Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief • Hacker News Board

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#281

Post by badsock » Fri, Jul 10, 2015, 10:45 PM UTC

magicalist wrote: post #249

generic_user wrote: post #221

The knife cuts both ways. The clickbait media and various groups are trying to paint the now predictable narrative of '50 white male racist misogynist neck beards' who want to chase women out of tech again. Over 200,000 people with legitimate concerns sign a petition to have Pao step down yet they still carry on with there charade. People are sick and tired of the media and a small group of militant activists trying…

> The most critical things against Pao and her husband I have seen are posts about there phony extortion sexism and racism law suits. All of which is factual information available to the public and even the media has to admit these things are facts. Oh please. You can disclaim the disgusting statements made all over reddit recently as not part of a coherent community or whatever, but don't pretend they didn't exist a…

Maybe I'm misinterpreting, but those last two lines read to me like a callout to #gamergate's "It's about ethics in journalism" BS.

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#282

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Jul 10, 2015, 10:45 PM UTC

magicalist wrote: post #249

generic_user wrote: post #221

The knife cuts both ways. The clickbait media and various groups are trying to paint the now predictable narrative of '50 white male racist misogynist neck beards' who want to chase women out of tech again. Over 200,000 people with legitimate concerns sign a petition to have Pao step down yet they still carry on with there charade. People are sick and tired of the media and a small group of militant activists trying…

> The most critical things against Pao and her husband I have seen are posts about there phony extortion sexism and racism law suits. All of which is factual information available to the public and even the media has to admit these things are facts. Oh please. You can disclaim the disgusting statements made all over reddit recently as not part of a coherent community or whatever, but don't pretend they didn't exist a…

[deleted]

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#283

Post by sroerick » Fri, Jul 10, 2015, 10:46 PM UTC

morbius wrote: post #258

generic_user wrote: post #221

The knife cuts both ways. The clickbait media and various groups are trying to paint the now predictable narrative of '50 white male racist misogynist neck beards' who want to chase women out of tech again. Over 200,000 people with legitimate concerns sign a petition to have Pao step down yet they still carry on with there charade. People are sick and tired of the media and a small group of militant activists trying…

> now predictable narrative of '50 white male racist misogynist neck beards' who want to chase women out of tech again This is a pretty accurate narrative. You may not agree, but casual misogyny is incredibly pervasive on most defaults, and it's fairly prevalent within the smaller, community-based subs as well. > small group of militant activists trying to silence people who they disagree with If you're referring to…

> If you're referring to SRS, they're annoying and take themselves far too seriously, but as far as I know they don't try to silence anyone.

I'm a feminist,and can't stand a lot of the stuff that goes on on reddit.

That said, censorship on that website is rampant. Reddit is trying to monetize, and that means stifling speech, especially that speech critical of corporate governance.

The issue isn't as black and white as you make it. There are people with legitimate grievances. And there are people who are being sexist pigs.

Reddit will tell their userbase that the whole fiasco was Pao's fault. They will tell the board and investors that the userbase is sexist.

They think it's win win, but they are on a sinking ship.

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#284

Post by pnathan » Fri, Jul 10, 2015, 10:46 PM UTC

nhf wrote: post #10

I think this was the right thing to do from a PR perspective. Having Steve back as the new CEO will definitely be good for the community. I also applaud Reddit's announcement for calling the community out on their childish BS: > As a closing note, it was sickening to see some of the things redditors wrote about Ellen. [1] The reduction in compassion that happens when we’re all behind computer screens is not good for…

There was a lot of evil stuff spewing about relating to Ms. Pao. It was pretty sad, and those people should feel ashamed of saying those things about anyone.

On the other hand, I don't think that she did a very good job managing the crisis (the first one caused by banning certain douchy subreddits, and the second one caused by the firing), which is one thing a CEO needs to be able to do.

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#285

Post by tptacek » Fri, Jul 10, 2015, 10:47 PM UTC

generic_user wrote: post #221

The knife cuts both ways. The clickbait media and various groups are trying to paint the now predictable narrative of '50 white male racist misogynist neck beards' who want to chase women out of tech again. Over 200,000 people with legitimate concerns sign a petition to have Pao step down yet they still carry on with there charade. People are sick and tired of the media and a small group of militant activists trying…

My favorite thing about Pao's loudest critics are how bad they are --- like, "ethics in gaming journalism" bad --- at concealing their agenda. "there phony extortion sexism and racism law suits", "even the media has to admit these things are facts". Real slick, there.

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#286

Post by Zuider » Fri, Jul 10, 2015, 10:48 PM UTC

sbilstein wrote: post #222

Patrick_Devine wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an occasional user of reddit, this whole ordeal has confirmed the reason why I prefer not to hang out in its forums. I have no idea whether Ellen was a capable CEO, but the vitriol which I kept seeing peripherally (through other news articles and here on HN) was absolutely appalling.

Honestly I'm so disappointed that Reddit's management allowed such a crappy culture to evolve in their forums for so long. I remember signing on in 2010 and just feeling really uncomfortable browsing any of the major subreddits. Why did it take so long to deal with characters like violentacrez?

>Why did it take so long to deal with characters like violentacrez?

He wasn't dealt with. He deleted his account in a frantic and futile attempt to avoid exposure.

Violentacres/Violentacrez (had to block him twice) set himself up as king of the reddit underworld. The admins cast a blind eye to his antics, and in return he prevented the raw sewage from gushing onto the clean streets of the reddit front page.

He was a troll from the start, and deliberately so, even in his choice of username which he had stolen from a popular blogger at the time. This illustrates the kind of brinkmanship that was his trademark - it is not quite impersonation to steal someone else's anonymous handle, but it is not quite ethical either.

His one good point was that he kept the other reddit trolls busy via interminable (literally) troll-fights.

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#287

Post by coolnow » Fri, Jul 10, 2015, 10:48 PM UTC

erikpukinskis wrote: post #235

oldmanjay wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who has only watched this popcorn feast, I have the sense that she was the subject of vitriol primarily for taking actions that people didn't like. Many of the insults may well have targeted her gender, but that is not the same thing at all. I have seen literally no evidence that she was harassed simply for being a woman.

Really? What are the decisions she has made that seem so substantially larger than past Reddit CEO mistakes? Worse than selling to Conde Nast? Worse than closing subreddits for content? To me the uptick in personal insults seems obvious, and uncorrelated to a long history of questionable decisions by Reddit admins. Although I think her being labelled as a feminist false accuser is as much the reason as her being a wo…

Probably the fact that she's relatively new and seen as an outside by most in the community who wants to "ban behaviour" yet goes after ideas (see: /r/fatpeoplehate drama, while subreddits like /r/coontown and other racist shitholes were allowed to stay). Their stance on brigading that seems to not apply to /r/shitredditsays. People seemingly shadowbanned for speaking their minds. Her lawsuit (that she rightly lost) against her former employer where she claimed her gender was the reason she wasn't promoted?

Pao was the face of reddit as CEO and had to rightly "face the music", not because she's a woman. I find it incredible to see things boiled down to "they hate her cuz she's a gurl".

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#288

Post by squeaky-clean » Fri, Jul 10, 2015, 10:48 PM UTC

generic_user wrote: post #221

The knife cuts both ways. The clickbait media and various groups are trying to paint the now predictable narrative of '50 white male racist misogynist neck beards' who want to chase women out of tech again. Over 200,000 people with legitimate concerns sign a petition to have Pao step down yet they still carry on with there charade. People are sick and tired of the media and a small group of militant activists trying…

> . The most critical things against Pao and her husband I have seen are posts about there phony extortion sexism and racism law suits.

What about the subreddit comparing Ellen Pao to Pyongyang [0].

Jokes about Pao with over a +4000 positive score [1] [2] Jokes comparing Ellen Pao to Hitler. [3] I remember a post to /r/pics or /r/funny of Hitler's Wikipedia page, with Pao's photo instead of Hitler.

I ran into some old coworkers (who take Reddit WAAAY too seriously) at a bar during the weekend this whole thing was first blowing up. They were literally talking about how Pao needs to die. Then they got drunk, forgot they had ranted about her, and told me again how she needed to die.

This whole thing was really disgusting and made me hate the average Reddit user. I'll still browse some of the smaller subs, but I won't be touching the frontpage ever again.

[0] http://www.reddit.com/r/paoyongyang

[1] http://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/3c03y8/ellen_paos_car...

[2] http://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/3c05wq/what_sound_doe...

[3] http://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/3c0b5p/whats_the_diff...

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#289

Post by monksy » Fri, Jul 10, 2015, 10:48 PM UTC

morbius wrote: post #258

generic_user wrote: post #221

The knife cuts both ways. The clickbait media and various groups are trying to paint the now predictable narrative of '50 white male racist misogynist neck beards' who want to chase women out of tech again. Over 200,000 people with legitimate concerns sign a petition to have Pao step down yet they still carry on with there charade. People are sick and tired of the media and a small group of militant activists trying…

> now predictable narrative of '50 white male racist misogynist neck beards' who want to chase women out of tech again This is a pretty accurate narrative. You may not agree, but casual misogyny is incredibly pervasive on most defaults, and it's fairly prevalent within the smaller, community-based subs as well. > small group of militant activists trying to silence people who they disagree with If you're referring to…

> but as far as I know they don't try to silence anyone.

See:

Project Panda, PREDDITORs, Their brigades (https://www.reddit.com/r/SRSsucks/comments/14iwvx/its_that_t...), the fact that they are "exempt from the non participation" requirement when linking to other subs.

Re: Ellen Pao Is Stepping Down as Reddit’s Chief

#290

Post by axlprose » Fri, Jul 10, 2015, 10:48 PM UTC

magicalist wrote: post #249

generic_user wrote: post #221

The knife cuts both ways. The clickbait media and various groups are trying to paint the now predictable narrative of '50 white male racist misogynist neck beards' who want to chase women out of tech again. Over 200,000 people with legitimate concerns sign a petition to have Pao step down yet they still carry on with there charade. People are sick and tired of the media and a small group of militant activists trying…

> The most critical things against Pao and her husband I have seen are posts about there phony extortion sexism and racism law suits. All of which is factual information available to the public and even the media has to admit these things are facts. Oh please. You can disclaim the disgusting statements made all over reddit recently as not part of a coherent community or whatever, but don't pretend they didn't exist a…

> I mean, seriously, what on earth are you addressing here? Who are you talking to?

For anyone that's equally confused, I highly recommend reading the book "Trust Me, I'm Lying": http://www.amazon.com/Trust-Me-Lying-Confessions-Manipulator...

What's happening right now isn't entirely intuitive, so it's understandable to be a bit lost, but what the parent is talking about is a serious, legitimate issue.