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Bro pages: like man pages, but with examples only

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Re: Bro pages: like man pages, but with examples only

#361

Post by ufmace »

ilyanep wrote: post #231
overgard wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely, lets throw away our sense of humor and wordplay because there are theoretically people that might be offended (maybe, kindof. You know. In theory.). (N.B. the people that seem to be offended so far are offended on other peoples behalf..) Isn't it way more offensive to assume that women are such dainty delicate creatures that like, they won't get the joke?

http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/Not_a_woman http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/You%27re_the_sexist#.22Ta...

I think what bothers me the most about that site is how ideological their arguments get. It's all done under the banner of protecting women, but they've gone way beyond being about what any actual women think and care about, and are more about pushing their ideology of how everybody should think and act onto everyone. To them, the ideology is all-important and must be injected into all situations, no matter how tenuous the link. Anything that touches these subject without bowing to the ideology is forbidden and must be destroyed. To the point that you can't name a little help utility a cute play on words of a well-known utility without starting a huge frickin argument.

Re: Bro pages: like man pages, but with examples only

#362

Post by [deleted] »

glesica wrote: post #346
mumbi wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

for a man to be offended by this FOR the sake of women, you must be one pussy whipped mofo. let the down votes commence.

So because I find words and actions that might belittle another person offensive, there's something wrong with me? What would you call me if I objected to a racist joke? Would you claim that I was somehow "whipped" by the targeted minority group? Considering the feelings of others is not a defect, it's part of our humanity.

[deleted]

Re: Bro pages: like man pages, but with examples only

#363

Post by nacs »

glesica wrote: post #343
nacs wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Another offended man checking in. And yet you typed out a racist, highly offensive word (far more offensive than "bro" I'm pretty sure) in your own 2nd paragraph.

Are you joking? Seriously, I recently confused a sarcastic comment for a serious one on HN, so I'm asking honestly. Because if you're serious, then I just don't know where to start. I'll keep it short. Using a term to facilitate a discussion of that term is completely and entirely different from using it in other ways. I assumed the intellectual maturity of this audience was higher than it would be on, say, Reddit. P…

No I'm not joking. There are many more offended by the word you used than the word 'bro'. The discussion is not about race nor that word so it's not relevant.

Next time you argue over such an intellectually deep matter such as whether the word 'bro' may be offensive or not, you may wish to be a bit more cautious about the use of such words.

Re: Bro pages: like man pages, but with examples only

#364

Post by ilyanep »

smokeyj wrote: post #345
Pxtl wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Point. It's such a shame that gender politics have created so many thorny issues in our industry, but you can't bury your head in the sand and pretend they're not there. If we had good female representation in the industry and we didn't have a small cluster of vocal misogynists, we'd be able to make cute jokes that play on gender. But sadly, we don't live in that world. Yes, we need to hold ourselves to a higher stan…

> It's a funny joke, I love the name. Change it. Women everywhere will appreciate your valiant display of chivalry. They shall chant "Thank you Pxtl, for saving us from male privilege!".

Of course this is his desired outcome, because every man who works for gender equality is doing it for praise or because he wants to get laid.

Re: Bro pages: like man pages, but with examples only

#365

Post by Steuard »

InclinedPlane wrote: post #309
overgard wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely, lets throw away our sense of humor and wordplay because there are theoretically people that might be offended (maybe, kindof. You know. In theory.). (N.B. the people that seem to be offended so far are offended on other peoples behalf..) Isn't it way more offensive to assume that women are such dainty delicate creatures that like, they won't get the joke?

Sure. It's just one drop of water out of a clear blue sky. The sort of thing that is easily tolerable, hardly even a nuisance really. Maybe you don't have many female friends, maybe none of your female friends work in tech, and maybe you've never had any female coworkers. The fact is, for women in tech it's been raining, it's been raining every single day for decades. One drop is tolerable, but it's the unrelenting d…

Well said.

Re: Bro pages: like man pages, but with examples only

#366

Post by egypturnash »

donotsurveil wrote: post #254
overgard wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely, lets throw away our sense of humor and wordplay because there are theoretically people that might be offended (maybe, kindof. You know. In theory.). (N.B. the people that seem to be offended so far are offended on other peoples behalf..) Isn't it way more offensive to assume that women are such dainty delicate creatures that like, they won't get the joke?

English is not my mother tongue so maybe that's why I don't get the humor here, what wordplay are you talking about ? man is short for manual following a unix tradition, bro is a word associated with despicable attitude and stupid behavior holding those as life goals which has absolutely no link with its actual use. There is no way I'm sharing my library of command examples I built for myself over the years with this…

"man" is the English term for "an adult human male".

"bro" is short for "brother", and is a thing a certain set of English-speaking adolescent and adult males call each other to express their affection for each other.

"man" is a shortening of "manual", used to name a Unix command which will show you the docs for a command-line tool.

"bro" is a Unix command which will show you a brief example of how to use a command-line tool and nothing else. If you're lucky it may be exactly what you want to do. But probably not.

So the wordplay here: two three-letter words for a particular kind of guy, for Unix commands that tell you how to use other commands. And if they decide to change the name based on people objecting to the cultural assumptions they see in "bro", I'd suggest "guy". Or maybe "dude", which is a little longer, but always feels more laid-back and chilled-out to me than what "bro" has become.

Hope that helps!

Re: Bro pages: like man pages, but with examples only

#367

Post by overgard »

Steuard wrote: post #344
overgard wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In what way is this sexist? There is not a single word of disparagement on that site. Nobody in their right mind would say that the word "bro" is sexist unless they're explicitly looking to be offended. (IE: picking a fight)

The term "bro" has been closely associated in the tech world lately with things like "brogrammer" culture. I don't know whether that was the intended reference in this case (though it seems pretty likely to me that something of the sort was on the authors' minds when they chose the name: why else would the term feel relevant?). But the real issue isn't "What did they intend?" in any case: it's "What impact might this…

Here's the problem with your argument: since there's nothing actually hostile towards women on that page, what you're basically saying is that any expression of male culture at all is "hostile". It's like saying "stop being men! it's chasing all the women away!".

Re: Bro pages: like man pages, but with examples only

#368

Post by raganwald »

mumbi wrote: post #289
glesica wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another offended man checking in. Why is it so hard to accept that sexist language and actions are offensive to men? I suspect that most people would agree that white people can be offended by the use of terms like "nigger", or jokes about slavery. So then why can't men be offended by misogynistic language or jokes that are likely to create a hostile environment for women? I clicked, I saw the name and was a little t…

for a man to be offended by this FOR the sake of women, you must be one pussy whipped mofo. let the down votes commence.

I believe that Hacker News is worse off when it includes comments like yours. I don't know or care who you're talking to, the tone of what you're saying drags a good forum down past Reddit and into talk radio call-in territory. And even without the tone, the premise is puerile and an insult to good faith discussions.

Sometimes, a thing just stinks. It doesn't matter which way the wind blows the stink, it stinks. Your comment stinks.

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