't get it.

So that's why I upvoted this article. Let's all keep drilling this into our community until it finally sticks.

Re: Sexism is not funny, let's stop laughing

#44

Post by oellegaard »

Showing a woman (or a man) in underwear is not sexism. It is btw equally funny no matter what gender it is.

The logic applied in this article is equal to saying that it is racist to display a white man on your presentation, because then you are obviously promoting racism.

Now, I completely agree that sexism is a bad thing - but come on, this is not really sexism.

Re: Sexism is not funny, let's stop laughing

#45

Post by mayneack »

singular wrote: post #18
flexie wrote: post #7

People laugh when they hear a "sexist" joke because it's funny. Maybe gender related jokes don't have a place at conferences and work places - I am not sure - but there should be room for jokes about genders somewhere, right? I mean, where does this political correctness stop?

People laugh when they hear a "racist" joke because it's funny. Maybe race related jokes don't have a place at conferences and work places - I am not sure - but there should be room for jokes about race somewhere, right? I mean, where does this political correctness stop?

Not sarcastic: People laugh when they hear a "racist" joke because it's funny. Maybe race related jokes don't have a place at conferences and work places - I am not sure - but there should be room for jokes about race somewhere, right? I mean, where does this political correctness stop?

Re: Sexism is not funny, let's stop laughing

#47

Post by nicholassmith »

When a security bug appears there's an argument made about responsible disclosure and publicising the crap out of it. There's a similar argument for sexism in the tech world, it should be dealt with out in the open so people know there's a problem and can patch it for the next release, but it needs to be done like this. Responsibly and without pitchforks and mob rule, which puts both sides at each others throats.

Re: Sexism is not funny, let's stop laughing

#50

Post by DanBC »

flexie wrote: post #7

People laugh when they hear a "sexist" joke because it's funny. Maybe gender related jokes don't have a place at conferences and work places - I am not sure - but there should be room for jokes about genders somewhere, right? I mean, where does this political correctness stop?

> Maybe gender related jokes don't have a place at conferences and work places

> I mean, where does this political correctness stop

It seems really obvious to me. At work, at a conference, you don't tell racist, sexist, ableist etc jokes. What you do outside work is up to you. (But, if you do it outside work and in public it may complicate things if you have a work related discrimination problem.)

> political correctness

"Political correctness" is often a buzzword used to dismiss people who want to discuss this. Other, better, words exist. "Politeness" is one.

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