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The PyCon Incident

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Re: The PyCon Incident

#311

Post by ratat »

blhack wrote: post #7

I would also like a response from Sendgrid here. Somebody they sent to a conference, who was representing their company there, went on a personal vendetta against somebody and got them fired. That's awful, and I join the people I see online right now in saying that I cannot, in good conscience, ever do business with a company that supports that behavior. --And to how far Adria has set back womens' rights here-- The c…

> They don't want to get treated like "a girl"

That's the thing. If this isn't what she wants, then she shouldn't act like such an incredibly immature child. What she did was many times more 'immature' than what the men allegedly said.

They allegedly exchanged a harmless, obviously immature joke between themselves, and should have been quieter given the setting. That's their fault.

She then responds by posting a slanderous/libelous covertly-taken picture that could only be described as a "creep shot" of these men to thousands of people (under the Sendgrid brand). And accompanies it with a baseless quote that is entirely unprovable. It doesn't matter what they said, if she has no proof then she has no right, NO RIGHT, to post such claims in a public forum.

What if she decided to 'teach them a lesson' and go even further with it? "OMG, two guys behind me talking about having sex with underage gurls! (insert creep shot here)". Why not? Clearly she doesn't feel the need to have any proof of her claims.

Sickening conduct. My company and our partners will also be boycotting Sendgrid if they do not respond in the appropriate manner.

Re: The PyCon Incident

#312

Post by josh-j »

jasonlotito wrote: post #281
sergiotapia wrote: post #17

I already sent SendGrid's sales department an email that I will boycott their company and recommend others do so as well moving forward. Where I work we were considering between SendGrid or Mandrill and this incident practically made our choice for us. We cannot and _will not_ support a company that backs[1] a person like this. [1] - https://twitter.com/adriarichards/status/314452708549603328

So, just to be clear, you are boycotting a company that employees someone who upholds the code of conduct agreed to by all attendees of pycon, but make no mention of the company that actually fired the guy. Gotcha.

It's a sane move if you want to discourage the culture that Adria is encouraging. Certainly her employers don't deserve any blame, though.

Re: The PyCon Incident

#313

Post by [deleted] »

wpietri wrote: post #191
Joeboy wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, I am really puzzled as to why these "jokes" are supposed to be offensive to women. They might be offensive to people raised in some cultures / subcultures, and they don't sound like they're great jokes in any culture, but nobody ever told me about the meeting where women decided knob jokes were offensive. In fact a female friend texted me one about an hour ago.

Imagine this situation: You are walking down the street. It starts to rain, so you duck into the nearest business, a bar. You order a beer, and realize that you have stepped into a gay bar. The table behind you starts making jokes about how virgin anuses are the best. They are pretty big guys, leather daddies. You worry they're talking about you, about your anus. You worry. That feeling of discomfort? The way your he…

[deleted]

Re: The PyCon Incident

#314

Post by columbo »

djcapelis wrote: post #245
basqio wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why ridicule someone for making a personal choice to choose who he does business with? Adria is a part of the company's image and just like any other company they will be judged by her public actions.

So. Let me see if I've got this straight: Posting to HN about how you think people should coordinate and send e-mails to a company's sales department about how they don't want to do business with a company because they're bothering to stand by one of their employees and not fire them. -> A personal choice and any comments disagreeing with it is "ridicule". Posting a tweet on your twitter account. -> Public actions re…

> Posting a tweet on your twitter account. -> Public actions representing a company.

I really don't want to step into this... but just to clarify the tweet did say: "@SendGrid supports me. Stop trolling." so yes, that makes it a position of/by/with-the-permission of the company.

quickly runs out of thread

Re: The PyCon Incident

#315

Post by dmishe »

lizzard wrote: post #228
kalethrowaway wrote: post #55

Why wouldn't she approach them directly? This is such a weird interaction.

Because people don't respect those requests and just joke more, get hostile, mock us. It is not about personal publicity. The fallout from reporting incidents like this (or documenting them at all in public) is extreme. It isn't good for the reporter.

Not everybody.

Re: The PyCon Incident

#316

Post by amykhar »

I'm a woman programmer and I'm probably the most likely person in my company to make a big dongle joke. I often cringe at oversensitive women whining about gimme t-shirts and other inconsequential things such as mildly raunchy jokes.

Somebody not hiring a programmer because she is a woman is a real problem. Somebody not paying a woman the same as a man is a problem. Somebody firing a woman for getting pregnant is a problem. Why can't we worry about the real problems and just get over the silly inconsequential stuff?

Re: The PyCon Incident

#317

Post by natas_drol »

llimllib wrote: post #46

Again I would like to point out that to slander somebody, you must tell lies about them. Nobody is claiming that Adria is lying , even the person she's talking about. She is clearly not slandering anyone. (Please note: this does not mean that I'm taking a position in any way on this issue)

Except that the person most prominently featured in the photo (with his legible name badge) was not involved according to person who was fired. I haven't seen Adria, either on twitter or her blog, clarify which attendees in the photo were the ones making inappropriate comments.

I would say Alex Reid may have been libeled by Adria.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5403250

Re: The PyCon Incident

#318

Post by vor_ »

songzme wrote: post #157

This is blown way out of proportion. Adria has the right to post what bothers her on her blog. It is her blog. Read it and get over it. No one should get fired over this, and Sendgrid does not have to respond to something this trivial. If playhaven really fired Mr-Hank over this, then it's probably a shitty place to work anyways. I work in a place where no matter what mistakes I make, TokBox will always have my back.…

Nobody's arguing Adria doesn't have the right to post what bothers her on her blog. Just as much, the community has the right to vocalize their disagreement with her actions because of their potential consequences. On Twitter and elsewhere, many women have been criticizing her, not just for her overreaction to a type of humor they themselves use, but also because of the backwards effect on gender equality in tech this might have.

That said, the biggest question for me is why she seemed so upset by the joke when she made the very same type of joke in public with a friend. I'm finding it very difficult to see where she's coming from because of it.

Re: The PyCon Incident

#319

Post by rozap »

johnny4000 wrote: post #201
djcapelis wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Want to tell us which company you work for so we can all avoid doing business with firms who makes decisions about which technology to choose based on whether or not they like the recent tweets of a company's employees on their personal twitter accounts?

I think you misread sergiotapia's comment. They were objecting to how Sendgrid was supporting the actions of Richards. The tweet seemed like a poor example. I also don't see an issue with having non-technical attributes being part of the equation in the criteria for selecting a vendor. Price is clearly important, as can be a business' ethics; both are not technology related but can important depending on the circumst…

Thanks for the heads up on Mandrill, I'll check out their solution for when I launch my project.

Re: The PyCon Incident

#320

Post by zopticity »

There goes the saying, "innocent until found guilty".

So if I were a popular tech individual who decided to tweet about something I may misheard in a bad way, I can actually get someone fired. The company who fired the guys should have done some investigation instead of basing it off tweets. This is ridiculous; this is the number one reason why I never went back to PyCon.

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