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Sad as Hell

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Re: Sad as Hell

#31

Post by lionhearted »

bouncingsoul wrote: post #27
jacoblyles wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As long as we are going to share the same internet, we can acknowledge that the use of the masculine as the default gender for an anonymous person is a longstanding tradition in the English language, and not every person checks every byline of every article she reads. Norms are changing, but I wouldn't call someone wrong or sexist for using a convenient idiom instead of more awkward and somewhat forced modern formula…

Norms will only keep improving if people keep complaining. Here's an article about the forgotten tradition of they as a singular pronoun: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=723184 Also, because of the he, I assumed Ixiaus was referring to Gary Shteyngart, the author being reviewed.

> Norms will only keep improving if people keep complaining.

This may be controversial or offensive, but it's the truth so I'll take the heat for saying it:

None of the most successful women I know really care or complain about things like he/she in the English language. For the most successful women I know - I'm thinking of an investment banker, lawyer, and chief editor of a magazine in particular - the idea of causing a fuss over pronouns is so low on their radar that it wouldn't happen.

Again, I'll take heat for this, and so be it - but I think people who complain about that sort of thing need to go do more relevant stuff in the real world. Most people who are actually hard working, enterprising, expansive and successful (professionally or in other worthy endeavors) simply don't have time to be upset and pedantic over this sort of thing.

Anyway, I'll take the heat for this now. It's not 100% the case, but the general pattern certainly holds.

Re: Sad as Hell

#32

Post by Ixiaus »

jholman wrote: post #24
Ixiaus wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a great comment. All of the tools, gadgetry, and connectivity referenced by the author as the harbinger of his decline from individuality (loss of personality) do indeed usher forth his dystopia because he is using them to fill the hole that was created by his leaving the stimulating environment of college. A place where learning is efficient and discovery nil (this is what college is good for, but it isn't t…

> his her If you can't check your sexist assumptions, then you could check the byline.

I was referring to both the author and Shteyngart using the masculine pronoun to make what I had written, "more personal" (instead of using "they"); a bit loose, I know, but this is a casual discussion medium.

Re: Sad as Hell

#33

Post by jamii »

SourPatch wrote: post #7

"It is my firm belief, and I say this as a dictum, that all these tools now at our disposal, these things part of this explosive evolution of means of communication, mean we are now heading for an era of solitude. Along with this rapid growth of forms of communication at our disposal — be it fax, phone, email, internet or whatever — human solitude will increase in direct proportion." -Werner Herzog

Thanks to the internet I can work anywhere in the world. Thanks to HN, Reddit and my RSS reader I can keep up with the cutting edge of my profession whereever I go. Thanks to email, jabber, skype and facebook I can travel the world without losing touch with my friends and family. Thanks to couchsurfing.org I've made friends all over the world and experienced dozens of different cultures. If the internet is making you lonely, you're doing it wrong.

Re: Sad as Hell

#34

Post by GeneralMaximus »

bouncingsoul wrote: post #27
jacoblyles wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As long as we are going to share the same internet, we can acknowledge that the use of the masculine as the default gender for an anonymous person is a longstanding tradition in the English language, and not every person checks every byline of every article she reads. Norms are changing, but I wouldn't call someone wrong or sexist for using a convenient idiom instead of more awkward and somewhat forced modern formula…

Norms will only keep improving if people keep complaining. Here's an article about the forgotten tradition of they as a singular pronoun: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=723184 Also, because of the he, I assumed Ixiaus was referring to Gary Shteyngart, the author being reviewed.

Forgotten? I still use it. I also like to refer to companies as groups of people rather than individual entities. I prefer "Apple are evil" over "Apple is evil", and "Google own you" over "Google owns you".

Re: Sad as Hell

#35

Post by neilk »

I constantly see my peers lamenting how technology has "taken" their time and space for reflection away and have no idea what they're talking about.

It may be uncool to admit but I have no trouble at all keeping my inbox to zero unread items. And I do have a social life -- less active than many, but more active than a lot of people. I even read books, actual physical things made of paper, in my spare time.

How do I do this? I think maybe I instinctively understand that my personal information processing abilities are limited. I know I'm not a computer; I don't try to be like one. First of all, I subscribe or commit to relatively little, and of what I do follow, I don't feel any obligation to read everything. Mailing lists are aggressively filtered, even when I read them I'm culling entire threads left and right. Facebook I avoid unless I want to keep up with invitations and so on. Quora was starting to become a bit addicting, so I've curtailed that.

Am I abnormal? Do the rest of you just... let the machine take from you what it will? Why? Is there some ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED: I READ THE INTERNET that I'm unaware of?

P.S. I'll admit that I failed rather badly a company where everyone was expected to read hundreds if not thousands of mail items daily. But I still blame that not on the fact that I didn't read EVERYTHING, but that I didn't prioritize effectively.

P.P.S. It even grinds my gears that this person laments random connections with people on the subway have now, in the Facebook era, somehow become an impossibility. It's not! I've done it! It's really not that hard. And yes I live in San Francisco, not Iowa.

Re: Sad as Hell

#36

Post by astrofinch »

As I was reading, I was having a hard time empathizing with the author. Then I realized that I had assumed the author was male, and checked. Sure enough the author was female. I feel like maybe men experience this stuff differently. For example, take this passage.

>Same with all-or-nothing friends: they’re only compelling if you talk to them all the time; when the chatty, daily interactions end so does the prospect of an interesting expository conversation. Without consistency, a long phone call seems not only daunting but also profoundly dull.

I have friends I meet with rarely and have great conversations with. We don't talk about each others' lives quite so much though. We talk about stuff :)

Re: Sad as Hell

#37

Post by michael_dorfman »

lionhearted wrote: post #31
bouncingsoul wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Norms will only keep improving if people keep complaining. Here's an article about the forgotten tradition of they as a singular pronoun: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=723184 Also, because of the he, I assumed Ixiaus was referring to Gary Shteyngart, the author being reviewed.

> Norms will only keep improving if people keep complaining. This may be controversial or offensive, but it's the truth so I'll take the heat for saying it: None of the most successful women I know really care or complain about things like he/she in the English language. For the most successful women I know - I'm thinking of an investment banker, lawyer, and chief editor of a magazine in particular - the idea of caus…

We're drifting from the topic at hand, but None of the most successful women I know really care or complain about things like he/she in the English language misses the point completely. The effect of sexist language on successful women is not the source of people's concern. Rather, it is the (subtle) effect on women who are not yet successful, and the reinforcing effect on men.

Casual minor acts of racism probably have very little effect on Michael Jordan. That doesn't make them ok.

Re: Sad as Hell

#38

Post by bouncingsoul »

lionhearted wrote: post #31
bouncingsoul wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Norms will only keep improving if people keep complaining. Here's an article about the forgotten tradition of they as a singular pronoun: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=723184 Also, because of the he, I assumed Ixiaus was referring to Gary Shteyngart, the author being reviewed.

> Norms will only keep improving if people keep complaining. This may be controversial or offensive, but it's the truth so I'll take the heat for saying it: None of the most successful women I know really care or complain about things like he/she in the English language. For the most successful women I know - I'm thinking of an investment banker, lawyer, and chief editor of a magazine in particular - the idea of caus…

You're saying when people don't care about a particular issue they just follow the accepted norm and get on with their lives. And you applaud that. But I don't see how that's incompatible with others who do care making an attempt to improve that accepted norm.

Re: Sad as Hell

#39

Post by astrofinch »

madair wrote: post #29

When N+1 is good, they are really good. When N+1 hosts writers just out of college, this is what we get. It happens. This is your typical "we're special because of xyz" conceit. We all know what that is. We've all been there, and fortunately many of of have noticed and the next time is less severe. The "we're special because humans never before did x" has been around since the beginning of time, and it's always right…

You realize that your post only discusses the fashions in writing that the essay may or may not be part of and not its actual thesis, no?

Personally I prefer to discuss actual reality as opposed to social reality.

Re: Sad as Hell

#40

Post by lionhearted »

michael_dorfman wrote: post #37
lionhearted wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Norms will only keep improving if people keep complaining. This may be controversial or offensive, but it's the truth so I'll take the heat for saying it: None of the most successful women I know really care or complain about things like he/she in the English language. For the most successful women I know - I'm thinking of an investment banker, lawyer, and chief editor of a magazine in particular - the idea of caus…

We're drifting from the topic at hand, but None of the most successful women I know really care or complain about things like he/she in the English language misses the point completely. The effect of sexist language on successful women is not the source of people's concern. Rather, it is the (subtle) effect on women who are not yet successful, and the reinforcing effect on men. Casual minor acts of racism probably ha…

> We're drifting from the topic at hand, but None of the most successful women I know really care or complain about things like he/she in the English language misses the point completely.

No, I understood your point. I think you missed mine though - my point is that you have a limited amount of time each day to direct your attention. If you want to be more successful, or want women to be more successful, then focusing on he/she pronouns is a very bad use of your time. Focusing on creating wealth, learning management, networking, investing, saving, become more disciplined, fit, healthy, exercising are all good uses of time.

After the majority of women are well-informed and well-educated on the topics of nutrition/fitness, finance, investing, negotiation, accounting, self-discipline, goal setting, etc, etc, etc. - after all that's done then let's turn our attention to pronouns. In the meantime, it's rather like stepping over dollars to pick up pennies. Learning more personal finance, investing, and negotiation will massively help anyone's career success, including women. Having everyone switch to singular they will not make so big of a difference.

> Casual minor acts of racism probably have very little effect on Michael Jordan.

I'm getting better at predicting what people's responses to my comments will be - I knew someone would play the racism card. Well done. Comparing the historical use of "he" in English for a singular pronoun to racism smacks of really missing the point though - the point is, pronoun usage is going to have a trivial impact, if any, on people's successes. There's much better places to deploy your energy and resources if you want women to be more successful, either individually or as a group.

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