It's a tempting feeling to get, and a contagious one, but no—the only inconvenience we care about is that of HN readers who don't want to read tedious flamewars tacked like burning barnacles onto the top comment. I'm kind of glad you said that, though, because usually the sinister implication goes the other way, Gitlab being a YC-funded startup and all.
Speaking of convenience, it's not that inconvenient to scroll down to find the flamewar. Seems like a reasonable balance to me.
"don't think we'll succeed teaching white, male middle managers empathy and compassion anytime soon so let's limit their scope of damage"
So when this guy makes workshops to spread his bigotry he is fighting for inclusion and when I speak up I am fighting against diversity initiatives? Are you for real?
But it is hilarious that posts on gender and race issue get flagged to death, posts about class are always voted to the top, and anything that threatens the status quo spurs outrage.
I'm thinking of adding to the site guidelines to please not post generalizations about the HN community unless you have data. It seems almost always to be associated with low-information, divisive comments. I don't mean to pick on you personally; lots of users do it. But almost always in bad parts of threads.
Edit: also why I asked for the number of upvotes. According to him it was 45? That's a lot.
People cannot be taught empathy through corporate courses. It doesn't matter if they are straight, male, or whatever. Probably mentioned male middle managers because management is mostly male. I'm not this easily offended.
Definitely not, it was two steps further from the topic.
1) It was talking about a competitor's company, which is fine
2) It was talking about a non-technical aspect of the competitor's company
However I would love to see this topic come up more, just not on gitlab's stuff.
It's gotten to the point where the use of SJW is just shorthand for "I know I'm wrong, I just preferred it when people knew their place"
This distasteful subculture really exists, and - as with anti-vaxxers, birthers, the chemtrail people, white supremacists and other irrational movements - it poses a fundamental threat to the values on which reasonable discourse is built. People who are immersed in SJW culture (as with those other subcultures just mentioned) become increasing comfortable rejecting reason and facts. Imo all thinking people ought to be at least as concerned about today's SJWs as they are about those other movements.
So? 'Racist' is also pejorative. Racists exist and we ought to be able to discuss their existence and harms. SJWs exists and we ought to discuss their existence and their harms as well.
> It means "shut up and stay in your place"
I literally laughed out loud on reading this. Of course SJW doesn't mean anyone should stay in their place. Where do you get this outrageous idea? And what is that place, to you?
> In this particular case, the post I was replying t
I can't speak to the motives and thoughts of this particular speaker, but it seemed to me you were making a generalization about what 'SJW' really means, and making unwarranted claims about what we should be able to reliably infer from the mere use of the term.
What is a SJW?
> I literally laughed out loud on reading this. Of course SJW doesn't mean anyone should stay in their place. Where do you get this outrageous idea? And what is that place, to you?
I literally hope you enjoyed laughing out loud. What does SJW mean to you?
> I can't speak to the motives and thoughts of this particular speaker, but it seemed to me you were making a generalization about what 'SJW' really means, and making unwarranted claims about what we should be able to reliably infer from the mere use of the term.
You can't speak to this particular speaker's motives, but you can to mine? What does SJW mean to you?
I've already stated what SJW means to me, namely, the person using it is stating "I know I'm wrong, I just preferred it when people knew their place"
If you'd like me to expand upon that, I'd be glad to. I just don't understand where you're coming from.
https://twitter.com/_danilo/status/690601512813367297
http://www.breitbart.com/tech/2016/02/08/report-anti-white-a...
Neither is going so far to the end of the spectrum i.e. "too PC" isn't the opposite of racism either. Hired just because you're not white? Not really a self-esteem boost.
Being inclusive is what Github should be doing to counter racism without the racist sexist bigoted attitude.
How about white people at Github?
A white person living in the Big Island of Hawaii.. almost daily.
It never really bothered me when I lived on O'ahu. I know the difference between "damn haoles" and "fuckin' haoles", and I know which one I am.
Github is predominantly white and located in SF. Are white employees there suffering significant "actual discrimination" as the post a couple levels up alleges?
Sure, whites have messed up. Still do. But does that mean they can't be discriminated against?
It's a tactic that's been around for a long time. Redefine words. Then pretend everyone's using your new, made-up definitions, and claim you've won the argument.
Maybe I'm just starting to notice it, but the level of doublespeak is really astounding these days.
Racism for example means BOTH the individual belief in superiority/inferiority of a particular race AND the societal/systematic belief.
This is why there are debates about whether Racism still exists in America, or whether discrimination against White people is racist. It depends on the context.
No one's talking past anyone. It's obvious what's going on. They don't want to admit that non-Xs can be terribly racist. So they flip words around so they can, at worst, say "well they may have prejudice". They invent stuff like "reverse racism".
And in fact, that's what Github's code of conduct enshrines.
It's intellectually dishonest.
It is the only place I have lived where, as a white person, you are discriminated against on a daily basis.
It really really sucks. It also opens your eyes to what it feels like to be on the receiving end of racism.
You should be able to migrate quite easily without losing too much history.
http://doc.gitlab.com/ee/workflow/importing/import_projects_...
Elaboration : I feel like apologising for the knee jerk reaction. A tweet I would forgive, but that corporate slide in a corporation that aggressively claims to be social, inclusive, community etc. is simply terrible hypocrisy.
But anyway I checked with my PM and my team uses self hosted gitlab and the decision was purely technical :)
It might not be the impact they wanted.
It reminds me of how ardent fans of <anything> (programing language, framework, brand, etc) are usually its worst enemies. But doing what they are doing, they are working for the opposition in fact.
EDIT : I see the links below now.
> Our open source community prioritizes marginalized people’s safety over privileged people’s comfort. We will not act on complaints regarding:
>
> ‘Reverse’ -isms, including ‘reverse racism,’ ‘reverse sexism,’ and ‘cisphobia’
Do you mind explaining this a little bit?
The phrasing of the parent was "You are doing A so that B can happen.", which I thought was presumptive and unfair towards the other party.
I've known a lot of people who participate in the subculture of SJWs, and I'm confident that many of them have no conscious desire to be enablers of hatred and bigotry, not even hatred and bigotry towards white males. They simply don't understand the consequences of their beliefs.
> Caucasians in America have all the power
This does not excuse anti-white racism, and is often mostly irrelevant to situations involving individuals.
Many people, sadly, will use this observation to justify their personal bigotry against white people.
you already made up your mind that [white males] got
to where they are unfairly
One possibility is that white males really are that superior. We (white males) have the power because we're the best. Conversely, this would also of course imply that other groups like women and minorities are intrinsically inferior.
The other possibility is that the system really is tilted in the favor of certain groups, and that has affected the distribution of power and wealth that you see in America today.
I believe strongly in the second possibility and reject the first.
why would Caucasians desire equality if they benefit
from inequality
I respect the fact that many people feel that actions like minority hiring initiatives are in fact the opposite of a level playing field. In the most myopic possible sense, that is correct. In a broader sense, I do not agree.
Oh no!
> The other possibility is that the system really is tilted in the favor of certain groups, and that has affected the distribution of power and wealth that you see in America today
Wrong.
There is another possibility, which is that once upon a time the system was severely tilted, and for various complex reasons there is a _massive_ multi-generational delay between leveling the system seeing the results of leveling the system.
Consider how difficult and unlikely it is for a low income white male living in a trailer with, say, alcoholic anti-intellectual parents to, say, become one of the wealthiest people in the country.
If we eliminated racism, we would not eliminate all of the factors that work against black children who are born into poverty.
There is another possibility, which is that once upon
a time the system was severely tilted, and for various
complex reasons there is a _massive_ multi-generational
delay between leveling the system seeing the results of
leveling the system.
What's the functional difference between "living in a system that is severely tilted" and "living in a system that has allegedly been repaired, but in practice will remain tilted for a number of generations until this alleged new-found fairness has a chance to propagate through the system?"
To those affected, I think there would be no useful difference between the two. Long-term solutions do not preclude the need for short-term action.
Consider how difficult and unlikely it is for a low income
white male living in a trailer with, say, alcoholic anti-intellectual
parents to, say, become one of the wealthiest people in the
country.
To be clear: nobody is claiming otherwise. Regardless of your feelings about white priviledge, please understand that it does not involve the idea that all things are always easy for all white people.
The second half of your second quote does not at all reflect the intention behind my statements. When people go around thinking that a 'system' is broken, it is all too easy to be sloppy in one's thinking about what _exactly_ it is that is broken. The definition of the 'system' is easily, dynamically changed to meet the emotional needs or political goals of the thinker or speaker at that moment; and they lose sight of (or intentionally hide) the logical fallacies (or dishonesty) that occur as a result.
My first point is this: At any point in time, manifest inequality of results does NOT logically require that there is necessarily either inequality of ability or, at PRESENT, inequality of treatment by 'the system'. This over simplifies the situation and you presented it as a nice, tight, seemingly irrefutable logical argument from which one _must_ conclude that the system is presently tilted. (Either that, or own the identity of the particularly terrible kind of racist who thinks one race is intrinsically superior to another). This is not just logically wrong onto itself, it forms the foundation for bigoted thinking on a larger scale.
To answer your question, the critical difference lies in developing an accurate understanding of the true nature of the problems. If we walk around thinking "group X has less money then group Y, therefore there MUST be a problem of Xism towards group X which benefits group Y" we are not only being irrational, we are missing out of important opportunities to more effectively improve the condition of the world for all involved.
> Long-term solutions do not preclude the need for short-term action.
I don't see how this really applies, on the face of it. If theoretically there were _no_ racism in the US, it would take generations for blacks and whites to have equal results, for a variety of reasons including the effects of inter-generational poverty and classism. But what types of 'short term' race-related actions might be needed in the hypothetical world in which there is no longer any racism? Reparations?
I mentioned the example of some poverty afflicted white male to emphasize the difficulties that _poor_ people have, not to draw attention to the plight of any white males as a group. I used a white male as an example to really drive the point home about the lingering consequences of generations of racism; the racism of the past has left many of today's black people in poverty, and not even a (presumed advantaged) white male can easily overcome some of the effects of poverty.
> please understand that it does not involve the idea that all things are always easy for all white people.
Who gets to decide the one true meaning of white privilege? I've discussed this topic with hundreds of people, and can confidently say there is a small but still frighteningly large group of people out there who disagree with you.
> The definition of the 'system' is easily, dynamically changed
> At any point in time, manifest inequality of results does NOT logically
> require that there is necessarily either inequality of ability or, at
> PRESENT, inequality of treatment by 'the system'.
To a young black woman in America in 2016 feeling every possible effect of centuries of (allegedly corrected) mandated inequality and familial discontinuity in America, what do we say? Do we just tell her that all those problems have been fixed, and it's terribly unfortunate for her that she was born before that effects of those (alleged) corrections bear any kind of fruit for the majority of black people in America?
> If we walk around thinking "group X has less money then group Y, therefore
> there MUST be a problem of Xism towards group X which benefits group Y" we
> are not only being irrational, we are missing out of important opportunities
> to more effectively improve the condition of the world for all involved.
In the long run, sure, they really ought to improve the roads in my neighborhood so that I don't get so many flat tires. But in the meantime I'm not going to let my car sit there with four flat tires.
> I mentioned the example of some poverty afflicted white male to emphasize the
> difficulties that _poor_ people have
And hey, just so we're clear: my car doesn't really have flat tires, and the roads in my neighborhood are pretty good.
> But what types of 'short term' race-related actions might be needed in the
> hypothetical world in which there is no longer any racism? Reparations?
> Who gets to decide the one true meaning of white privilege? I've discussed this topic
> with hundreds of people, and can confidently say there is a small but still frighteningly
> large group of people out there who disagree with you.
Though I do question if maybe you misunderstood them. White privilege does not make everything easy, but it does actually suffuse most things. To take your theoretical example of an impoverished white male raised in an alcoholic household: while life certainly is not easy for that theoretical person, there are additional challenges he would face if he were black, female, etc.
And of course, one can certainly think of some situations where being white and male is actually a disadvantage. Again, not incompatible with the notion of white privilege or male privilege existing.
altruism or morality or may be people just want to be nice to each other...
>Of course, when you say equality and diversity, you mean >a reduction in white males, regardless of merit
Economics is not a zero-sum game.
>you already made up your mind that they got to where they are unfairly
Civilization is a new idea. May be we are all learning from the past and working towards a better future.
What happened in the world the last 2-3 years? It feels like someone took a shovel, dug up some old corpses from the graveyard of political culture and set them loose on the world again. Suddenly...
...people who call themselves 'feminist' start calling for what can only be described as a war between the sexes, given that they spout the opinion that males - preferably heterosexual, middle-aged 'white' males - are the cause of anything bad in the world. They obviously did not listen to Joe Jackson when, in 'Real Men', he sang 'and if there is war between the sexes then there will be no people left'.
...people who call themselves 'anti-racist' are trying to pull just about any public debate in a racial direction by claiming that it is all caused by the colour of the skin of whomever they're focusing on. Again, if that skin colour happens to be 'white' the person generally did something heinously wrong, while the same deed performed by someone who saw a bit more sun is either 'understandable' or 'justified' or 'caused by society being mean to (person)'...
...people who call themselves something between 'male' and 'female' start claiming that gender is nothing but a social construct and that there are really more than 50 'genders' and with that is it 'racist' to call someone 'he' or 'she' as it could be that person does not consider him/herself as either of those...
Meanwhile the real world is still full of REAL racism - just go and visit any middle-eastern country while being 'black' and you'll soon find out. For some reason the 'anti-racists' don't want to touch this subject, and other who do are quickly labelled 'racist' by them.
Meanwhile the real world is still full of REAL gender discrimination - just go and visit most middle-eastern countries (amongst others) while being female and you'll soon find out. The 'feminists' don't seem to want to speak up about this, instead they label those who do as, you guessed it, 'racist'.
Meanwhile the real world is still full of REAL discrimination against those with non-mainline sexual orientations. Again, just go to one of those middle-eastern countries I mentioned while being openly homosexual and you'll soon find out. For some reason the 'gender-denialists' are quiet about this, instead labelling those who do speak up as, again, 'racist'....
Meanwhile the position of women in the 'western' world is generally on a level with that of men, give or take a few cases of institutional gender preference. This does not mean that all professions have a 50/50 share of both (yes, both, male and female... not 'all 50') genders, eg. where I live (Sweden) nearly all veterinarians are women, nearly all lumberjacks are men, women are under-represented in IT but overrepresented in social functions, etc. Is this bad? Not necessarily, it depends on WHY there is a discrepancy. Is it because men are not allowed in veterinary college? Are women not allowed near computers? Of course not, this seems to be a case of personal choice. Are women incapable of handling chainsaws? No, they are not, but they are generally less strong than men and they don't feel at home in a group of men who talk about their favourite subjects of hunting, fishing and riding snow scooters (to take an example from our local - Swedish - culture). Does that mean those lumberjacks need to go to some re-education camp to learn to talk about more gender-neutral subjects? Of course not. Should women go to re-education camps to learn to talk about hunting, fishing and snow-scooter riding? No! Should there be male quota for vet schools to combat their under-representation in this field? No, if men want to become vets they can go to vet school. Something seems to keep them from doing that, maybe the fact that the field is female-dominated?
Fortunately there is no war between the sexes and men and women still get together to create more men and women. They create 'white' ones, brown ones, 'black' ones, 'yellow' ones, 'red' ones, etc. New humans who come to this world without prejudice about the colour of their skin, and - if they are lucky enough to live in one of those western countries which are largely free of REAL racism - should be able to live their lives to the fullest - unless the 'feminists', 'anti-racists', 'gender-denialists' (for lack of a better word) and other similarly befuddled people are successful in derailing the progress of the last few hundred years and throw us back into struggle and strife.
It is almost as if all these 'isms' (feminism, anti-racism, etc) are worried of becoming irrelevant due to the progress made on these fronts in the 'west' and started looking around for new 'causes'...
Even in context, apparently the background is an article called the "Trouble With White Women" (http://www.racismreview.com/blog/2014/01/28/trouble-white-wo...). It's hard to take seriously this article when it pretty much begins with the well known "friend argument" used by racists everywhere (http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Friend_argument).
While these people may be discussing some legitimate biases, countering racism / sexism with reverse racism / reverse sexism is completely wrongheaded.
No matter one's ethnicity, one should be against discrimination.