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How Basecamp Blew Up

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Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#651

Post by hinkley »

otde wrote: post #463

Bit of a fool’s errand to try and avoid politics at work — like a fish trying to avoid water in the ocean. The ways companies are built and maintained, the relationship between employers and employees, workplace requirements and benefits — all of these are shaped by and and built from political systems, to say nothing of how politics surrounding a person’s identity might affect their worldview. You’re never going to…

I think one of the reasons companies introduce matching donation programs is that it’s politically easier to manage than trying to pick five charities to support. Someone will have a loud reaction to whatever you chose. Matching makes you vote with your wallet. Put up or shut up.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#652

Post by drak0n1c »

otde wrote: post #392
treeman79 wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Had to quit a company last year due to bigotry. Constant bashing of white men on company calls. Exceptions if you were openly non straight. They also loved talking about how inclusive they were. Constant mocking of customer base, who was mostly traditional white people. I figure out quick I was hired only because they were desperate for someone with experience. Which sadly meant hiring an undesirable. At some point i…

I really tried not to take the bait here, but come on, dude, that last bit was especially rancid. You do get that we’re real human beings with rich internal lives like everyone else and not shallow, opportunistic crossdressers, yeah? I’d be mortified if I worked with someone who thought like this, and I’m glad I don’t.

Giving the parent comment a charitable and close reading, it seems to only be mocking the performative and fake-nice corporate checkbox culture engaged in by non-trans people that puts being trans on a pedestal, and is not directed toward trans people themselves.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#653

Post by skissane »

simondotau wrote: post #477
Tainnor wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That doesn't imply that I have to like his self-promotion book. After all, if I'm to read a book I want to get something out of it. As I already mentioned, the book has good parts, but it reads quite jarring in many places. Also, I guess this is personal, but a little humility is good for everyone, IMHO, and doesn't necessarily contradict a healthy dose of self-confidence either. DHH seems to have little of it — at l…

Just because someone isn't skilled at the traditional, mainstream Western methods of conveying empathy doesn't mean they actually lack empathy. This ought to be obvious when considering persons on the extreme end of the autism spectrum, but as time goes on we're learning that the spectrum might subtly encompass far more people than we ever realised. (With no small amount of irony, I find that many "normal" people hav…

> but as time goes on we're learning that the spectrum might subtly encompass far more people than we ever realised.

The autism spectrum is a continuum that fades into normality, with no clear boundary. Part of that continuum is individuals with broad autism phenotype (BAP), who have significantly more autistic traits than the average person does, but not enough to reach the diagnostic cutoff for ASD. That cutoff varies from clinician to clinician, and is moving over time, which renders the boundary between BAP and ASD particularly fuzzy.

> (With no small amount of irony, I find that many "normal" people have a very hard time truly empathising with the ways in which people on the spectrum are different.)

Damian Milton speaks of the "double empathy problem" – it is claimed that a defining trait of autism is deficits in empathy, and yet very many non-autistic people are at least as deficient in empathy for autistic people.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#654

Post by drak0n1c »

anm89 wrote: post #455
throthro111 wrote: post #160

I feel bad for everyone involved. This story made me realize that working at Basecamp is not something I would want to do in the future, primarily because DHH and Fried are so egotistic. However, it also makes me face the reality that I would not want to work with many of the people that resigned. Resigning over a random employee refusing to say that "white supremacy exists" is absurd. I imagine myself working at som…

He very clearly did not say "white supremecy does not exist". He said it didn't exist at the company. Those two things are very different.

It’s a catch-22. Princeton gave an excuse to be investigated by the federal government when the head admitted that they’re an institution of “white supremacy”

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#655

Post by dang »

cozuya wrote: post #71
tha0xa1 wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>What is the strawman? "No one sane", and then you build the Tucker Carlson strawman, and continue to use him, after we both conclude he's not "sane". > What is the whataboutism? Bringing up right-wing examples here when they were immaterial to my OP. These are textbook examples of strawmaning and whatabouting. >Tucker Carlson, one of the most popular "conservatives", opposes racial equality Where did he oppose racia…

You're just playing word games to refuse to back down on your ridiculous statement, which, again, was: "No one sane opposes racial equality, conservative or liberal." Do you think Americans and the world really don't remember the past 5 years? Do you think we don't remember The Former Guy coming to relevance specifically because of the racist "birtherism" movement, or calling Mexicans rapists? Are those the actions o…

Since you've been using HN primarily for ideological battle and have ignored our request to stop, I've banned this account. We ban accounts that do that, regardless of what ideology they're battling for, because it destroys the curious conversation this site is supposed to be for. Curious conversation is not about smiting enemies; those two things are in disjoint ranges.

https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#656

Post by SideburnsOfDoom »

anm89 wrote: post #455
throthro111 wrote: post #160

I feel bad for everyone involved. This story made me realize that working at Basecamp is not something I would want to do in the future, primarily because DHH and Fried are so egotistic. However, it also makes me face the reality that I would not want to work with many of the people that resigned. Resigning over a random employee refusing to say that "white supremacy exists" is absurd. I imagine myself working at som…

He very clearly did not say "white supremecy does not exist". He said it didn't exist at the company. Those two things are very different.

Singer alternated saying "white supremacy does not exist at BaseCamp" and posting articles off Breitbart into the company chats. Yeeesh.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#657

Post by gustavo-fring »

jolux wrote: post #615
gustavo-fring wrote: post #606

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes and the discussion is about how we do conflate the two, sometimes correctly and sometimes incorrectly.

The discussion is about how a company should handle a situation where one employee is making a significant number of others feel unwelcome because of the color of their skin or their commitment to anti-racism. Party politics only factors into it if you think people make decisions about who to associate with primarily by extrapolating voting habits from others’ behavior instead of assessing the behavior itself.

I get what you are saying. What led to my jumping off to that topic is the original post gets into the usual "politics is everywhere" meme (paraphrasing). If this is the case then the discussion about parties is more than a littel relevant.

I'm trying to get across where the pushback comes from on seemingly obvious issues like racism.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#658

Post by gustavo-fring »

gustavo-fring wrote: post #624
jolux wrote: post #621

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You should look at the political career of Lee Atwater if you haven’t, he was a Republican political consultant who was uncharacteristically candid about his methodology. At the very least, he thought Southern Strategy-style tactics were politically successful, and he may have been mistaken, but I think it’s hard to argue they didn’t exist.

He's famous for spreading racist rumors about McCain (he had adopted a darker-skinned girl) during the 2000 primaries. There's a documentary about him. Boogeyman? Something like that.

...that was actually Karl Rove, his protege.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#659

Post by SamReidHughes »

otde wrote: post #392
treeman79 wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Had to quit a company last year due to bigotry. Constant bashing of white men on company calls. Exceptions if you were openly non straight. They also loved talking about how inclusive they were. Constant mocking of customer base, who was mostly traditional white people. I figure out quick I was hired only because they were desperate for someone with experience. Which sadly meant hiring an undesirable. At some point i…

I really tried not to take the bait here, but come on, dude, that last bit was especially rancid. You do get that we’re real human beings with rich internal lives like everyone else and not shallow, opportunistic crossdressers, yeah? I’d be mortified if I worked with someone who thought like this, and I’m glad I don’t.

California has already passed a law that says he can only get certain jobs if he puts on a dress.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#660

Post by simondotau »

skissane wrote: post #653
simondotau wrote: post #477

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just because someone isn't skilled at the traditional, mainstream Western methods of conveying empathy doesn't mean they actually lack empathy. This ought to be obvious when considering persons on the extreme end of the autism spectrum, but as time goes on we're learning that the spectrum might subtly encompass far more people than we ever realised. (With no small amount of irony, I find that many "normal" people hav…

> but as time goes on we're learning that the spectrum might subtly encompass far more people than we ever realised. The autism spectrum is a continuum that fades into normality, with no clear boundary. Part of that continuum is individuals with broad autism phenotype (BAP), who have significantly more autistic traits than the average person does, but not enough to reach the diagnostic cutoff for ASD. That cutoff var…

Thanks, an interesting response. I will look into Damian Milton.

Based on my own experiences (which are very limited) I don't see a deficit of empathy in people on the spectrum. What I do see is someone who sees the world differently (has a different kind of "filter" to distinguish signal from noise) which causes the response to stimulus to be different. If you see the world differently, your internal model of what another person is is different, and therefore the way one expresses their empathy is different.

Arguably this isn't so different to how concepts of honour and respect can vary greatly between cultures.

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