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Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost
301–310 of 395 posts
Re: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost
#302In relatively civilized society, above a certain level of "civilness", these things actually work backwards:
1. Forbidding porn/sex allusions will promote them and also make them more mean - people like breaking stupid rules just for the fun of it and they take revenge for the rule being imposed on them by being meaner to others when they break it!
2. Take too many measures against sexual/national/racial discrimination will increase sexual discrimination - because doing it or even joking about it is considered bad, it starts happening underground, with people smiling and being pro-equality on the surface and busy finding technical reasons to get rid of people of the respective sex/nation/race.
3. Try to much to prevent sexual harassment will also drive things underground and "innocent but distasteful" jokes will turn into actual acts of mean but well disguised discrimination - I bet that a huge number of people will now find "technical reasons" not to invite AR to conferences and that the people whose jokes she considered offensive will make even more offensive jokes behind her back and even try to revengefully harm her career by dirty "underground" maneuvers.
...that's how humans work you know.
Re: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost
#303Earlier quoted context omitted.
" There is horrifying sexism in the comments that have been posted over the past 24 hours, and it just brings to light the pervasive sexism in our industry." Exactly. Which is why I'm happy this is playing out now, because I haven't seen the industry introspect on gender issues in a long time.
I don't know if i'm missing something, but I've seen very little introspection in the responses to the situation. The guy who was called out's apology notwithstanding, out seems like there's just been a mass venting of anti-feminist attitudes all around.
I've seen a lot of posts reflecting on the situation, including of course this page on reddit. Certainly it hasn't just been a "mass venting of anti-feminist attitudes", although that's certainly been present too.
Re: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost
#304Let's simplify the rules to basic decency. Don't Be a Dick. Oh wait, I guess I can't say that now. Well, fuck me. Whoops, can't say that either. I hope mr-hank gets a huge severance out of PlayHaven. (At-will employment is not as simple as employers like to say it is.) At this point, he has position for something substantial, given that they discussed the termination in the public (disclosing an opinion that he is gu…
The 77 cents on the dollar thing is just a symptom of the same thing, blaming men for all and everything and portraying women as victims (to excert special compensation for women). If you research the paygap issue a little bit, you'll find that it really isn't an issue of discrimination at all (hint: among other things, women chose other professions than men).
I admit that I have started to become very angry about this constant misrepresentation of men as oppressors of women and women being the victims. In reality women are the privileged "class" in our society.
Actually I am willing to shoulder more, as had been men's ordained role for quite a while (in exchange women risk their lives for childbirth), but to then be derided and spat on is galling.
WSJ: there is no male-female wage gap http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870441510457625...
Why the pay gap is a sham: http://www.businessinsider.com/actually-the-gender-pay-gap-i...
Women in tech earn more than men: http://www.businessinsider.com/women-in-tech-make-more-money...
Re: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost
#305Earlier quoted context omitted.
That definition of racism is certainly a minority one, and isn't supported by the dictionaries I checked. To intentionally misunderstand what most people mean by racism, and then tweet like that, it seems like she's setting up a straw man in order to get into a fight.
The popular definition of racism is popular because it robs the word of it's purpose, which is to fight power, not pattern matching.
Source?
Re: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost
#306Earlier quoted context omitted.
Apparently it's ok to post offensive jokes/sexual innuendo if you're a woman ( http://www.flickr.com/photos/adriarichards/sets/721576169418... ) or ( https://twitter.com/adriarichards/status/312265091791847425 ), just like you can only be racist if you're white ( https://twitter.com/adriarichards/statuses/6039856858 )
> just like you can only be racist if you're white ( https://twitter.com/adriarichards/statuses/6039856858 ) I see people post this a lot without understanding the point of what she's saying. Adria subscribes to the belief that "racism = prejudice + power", which is basically to say that, yes, black people can be hateful towards white people and yes, racial discrimination does occur within the black community, but RA…
That's a lot of nonsense and semantic quibbling. Words mean what they are understood to mean. The school of thought she adheres to is attempting to re-define a word, and they have thus far failed.
Therefore, no, she cannot expect her audience to adhere to her particular definition of racism since it is highly non-standard outside of certain limited circles.
For what it's worth, I also happen to think her "definition" of racism is rubbish. It makes all kinds of assumptions about power dynamics in a given situation and injects motivations into actors where none are known.
Re: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost
#307Earlier quoted context omitted.
I hope you are referring to the men and not Ms. Richards. Because her "little mistake" resulted in the firing of a decent human being with a wife and 3 kids.
She posted a tweet. Even had she called for his resignation (which she didn't), she didn't have any power to effect it. What about the overreacting HR people who actually fired him over that tweet (knowing about the 3 kids and all)?
She did more than just posting a tweet. She publicly hounded and demonised them when a simple "guys, shut up" would have sufficed. Those people in question have come across as the mature ones since (apologetic and cool-headed) so I'm sure they would have taken her complaints seriously and kept quiet. Failing that, then they would have deserved any backlash. But they weren't even given a warning nor chance to explain the context of their conversation (which wasn't nearly as pornographic as Adria interpreted them).
I know I might now sound heartless, but I struggle to find any sympathy when a bully gets bullied. And while I don't wish anyone to lose their job nor receive death threats, this isn't the first time Adria has bullied individuals nor organizations. Quite frankly, she has a history of being unprofessional and a bully. So while I don't wish the backlash on anyone -not even her- I also can't help thinking "what goes around comes around".
Sorry if that makes me sound heartless. I generally have a lot of time for people (even those who I don't like). But after a childhood of being bullied for being different (read: nerdy), I have zero respect for those who choose to bully my nerdy peers (be them male, female, American, Indian, Chinese, gay or straight - i couldn't care less about that stuff; we're all nerds. But if they're a bully, then my respect for them ends).
Re: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost
#308Earlier quoted context omitted.
Apparently it's ok to post offensive jokes/sexual innuendo if you're a woman ( http://www.flickr.com/photos/adriarichards/sets/721576169418... ) or ( https://twitter.com/adriarichards/status/312265091791847425 ), just like you can only be racist if you're white ( https://twitter.com/adriarichards/statuses/6039856858 )
Tu quoque (appeal to hypocrisy) is a fallacy, but this annoys me too. The pictures she took at PyCon of her playing a game of Cards Against Humanity are perhaps the most galling: https://www.facebook.com/adriarichards e.g. the one on March 14th where she's holding a card that says, "Eating all of the cookies before the AIDS bake-sale."
Note: Things are only "a fallacy" when they are applied falsely. It may not be your favorite flavour of argument, but the true fallacy is making sweeping judgements outside of context.
Re: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost
#309Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, no, we say server, because server is gender-neutral. Compare steward/stewardess with flight attendant. And some servers will get mighty angry if you call them a waitress. I don't necessarily think that response is justified when no offense is actually meant. But the point is that there has been an identifiable trend in our language towards moving away from gender-specific terms for roles that shouldn't otherwis…
That's always seemed an odd quirk of the restaurant industry to me. Server to refer to a person sounds stilted to my ear; a server is a computer to me, but a waiter or a waitress is a person. So a sincere question: Why would someone be offended to be described as a waitress?
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Re: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost
#310Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't know. Some words are just attached to each sex, and that's just a part of language. We don't say waitperson over waiter or waitress. Something that is both attached to a gender and insulting is by no means insulting someone for their gender or insulting a gender overall. English is definitely one of the least sexualizing languages of the Romance Languages. In French or Spanish, everything would be attached to…
Well, no, we say server, because server is gender-neutral. Compare steward/stewardess with flight attendant. And some servers will get mighty angry if you call them a waitress. I don't necessarily think that response is justified when no offense is actually meant. But the point is that there has been an identifiable trend in our language towards moving away from gender-specific terms for roles that shouldn't otherwis…
Server is a US thing (maybe AU, NZ too?), we don't use it in the UK.
I find server to refer to a waitress and waiter a really odd term, almost de-humanising but that might just be a cultural difference.