News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:We were wrong by tanderson11 on Friday June 21, 2013 @02:04PM (#5919846)
The cultural acceptability and effectiveness of the asking for consent is incidental to the issue at stake.

I honestly find it shocking that so many people on HN are having such difficulty accepting the principal of expressly verbalized consent. Surely we can move on from the notion that men need to "be dominant" and "force her to rebuff your advances".

While a particular culture may call for certain shifts in attitude, that does not mean verbalized consent is not important.

>I think Neil Gaiman's thoughts "Why defend freedom of icky speech" is particularly relevant here.

I think a key distinction between the subject of Gaiman's thoughts and the material at hand is that "Above the Game" purports to offer advice applicable to real word scenarios. This advice, however, will, unquestionably, lead to sexual assault if followed (not in every case, but in some).

I would certainly find it dubious for the United States Government to condemn the book, but I feel that Kickstarter's stance is defensible from the position of not wanting to be associated with such dangerous and callous material.

Re:We were wrong by malandrew on Friday June 21, 2013 @02:16PM (#5919920)

    "While a particular culture may call for certain shifts in 
    attitude, that does not mean verbalized consent is not 
    important."

Nor does it mean that verbalized consent is important or necessary. Not all human communication is verbal.

    "but I feel that Kickstarter's stance is defensible from 
    the position of not wanting to be associated with such 
    dangerous and callous material."
Do you find the financial embargo of Wikileaks by Visa, Mastercard, Paypal and Amex to be acceptable?

With centralized electronic payments and centralized crowdfunding platforms we've lost the neutrality of money and that is a threat to a free and open society.

Re:We were wrong by hackinthebochs on Friday June 21, 2013 @03:45PM (#5920513)
>Not all human communication is verbal.

Good god this. Until these guys can explain why we must suddenly ignore a million years of hardwired non-verbal communication, their argument is completely moot.