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Jon Ronson: How a Tweet Can Ruin Your Life

esquire.co.uk

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Re: Jon Ronson: How a Tweet Can Ruin Your Life

#291

Post by byuu »

Jem wrote: post #219
byuu wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right that I can never directly relate to being a female. All I can do is think about things logically. If she truly had this kind of response to an innocuous joke, I think that says more about her own insecurities than about the behavior of Hank. Feeling danger in response to a bad joke in a crowded room is not a reasonable response to have. It's grossly over-proportionate. How far should we go to cater towar…

This reminds me of when I go out running at night. I avoid running near men (particularly groups of men) because of a fear that I'll come to harm: specifically rape. It's irrational, and unreasonable, but it's the reaction I have nonetheless. (This is common, FYI, many women feel like this.) I don't expect other people to cater towards my fear, but acknowledging that it's real and that it happens is important. Ridicu…

> Ridiculing it won't make it go away.

Certainly not. It's a very complicated issue that starts with the common popular stereotype that all men are sexual predators. We live in one of the safest times in human history, yet the news has us all believing we are in constant, imminent danger.

But you are in fact thousands of times more likely to be hit by a car while jogging than raped. Yet almost nobody feels immense fear when a car drives by them.

I have OCD, so I deal with irrational thoughts all the time. I can truly empathize with how difficult they are to dismiss, even when you understand just how irrational they are.

The ridicule here is because Adria acted on her irrationalities and ended up costing a guy his job over them.

Re: Jon Ronson: How a Tweet Can Ruin Your Life

#292

Post by Lawtonfogle »

fpgeek wrote: post #116
theorique wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Not too bad, he's a white male. I'm a black Jewish female." Nice quote here. As you say, it really does make Richards look empathetic. /s But seriously, this is not good for her image.

No, she doesn't look empathetic, but, considering the broader context, how much empathy can you reasonably expect? He lost his job and got a new one "right away" (according to the article). She also lost her job, was bombarded with all kinds of threats (death, rape, etc.), had to go into hiding and still doesn't have a new job (at least as of her interview for the piece). I'm sure she could improve her image if she w…

He lost a job for sharing a private joke with a friend in a public setting. Who hasn't done that? He then apologized and wished the one who made his joke public well. His line of work is, at the core, developing software.

She lost her job for tattling on a private joke shared with a friend that she overheard. She then tried to get the claim that she cost someone a job taken down, blamed the victim for his own problems, and blamed the victim for her problems. She is also quoted being quite racist and sexist. She may also have used her PR position to cause much of this (I've heard but have not seen conclusion evidence that the account she used was officially associated with her company.) Her line of work is, at the core, PR.

That one was hired and the other wasn't should not be a surprise.

Re: Jon Ronson: How a Tweet Can Ruin Your Life

#293

Post by lurknomore »

Dewie wrote: post #155
TuringTest wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And, "if I had kids, I wouldn't tell jokes"? Seriously? This. Young netizens need to learn the meaning of "proportionate response". There were two adequate courses of action given the offence: - Confront the guys, and shame them face to face for their behavior. - If the goal was to change such misogynistic behavior of men at that kind of events (which is a reasonable and even courageous thing to do), the proper act…

> If the goal was to change such misogynistic behavior of men Making a sexual innuendo about dicks or whatever isn't misogyny . Please, tell me how talking about dicks is an exhibit of contempt for women . The "joke" doesn't even have to do with women.

Misogyny: Thinking, saying, or doing something a woman doesn't like.

Re: Jon Ronson: How a Tweet Can Ruin Your Life

#294

Post by TheHypnotist »

nsxwolf wrote: post #276

I didn't think my opinion of Adria Richards could actually decrease further, but somehow it just did (assuming the article accurately represented her statements). I want to be charitable to her but these statements are just bad.

Read her twitter. It doesn't get much better.

Re: Jon Ronson: How a Tweet Can Ruin Your Life

#295

Post by interpol_p »

ernave wrote: post #258
interpol_p wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See I don't get hatred at Hank, I mean, I did initially read it like that. But when I took a step back I started to see it as hatred of being excluded in a field you love. Hatred at the obliviousness of Hank — his inability to realise how vulnerable she felt simply attending a conference because she was in the minority. I think her view of Hank is to disregard him — kind of "Oh he'll be okay, the system's on his side…

> being excluded in a field She wasn't being excluded. She wasn't being made fun of. She wasn't being oppressed. If the joke was, "lol that dongle reminds me of penis!" then the only significance of that joke is that it acknowledges the existence of human sexual organs. That's it. That's all it does by itself. All that about being offended and excluded and threatened, that is all baggage that she brought with her int…

> She wasn't being excluded. She wasn't being made fun of. She wasn't being oppressed.

Unfortunately that isn't how she felt. Her feelings should matter to us just as Hank's feelings matter.

> the only significance of that joke is that it acknowledges the existence of human sexual organs. That's it.

No one is arguing that the joke is not innocuous, or that the joke is somehow sinister. I've been in Hank's shoes, I've made stupid jokes about sex.

I'm not arguing that Hank deserved any retribution for making that joke. He seems like a really nice guy. It was horrible what happened to him.

I'm arguing that there is a problem because someone doesn't feel safe when an innocuous joke is made. And a lack of diversity is the root of this problem.

Unfortunately when this topic comes up here we all question Adria's motives, we accuse her and call her delusional. We deny her feelings, and in doing so we exclude her and other women. We make the situation worse.

We should be trying to understand how she came to do something so rash and question the culture and environment that brought this horrible situation about.

We should give Adria the benefit of the doubt and assume that she is not a monster, then we will see where the real problem lies.

Re: Jon Ronson: How a Tweet Can Ruin Your Life

#296

Post by jeffbush »

A lot of time is spent talking about Hank and Adria, but most of the damage in these sorts of cases are caused by bystanders: all of us. It feels pretty safe to be part of the crowd pillorying someone else, but I'm sure we've all said or done something thoughtless in the past that we would be embarrassed about if it were broadcast publicly. And while there is a valid discussion to be had about the environment for women in tech, I don't believe this incident has moved that discussion forward. It has put a lot of people on the defensive and made them dig into extreme positions. If there is a moral here, perhaps it is that we should try to be a little less self righteous and see things in a more nuanced way.

Re: Jon Ronson: How a Tweet Can Ruin Your Life

#297

Post by sspiff »

BSousa wrote: post #222
interpol_p wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's a lack of empathy. It feels like anger at a system that caters to men in a field she very much enjoys and wants to be included in. Unfortunately Hank happens to be a fairly good guy who is defended by this system and oblivious to it. He's an unintended casualty of her anger at something bigger. I had many of the same reactions as you when I read her words. But I've been trying very hard to imagine…

I'm sorry, Hank got more than he deserved (edit: being fired not the harassement), but not Adria. She posted the tweet WITH the photo. She started this. She (if I remember correctly) was some PR/evangelist in the company. What she did was exactly the opposite. I could understand if she tweeted about 'two men' making those jokes/whatnot and complain about it, BUT without a picture. With it, I honestly believe she got…

I don't see how she got what she deserved. What she did was wrong, but nothing to deserve graphic death and rape threats.

Re: Jon Ronson: How a Tweet Can Ruin Your Life

#298

Post by PaulRobinson »

Taking sides in this is the wrong thing to do.

The guys should perhaps have been more aware that they could cause offence. She should have perhaps been more aware that photographing and publicly shaming those individuals would have public repercussions she could not anticipate.

However it's the people taking sides that caused the problem here. It's the employers, the haters, the people sending death threats and photoshopping pictures and DDoS'ing sites and all of that.

There's no need. Somebody breached a conference code of conduct. Somebody else was offended by that. It should have been an issue between the person who made the joke, the person who complained and the conference organiser.

The fact it spilled out into the public domain could be handled if people were not going to take sides and just realised that this was absolutely 100% none of their business, and to reflect that keeping within codes of conduct is a good thing for everybody.

But the Real World isn't like that. The juvenile idiots on 4chan are more than happy to take a side based on prejudice, cognitive bias and the protection of pseudonymity and behave in an absolutely disgusting way.

If you're about to do something publicly, be prepared to explain yourself to everybody you know, including your mother.

If you're about to do something in a semi-public space, same thing applies, and semi-public means using a pseudonym.

Everybody involved in this story got it wrong, but the very worst people around this were the people who decided to take it a level of hatred it did not deserve.

Re: Jon Ronson: How a Tweet Can Ruin Your Life

#299

Post by wahsd »

Seems like their mistake was admitting anything. They should have then just sued her for defamation.

This is really nothing more than bullying, self-righteous bullying. Just because you overheard something give you no fucking right to shame someone in public.

Maybe their jokes were immature. Maybe humanity should cease thinking about sex. Either way she's the one guilty of bullying and should be shamed for the horrible person that she is. Fucking move if you don't like what a couple guys are inappropriately joking about.

Re: Jon Ronson: How a Tweet Can Ruin Your Life

#300

Post by TheHypnotist »

moomin wrote: post #27
throwawayaway wrote: post #2

> He noticed ruefully that a few days earlier the woman – her name was Adria Richards – had herself tweeted a stupid penis joke. She’d suggested to a friend that he put socks down his pants to bewilder TSA agents at the airport. Lot of hypocrisy here! Neither person deserved to lose their job, the whole situation seems to have gotten completely out of hand. Funny how even the smallest hint of acknowledgement or respo…

One was a professional context, one wasn't.

So is her twitter not used ever in a professional context? Or does she get to pick and choose which statements are and aren't in said context?
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