He seems like a nice, reasonable guy. I actually think that he's more tolerant than most people, and that the radical left could learn something from him.
As opposed to the radical right, you mean?
Is LambdaConf for Conservative Christians, Too?
11–20 of 52 posts
Re: Is LambdaConf for Conservative Christians, Too?
#12I believe that “good” can only, ever mean, “I like it,” and bad can only, ever mean, “I don’t like it.” Morality, in my view, is just how we try to objectify what are inherently subjective personal preferences. This is... a ridiculously oversimplified caricature of atheistic philosophy, presumably now posted (as the original post predates the current controversy[0]) to imply the obviously incorrect syllogism that if…
> public figure by promoting racist violence is absurd
There haven't been any instances of this that I've seen - I tried to describe the offending paragraph as best I could here (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11363002).
Re: Is LambdaConf for Conservative Christians, Too?
#13Why not just reject a speaker if you think it will hurt ticket sales? You don't have a duty to stand up for free speech, or whatever. You host a conference, you protect your brand, and if people don't like it they can start their own.
This is the same principle that restaurants probably shouldn't reject homosexual people even if it may hurt sales.
Re: Is LambdaConf for Conservative Christians, Too?
#14He seems like a nice, reasonable guy. I actually think that he's more tolerant than most people, and that the radical left could learn something from him.
As opposed to the radical right, you mean?
In this particular case it's the radical left that is irate, so yes.
Also, in general the radical right (when this is used to refer to neoreaction) tends to just opine with long blog posts where they capitalise words like Tradition, Civilization and Enlightenment. They don't like to angrily point fingers as they feel this is unbecoming of gentlemen/women. (I'm being honest about their pretensions here.)
Re: Is LambdaConf for Conservative Christians, Too?
#15I wonder if the original email was more about this point in the "Pledge": > That I shall not talk or act in ways that could make minority groups feel bullied, harassed, intimidated, stalked, stereotyped, or belittled; examples of minority groups include women, people of color, lesbians, gays, and people who are disabled, bisexual, transsexual, asexual, intersex, transgender, and gender-variant; It specifically talks…
> I wonder why the pledge explicitly talks about minority groups? Why not just say that there should be no bullying, harassment, etc. period.
I think those groups are explicitly listed because not everyone believes all of those groups really exist. Similarly, some people believe that belonging to some of those groups is a choice.
Further, I'd imagine that all of those groups will be minorities at LambdaConf, but not all of them are minorities everywhere (women, people "of color", etc.)
I, too, am "of color" and dislike that phrase because A) it means nothing, B) it implies that being "of color" is abnormal and requires someone to quality the word "person", and C) there are way more of us than of non-colored people (whatever that means).
Re: Is LambdaConf for Conservative Christians, Too?
#16Earlier quoted context omitted.
As opposed to the radical right, you mean?
In this particular case it's the radical left that is irate, so yes. Also, in general the radical right (when this is used to refer to neoreaction) tends to just opine with long blog posts where they capitalise words like Tradition, Civilization and Enlightenment. They don't like to angrily point fingers as they feel this is unbecoming of gentlemen/women. (I'm being honest about their pretensions here.)
Attendees at Trump rallies are not exactly known for writing long blog posts, suggestively capitalized or not.
Re: Is LambdaConf for Conservative Christians, Too?
#17I wonder if the original email was more about this point in the "Pledge": > That I shall not talk or act in ways that could make minority groups feel bullied, harassed, intimidated, stalked, stereotyped, or belittled; examples of minority groups include women, people of color, lesbians, gays, and people who are disabled, bisexual, transsexual, asexual, intersex, transgender, and gender-variant; It specifically talks…
I took at it the other way. In my experience, and I think it's not controversial to claim this, devout (is there a better word? active?) Christians are in the minority in technology context. And especially so in 'tech cities' like NYC and SF. Specifically recognizing some minorities as protected and others as not protected can come across as antagonistic.
Of course that's just anecdotal, but it's worth considering that Christians do feel pressure to 'stay in the closet', so to speak.
Re: Is LambdaConf for Conservative Christians, Too?
#18I am always amazed at how religion is such a hot and polarizing topic in the US.
Political debates in the US presidential election are baffling at best and often utterly cringe-worthy.
I don't even understand why someone would ask if a tech conference, a topic that has zero to do with religion, is 'for them too' because they're Christian? Is proselytizing part of the conference's aim? no? Then why even ask? Is it non-obvious enough that you would need to ask?
This is really weird.
Re: Is LambdaConf for Conservative Christians, Too?
#19I believe that “good” can only, ever mean, “I like it,” and bad can only, ever mean, “I don’t like it.” Morality, in my view, is just how we try to objectify what are inherently subjective personal preferences. This is... a ridiculously oversimplified caricature of atheistic philosophy, presumably now posted (as the original post predates the current controversy[0]) to imply the obviously incorrect syllogism that if…
> a ridiculously oversimplified caricature of atheistic philosophy
It seemed to me that the author was offering an explanation of amoral atheism, which he explicitly mentioned several times.
Re: Is LambdaConf for Conservative Christians, Too?
#20Do tech conferences honestly need codes of conduct? Feels a bit like living in a home - some folks hate the idea of Home Owner Associations with their explicit rules, others can't imagine living next to people without everything spelled out.
> Do tech conferences honestly need codes of conduct?
Yes. "Common sense" and "common decency" aren't universal, even in situations that seem to fall under obvious and well-established social norms.
It's better to have these things written out so that no one can claim they didn't know any better. No one is asking the attendees to take this conduct into the rest of their lives -- it's just a way to behave that everyone can agree upon ahead of time to keep things civil.