Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

A Difficult Situation

blog.sendgrid.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

441–450 of 485 posts

Re: A Difficult Situation

#441

Post by trhtrsh »

powertower wrote: post #98

They need to update that statement with the fact that the joke was not about her, nor directed at her. Their statement leaves that very important part out, making the reader think otherwise - that she was the victim. At the same time (or around that time) this was happening, here is a conversation she was having - http://i.imgur.com/nRC5J7f.png Another gem from years ago - http://imgur.com/5tbXR2c I'd imagine she was…

It's a bit surprising that someone who behaves as screencapped here is capable of getting through an interview and N weeks on the job as a professional PR person.

There must be some awkward conversations over at SendGrid HQ about how she got hired in the first place and what might have been happening since that they haven't noticed yet.

Re: A Difficult Situation

#443

Post by trhtrsh »

seivan wrote: post #301
base698 wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What happened was bad taste to be sure, but it isn't sexism. If they made a comment asking why all the women in the audience aren't bringing them beer that would be sexist. Using sexual language is not by itself sufficient for sexism. It is bad taste and an argument could be made it should be rooted out in a professional environment, but it shouldn't be confused with actual sexism. Sexism: Belief one of the sexes can…

I agree, you can't put South Park there, makes me think all the satirical points just went above your head. Have you actually seen an episode and get the point of the episode it makes (usually at the end by either Stanley or Kyle) But then again I'd even go so far and put Abercrombie under racism. You seen their Singaporean ads?

I think you'll find that a major part of South Park's popularity is not its satire, but its juvenile humor.

Re: A Difficult Situation

#445

Post by devilshaircut »

xshoppyx wrote: post #416
powertower wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It depends on your definition of racism racism - dictionary 1.The belief that all members of each race possess characteristics or abilities specific to that race, esp. so as to distinguish it as inferior or superior to another race or races. 2.Prejudice or discrimination directed against someone of a different race based on such a belief. This is the original definition of the word - 1 year ago, 10 years ago, 100 y…

I was drinking with an Asian co-worker at work today and something somewhat relevant came up. A 3rd coworker asked my Asian coworker "Are you ok? Your face is red and puffy". And then he stated that Asians (saying all Asians is probably a generalization, but for this example let's assume it is true) lack an enzyme to process alcohol and that Asians are essentially allergic to alcohol. Under this definition, would it…

"they never evolved to possess the same enzyme"

... what? Asians are the same species as every other race. The idea that Asians somehow did not evolve this particular thing has nothing to do with the genetic change over time that causes speciation/evolution. I think you grossly misunderstand evolution and that your remarks are ignorant (and I think many people would claim racist).

Re: A Difficult Situation

#446

Post by _pmf_ »

cletus wrote: post #318

I'm honestly surprised that anyone is attacking Sendgrid, defending Ms Richards, attacking PyCon or defending Playhaven in this incident. The fact is that what you do reflects on your employer to a degree. If you're a developer evangelist, that's quite a high degree, particularly if you drag them into your public spat. Most people in the media (news readers and so forth) have a "morals clause" in their contract becau…

> I'm honestly surprised that anyone is attacking Sendgrid, defending Ms Richards, attacking PyCon or defending Playhaven in this incident.

Indeed. SendGrid did not have many options there. Playhaven, on the other side, could have dealt with the situation in a graceful and humane manner (absolutely nothing would have been lost if they just temporarily suspended the guy), but chose not to.

Re: A Difficult Situation

#447

Post by jennyjenjen »

benjiweber wrote: post #437
jennyjenjen wrote: post #397

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish I could say that I'm surprised that anyone is attacking SendGrid. Even though they have done nothing to deserve such backlash - both before and after firing Adria Richards - it doesn't surprise me in the least that people are taking the opportunity to unleash hateful comments and demonstrate poor attitudes. I agree with you all the way, other than that. SendGrid made a great case for departing with Ms. Richard…

> Even though they have done nothing to deserve such backlash They fired an employee without due process. Apparently a knee-jerk reaction rather than considered disciplinary process. They capitulated to an anonymous DDOS. Even with a ridiculous demand. Giving the impression they were not technically able to bring the service back up by themselves. Neither of these gives me confidence in trusting SendGrid with email.…

> They fired an employee without due process. Apparently a knee-jerk reaction rather than considered disciplinary process.

How do you know? Are you at SendGrid? Did you speak to Adria? Have you talked with the founders, CEO, legal counsel?

Colorado, like California, is an employment-at-will state and has been since 1987. The employer may terminate an employee for a million reasons under the sun. IANAL but I think most other people who have been in the working world more than a few years understand what that means.

In a way, I was incorrect... they did do a few things to deserve such backlash. They lacked tact in their initial posts about firing Ms. Richards. They should've led with the "Difficult Situation" post. If you read the post, which they finally churned out a few hours after declaring her employment terminated, you can see that it wasn't terribly rash. They certainly thought it out. Would you have held onto an employee you couldn't trust?

As for their technical abilities, I'm not able to judge that - so you may be correct about such competencies. However, "due process" isn't necessarily for firing an employee in Colorado, and besides, we don't know what went on as this developed and how the company actually went about terminating Ms. Richards' employment. We may find that out soon.

Re: A Difficult Situation

#448

Post by abcd_f »

cletus wrote: post #318

I'm honestly surprised that anyone is attacking Sendgrid, defending Ms Richards, attacking PyCon or defending Playhaven in this incident. The fact is that what you do reflects on your employer to a degree. If you're a developer evangelist, that's quite a high degree, particularly if you drag them into your public spat. Most people in the media (news readers and so forth) have a "morals clause" in their contract becau…

> Some other commenters suggest Ms Richards can sue

That will completely total what's left of her reputation and the re-employment perspectives. She appears to be a "people's person" thriving on social interaction, but nobody likes litigious persons.

Re: A Difficult Situation

#449

Post by jennyjenjen »

kamkazemoose wrote: post #439
jennyjenjen wrote: post #397

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish I could say that I'm surprised that anyone is attacking SendGrid. Even though they have done nothing to deserve such backlash - both before and after firing Adria Richards - it doesn't surprise me in the least that people are taking the opportunity to unleash hateful comments and demonstrate poor attitudes. I agree with you all the way, other than that. SendGrid made a great case for departing with Ms. Richard…

I agree that the backlash to SendGrid has been extreme, and an overreaction, but I feel that they were at least partially to blame before firing Ms. Richards. She stated the SendGrid supported her actions, and without SendGrid saying anything, they are implicitly agreeing that they support her. So I feel people have a right to be angry with SendGrid for supporting Ms. Richards, and I understand people who wrote them…

I see what you're saying. I'm not entirely sure I agree, especially since they waited for a while to come out with commentary about it. Additionally, although she said that they support her, that may have never been true. But I see what you're saying and that's legitimate.

Re: A Difficult Situation

#450

Post by oelmekki »

cletus wrote: post #318

I'm honestly surprised that anyone is attacking Sendgrid, defending Ms Richards, attacking PyCon or defending Playhaven in this incident. The fact is that what you do reflects on your employer to a degree. If you're a developer evangelist, that's quite a high degree, particularly if you drag them into your public spat. Most people in the media (news readers and so forth) have a "morals clause" in their contract becau…

> Most people in the media (news readers and so forth) have a "morals clause" in their contract because they publicly represent the company. This situation is much the same.

Indeed, community manager (call that evangelist if you want to) is a weird job. You're supposed to be social, natural - to be as you would be in private life. In cases like these, you're even supposed to use your own identity to support the brand : you are someone real, that get in touch with real people in the most friendly fashion.

But you can't be yourself too much. That's a problem here, since you don't have any other "real" identity. You have to be the brand and as such, everything you do and say is backed up by the brand.

Adria used her own personal twitter account to make her statement, that sounds legitimate. But developer has been fired because she had the weight of sendgrid brand.

That's something very pervert in the community manager / evangelist job : you sell your social self (something I guess politicians know well).

On a side note, I'm quite surprised this can happen in the US, which places free speech as the one and most important right. Not when related to business.

Post reply on HN