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This Industry is Fucked

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Re: This Industry is Fucked

#221

Post by purp »

shoeluckpotland wrote: post #195
shykes wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Noted, thank you!

Just so you know, the OAPI is run by Randi Harper, who herself has harassed many people. Most notably Vivek Wadhwa and Claire Schumann, but there are more names on that list. I wish you luck in tracking down the guilty parties. Threats are not okay, no matter who makes them.

I'm not a particular follower of Randi's and still couldn't help but see the Vivek stuff going on. I wouldn't have labeled it harassment; what I saw was a loud and unrelenting public call for accountability. I don't believe she threatened, doxxed, or otherwise harassed him. Do you know differently?

What I would call harassment is that Randi was doxxed as well as swatted, seemingly by the same sort of folks involved in this situation. She seems to have decided to aggressively stand up for her rights and the rights of others.

I'm sure that makes many uncomfortable, some so much so that they create new profiles in social media to comment on it without risking their reputation. Which is fair, though you have to ask yourself why.

Re: This Industry is Fucked

#222

Post by aredridel »

JoshuaDavid wrote: post #208
alaroldai wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, no. But I can't believe that ignoring the issue is going to be more helpful than bringing attention to it.

Have you heard the phrase "don't feed the trolls?" Generally, if someone is saying hurtful things because they didn't know better, raising awareness is likely to help. If they're saying hurtful things to get attention, saying that they're hurting people and should stop is likely to be counterproductive. I don't know enough to be positive in this case, but I'm guessing this is a case of "trolls", not a case of "ignora…

Turns out the trolls have found impossible to ignore ways to interact now: they'll SWAT, Dox, and DoS you right out of your life.

Re: This Industry is Fucked

#223

Post by forgottenpass »

marcus_holmes wrote: post #212
forgottenpass wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your post has inadvertently cemented how little sense of community I get from being a "tech" person. Tech doesn't feel like a town hall meeting in a new home I just haven't integrated with yet, it feels like commuting into NYC for work and looking around on a subway car. I don't know what shared credit or shame I take part in sharing that is specific enough to identify with. Do we really respond to events together? A…

Well the way this is playing out for the Muslims isn't great for them. If the same follows for us, then any self-identified member of the tech community will automatically be suspected of being an asshole by everyone else. I have no idea whether your plan to not identify with the tech community will work. Maybe you're right and it's grown too much to be seen as a single community. Be interesting to find out.

But isn't Islam an counterpoint to your argument to hold the whole community responsible? Or are you just making the detached observation that because it happened to them, it can happen to us?

It's already happened to us, and it's not sexism (not that it would excuse anything, but as far as sexist industries go in society, I think we're low enough on the list to escape external criticism). It's the shocking elitism and douchbaggary that has come to define "tech." If you're in NorCal, you probably see it daily. Or if you really want some outsider perspective listen to John Oliver's comedy routine at The Crunchies, it's pretty cutting.

And the best part, both with the sexism and the way tech startups business models piss people off: the largest concentration of it comes from the "tech" people who are really the tech-adjacent business folk that came to tech just looking to make some cash.

Re: This Industry is Fucked

#224

Post by purp »

alaroldai wrote: post #116
mholt wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It may seem counterintuitive, but the fastest and most effective way to stop posts like this turning up is actually to make more of them, until the harassment and abuse stop. You have evidence to back this up? Honest question.

Actually, no. But I can't believe that ignoring the issue is going to be more helpful than bringing attention to it.

Actually, yes. There's ample evidence of the effects of under reporting crimes:

http://www.allgov.com/news/top-stories/more-than-3-million-v... http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/vnrp0610.pdf

From the article:

"Bullying remains a big problem, according to the study data. About 76% of violent crimes that occurred at school were not reported to police, which is consistent with the findings that from 2006 to 2010, crimes against youth age 12 to 17 were more likely to go unreported than crimes against persons in other age categories."

Now, here's my question for you, mholt (and others), meant in a kind but very direct tone: why should someone need to prove that reporting more of these crimes is justifiable? Why quibble with that question versus addressing the question of, "is there a wrong being done and can I help stop it?"

There is a wrong being done. You can help stop it.

So let's fix it.

Re: This Industry is Fucked

#225

Post by purp »

alaroldai wrote: post #116
mholt wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It may seem counterintuitive, but the fastest and most effective way to stop posts like this turning up is actually to make more of them, until the harassment and abuse stop. You have evidence to back this up? Honest question.

Actually, no. But I can't believe that ignoring the issue is going to be more helpful than bringing attention to it.

Actually, yes. There's ample evidence of the effects of under reporting crimes:

http://www.allgov.com/news/top-stories/more-than-3-million-v... http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/vnrp0610.pdf

From the article:

"Bullying remains a big problem, according to the study data. About 76% of violent crimes that occurred at school were not reported to police, which is consistent with the findings that from 2006 to 2010, crimes against youth age 12 to 17 were more likely to go unreported than crimes against persons in other age categories."

Now, here's my question for you, mholt (and others), meant in a kind but very direct tone: why should someone need to prove that reporting more of these crimes is justifiable? Why quibble with that question versus addressing the question of, "is there a wrong being done and can I help stop it?"

There is a wrong being done. You can help stop it.

So let's fix it.

Re: This Industry is Fucked

#226

Post by wpietri »

corysama wrote: post #176
wpietri wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They don't give a damn about "Women in Tech", her or anything else. I disagree. If this was a pure love of fucking with people, men and women would get equal levels of this. But that's definitely not the case. They have a strong opinion on women in tech (and in gaming): they're vigorously opposed. > The only way to discourage them is to introduce concrete risk to the unwanted activity. I'm all for that. But it's tr…

> If this was a pure love of fucking with people, men and women would get equal levels of this. But that's definitely not the case. Women in tech and gaming are targeted because they are juicy targets. They have a high reward/effort ratio. It's easy to get hooks into a woman in tech/gaming. Vigorously opposing them is a means to the end of getting a reaction. It's relatively much harder to get a reaction from a man f…

> So, the trolls go for the low-hanging fruit.

I agree that they can cause more damage to women, but I think that's mainly because the culture (and the tech industry) is still substantially sexist.

But it's precisely that endemic sexism that makes me suspicious of your theory that of all the people being terrible mainly to women (misogynists, cat-callers, street harassers, pick-up artists, date rapists, abusive partners, exploitative bosses, etc, etc, etc), these trolls are the only ones who happen to be perfectly free of bias.

Do you have some explanation of how all of these people happen to be so unusually free of bias and then take up a hobby where they abuse women for fun? Otherwise, Occam's razor suggests that this is just the on-line form of the culturally endemic male abuse of vulnerable women.

> Indictments of whole industries are worse than distractions.

Nope! Definitely not. People are perfectly happy to let problems exist when they're on a large enough scale, because they don't see themselves as having a way to act. But this problem exists in our industry, and we can fix it here if we want. I sure do.

Re: This Industry is Fucked

#227

Post by vonklaus »

purp wrote: post #168
vonklaus wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You are not voicing a valid opinion I'm not sure how an opinion could be invalid? Maybe to another, but obviously not to the person who has that opinion. > asserting that gender has nothing to do with it Of course it does in her case. I feel bad for her, and it totally sucks. However, this is what trolls do. They troll people for various illogical reasons. > So let's fix it. I am not trying to be rude, but this is…

> You can't do anything to stop trolls online [...] So painfully wrong. There are many things you can do, including not giving up and walking off. You just have to decide you've had enough and are willing to do hard work. Speak out, even when it's not in your own best interest. Support people who are targeted. And, last but not least, don't pick pedantic points to argue while losing sight of the main issue: it absolu…

I am not trolling I am just being a realist here. I recognize that it totally sucks, and it does seem to be harder for women in certain arenas because they are targeted by trolls more heavily. That being said, this comment is wishy-washy feel good fluff, and doesn't address the real issue.

If i was being harassed online how would I employ these tactics? These are just cliche motivational phrases.

> not giving up and walking off

> had enough and are willing to do hard work

> Speak out, even when it's not in your own best interest

None of these would do anything to prevent harassment.

> Support people who are targeted.

This could mediate some of the damage caused.

> So let's fix it.

You act like it is a clogged sink.

Re: This Industry is Fucked

#228

Post by wpietri »

TTPrograms wrote: post #99
alaroldai wrote: post #80

Every time I see posts like this, I see people commenting on it with varying statement to the effect of "that's a shame, but most people in tech aren't like that", or "I'm so tired of seeing posts like this, quit making a fuss." And that makes me so angry. Sure, maybe not everyone in the industry is an arsehole. But enough people are, and those people are vocal enough, that a significant number of people feel disgust…

>That should be enough to tell you that even if the majority are lovely people, the industry as a whole still has a problem. Is that really the case, though? If there's a violent criminal in a town, does the town as a whole have problem? Is the whole town to blame for the acts of that individual? We should do what we can to stop this sort of abuse and make things better, but why do we have to spend so much time alloc…

If there are violent criminals in a town running rampant and unaccountable, then yes, the whole town has a problem. How could you think otherwise? Every municipal election I've seen or read about touches on crime and response to crime.

> why do we have to spend so much time allocating blame to everyone in same field of work?

We only spend a lot of time on this because every time somebody talks about their actual experience, eight zillion dudes pop up to shout, "#notallmen"! Or to demand that the problem be proven to them right this instant with detailed studies in top journals. Or to say, "why are we allocating blame" when nobody was in fact blamed.

The tech industry has a problem. Do others? Possibly, but I don't care. Other people can worry about fixing their own industries. I'm going to worry about fixing mine. But it's not going to start getting better until people admit that there's a problem.

Re: This Industry is Fucked

#229

Post by purp »

MollyR wrote: post #28

I'm sorry to hear this. But I want to add a counter statistic. I've only had pleasant experiences from people trying to help me. The only shit I got in the industry was from a business manager trying to push our team into a death march. There are many factors out in there in the world. We need to put things back into context, rather than just saying things like "Our Industry is fucked". It feels like lately its too e…

A counter-counter-example: do you believe the majority of the citizenry of Tombstone, Arizona, circa October 1881 were outlaws? And yet https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gunfight_at_the_O.K._Corral

I'm happy it hasn't impinged on your work life, and I hope it never does. And there's still folks being hurt by a malevolent minority in and around our industry.

When does that majority of incredibly decent human beings, both men and women, start to care enough that they refuse to accept this any longer?

Re: This Industry is Fucked

#230

Post by wpietri »

TTPrograms wrote: post #154
alaroldai wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we're doing what we can to stop this sort of abuse, there's nothing to blame us for. If we're spending our time trying to sweep these issues under the rug, maybe there is.

I don't think refusing to take blame for the acts of others is sweeping anything under the rug.

Nobody is blaming you. They are asking you to take responsibility for your professional community. Will you?
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