Linus Torvalds: 'I'll never be cuddly but I can be more polite' • Hacker News Board

Re: Linus Torvalds: 'I'll never be cuddly but I can be more polite'

#211

Post by maxk42 » Thu, Sep 27, 2018, 2:25 PM UTC

alfredmuffin wrote: post #49

I question the professional experience of those suggesting that continuing to be an asshole is the preferable situation here ("but at least he's HONEST "). That would simply not fly at my company. It is absolutely possible to be kind when giving honest and constructive feedback and criticism. Empathy is a skill this industry needs to develop.

This isn't a company. It's an all-volunteer force.

And educating people with four-letter words is a highly effective way to get people to fall in line with your culture, rather than allowing them to go around half-cocked all the time.

A well-placed "fuck you" keeps people humble. Spare the rod and all that.

20 years experience, C-level, and my direct reports love me.

Re: Linus Torvalds: 'I'll never be cuddly but I can be more polite'

#212

Post by 08-15 » Thu, Sep 27, 2018, 2:25 PM UTC

tylermac1 wrote: post #160

notyourday wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because me telling you that your code sucks is not being anti-gay if you are gay or anti-trans if you are trans. It is me telling you that your code sucks. You should either make your code not suck, or you can GTFO unless I'm lower on the org chart than you are, then you can do whatever you want, including telling me to shove it or GTFO and based on how I feel about it, I can either forget about it or GTFO. That's eq…

You must be insufferable to be around. Here's a novel idea, how about instead of directly resorting to "Your code sucks." we instead say something like "I think there's still some work to do here. Here's the way I would have done this." It's really not that hard to give constructive criticism.

In practice it works like this:

"Your code invokes undefined behavior and may fail in the following ways. These corner cases are handled incorrectly. There are a few other cases I'm not sure about, because I have trouble following the logic."

"The code is fine. I have tested it!"

"It happens to work on you current machine. That's the nature of undefined behavior. It might fail in the future without warning."

"I tested it, it works. Now merge it!"

"Sorry, man, the code is crap. Go and fix it."

Nobody resorts directly to "your code sucks". Engineers love to give constructive criticism, but they hate to give marks for effort. And where constructive arguments fall on deaf ears, they give up and either ignore you or tell you to GTFO. Both are perceived as impolite, but what else could they do?

Re: Linus Torvalds: 'I'll never be cuddly but I can be more polite'

#213

Post by ethbro » Thu, Sep 27, 2018, 2:25 PM UTC

mikeash wrote: post #89

Vinnl wrote: post #64

His feelings about two of the "sides" of this argument are so recognisable. I'm generally in favour of going out of my way e.g. to make minorities feel more welcome to compensate for the natural tendency to make them feel less welcome. However, the nastiness of some of the people in "my camp" pushes me away from it and makes me reluctant to openly support that cause. In effect, they're really counterproductive, and t…

I wish people would stop being so concerned about what other people think. If treating people well is the right thing to do, then do it. If people are nasty when they try to make you treat people well, ignore them. When people say that they wanted to do the right thing but got pushed away because the advocates were jerks, that just sounds like an excuse. That’s not to say that it’s ok to be a jerk just because you’re…

Civility is the bedrock on which justice is built.

That's why Gandhi, King, and Mandela effected change.

And so many passionate others did not.

Re: Linus Torvalds: 'I'll never be cuddly but I can be more polite'

#214

Post by tenaciousDaniel » Thu, Sep 27, 2018, 2:26 PM UTC

DFHippie wrote: post #180

beaconstudios wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the question of the status quo is itself politicised. One side (progressive sphere) says people who don't belong to the normed group (cis-white-hetero-male in US/EUR) are inherently treated worse, either consciously or unconsciously (bias), and conscious effort has to be made to overcome this. Another (classical liberal sphere) says that exclusionary behaviour are the exception and most people abide by the golden rul…

It is important to note that this isn't merely a matter of opinion. One can study the effect/presence of unconscious bias objectively and quantitatively. These studies have large error bars but they use conventional and accepted statistics. To the extent it is politicized, it's politicized the way evolution and climate change are: groups who are politically opposed have opinions about the consequences of these studie…

Taken at face value, your statement seems to imply that if there is any research devoted to a topic using "conventional and accepted statistics", then no one can have an opinion on it.

Re: Linus Torvalds: 'I'll never be cuddly but I can be more polite'

#215

Post by sonnyblarney » Thu, Sep 27, 2018, 2:27 PM UTC

l8again wrote: post #46

Here we go normalizing verbal abuses to just "not being polite enough". This culture is now so pervasive in our industry that people are wearing their rudeness to their fellow coworkers as a badge of honor. I have seen incredibly meek guys on the outside turn into monsters as soon as they get into their roles of lead devs or tech leads. Repeat after me - "Kindness is cool."

There's a huge difference between being 'very frank' and being a true douche. Both can be perceived as jerkoff but I think only the later really counts as that.

As far as 'meek guys' turning to jerks with a taste of power - it's very common for all types.

Without going into my background I had a chance to witness 100's of young people come into, and go out of power. Almost everyone 'over identifies' with their power when they first get it. It takes 'coming out of power' to have self reflection and awareness about it.

Tragically - so many people in their careers just go 'up' the power ladder and never develop any awareness. It takes going 'down' or 'laterally' a few notches to really internalize the lessons.

The situation I was in, I witnessed a lot of 'power rotation' i.e. people taking turns being lead/manager. It was a really, really powerful thing. Though this was not in high tech and a completely different field, not sure it would work in tech.

Re: Linus Torvalds: 'I'll never be cuddly but I can be more polite'

#216

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Sep 27, 2018, 2:27 PM UTC

rooam-dev wrote: post #31

matthewmacleod wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s essentially a cliché false dichotomy. Wouldn’t it be even nicer to work with someone who can express how they feel in a constructive and helpful manner?

Sometimes "constructive" requires more effort, which for an engineer could mean "overhead". Especially if communication is text based (email, chat, etc.), it's more difficult to express your emotions. My imho of course.

[deleted]

Re: Linus Torvalds: 'I'll never be cuddly but I can be more polite'

#217

Post by notacoward » Thu, Sep 27, 2018, 2:27 PM UTC

inawarminister wrote: post #137

notacoward wrote: post #104

IMO the most interesting part - especially relative to the discussions I've seen right here - is near the end. "But if people at least realise that I'm not part of the disgusting underbelly of the internet that thinks it's OK to show the kind of behaviour you will find if you really have been reading up on the 'discussions' about the code of conduct, then even that will be a really good thing." Yes indeed, if you loo…

see, the problem is that the same thing can be said vis-a-vis the COC toting social justice warriors, making things nasty to everyone just to bring their pet political issues. Indeed, things such as The End of Meritocracy manifesto... Seems to beg the thought: is the trolls in the underbelly always this nefarious that it needs this amount of unhealthiness, or are they, at the end of the day, swelled by reaction to th…

"the problem is that the same thing can be said vis-a-vis the COC toting social justice warriors"

I'm no friend to some of the people pushing this. Just a couple of days ago, I was in a Twitter argument with some of them as they tried to turn this into part of their "kill Linux Foundation" feud. They definitely do have their own faults, but I still think there's a difference. They're willing to put in place a set of rules that could very well be used against them in their own immoderate moments. Some have already pointed this out. The anti-CoC crowd accept no explicit limitation. I'm not trying to put one above another, but those positions are different.

Re: Linus Torvalds: 'I'll never be cuddly but I can be more polite'

#218

Post by eropple » Thu, Sep 27, 2018, 2:27 PM UTC

matz1 wrote: post #188

eropple wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are highlighting the false dichotomy that a lot of folks in this thread--and, if I'm being frank, not for good, decent, or ethical reasons--are piling in on. You can do something that makes people upset without being an asshole. It's really that simple. "No, I won't merge this pull request because of X, Y, and Z." Somebody's probably not going to be happy. But you have not needed to stoop to insulting them. You h…

Is it better to train myself to not be affected with insult ? If some one say to me "No, you stupid pile of sheet, I won't merge this pull request because of X, Y, and Z." I'll just ignore the insult part or at very least to not let myself negatively affected and move on.

No, it's not.

It is better to respond coolly to assholish behavior. But it is not better to allow it to remain unchallenged. Not challenging assholish behavior means that it becomes a community norm and is then incumbent upon everybody else to "train" themselves, as you say, to ignore the behavior of a minority of assholes. It hands the responsibility of defining what the culture is to those assholes.

Letting the assholes normalize the culture is bad. It decreases uptake. It increases, even if people "train" themselves, the likelihood of burnout and of departure. And it makes the world, even if incrementally, a worse place.

Re: Linus Torvalds: 'I'll never be cuddly but I can be more polite'

#219

Post by PeanutNore » Thu, Sep 27, 2018, 2:27 PM UTC

Vinnl wrote: post #64

His feelings about two of the "sides" of this argument are so recognisable. I'm generally in favour of going out of my way e.g. to make minorities feel more welcome to compensate for the natural tendency to make them feel less welcome. However, the nastiness of some of the people in "my camp" pushes me away from it and makes me reluctant to openly support that cause. In effect, they're really counterproductive, and t…

I was thinking about this sort of thing the other day, and the word "fanatic" really stuck in my mind. I especially like this word for its religious connotations, because for some of these people their politics, and more specifically extremism in their own politics, has become a sort of secular religion for them.

I certainly have my own political leanings and find more agreement with those on "my side", but I would much rather spend time with someone from the "other side" who can be polite and civil and magnanimous than a "fanatic" from "my side" who cannot.

Re: Linus Torvalds: 'I'll never be cuddly but I can be more polite'

#220

Post by furgooswft13 » Thu, Sep 27, 2018, 2:28 PM UTC

alfredmuffin wrote: post #128

arayh wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely! This reminds me of https://compassionatecoding.com/ - there's a lot to be said about this industry and the "cold" work environments that are associated to it. I support the compassionate coding movement. Software engineers should support and help each other improve as a whole. It creates a much better work culture and more effective team communication.

Every company needs to adopt this movement. I wish the HN community weren't so rooted in their toxicity, and just recognized the need for industry-wide change.

That's not a movement, it's a buzzword laden sales pitch for a consulting service.

Yes the industry needs change, but in the way of having less bullshit, not more.