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In defence of Douglas Crockford

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Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#321

Post by ufmace »

danso wrote: post #70
ageofwant wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Crockford would be well advised to spend some quality time with his libel lawyers. Nodevember and their associates need to be taught a lesson in respecting people and boundaries, other people have rights too. Virtue signalling between sjw and their groupies are amusing and entertaining, until its not. Crockford needs to bring the hammer down hard.

I can't resist being pedantic here. Nodevember's shitty tweet does not likely fall under "libel" because it's not a falsehood. It may be considered defamatory (and libel is a kind of defamation), in the way that "We've decided not to invite Douglas Crockford because we want to maintain an environment where children aren't abused" can be technically true but defamatory by insinuation. I justify being pedantic here, th…

This I'm going to agree with. One of the particularly odd things about the whole "social justice" craze is the desire to run everything through the legal system. It seems to be rooted in the idea that in any conflict, there must always be an authority figure to pronounce one side right and the other wrong, and there must be a visible, tangible punishment for the side deemed to be wrong, so they can be "taught a lesson" about how wrong they are. Maybe it's a lost art or not emotionally satisfying enough to just say that this person or group are being jerks and I don't want to deal with them anymore, including by trying to definitively prove to some authority figure why they are jerks.

Along those lines in this situation, I'm not really part of the Node/JS community, but I have at least heard of Crockford, and have never heard of Nodevember. It seems likely that the Nodevember people will suffer a lot more from this drama than Mr. Crockford. It seems petty and undignified to me for Crockford to start any kind of legal action, as they will probably suffer more from the lack of his presence and the drama related to this than any legal action would be likely to cause.

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#322

Post by gcb0 »

rtpg wrote: post #215
gnarbarian wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm willing to bet that he didn't pose any danger to these people other than having the gall to publicly harbor opinions they are uncomfortable with. In other words, diversity does not extend to diversity of opinion.

So what? The talk organizers were faced with a dilemma: either keep Crawford and lose a bunch of other speakers or lose Crawford but keep others I do think clarification is needed, but I could see "being a jerk " as a legit reason to not want to associate with someone. People do the same with people like Torvalds Being unliked is also a reason that people won't want to associate with you.

i would lose the bunch that can't hold their side in a ideological argument about their work and instead resort to ad hominem

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#323

Post by Udo »

whorleater wrote: post #12

Ignoring the fact this discussion about this, and this culture as a whole, is a minefield to navigate, it's important to note that Douglas Crockford can definitely be abrasive [1]. The issue at hand is that whether this abrasiveness is a bad thing, when compared to the contributions he's made and whether it leads to constructive discussions. The javascript developer who took offense (Kas?) definitely seems to have ta…

I think it's fair game to call ideas stupid, and that's what he did. It's his assessment, your opinion may be different, but in this case I'd personally say his judgement was correct.

As far as feedback on ideas goes, this is a harsh criticism, but it hasn't really crossed the line into abrasiveness because it's not a personal attack. It's just a given that even smart people can and do have stupid ideas. At no point did he say or imply anything about the person raising the idea.

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#324

Post by yardie »

coldtea wrote: post #277
yardie wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As an introverted white guy who lives in a foreign country, I feel that I am being discriminated against all the time. This is, literally, what it feels like to be a minority in the US and most European countries. Everything about you is questionable, you get slighted all the time, and you're the representative of an entire ethnicity. So whatever you do or opinions you hold are representative of the entire group.

Except if you make it to "fame/success status". Then you can use the minority card all the time in your favour.

More likely they are invoking their famous card. The minority card had no advantages.

Chris Rock pointed out that in being a black actor he is not allowed to make a bad/questionable movie. He makes one bad film and and all of black Hollywood is out of work for a year.

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#326

Post by ufmace »

vidarh wrote: post #62
aidenn0 wrote: post #40

My thoughts: Maybe someone can tell me what's offensive about the first comment. It seems to be poking fun at programmer machismo. The second quote is more problematic. I'm firmly of the opinion that it is not slut-shaming because it presented both promiscuity and commitment in a positive light. On the other hand, it is perfectly reasonable for a conference to not want sexual metaphors in presentations. The whole "he…

"Promiscuous" also has a long history in computer networking. E.g. network cards with "promiscuous mode" (allowing it to receive all available packets rather than only passing on packets with the correct address; not as relevant any more, but was commonly used to sniff packets on a hub, but also to implement aliases). Commitment is non-sexual and often used in all kinds of contexts that does not imply anything sexual…

I agree that those terms are clearly meant in a networking context, where they also have a long history. Interpreting it as slut-shaming seems like somebody who has zero interest or knowledge about technology or networking started listening to talks to try and find something that could be twisted into meaning something sexist.

I would hope that everybody with a genuine interest in technology finds these people ridiculous, and their constant demands to kick people out of things for nonsensical reasons more offense than anything that was supposedly said.

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#327

Post by thomasfoster96 »

lake99 wrote: post #282
thomasfoster96 wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The major difference there is that they actually identified the particular action that got him uninvited - and to Dawkins’ credit, (as far as I know) he deleted the offending tweets.

As for whether that constitutes a major difference or not, it's a judgement call. And I don't agree with your judgement. Here are the full facts, in their own words: NECSS: in response to Dr. Dawkins’ approving re-tweet of a highly offensive video. That's it. Because it was offensive. And Dawkins' reponse after continued attacks against him on Twitter: Dawkins: Don't you think she should apologise for shrieking "Shut…

It appears I didn't know everything about the Dawkins incident - disregard my comment.

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#328

Post by nopit »

douche wrote: post #211
wyldfire wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the significant change is that the tech community is growing to include other subcultures. And some of those subcultures bring new/different focuses on what's important to them. Also, I think there's some amount of momentum behind the legitimate disclosure of unacceptable behavior. The fact that many women and minorities lately feel unashamed in admitting that they were oppressed/assaulted/etc is a net win. T…

Hmm, so increasing diversity increases the level of friction and strife within a particular culture... What a novel concept. Eventually the people who just want to build shit and get things done will have to splinter off again and go back into an uncool cultural ghetto.

This is my worry as well.

Re: In defence of Douglas Crockford

#329

Post by BinaryIdiot »

prance wrote: post #239
BinaryIdiot wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Given information publicly available this seems infuriatingly ridiculous, but Nodevember's official statement in response seems quite reasonable: http://nodevember.org/statement.html That statement is the opposite of reasonable. If you're going to call someone out, publicly, that they're making other speakers uncomfortable to the point where they won't show up if he's there (when he was one of the first confirmed s…

No, absolutely reasonable. They say that multiple other speakers have stated that Crockford's "presence would make some speakers uncomfortable to the point where they refused to attend or speak." So they chose to prioritise them over him, something which they can totally do as organisers. Do they owe everyone a detailed explanation for that? I think not.

If you're going to give a vague insinuating tweet regarding him being uninvited then yes they need to clarify why otherwise how do I know there is even an issue here? Many tickets purchased by people would be to hear Crockford himself speak (he's a real crowd drawer in JS conferences). So if he did something wrong that's bad enough to make multiple speakers, those who actually wouldn't have to interact or deal with him much at all, then it needs to be public because it's apparently bad.

Alternatively if they don't want to say because, let's say he did do something awful and saying why would give the victim away, then why the original insinuation in the first place? Instead they should have went the professional route of simply saying he's no longer coming or something.

Ultimately we, while allowed to say almost anything,need to mind what we say about others. If someone is saying unsubstantiated things regarding someone else that could be career ending in this current climate. If it is substantiated then it should be brought to the attebtion of police or perhaps the public depending on what it is.

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