We "all" laugh at jokes that are funny until we hear one that "isn't so funny" because it targets something painful in us.

For example, I'm pretty damn tired of all jokes about Balkans, ex-Yugoslavia, Serbia, etc. A lot of them are even true, but after several wars and a bombing campaign from NATO and leaving the country because I feel deserve a future denied to me by choices of previous generations, let's just say that I can't appreciate that particular humor anymore.

Now, imagine being a woman. Imagine growing up with TV cartoons grooming you to become a princess, a fashion model or, if you failed at that, a housewife. Imagine getting only a certain kind of gifts for birthday, in certain colors. Imagine people paying more attention to your breasts than what you're saying to them. And then imagine hearing sexist jokes since you were a kid. Would you really find a sexist joke funny at a conference?

By the way, I don't think that it is appropriate to show people in underwear at a conference unless it is relevant. I am just pointing out that what you said could easily be applied to men.

I've seen your other comments and I think you're consistently overreacting. Scalzi's essay is there to simply introduce a metaphor to explain why straight white males, on the average, have it easier than other groups. It's not there to condone or promote sexism (or racism or any other unfair discrimination) towards straight white males.

If your whole point is "well, it's not right to be sexist towards men either", then I agree with you completely, but the relevance of your claim is questionable in this discussion because: 1) nobody originally claimed it's right to be sexist to men and 2) sexism towards women is so much more prevalent, especially in our industry, that it's a problem that has higher priority than sexism towards men.

Please explain to me how boys do not hear sexist jokes towards men but girls hear sexist jokes towards women.

>Our society is not equally sexist to men and women.

I never claimed that it was but I am sick of this complete denial that sexism towards men is an issue and is arguably as big an issue as sexism towards women.

>Scalzi's essay is there to simply introduce a metaphor to explain why straight white males, on the average, have it easier than other groups.

Yes but Scalzi's metaphor does nothing to explain "why" at all. There is no evidence presented. It just presents a metaphor that explains what he thinks is going on not what causes it or if it even exists in the way he thinks it does. Is there some part of it that I am missing?

>It's not there to condone or promote sexism (or racism or any other unfair discrimination) towards straight white males.

It could be argued that constantly telling men (and boys) that they have it easier without presenting evidence of specific areas where this is true is sexist as well as damaging to both men and women.

>If your whole point is "well, it's not right to be sexist towards men either", then I agree with you completely, but the relevance of your claim is questionable in this discussion

My original comment was in reply to klodolph's assertion that sexism towards men is so far fetched that one needs to imagine some alternate reality to our own where sexism towards men exists in order for a man to understand sexism. My argument is that it does exist in this reality and it is far more wide spread than people would have you believe. Klodolph claims that I misunderstood their use of this alternate reality argument so that makes my original comment pointless. Subsequently, halostatue replied with an extremely frustrating comment that suggested that any issue a man has with regards to sexism is always inconsequential because some author wrote a blog post where he claims that men always have it easier to anyone else in the same position. Not only does that make very little sense but condoning the dismissal of sexism towards men in such a way is sexist in itself.

I replied to your post because I am tired of this belief that men need to imagine what sexism feels like in order to understand it. We don't need to imagine what sexism feels like because we experience it all of the time, just like women do.

>1) nobody originally claimed it's right to be sexist to men

Yes nobody claimed that it's right to be sexist towards men but no one seems to acknowledge that it even exists on the scale that it does.

>sexism towards women is so much more prevalent, especially in our industry, that it's a problem that has higher priority than sexism towards men.

This is difficult. I honestly do not know which type of sexism is more prevalent but I feel that that is irrelevant because sexism needs to be seen as a single issue, not as two different issues. In order to get rid of sexism you need to do it in a non sexist way otherwise, you are merely shifting sexism from one group to another. Perpetrating sexism towards men in order to solve (or while solving) sexism towards women does nothing but but cause anger and frustration among men and women.

Matter of scale, as before. For every sexist-to-men joke I've heard as a kid, I've heard more than ten sexist-to-women jokes.

I never claimed that it was but I am sick of this complete denial that sexism towards men is an issue and is arguably as big an issue as sexism towards women.

There's no denial that sexism towards men exists. What is being constantly denied is that it's a valid argument in the debates about sexism towards women. Literally every time someone is discussing sexism towards women there's someone -- to be blunt, someone like you -- who says something along the lines of "But, but, there's sexism towards men, too and it ain't right!"

Yes, there's sexism towards men and no, it's not right, but you're derailing the discussion of a more pressing issue: sexism towards women.

No, it's not "arguably as big an issue as sexism towards women", because of the scale and history. Again, it's something pretty well described in "The Distress of the Privileged".

Yes but Scalzi's metaphor does nothing to explain "why" at all. There is no evidence presented. It just presents a metaphor that explains what he thinks is going on not what causes it or if it even exists in the way he thinks it does. Is there some part of it that I am missing?

Yes, you're missing the part called "required reading". It's just like reading an article about using matrices in 3D graphics: you're expected to know basic arithmetic operations such as adding, subtraction, multiplication, etc.

Scalzi's essay presents a way of explaining a phenomenon that has been described and analyzed in a myriad of other places to which you have easy access.

It could be argued that constantly telling men (and boys) that they have it easier without presenting evidence of specific areas where this is true is sexist as well as damaging to both men and women.

That's like arguing that swimming against the current will necessarily move you upriver, without considering how fast you're swimming and how fast the current is.

People are telling men (and boys) that they have it easier because they're still living in the world where it's normal for them to have it easier without even knowing it.

Yes nobody claimed that it's right to be sexist towards men but no one seems to acknowledge that it even exists on the scale that it does.

That's because the scale on which it exists in the areas of the society we're usually discussing (i.e. tech industry) is nothing compared to the scale on which sexism towards women exists in those same areas.

I agree with you that traditional gender roles that are still being imposed on both men and women are just as sexist towards men as they are towards women. Case in point: in the school, a kid is not considered manly if he doesn't conform to those gender preconceptions (hold your drink, have a pretty girlfriend, be muscular and/or athletic).

I honestly do not know which type of sexism is more prevalent but I feel that that is irrelevant because sexism needs to be seen as a single issue, not as two different issues.

That's tricky. You can "see it" as equally wrong and punish it equally, but that's not all there is to handling and countering sexism.

In order to get rid of sexism you need to do it in a non sexist way otherwise, you are merely shifting sexism from one group to another.

I agree that countering sexism to women by being sexist to men is a case of two wrongs not making a right. What I disagree with is your claim that informing men of prevalence of sexism towards women is sexist in itself. What I also disagree with is the idea that men are being equally harmed by whatever degree of sexism towards them exists currently as women are harmed by the degree of sexism that is currently leveled against them.

I do disagree with a number of points in your reply but I am not going to respond to them because then you will respond to my reply and so on without us getting anywhere. This is futile. Agree to disagree but hopefully you three will try to look at things with a slightly more open mind and I will do the same.

> I mean, where does this political correctness stop

It seems really obvious to me. At work, at a conference, you don't tell racist, sexist, ableist etc jokes. What you do outside work is up to you. (But, if you do it outside work and in public it may complicate things if you have a work related discrimination problem.)

> political correctness

"Political correctness" is often a buzzword used to dismiss people who want to discuss this. Other, better, words exist. "Politeness" is one.

"Freedom of expression" is another, though.

Just wanted to highlight this response from coldtea below because it's spot on.

I don't have first amendment rights, as I'm not American. And the cliches and Prudishness of one specific society do not universal "basic human decency" constitute.

Or, as Bernard Shaw put it: "Pardon him, Theodotus. He is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature."

This is not "freedom of expression" being under attack. It is, at most, about let's maybe not so much invite guys like that to talk at conferences.

It's not about "politics" as in the narrow sphere of political affairs (democrats, republicans, voting etc).

It's about "political" in the wider sense (that is "trying to be tactful", not to annoy various sides, etc).

No, that's a false etymology. The term "politically correct" in its modern usage came from leftist movements in the 70s to describe politics (not in the broad sense of "tact"). Think of it as a synonym for "ideologically sound". The civil rights movement was definitely about politics, not tact. The term "politically correct" was then appropriated by the same leftist movements and used sarcastically to parody themselves.

Afterwards, it entered the general lexicon.

It's not about etymology. It's about usage. The term has a long history and differing uses. The etymology does not matter (it rarely does, and if it does it's mostly for historical reasons).

It's the use of the word that matters.

That's your way of advocating for more politeness? Just goes to show the hypocrisy of the whole thing.

I'm even _more_ for an egalitarian society. And far more actually than merely getting some "bikini slides" off of tech presentations or ensuring women make the same as men.

I don't want women and men being paid less than other men and women and being treated as trash in the first place. That is, i'm a pro-left, in the marxist tradition. Now, do I get to call you a "coward" or a "capitalist pig" if you don't agree with me in this issue?

Furthermore, is a place full of actual and wannabe startup founders/millionaires, the place to accuse me of "hiding behind my own narcissistic conception of freedom and unexamined privilege"?

I find gagging on the gnat of "sexist slides" while digesting the camel of economic inequality hypocritical and counter-productive.

Bosses don't pay women less because they are sexist. They pay them less because they can (e.g talking advantage of the fact that women get maternal leave, or are better at work-life balance than men, and thus deemed less "devoted" to the company and such BS). If they could, they would pay anyone less (and when they can, they do). It's not about making them less "sexist" (there are women bosses that also pay women employees less). It's about making LAWS to force them to give equal pay for the same job description.

The simple fact is that "jokes" which reinforce current power structure are not good jokes. As a man you don't get to decide how women should feel about scantily clad ladies in technical talk slides, just as a white person you don't get to tell black people how they should feel about affirmative action. When you make philosophical proclamations about the world from a position of power you're no different from a jock making fun of a nerd because "he looks funny".

Just a modicum of empathy is all that people want in the vast majority of cases.

Famously? People have been making jokes about farse worse matters than rape for millenia. From war, to incurable illness, to genocide, to torture, to the plague, everything has been made into the subject of a joke.

It might be a novel concept for a prudish, politically correct section society, but it's historically true.

Nothing. It has to do with the "proved" part. Something known to be true man for millennia does not get "proved".

How could you possibly come to the conclusion that "jokes which reinforce the current power structure" are equivalent to jokes about dead babies, torture or genocide? Especially after I opened my comment explaining that yes, in fact, you can make a joke about any subject matter. It's like you didn't even read my comment at all, you just glanced a keyword signifying a binary position and then you decided to dump your preconceived opinion here.

What do you think about the assymetry of, for example, the classic "[A], [B], [C] walk into a bar" jokes, where an ethnic /racial/profession/etc group C is crudely belittled and made fun of?

In practice, such jokes are seen as acceptable if C is a major/nonthreatened group, but the exact same joke would be offensive if C is swapped to a smaller/more vulnerable faction - does that match what you feel?

Maybe race related jokes don't have a place at conferences and work places - I am not sure - but there should be room for jokes about race somewhere, right? I mean, where does this political correctness stop?

When you are exclusively in the company of people who know you well enough to tell precisely how ironic you are or aren't being.

There's a big difference between making race/sex jokes with people who realise you are being ironic + actually have no problem with it (I emphasise actually!), vs. when you are actually demeaning someone and they are __in the room__ at the time.

There's definitely a big problem with sexism in our industry (+ elsewhere too clearly.)

A thought experiment: somebody gets up on stage and presents a slide saying 'so simple that even blacks can use it!'

There's a degree to which in any society where it's ok to make 'jokes' or comments with an edge, when the group in question is to some degree subjugated. That still remains the case with women to a large degree, far less so race (at least openly in the west), and 100% is the case with weight. It's worth stopping and taking a look at that.

Now, not all of those jokes fit into any environment. And neither should fun be derived from putting someone else down, like racist or sexist jokes do. And then, there's always the question of "what's funny?" So the best way to handle things is: The more people listen to you, the more you err at the side of caution.

Racism is a different thing than "jokes about race".

A joke about race can be very funny, both ways. A racist joke, is just racism.

I'm am not going to down vote you, but I hope you understand the difference.

Prejudice against privileged groups isn't met with as much outrage as prejudice against unprivileged groups, and this is as it should be. Both are harmful, but the harm of the former is tiny in comparison to the harm of the latter.

This gets complicated when we consider that treating underprivileged groups as the proverbial 5-year-old children can also be a problem, such as when we assume they're incapable of speaking cogently for themselves, and so on. It's a difficult problem, which is why these kinds of topics always generate 100+ comment threads and much simpler topics do not.

That's why people called grown Black men "boy" back in the day - it's egregiously racist and infantilizing to African Americans.

One view says that fairness is about aggregate outcomes. We can observe that certain groups appear to be suffering from poor outcomes, and we regard this as unfair to members of those groups. We also recognise the historical factors involved in producing those outcomes. So, we might say "Women are under-represented in the software industry. This is because there are fewer women with relevant skills. But this is because of a legacy of centuries of sexist discrimination against women, and the only way to correct this is to perform some balancing discrimination in favour of women now". This view has no problem in recognising that women can be, on average, "inferior" (less experienced, say) programmers, but says that if they are inferior then it is because of historical factors and not any innate characteristic of women.

The other view says that fairness is about individual acts. It's unfair to take certain aspects of a person's identity (e.g. gender) into account when evaluating a person, so we don't do that. It's unfair to act in a way that makes people of certain identities uncomfortable or disadvantages them in group situations, so we don't do that. Since advantage is relative, it's also wrong to act in a way that benefits only people of a certain identity. They think that disadvantaging someone because of their identity is unfair to that person, and even giving a person a positive advantage is unfair to them because it demeans their real achievements.

Followers of the two ethical frameworks have a lot of trouble understanding each other. The second group thinks fairness is about acting fairly towards individuals, and thinks that it would be wrong to treat a woman differently from a man, since that is, after all, the sine qua non of sexism. But this also rules out giving the women a positive advantage. This directly conflicts with the notion of fairness held by the first group. They will, bizarrely, both describe the other group as being 'sexist' - group one for believing that it's legitimate to treat women differently from men (but only if it is done to correct a historical imbalance), and group two for arguing that it's wrong to consider gender when dealing with someone, because this ignores historical and systemic factors.

I lean towards the individualist position myself, but it's not wrong to worry about the systemic factors and the aggregate outcomes. I also suspect that whilst the philosophical debate is very entertaining, it's also not very relevant to day-to-day life, which would be vastly improved by putting the philosophy to one side and just being a bit nicer to each other.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_slave_trade

Now, start your talk please

The problem arises when sexist jokes aren't regarded as intentionally offensive, and the discourse is internalized to the point where sexism is regarded as being funny, because it's sexism.

I don't see a lot of "funny" racism - if any - in the industry, and I think it's because we've come much farther, when it relates to race - and to some degree sexuality as well.

Comedian Stewart Lee is good at describing this mentality: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgABbHPdwH4.

Can I turn that around? Can I instead answer "When should the jokes about gender stop?" They should stop when they begin to offend someone or to marginalize them.

Now, when hanging out with a couple of your friends, you probably have the social skills, the ability to discern body language to be able to tell when someone gets offended and back off. Or maybe you don't: maybe, like me, you aren't especially good at reading nonverbal cues, in which case you should realize that about yourself and tread less close to the line.

But when presenting at a conference? When sending out a company-wide email? You don't have the skill to tell what will be a problem and what will be funny: NO ONE has that skill. So stick to the things that you are sure won't offend anyone.

Unless you're the kind of person who thinks it's just FINE to exclude or offend a few "sensitive" individuals as long as you get a chuckle from most of the room. If you're that kind of person then I don't want to associate with you anyway.

You should be allowed (both legally and morally) to make crude fun of leaders and politicians, including the leader of your country and leaders of companies, parties and NGOs.

You should be allowed (both legally and morally) to make crude fun of people's habits, including the current religious practices of your country or other peoples.

These are important core freedoms to have - but these already offend some people SO much, up to and including murder, that the other sensitive topics (racism,sexism,etc) pale in comparison.

To be fair, the examples given are, I think, sexist, and there for titillation. These examples aren't jokes, they are, er illustration.

On the other hand, women are beautiful to look at, and using women in this way does, I'm afraid, help bind information in to the male head. That is why sex is used so much in advertising. Until men are completely de-sexed in some creepy way, I don't see this changing much.

I dunno, I just don't like the idea of giving up being a "man" and having man feelings. And I feel like this sort of feminism is all about women being women at the expense of men being men. None of that means women should be mis-treated in the work place, underpaid, or even slightly harassed. But I do think a bit of understanding both ways is required.

I say drop the stuff about images, and make damn sure women are paid properly and taken professionally seriously.

Is that not enough?

And it's not political correctness, it is respecting that we all experience things differently.

I agree that most humour will offend someone. Try watching a stand-up act that doesn't offend someone's race, gender, sexual orientation, age, or any other demographic information. Some of those discriminatory jokes can be really funny; after all we're human.

There's a time and place for it. Context is everything.

Tech events do not satisfy any of these criteria. If you are presenting, there are numerous ways to inject humor without demeaning anyone. What's funny is that, as a guy raised in the rural south, the thought of presenting ANYTHING with pictures of scantily clad women strikes me as immediately something not to do in public, ever. It also smacks of someone lacking intellect and creativty, and is in the same realm as bathroom humor. If you have to sink to that level, you aren't clever or funny, so don't try to be.

What makes these jokes different, though, is that they are about having fun at somebody else's expense. Some people care about not causing others discomfort; some don't.

Also, personally, I tend to find them embarrassing and juvenile, not funny.

I mean, where does this political correctness stop?

Usually wherever inability to empathize with others begins. There is, after all, no law against being inconsiderate.

The fact is, it's always possible to be offensive no matter what the actor does.

Anecdotally however, playing a character of a given background becomes offensive when the actor portrays a caricature of the background or the actor speaks or acts in a way that takes away the character's humanity. Therefore, it's typically okay to play a character of a specific background, as long as you stay true to how the character thinks or acts as a human, and not as a caricature or cartoon.

Look, it's like talking about or showing your naked body. You can't do it in work or professional contexts. If the people close to you are OK with all of ye getting naked, fine. But if someone complains of you being naked at work, you have no right to complain.

Another issue with offensive speech is that it normalises behaviour and thoughts that may be far more pernicious than a tendency to make jokes. If you have one of "those friends" that tells a disproportionate amount of (sexist/racist/rape-based/etc) jokes, it may be the case that you laughing along is actually justifying/enforcing beliefs they hold that you would find reprehensible (and likewise for you telling jokes of the same nature in their company)

As we are all subconscious sexists (there's a link up-thread to a study on blind hiring as an example) there is also a very real danger that you cause harm to your own mind (in the sense of creating or reinforcing bad behaviour and opinions) by engaging in humour or speech based on sexism, even if you don't think you believe the underlying sexism that you are lampshading with the humour.

Why?

It is perfectly possible to joke about horrific things without intending to condone or support those things. That said, the place for these jokes is unlikely to be in groups of people you don't know at tech conferences. That's insensitive, rude and often intimidating - so don't.