Live data from Hacker News

Fork My Dongle

forkmydongle.com

171–180 of 254 posts

Re: Fork My Dongle

#171
post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shift the focus by putting the original tasteless remarks that started the whole ordeal on a t-shirt? Sorry, but I'm skeptical.

AFAIK we haven't quoted the original remarks and the phrase on the shirt is a nonsensical paraphrase of what was said. Part of the intention was to neutralize the words. Really, it's just a bit of fun and the best outcome would be to raise some money for women in tech.

   Really, it's just a bit of fun and the best outcome would be to raise some money for women in tech.
Yes. You're doing a wonderful thing to advance the cause of women in technology.

I am sure women will be out in droves dying to buy this shirt.

Re: Fork My Dongle

#172
Good to know this on the FrontPage of HN. I was wondering how the community could say, "hey, we heard some women are offended by sexually implicit humor, and we think a professional environment should be sexualized,so we're just going to let it all hang out and if you care at all, go fork yourself."

Re: Fork My Dongle

#173

I love this. Finally someone is treating the situation with exactly the right tone. Quoth PG, from "What You Can't Say": Best of all, probably, is humor. Zealots, whatever their cause, invariably lack a sense of humor. They can't reply in kind to jokes. They're as unhappy on the territory of humor as a mounted knight on a skating rink. Victorian prudishness, for example, seems to have been defeated mainly by treating…

Ah, the old "quoth PG" routine. You know, Paul is capable of saying things which are not entirely correct, and quoting his words does not immediately make you in the right.

What Paul misses, in this case, is that there's a difference between "laughing up" and "laughing down" – that is, laughing at an injust situation by mocking the people who benefit from such a situation, the people in power, and laughing at the people hurt by a situation. Laughter is a potent weapon against dogma, sure, but the feminist cause is far from dogmatic. It's a response to the incredibly pervasive anti-woman bias in the programming world, the workplace in general, and society at large.

It is truly unfortunate that Adria triggered such a shitshow, because I do think she overreacted, in a big and kind of cruddy way. But the unfortunate part is less that than the fact that plenty of people will use her as a symbol of how stupid feminism is, how humorless its advocates are, and how right men are to dismiss it as a cause completely. It's a damn shame. There needs to be a discussion about how messed-up our view of women is, and this is the sort of place to be having it. But because the first shot was fired by an overzealous woman, the conversation we should be having isn't being held at all, and instead we're reaching a group consensus that women who think things like this are an issue are full of themselves. Which is almost exactly the wrong consensus to reach here.

Re: Fork My Dongle

#174
post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I will forever remain at a loss about how dongle jokes perpetrate injustice. All I know is that they really got under the skin of an all-too-serious, uptight prig, and the overreaction of that prig means it gets even deeper under the skin of prigs everywhere. And that is always funny.

You have to take it in the context, and the point of these tees is taking side in a sexual harassment dispute. (Racist or homo jokes are sometimes witty too, and get under the skin of many. That something's funny is irrelevant.)

Funny is relevant. As you say, sexist, racist and homo jokes are sometimes witty too - so unless they are explicitly used to demean and hurt someone, people should be free to joke about all such things. Including jokes about a gay jewish pope eating dead babies, or whatever combination of things offensive to racial/religious/gender/ethnical/etc groups people may think of.

In the Pycon case, my greatest surprise when I discovered that the jokes were made between two audience members - I would understand and fully support the reaction if that insulting joke was made on stage; but I cannot understand why Ms. Richards and PyCon staff were sticking their noses in private conversations of two adults and trying to police that? That was both impolite and unacceptable - if you don't like their biases, then shun them and don't talk to them; they weren't harassing the female audience as far as I heard from both sides.

The liberty to swing your fist ends at my nose; and as they weren't hurting Ms. Richards, they had the right to discuss their business in whatever way they wanted, and they had the right to be left alone.

Re: Fork My Dongle

#175
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, to be clear, unlike submitted link's teespring payment arrangements (100% of proceeds will be donated to Girls who Code), 100% of proceeds on your link will be going to your pocket. Not knocking on you, just making it clear you hold no affiliation to the 'Girls who Code' organization as well.

Why should we care about donating money to Girls who Code? I'm not a girl and I don't see any reason why I should support them, particularly when the only time I hear anything about girls who code is when they're causing some drama. You know what girls who code should do? They should write code and be humble instead of forming a group called Girls Who Code in order to get attention and hand-outs. To be clear: I'd rat…

See you're one of those guys that's ruining it.

It's just a cause, it's just a group of people with similar desires. It's no different than black entreprenuer clubs or jewish groups. They're not asking for a hand out they're just working together.

Re: Fork My Dongle

#176
post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's no different then telling women not to wear provocative clothing if they don't want to be raped Telling women that not wearing provocative clothing will lower their chance of being raped is simply stating a truth. We wish it were otherwise, but it isn't. It's thus by definition sound advice and much more useful advice than stating "men shouldn't rape". Gee, thanks, the victim wasn't aware of that. Giving advice…

> Telling women that not wearing provocative clothing will lower their chance of being raped is simply stating a truth. Source?

Seriously. Confusion's statement contradicts all my own reading, as well as comments from rape victims[1]/friends of rape victims. Rapists are usually not strangers looking to score. It's almost always someone the victim knows, and it's usually about power, not looks.

[1] Survivor is a better word, but it was a clunky read when I tried it. I won't be bothered if you use it instead if you reply.

Re: Fork My Dongle

#177
post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Forks and dongles are both male, so this is a retarded way to "support women in tech" "Finger my ports" would be far more appropriate.

I have a mentally handicapped son and your use of the word retarded offends me. Pick another word? (And by the way, I do agree with your premise).

Correction: Forks and dongles are both male, so this is a mentally handicapped way to "support women in tech"

Re: Fork My Dongle

#178
post #61

Wow... How did HN become a den of self-righteous, humorless self-flagellation. Someone tried to do something funny after all the overheated rhetoric of the past of couple of days along with introducing a clever bit of entrepreneurship in the process. Whether you'd buy the shirt or not (I won't) at least try to appreciate the initiative and cheekiness.

I'm just getting tired of it... I want to learn things when I come here, and I want to watch great conversations unfold, sometimes even participate in them, but these meme-cycles... the whole "x will get google reader'd!" thing, the fork my dongle thing, the chart.js 'scandal', all of these just senseless, tiring mass bursts of outrage that pop up everywhere are getting in the way of my goal of learning and conversin…

Basically what you are saying is you don't want HN to turn into Reddit.

Re: Fork My Dongle

#179
post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't go as far as to say that the lesson learnt recently is "If people get offended at anything it's their fault". If you think that's the case then I've got a Westboro Baptist Church to sell you...

I think the WBC is amusing. I'm deeply saddened by the fact that the top-supported petition on whitehouse.gov is a request for their free speech rights to be curtailed.

I agree. But I wouldn't feel too marvellous telling the mother of a dead serviceman that it was their problem they were offended and that they should just get over it.

Re: Fork My Dongle

#180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand why you find that distasteful? I've spent way more time than I should have following many, many conversations about this insanity. When you filter out the crazies on either side, it seems that most rational people have decided that it's ok to make fun of things, even if your joke isn't for everyone. I think it's unfortunate that you're saying that a man or group of men shouldn't be able to raise mo…

Because a woman got fired because she got a guy fired for making a completely innocent joke and then a bunch of guys all started harassing that woman on the internet to the point where I had to kinda feel bad for her even though she was entirely in the wrong and I was glad she got fired. So a bunch of guys then making fun of the whole thing with a shirt seems mean-spirited. Like, your gender won (well, common sense w…

> So a bunch of guys then making fun of the whole thing with a shirt seems mean-spirited. Like, your gender won (well, common sense won, but) let it go.

Except both genders lost. Having a laugh with the t-shirt is the consolation prize.

Post reply on HN