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An Apology From TechCrunch

techcrunch.com

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Re: An Apology From TechCrunch

#101

Post by Swizec »

mcantelon wrote: post #94
Swizec wrote: post #47

I've always wondered why in the US everyone loses their shit over a tittie app, but in Europe you can have billboards containing nothing but naked breasts advertising a conference. Source: http://metro.co.uk/2009/09/11/giant-boobs-advert-turns-heads... Related question: would everyone lose their shit if the app was called GuyStare and was aimed at women to look at hot guys?

>advertising a conference The art world has a different culture than the business world.

Yes. But a lot of people seeing those ads were business people. Some had business meetings in cafeterias overlooked by those giant boob billboards. A lot of the people were elementary school kids on their way to school.

etc. etc.

It seems if somebody tried to put out a billboard like that in the US the public would be satisfied with nothing less than seppuku.

Re: An Apology From TechCrunch

#102

Post by MetaCosm »

WestCoastJustin wrote: post #91
jessedhillon wrote: post #52

I'd like to stem a couple of obvious, but inevitable (for HN and some other tech communities) criticisms that are bound to appear: 1) Yes, this stuff is tasteless and offends the sensibilities of most decent adults. (Invariably, someone likes to point out that it offends everyone, and conclude therefore that it can't be misogynistic) 2) Yes, people differ in their tolerances for crudeness in their humor. First, I thi…

Distilled into management of expectations . When you go to an event like this, or say a TED talk or some type of technology conference (VMworld, PyCon, etc), I assume a G/PG rating, unless told otherwise. Sure they were jokes, just told in the wrong setting. Some people like to push the boundaries, and if you give them a soap box, they will speak. This should be news to no one, but when you show PG-13, or R content t…

Agreed. Would be nice if the people running a hackathon like this simply put a note "Keep it family friendly" (which, with a 9 year old presenting, seems reasonable).

Context matters a ton, but don't assume people have a clue, spell it out. "Keep it G rated, this is a family friendly hackathon" ...

Re: An Apology From TechCrunch

#103

Post by johnnyc3po »

I think everyone needs to lighten up.

Men will have to soon stare at the floor when talking to a woman in the work place as prolonged eye contact could be interpreted as sexual harassment. Also, even glancing at her chest will cause immediate dismissal.

C'mon....

Re: An Apology From TechCrunch

#104

Post by adamnemecek »

estel wrote: post #74
adamnemecek wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you please provide an extensive list of things that are ok to be offended by and that others have to accommodate?

No, because we have judgement. (And any given conference has its own rules regarding inclusivity and anti-discrimination).

>> No, because we have judgement.

Oh right, I forgot that we all have a one, shared judgement and that material that is offensive to one person is equally offensive to everyone else.

>> any given conference has its own rules regarding inclusivity and anti-discrimination

It appears that in this case they did not have these rules, the article says that they failed to "establish clear guidelines for these submissions".

P.S. I find your comment extremely offensive, could you please remove it? Thanks.

Re: An Apology From TechCrunch

#105

Post by theorique »

Amadou wrote: post #63

I watched the two presentations via the valleywag page others have cited. The problem I see with TechCrunch's apology is that they are mixing up terminology. I don't think either presentation was sexist and especially not misogynstic - what they were was sexual. Modern society has a similar problem distinguishing between racist humor and racial humor. While there certainly can be overlap between -ist and -ual humor,…

You're right that it was "sexual". However, I'm not sure that the industry has enough average maturity to handle frank discussions of sexuality, especially in big, diverse groups.

Given the demographics of the industry, I don't think it was an accident that it was "TitStare" rather than "DongStare" or "CockStare". I'm sure you could imagine that the nature of the app might make the women in the audience feel a bit odd, that the big punchline was an app about looking at their breasts. Especially since a lot of women feel like they are already struggling for legitimacy in this industry, which is considered by many to be dealing with a sexism problem

Re: An Apology From TechCrunch

#106

Post by zainny »

graue wrote: post #82
zainny wrote: post #64

I wonder if the biggest reason why things like this keep happening is because we're all on a state of "high alert" in the tech community. Hear me out. Right now in the tech world we've got ourselves in a big damn tizzy over anything even slightly sexual in nature. By contrast, almost every single other medium we encounter on a day to day basis (TV, movies, magazines) is HIGHLY sexualised and makes absolutely no apolo…

First of all, not everything that's ok in an entertainment medium (TV, movies) is ok in a professional setting. I don't think presentations like these would have been appropriate at a conference of lawyers, doctors, artists, or biologists, either. That said I think this also has to do with the extreme gender imbalance. Tech conferences are very male-dominated. I think the first photo here really gets this across, of…

I think the difference here though is conferences like this are intentionally positioned at being more casual and less formal/professional. I doubt lawyers even have similarly casual conferences of this nature. In the tech world, we've intentionally positioned our conferences to be this way. I honestly think therefore that people will be more likely to bring their normal set of standards to bear in situations like this.

Now, I have a question for you. Imagine that you're a woman and you're walking to the restroom, past a line of 40 or 50 men. And now imagine those men have any time recently walked past a magazine store where upon they saw hundreds of magazines depicting women naked (ie. every single magazine store anywhere).

Or imagine those men are discussing the latest episode of Boston Legal, a typical TV show depicting a professional setting (legal firm) which contains highly sexualised themes (like, again, pretty much every show on TV today).

I'm not saying this is a good thing. I'm simply making the point that the standards people seem to be applying in the tech world seem to me to be completely out of whack with what society in general deems appropriate.

Re: An Apology From TechCrunch

#107

Post by polemic »

farmerjack wrote: post #88
polemic wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, people are actually outraged. Because it's outrageous. This isn't "political correctness", this is "how not to shit on the fellow members of our profession". Telling people to Lighten Up[1] is not an adequate excuse for shitty behaviour. 1. http://therealkatie.net/blog/2012/mar/21/lighten-up/

The examples in that blog post are discriminatory, and if I were her, I'd be very pissed off. However, the coworkers' comments were directed at her specifically. In this case, it's some men saying they like to stare at boobs. It's not saying women are bad programmers, and it certainly doesn't seem like they're trying to say "men are better than women." If anything, it's saying, "We're dumb males. We like to look at b…

The point of the post was not to try to give you examples of discriminatory behaviour (and if you think that's the point of the blog post, you've missed the point entirely).

When we, as an industry, create an atmosphere that degrades members of our community, it's not adequate to say "lighten up, it's just a joke, get over it".

You seem bothered about who is getting outraged. In my case, I'm a programmer who talks to high school children about careers in technology. Several times I've been in a position where I've told young women: "this attitude exists, I'm sorry, we're trying to change it", and to the young men: "this attitude exists, it's up to you to change it". The 9 year old who presented next to those idiots got a real world taste of the industry she's entering, and I sincerely hope she manages to navigate the waters. In the meantime, I'm vocal because I'm fighting the "lighten up" attitude - your attitude - in a younger generation.

Re: An Apology From TechCrunch

#108

Post by calbear81 »

david_shaw wrote: post #60
pcerioli wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a woman and I found them funny, but that is my 2 cents :)

Sure, and I'm positive that you weren't alone. I'm not saying that they shouldn't make joke apps, but TechCrunch should not have let them take the stage.

I'm not sure it's clear what we should discount "joke" apps as not being serious business. After all, they built a place where users upload offensive photos and allow folks to vote and share ... just like 9Gag, Reddit, and countless other legitimate, funded, businesses.

Re: An Apology From TechCrunch

#109

Post by jessedhillon »

WestCoastJustin wrote: post #91
jessedhillon wrote: post #52

I'd like to stem a couple of obvious, but inevitable (for HN and some other tech communities) criticisms that are bound to appear: 1) Yes, this stuff is tasteless and offends the sensibilities of most decent adults. (Invariably, someone likes to point out that it offends everyone, and conclude therefore that it can't be misogynistic) 2) Yes, people differ in their tolerances for crudeness in their humor. First, I thi…

Distilled into management of expectations . When you go to an event like this, or say a TED talk or some type of technology conference (VMworld, PyCon, etc), I assume a G/PG rating, unless told otherwise. Sure they were jokes, just told in the wrong setting. Some people like to push the boundaries, and if you give them a soap box, they will speak. This should be news to no one, but when you show PG-13, or R content t…

Yes, I agree with your point.

When you're at an event with tens of people, you can look around and see who in attendance. All youngish tech guys? Great, let's push the boundary for stupid humor. That's an acceptable judgment, although I personally would still keep it professional. It's an understandable assessment.

If, though, there are hundreds (thousands?) in attendance then prudence would suggest that you raise the floor of acceptability. The lowest common denominating factor has gone way down -- that people here all breathe air and want to see hackathon projects is about all you can safely assume. To come out and jerk off with your phone on stage is very poor judgment and not at all calibrated with the audience.

Some things do not need to be explicitly spelled out, and it is not negligence on the part of the presenters to expect people getting up to speak publicly to exercise a basic level of judgment. The conclusion, "I can't safely assume that everyone here will find this funny, or at least tolerable," is not difficult to arrive at given the circumstances presented.

Re: An Apology From TechCrunch

#110

Post by Nutella4 »

metaphorm wrote: post #67
chrischen wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Political correctness is sensitivity to the minority, and is generally not a bad thing.

there's a difference between appropriate consideration of minorities and over-the-top political correctness. simply put, intent matters and people need to accept that a reflexive hostility towards puerile male humor does not advance the cause of women.

Nope, intent isn't magic. http://genderbitch.wordpress.com/2010/01/23/intent-its-fucki...

And puerile male humor is often intended to drive women away from the boys' club.

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