The irony in this manipulative[1] use of language in a topic on sexism is outstanding.

Seriously, could you have tried any harder (to fan the flames)[2]?

_________________

[1] http://wis-wander.weizmann.ac.il/a-chemical-signal-in-human-...

[2] eg, courtesy of google

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jennagoudreau/2011/01/11/crying-...

Crying At Work, A Woman's Burden

There are few situations where crying is “acceptable.” The worst offenses, she found, are crying in a public meeting or because of work stress, like a looming deadline or coworker disagreement, because it is considered disruptive and weak. Crying in a private performance evaluation is also considered unprofessional and often manipulative.

The only exception to criticism is crying due to a personal loss like death or divorce, and even that has its limits. “If the crying is excessive–repeated or prolonged, rather than a single episode–it could be considered unstable or weak,”

My question to you is what were you thinking in this choice of language?

If you're saying my use of language was extremely strong, you're right - intentionally so because I actually felt like crying and did, in fact, cry a tiny bit after reading these comments. They're horrible and I love HN so much, I can't stand that it can't deal with gender issues in a reasonable way.

You seem to dismiss the plausibility/utility of feigned empathy.[1]

Headline> Babies do fake cry to get attention according to research

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/10577825/Bab...

[1] Nothing personal, just connecting the dots.

At this point, you have to believe that comments like this (along with the "why no programs to get more male teachers?" gem) are pure trolling and not people trying to express new or compelling ideas.

I mean, do these guys think that they are such brilliant thinkers that they are the first ever to try apply symmetry to an asymmetrical context?

> I mean, do these guys think that they are such brilliant thinkers that they are the first ever to try apply symmetry to an asymmetrical context?

You need to read more charitably, because I can safely say that everyone recognizes the asymmetry.

There are a couple of issues here, the first of which is that contextual asymmetry doesn't always matter.

One example:

Sarah and Amy walk up to John and Christopher on the playground at school. John is enjoying a strawberry ice cream cone.

The two girls slap Christopher, who retaliates by slapping them both back. John, ice cream cone still in hand, yells for the teacher to come over.

"Christopher!", scolds the teacher, "Slapping is wrong! Come to the office with me."

"But Sarah and Amy slapped me first! Why aren't they getting in trouble?"

"Because John has an ice cream cone, and you're both boys."

Second, some of the asymmetry in this context is actually inconvenient for your position.

A few examples:

1. Society is far more sensitive to the plight of girls than to the plight of boys. As such, it's often politically unfeasible to ever reverse a program that elevates girls at the expense of boys. For instance, there are still far more scholarships available to girls than are available to boys, despite the fact that women have outnumbered men in college for decades.

2. Boys and men are less risk-averse than girls and women, and as a result, they find themselves more numerous at both the top and the bottom of society. Programs that ignore the men not at the top of society, in favor of elevating women toward the top, end up hurting disadvantaged men.

3. STEM jobs are perhaps the only good realistic job prospect for young boys today. Programs that whisk girls ahead of boys for STEM jobs end up leaving those boys with nowhere to turn, because there is insufficient (not non-existent) political pressure to open up other opportunities for them (as point #1 above demonstrated).

You might not realize it, but women face a similar issue all the time at conferences/events where "unisex" (really men's) cut t-shirts are given out. These t-shirts are generally quite flattering on men and not-so-flattering on women, so I'd argue they're the woman's equivalent of your purse.

I went to the Grace Hopper conference this year and it was very refreshing to see that every company that gave out t-shirts used female cuts, since those are t-shirts I'll actually wear!

Erm. This kind of makes a lot of assumptions about what 'flattering on women' means. Which of course begs the question about a lot of possible latent sexism at play in your response.

The sorts of t-shirts given out at conferences don't fit anyone. They're generic pieces of cloth that wear like drapes. Hanes Beefy-Ts. That you think they're appropriate for men but not women kinda speaks volumes. Drapes over pecs are fine, but not breasts? Why? What would make a women's t-shirt fit in a more 'flattering' manner? Tighter? More forming to curves on the waist and breasts? Looser, more baggy? Why would that particular fit be flattering?

Also why is the goal to have a 'flattering' t-shirt -- which implies impressing other people, being an object for everyone else's gaze -- rather than a t-shirt that you like? It's sexism against women if we don't provide t-shirts that are 'flattering' to the people looking at her?

They're designed it seems for a man who's 5'10 and 170lbs or something and then just scaled linearly in both X and Y. That's not how human beings scale, though.

As a guy who's 6'3 and a bit more torso than legs I feel like I would need to be at least 250-275lbs for an XL shirt (which I need to wear so it's long enough) to not look like a sail.

This isn't a problem unique to women, it's unique to anyone who's not a 5'10 170lbs man; the mannequin they designed the shirt for.

A lot of people on "your side" of the issue are either flat out incoherent or go far too deep into proselytization land to be tolerable. The other side is also somewhat incoherent and often shallow or juvenile. Together the two sides are creating a lot of noise for each other, with hardly any digestible information for the masses.

Well the problem with debate is that everyone wants to "educate" the other side. So my idea is that you prove you are actually right, and then maybe people will accept your views.

This is not strictly true, position is based on a lot of factors.

Note that this is not what I said. I just said that votes are not the only factor.

> On the front page, by points divided by a power of the time since they were submitted. Comments in comment threads are ranked the same way.

http://ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html

Now, HN runs on a slightly modified version of news.arc, so we can't be 100% for sure. pg did give the formula a long time ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1781417

TL;DR: time since the comment was left is often a factor.

Because I'm done with these people bashing these events. Either they're highly-advanced trolls and we're all getting played REALLY HARD or these people are serious; if the latter then as far as I'm concern they're just awful people not much better than the folks at stormfront.org. I think any reasonable person understands it would be a waste of time trying to argue with stormfront.org members... and I'm just about ready to mentally tag these HN comments with the same level of lunacy & bigotry.

____

Preemptive: And yes, I know one of you is going to come along and throw the definition of bigotry back in my face. I don't care. I refuse to consider the ridiculous points of view I've been seeing on these gender stories in the same way I refuse to consider stormfront.org. You're all just trolls or really awful people. The end. I'm just super-happy that Ycombinator officially supports & organizes these kind of event to show YC is above your nonsense.

Blog: http://istommydrunk.svbtle.com/the-maleonly-version-of-the-f...

Comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7099636

If anyone wants to find it on the front page, it's there

Ah, estrogen privilege.

I've read your comments. You claim to know the real reasons why women aren't going into tech, you reply to comments about gender/racial disparity with such simple-minded arrogance and assurance, yet your profile says you're a college student studying EE and physics. You're nothing more than the typical puffed-up ignorant college asshole who thinks he has the world figured out.

Wait till all the pubes have grown in and get a few years in the real world under your belt before thinking about making such idiotic statements because as of now you have absolutely nothing of value to contribute. For a college kid in the throes of acquiring knowledge and perspective, you're pretty god damn ignorant and stubborn and just dickish on the whole.

And if you're not the typical 18-22yo college kid, but rather someone a bit older, then this is all the sadder really.

SJWs always think they know everything about people who disagree with them, just by the virtue of the fact that the person dared to disagree. Perhaps it is for this reason that you and others of your ideological persuasion seem unable to resort to anything aside from hostile yet awfully generic (and as result--often hilariously inaccurate) personal attacks.

Rude remarks and mistaken assumptions about my genitals aside, no, I am not in the 18-22 year old age range, and haven't been for some time. Sad as it may seem to you, there are indeed people of all ages who believe in egalitarianism.

I'd have kept your age a secret.

Man, SJWs really take anything involving the word "privilege" seriously, even when it's obvious sarcasm. Anyone have any theories as to why their sense of humor is so underdeveloped?

I don't know what's gotten into the water lately.

(I don't think my size or athletic ability has anything to do with my maleness, but given the quality of discussion going on here, I figure it may be relevant in some people's minds)

This thread is doomed to the flamewar detector anyways, I don't suppose there's any point in trying to have decent discussion here.