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Final Statement on the LambdaConf Controversy

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Re: Final Statement on the LambdaConf Controversy

#71

Post by apsec112 »

phillmv wrote: post #63
apsec112 wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"But consider the following: I am a pro-choice atheist. When I lived in Ireland, one of my friends was a pro-life Christian. I thought she was responsible for the unnecessary suffering of millions of women. She thought I was responsible for killing millions of babies. And yet she invited me over to her house for dinner without poisoning the food. And I ate it, and thanked her, and sent her a nice card, without smashi…

Thought experiment: Is there no set of personal views sufficiently abhorrent to dissuade you from associating with a given person?

"Cooperation is unstable, in both game theory and evolutionary biology, without some kind of punishment for defection. So it's one thing to subtract points off someone's reputation for mistakes they make themselves, directly. But if you also look askance at someone for refusing to castigate a person or idea, then that is punishment of non-punishers, a far more dangerous idiom that can lock an equilibrium in place even if it's harmful to everyone involved." - http://lesswrong.com/lw/42/tolerate_tolerance/

Re: Final Statement on the LambdaConf Controversy

#72

Post by sparky_z »

phillmv wrote: post #63
apsec112 wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"But consider the following: I am a pro-choice atheist. When I lived in Ireland, one of my friends was a pro-life Christian. I thought she was responsible for the unnecessary suffering of millions of women. She thought I was responsible for killing millions of babies. And yet she invited me over to her house for dinner without poisoning the food. And I ate it, and thanked her, and sent her a nice card, without smashi…

Thought experiment: Is there no set of personal views sufficiently abhorrent to dissuade you from associating with a given person?

As long as they don't act on their views (except to write essays explaining and discussing them), then no.

If they were rude to me or to others (in a personal way), then I would not want to associate with them, but that's true of anybody regardless of their views.

Re: Final Statement on the LambdaConf Controversy

#73

Post by Swizec »

forrestthewoods wrote: post #43
lukev wrote: post #16

Of course, LambdaConf has every right to define its community in the way it sees fit. While their explanation does have a lot of logical appeal (see: https://www.facebook.com/notes/satnam-singh/dr-spock-vs-dive... ), it's important to remember that prospective attendees and speakers also have the right of free association. The fact is, I do wish to exclude myself from any community that deliberately includes Yarvin a…

Listening to a technical talk at a technical conference qualifies as drinking beer and breaking bread? I dunno about that. I've always felt that professional adults should be able to work with people who think different things that them. If you work in an office with 50+ people I guarantee you have coworkers who think horrible terrible things that you passionately disagree with. But that's ok. Because we're all profe…

Exactly this.

In 2012 there were 747,408 sex offenders in the US. The population was 314,100,000. This means 0.2% of the population are sex offenders.

So, ignoring clustering, if you work for a company with 500 people, then 1 of your coworkers is a sex offender.

For instance if you work for Facebook, 25 of your coworkers are sex offenders. How can you live with that? Should you quit on moral grounds because you can't work with sex offenders?

For a less extreme example. 44% of americans are "pro-life". How big of a company do you need to overcome clustering effects and have a coworker that believes the opposite of what you do? 10? 50?

Re: Final Statement on the LambdaConf Controversy

#74

Post by chipotle_coyote »

marklyon wrote: post #10
hoodoof wrote: post #4

Seems conferences are quite a controversial thing these days.

Agreed. In addition to "codes of conduct" that seem to assume all attendees are lecherous, racist rapists some conferences step outside their focus and end up turning away potential attendees. For example, this military member who really seems to be the target market for DjangoCon but who can't attend due to past pro-marijuana speakers. https://www.reddit.com/r/django/comments/4dihy4/django_train...

While I suppose there may be some codes of conduct out there that truly make those assumptions, most of the ones I've seen are simply predicated on the assumption that it's better to proactively make rules outlining acceptable behavior -- and, ideally, outlining both the ways complaints will be handled, including enforcement.

We'd all like to believe that "trust everyone to not to be jerks to one another" is code enough for any convention, and I get that "X, Y and Z will not be tolerated" can come across like taking sides in a debate. But establishing a CoC first is the social engineering equivalent of test-driven development. Handling complaints on an entirely ad hoc, subjective basis works as long as complaints remain relatively minor, but the failure mode can be pretty spectacular, and not in a good way.

Re: Final Statement on the LambdaConf Controversy

#75

Post by Moshe_Silnorin »

Aqueous wrote: post #35
danharaj wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That wasn't the point of protesting his presence at LambdaConf. The point was so that people who want to go to LambdaConf and feel threatened and humiliated by someone's enthusiastic support of racism and slavery don't have to associate with such a person. It is so exasperating that so many people who aren't denigrated and targeted by his hateful politics think this is a matter of abstract principle . Somehow, lettin…

In public life we have to - and should - encounter and tolerate people whose opinions we find abhorrent. I would much prefer a world where I feel emotional discomfort being in the presence of someone I loathe than a world where such a person is prohibited from ever being near me, because of social ostracism. It provides for a much richer marketplace of ideas. If you don't like him, protest him. Disturb him with your…

>If you don't like him, protest him.

How about just ignore him.

Re: Final Statement on the LambdaConf Controversy

#76

Post by antifasci »

eli_gottlieb wrote: post #55
tomp wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would love to hear a speech by Hitler. Regardless of his actions, he was a master persuader and accomplished (affected the world) in a decade more than most people couldn't in 1000 years! We could all learn a lot from him - which of course doesn't mean that we would have to use the skills for the same means he did.

>he was a master persuader and accomplished (affected the world) in a decade more than most people couldn't in 1000 years No. He accomplished what most people wouldn't and oughtn't in a thousand years.

Or just didn't until Stalin and Mao.

Re: Final Statement on the LambdaConf Controversy

#78

Post by OoTheNigerian »

Exceptionally lucid and captures every this I think of and aligns well with my position.

It is ironically said that fundamental Christians of today would give Jesus the hardest time if this was his Era.

Likewise, I have observed that the most "militantly liberal expousers" seem to be the most intolerant of other views.(I speak as an observer from outside the western world where this is prevalent)

I hope this is the end of this issue.

This response will serve as template for future moral police people

Re: Final Statement on the LambdaConf Controversy

#79

Post by st3v3r »

Kalium wrote: post #49
jordigh wrote: post #45

> Free speech advocates have gathered on one side, advocates for social justice on the other wtf Those two are supposed to be the same side. There's some really perverse twisting of words here to put social justice in opposition to free speech. How has the debate come to this?

A speaker-blind selection process selected a talk by someone who is considered by some to be offensive for reasons not directly relevant to the content of the talk.

Yet definitely relevant to the people who would choose to attend the conference. It's definitely going to make some people feel uncomfortable attending, knowing that they invited someone who believes that you are not deserving of human rights and dignity to speak.

Re: Final Statement on the LambdaConf Controversy

#80

Post by jasonwatkinspdx »

mikeash wrote: post #62
lukev wrote: post #16

Of course, LambdaConf has every right to define its community in the way it sees fit. While their explanation does have a lot of logical appeal (see: https://www.facebook.com/notes/satnam-singh/dr-spock-vs-dive... ), it's important to remember that prospective attendees and speakers also have the right of free association. The fact is, I do wish to exclude myself from any community that deliberately includes Yarvin a…

I've followed this saga with much confusion and I wonder if you could explain why you'd avoid a conference with a speaker like this. For me, if I'm evaluating a conference speaker, all I care about is: 1. Is the topic useful or interesting? 2. Is the speaker well informed and the content correct? 3. Does the speaker present the material well? I couldn't care less about them otherwise, and especially not their politic…

That's great for you, but you don't dictate whether people who see things differently have valid views or not.

Consider that what is "relevant" in your experience depends heavily on what kind of bullshit society throws your direction on a daily basis. It's easy to not see a problem here if you're not the group Yarvin advocates subjugating. If you are part of that group or empathize with it, things obviously looks a bit different.

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