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Linus on "acting professionally"

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Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#11

Post by ealexhudson »

Linus is dead wrong here. When he says acting professionally means "fake politeness, the lying, the office politics and backstabbing, the passive aggressiveness, and the buzzwords", he's attacking a straw man: none of that behaviour is professional, and to say that professional behaviour must degenerate to that behaviour is a stretch at best.

Aggression is not warranted in a professional environment; neither overt (a la LKML) or covert (passive). Lying is not warranted under any circumstance. Being professional means not calling people names.

All of this stuff is what you get taught in kindergarten, it's not rocket science. Mental abuse is no better than physical abuse, and given I don't buy that hitting developers with sticks makes them "better" somehow I'm also not going to buy into clue-by-four beatings being any better.

Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#12

Post by sz4kerto »

The reason why Linus (or anybody else) might want to act 'professionally' (or nicely, whatever) is because some people feel bad when they are shouted at. It's completely valid to argue that shouting is just a culturally different, but acceptable way of expressing one's thoughts but then you need to be aware that you'll potentially lose people who just simply hate this form of communication.

So this discussion is not about whether shouting and cursing is morally acceptable or not. It's about who's going to make compromises, who's able to make compromises and who are we going to lose in the process. What Sarah (probably) implicitly says is 'I hate this, and I don't want to work in an environment like this - and there might be other people who feel the same'. If Linus thinks that he cannot work in a different way then (because he's pretty important for Linux) probably Sarah is going to be sacrificed in some way. That might be all right, but again: this is not a moral issue.

Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#13

Post by Ygg2 »

lacion wrote: post #3
aymeric wrote: post #2

I find his answer very reasonable (although I also found some of his past answers quite harsh).

i don't think sugar coating the world will make it less harsh.

Yes it would. Aggressive behavior begets more and more aggressive behavior. E.g. if you punch things to make you feel better when you are in a bad mood, you are more likely to punch people/things when you are in a bad mood (in fact it has an addictive quality).

Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#14

Post by pasiaj »

lazyjones wrote: post #5
aymeric wrote: post #2

I find his answer very reasonable (although I also found some of his past answers quite harsh).

I agree mostly, but I'm still wondering what kind of natural urges he is suppressing that he has to curse like that.

Huh? The whole point is that he is not suppressing the urges. When he feels frustrated, he might add a "fuck" or "shit" to convey that feeling.

You, on the other hand, did not agree to something, felt mad or frustrated, and instead of conveying that frustration you snidely suggested that that he must be suppressing some "natural urges". Violent? Homosexual? From whose subconscious did those arise from? Not Linuses?

(See what I did there? What kind of urges might _I_ be suppressing?)

All in all: I find your reply to be a perfect example of what Linus is trying to avoid ("fake politeness, the lying, the office politics and backstabbing, _the passive aggressiveness_, and the buzzwords")

Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#15

Post by seivan »

ealexhudson wrote: post #11

Linus is dead wrong here. When he says acting professionally means "fake politeness, the lying, the office politics and backstabbing, the passive aggressiveness, and the buzzwords", he's attacking a straw man: none of that behaviour is professional, and to say that professional behaviour must degenerate to that behaviour is a stretch at best. Aggression is not warranted in a professional environment; neither overt (a…

That's what it ends up being.

Also way to go to ignore all the other arguments he made, before talking about office politics, it seems like you just skipped to the end.

Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#17

Post by Ygg2 »

ealexhudson wrote: post #11

Linus is dead wrong here. When he says acting professionally means "fake politeness, the lying, the office politics and backstabbing, the passive aggressiveness, and the buzzwords", he's attacking a straw man: none of that behaviour is professional, and to say that professional behaviour must degenerate to that behaviour is a stretch at best. Aggression is not warranted in a professional environment; neither overt (a…

Just gonna post these two gems I found at a previous thread about Linus (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6050443):

http://linux.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3977141&cid=442916...

http://linux.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3977141&cid=442909...

To me Linus is kinda like Wagner, I do like and enjoy his work, but as a person he is not someone I'd aspire to emulate.

Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#19

Post by geuis »

ealexhudson wrote: post #11

Linus is dead wrong here. When he says acting professionally means "fake politeness, the lying, the office politics and backstabbing, the passive aggressiveness, and the buzzwords", he's attacking a straw man: none of that behaviour is professional, and to say that professional behaviour must degenerate to that behaviour is a stretch at best. Aggression is not warranted in a professional environment; neither overt (a…

That's not what he's saying at all. He's giving examples of exactly the kind of shit he doesn't put up with.

Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#20

Post by ealexhudson »

seivan wrote: post #15
ealexhudson wrote: post #11

Linus is dead wrong here. When he says acting professionally means "fake politeness, the lying, the office politics and backstabbing, the passive aggressiveness, and the buzzwords", he's attacking a straw man: none of that behaviour is professional, and to say that professional behaviour must degenerate to that behaviour is a stretch at best. Aggression is not warranted in a professional environment; neither overt (a…

That's what it ends up being. Also way to go to ignore all the other arguments he made, before talking about office politics, it seems like you just skipped to the end.

No, I didn't just skip to the end: I pointed out that his version of "acting professionally" doesn't match any I recognise. There's no point engaging in arguments over a straw man.
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