Weekly Edition
Return to the Announcements page
| |||||||||||||
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost
Perhaps the best description and analysis of the unfortunate events at
PyCon can be found in this post from
Amanda Blum. In short, she concludes that everybody lost in this
incident.
Any comments posted should, please, have something new to say and demonstrate the highest level of respect for others, whether or not you agree with them. See also: What really happened at PyCon. (Log in to post comments)
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 22, 2013 14:15 UTC (Fri) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] What I find disturbing was the two firings. Maybe the people in question behaved badly, but who among us hasn't overreacted occasionally or done something stupid in public? I don't think people deserve to lose their jobs over something like this.
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 22, 2013 14:41 UTC (Fri) by DOT (subscriber, #58786) [Link]
I suppose this is the result of emerging feminism in the open source community. Everybody is now so preoccupied with sexism that they overreact, by posting pictures online and firing employees. The only people who behaved correctly in this situation, were the conference organizers. It's a necessary evil, and there are probably going to be lots more casualties before the the dust settles and the community as a whole has learned how to deal with gender issues. It's a long road.
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 22, 2013 15:05 UTC (Fri) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
Both politically correctness and sexism is bad, mkay?
The problem with a lot of the guys in technology is that they are socially maladjusted and haven't been taught that they actually be mindful of the respect they display towards females. It's just part of the natural differences in sexes.
Of course, being accusatory and calling people out in public instead of dealing with issues in a more appropriate manner is a sign of a person with personal issues and thus should be ignored completely by anybody with common sense.
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 22, 2013 16:55 UTC (Fri) by zonker (subscriber, #7867) [Link]
"Of course, being accusatory and calling people out in public instead of dealing with issues in a more appropriate manner is a sign of a person with personal issues and thus should be ignored completely by anybody with common sense."
Let's rethink that, please. How about this?
"Of course, being accusatory and calling people out in public instead of dealing with issues in a more appropriate manner is a sign of a person who may have over-reacted and should be listened to, but perhaps asked to deal with things in a less inflammatory manner in the future."
Let's agree that we can listen to someone without going overboard, and we can try to de-escalate things without disregarding someone entirely. Speculating on whether someone has personal issues or not isn't, IMHO, particularly useful - and even *if* said person has personal issues, it doesn't automatically mean they don't have a valid point.
One of the things that has caused this entire thing to get blown out of proportion is that people have assumed ill-intent on all sides while also refusing to look at things from the POV of the "other side" of the issues.
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 22, 2013 21:32 UTC (Fri) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
I'll stand by my statement. There are appropriate ways to deal with issues and inappropriate ways. I have met enough people and dealt with enough personal conflicts to know what I am talking about. People that instigate drama for drama's sake are usually not healthy and they should be left alone and ignored when they are behaving inappropriately. I don't know or care about this lady spefically. It is a general statement.
She should of been ignored, period. Right from the get-go. It was a mistake to assign a twitter post any credibility, period. It is a mistake to respond to it. It should of been let go.
The only person with a real grievance would be the guy she purportedly falsely accused.
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 23, 2013 4:45 UTC (Sat) by sjj (subscriber, #2020) [Link]
With due respect, if you are absolutely convinced that your snap judgment is always correct, period, you haven't met enough people and dealt with enough personal conflicts.
This is why organizations need processes and procedures to deal with this shit. You can't rely on a single person's snap judgment.
Ignoring somebody who makes a complaint will just escalate the situation - even if the original complaint was done in a wrong way.
Firing was over-reaction Posted Apr 4, 2013 18:29 UTC (Thu) by Baylink (subscriber, #755) [Link]
I don't see that drag said it had to be *his* judgement that controlled the issue.
But my overarching reaction to this incident, and others like it, is to quote the Fidonet slogan, now nearly three decades old:
Be ye not overly annoying...
Certainly there are some people who fail on the first point.
But it's pretty clear that there are also people who are, in my best friend's lyrical phrasing, "spring-loaded to the pissed off position", thus failing rather theatrically at the second.
Just as the Supreme Court has repeatedly ruled that the target for the Internet and the content thereon cannot reasonably be limited to that which is considered Suitable for Children by the Most Conservative Observer, interpersonal behavior cannot reasonably be limited that hard either -- there will *always* be someone who can contrive to be offended by any single thing you or I say. People will always game the system, no matter what the rules are; anyone who's a parent understands this.
Zero tolerance has been proven pretty effectively not to work in education; it's not going to work in public conference rules, either.
If you want to interview NFL players in the locker room, you really do have to take on the possibility that you're gonna see some nudity.
Certainly, there are people who go beyond the pale.
But the pale isn't anywhere near a sotto-voce quip about a "dongle", from a different row, not directed at you. If I were the fired gent from the other row, you can be certain that I'd be investigating civil action against Adria Richards.
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 24, 2013 16:41 UTC (Sun) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
> Let's agree that we can listen to someone without going overboard, and we can try to de-escalate things without disregarding someone entirely.
Let's never forget that life is way too short to waste time with people not worth our time. They should always be ignored and avoided every time it's possible. This applies even more to people merely looking for attention (among others... TV channels!)
Of course this should be done as politely and respectfully as possible; one should always say "good bye" and smile. Manners.
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 23, 2013 4:04 UTC (Sat) by sjj (subscriber, #2020) [Link]
Can you please define what "political correctness" means to you in this context, and why it is equally bad as sexism?
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 23, 2013 13:54 UTC (Sat) by robert_s (subscriber, #42402) [Link]
> [...] political correctness [...] is bad [...]
How so?
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 24, 2013 7:54 UTC (Sun) by sjj (subscriber, #2020) [Link]
"Political Correctness" is a term used in the US by right wingers to denigrate those who want to use inclusive terms when referring to groups of people. Like humankind vs. mankind, Also when groups of people don't want to use an outsider-given name of their group (sexual minorities' names have often been slurs, ethnic groups have been named by their neighbors or enemies etc).
It's most often used by people who occupy a cultural position of privilege (white male being the typical example) who get offended when people in positions of less cultural power ask for respectful terms to be used. For certain people, this request is highly offensive because they see undermining their power to set the terms of discourse in society.
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 24, 2013 16:27 UTC (Sun) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
> It's most often used by people who occupy a cultural position of privilege who get offended when people in positions of less cultural power ask for respectful terms to be used.
"Most often" people qualifying something as "politically correct" are more amused than offended.
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 24, 2013 22:53 UTC (Sun) by sjj (subscriber, #2020) [Link]
Do you find it amusing if someone asks not to be referred to in a derogatory or exclusionary manner?
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 24, 2013 23:14 UTC (Sun) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
This has degraded into the "have you stopped beating your wife yet" type of rhetoric, can we please stop now?
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 24, 2013 23:58 UTC (Sun) by sjj (subscriber, #2020) [Link]
Yeah, I think you're right.
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 24, 2013 23:34 UTC (Sun) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
OK I think I understand the misunderstanding now... you have in fact no clue what people have on their mind when they use the words "politically correct".
Before expressing your problem(s) with these words please go and do some reading until you understand a tiny bit when, how and why people actually use them. I'm not asking you to agree - just to have a vague idea of what you are talking about.
> Do you find it amusing if someone asks not to be referred to in a derogatory or exclusionary manner?
In general: no. In rare cases like this PyCon story: yes, it can be quite ridiculous sometimes.
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 24, 2013 23:57 UTC (Sun) by sjj (subscriber, #2020) [Link]
I said pretty clearly what I think of the "political correctness" argument above. You chose not to explain what you mean by it, but instead attack me for insufficient mind reading of "what people have on their mind".
<smile>Goodbye.</smile>
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 25, 2013 14:24 UTC (Mon) by dgm (subscriber, #49227) [Link]
> The problem with a lot of the guys in technology is that they are socially maladjusted and haven't been taught that they actually be mindful of the respect they display towards *females*.
THIS is sexism. And a gross overstatement, depending of your definition of "a lot".
A much better and accurate phrase would have been:
"The problem with some people is that they are socially maladjusted and haven't been taught that they actually be mindful of the respect they display towards others."
Please don't Posted Mar 22, 2013 15:06 UTC (Fri) by job (guest, #670) [Link]
We do not know if anyone overreacted here or not. Only the employer and ex-employee have all the facts why this person was fired. We don't. And I don't think it is within "the highest level of respect for others" to speculate.
Please don't Posted Mar 22, 2013 16:24 UTC (Fri) by DOT (subscriber, #58786) [Link]
The male ex-employee in question said the following: "As a result of the picture she took I was let go from my job today."
The announcement from SendGrid is not available anymore, but secondary sources imply that it announced firing the female ex-employee because of this incident.
A tragic turn of events this is. A mystery, not so much.
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 26, 2013 17:38 UTC (Tue) by rickmoen (subscriber, #6943) [Link] 'DOT' wrote:I suppose this is the result of emerging feminism in the open source community. In the spirit of attempting to express something novel and evince maximal respect for others: Some do honestly perceive feminism as meaning sundry attempts to annoyingly social-engineer others' lives. However, I hope you can also imagine such a term becoming embroiled in Internet polemics, by anyone with a grudge feeling entitled to claim the term, and by some folks' temptation to label whatever one dislikes feminism. That is not feminism as I've known (and tried to live) it for the past 50ish years. The term properly means "believing in, supporting, looking fondly on, hoping for, and/or working towards equality of the sexes". Equality of opportunity, in other words -- encouraging the ability of people to achieve without artificial obstacles imposed on them merely on account of their sexes. That is and has always been the core concept. So, emerging feminism in the open source community? Like modern civilisation, I see it as altogether a fine idea. Best Regards,
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 29, 2013 5:42 UTC (Fri) by jmorris42 (subscriber, #2203) [Link]
"The term properly means...."
Nope. Sorry, sanity lost that argument. Just like "liberal" here in the US no longer means what your dictionary says it means, and what most of the rest of the English speaking world still thinks it means.
For good or ill, the word 'feminism' is now understood to mean something almost entirely different from what it was originally meant to be.
Firing was over-reaction Posted Apr 4, 2013 16:31 UTC (Thu) by rickmoen (subscriber, #6943) [Link] jmorris42 wrote: Nope. Sorry, sanity lost that argument. Call me stubborn. For good or ill, the word 'feminism' is now understood to mean something almost entirely different from what it was originally meant to be. Like legal rights, useful words do not defend themselves. I'm even a stickler for 'imply' differing from 'infer' and 'enormity' meaning 'great wickedness', which will show you what a no-hoper spokesman for sanity and literacy I remain. Best Regards,
Firing was over-reaction Posted Apr 4, 2013 18:32 UTC (Thu) by Baylink (subscriber, #755) [Link]
You are stubborn, Rick.
:-)
But you are not alone; I too am on a mission to civilize.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 22, 2013 15:41 UTC (Fri) by bkuhn (subscriber, #58642) [Link] I've been fired myself before for less, frankly. Specifically, I was once fired (in part) because I regularly made personal statements on my personal blog (and as a commentor on third-party sites) that publicly criticized various for-profit companies that my employer was chummy with. Fact is, I was an at-will employee. At-will employees can be fired for anything at any time, as long as it's not discrimination based on being in a protected class. I think employees have a right exercise their Free Speech rights on the Internet without employer retaliation, and I'd probably insist on that being written into future employment contracts I might sign. But at the moment, I'm an at-will employee again, and I know I can be fired for just about anything at any time. That's what jobs are like in the USA, sadly. Welcome to unbridled capitalism. Meanwhile, IANAL and TINLA, but Adria may have a discrimination claim, arguing that her employer retaliated against her for standing up to sexism in her workplace. (And, yes, a professional conference is a workplace, especially if her company assigned her the job of attending on their behalf). Anyway, I think it's completely reasonable that the guy was fired, but mostly because of my own personal experience: I've been fired for less and I'm fine with it. It's in some sense a lesson that one should get an employment contract rather than be an at-will employee. OTOH, most employment contracts, I suspect, would declare sexist comments in the workplace a firing offense, so admittedly that may not have helped him here.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 22, 2013 15:44 UTC (Fri) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
> That's what jobs are like in the USA, sadly. Welcome to unbridled capitalism.
I prefer it to be that way, actually. It's a good thing.
Plus I don't want to work for somebody who doesn't want me working there in the first place; that sort of thing just makes life miserable for everybody involved.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 22, 2013 15:53 UTC (Fri) by bkuhn (subscriber, #58642) [Link]
Well, I've worked in union shops (and specifically on the management side and not the Bargaining Unit side) and I felt it was actually really useful to have a process of escalation and documentation for firing, along with a few items spelled out that were just so unacceptable that firing could be immediate. For example, sexist statements in the workplace would be appropriate to be on the "instant firing" list, IMO.
Unchecked and arbitrary power of managers to fire people at will for anything at their own whims is not a good thing generally for society, IMO.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 22, 2013 19:22 UTC (Fri) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
If you are a valuable employee then the manager firing you for no reason it is also his loss. He just cost his own employers significant profit. Hiring new employees is extremely expensive and time consuming. Also if a business allows some manager to run rampant and fire employees for frivolous or personal matters then that manager is going to be costing them money. Competitors then can pick up the experience and training that was invested in the employees at a bargain price and thus benefit directly from the rival manager's idiocy.
So bad behavior in this manner is it's own punishment.
Also I do like the concept of collective bargaining power. I think it's a valuable tool for employees to make sure that their market value is kept accurate.
I just don't like it when they leverage laws to restrict the ability for non-affiliated people to seek employment, which is the typical approach in modern times. Also I don't like the reverse were businesses try to use legal tactics to prevent ex-employees from seeking employment in competitors. Both approaches damage society, IMO.
is it really? Posted Mar 23, 2013 0:16 UTC (Sat) by tialaramex (subscriber, #21167) [Link]
The idea that "bad behaviour is its own punishment" just isn't very realistic over the short term in which we mostly care. The idea that "Something bad was done to you, but those responsible will eventually receive criticism in historical retrospectives so that makes up for it" for example doesn't intuitively feel like /justice/.
The sort of direct consequences you envision are, frankly, unlikely. Manager X fires you, the company lacks your expertise, as a result Manager Y's team runs into a problem, their performance is poor, Manager Y gets fired. How was Manager X punished in this scenario? They weren't. The idea that large corporations somehow "learn" from individual incidents is also pretty laughable. Most lack any mechanism to do that. Whole industries lack such mechanisms. Safety critical industries had to invent, and re-invent means of institutional learning to stop millions of people from dying, they aren't something that just magically appears when you hire your tenth (or ten-thousandth) employee.
The US employment model isn't special in the sense that this problem is distributed throughout US society. Denial of the statistically measurable unfairness of the world, whether its in the form of "name it and claim it" theology, the myth of the undeserving poor, or the continued enthusiasm for "at will" employment is a problem that Americans ought to but most likely won't address as a nation and a culture.
You've alluded to closed shop practices, for what it's worth the EU forbids both "at will" and (almost all) closed shops. You are entitled to work without joining any type of union, political movement, club or society and employers are forbidden from terminating permanent employees for any reason other than redundancy (ie there will no longer exist any job for you to do) misconduct (either "gross" misconduct e.g. fighting in the workplace, or a pattern of misconduct which you were given opportunities to correct and didn't) or clearly inadequate (not just "less than we'd like") performance. Furthermore there are strict laws protecting workers from being classed as "temporary" workers or third party contractors when they are in practice permanent employees. By far the EU's biggest remaining problem is enforcement, the most abused workers tend to be from vulnerable groups that are reluctant to confront their employers or complain to the authorities.
is it really? Posted Mar 25, 2013 23:31 UTC (Mon) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
> The idea that "bad behaviour is its own punishment" just isn't very realistic over the short term in which we mostly care.
Extreme laissez-faire / free trade theories are all failing to see that most feedback loops are imperfect and most importantly: slooow. Yeah sure: there will always be some kind of punishment... in long run. But "in the long run, we're all dead". Can we please get a half-decent life some time before that? Thanks.
No extreme and simplistic theory will ever good enough for the real world (and none is ever actually applied for real if you look closer)
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 23, 2013 14:16 UTC (Sat) by robert_s (subscriber, #42402) [Link]
> So bad behavior in this manner is it's own punishment.
But not at all in a proportional way.
An employer will risk losing a relatively small amount of productivity and re-recruiting costs that they can most likely afford.
An employee will lose their livelihood. 100% of their income.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 22, 2013 23:52 UTC (Fri) by dwmw2 (subscriber, #2063) [Link] "Unchecked and arbitrary power of managers to fire people at will for anything at their own whims is not a good thing generally for society, IMO."One of the reasons I would never want to work for a US company under US law.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 23, 2013 0:03 UTC (Sat) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
frankly, if a manager really wants to get rid of you, they can find some reason to do so (or make it so that you really don't want to work for them any longer)
While it's trivial to fire people in theory, in practice most companies don't give lower level managers the power to fire people, and HR orgs are cautious enough (fearing wrongful termination lawsuits) that it's actually pretty hard to fire people.
Constructive dismissal Posted Mar 23, 2013 11:15 UTC (Sat) by tialaramex (subscriber, #21167) [Link]
"make it so that you really don't want to work for them any longer"
Constructive dismissal is likewise illegal where I am. It's not common, but it happens often enough that most people will have heard of someone. The employee is entitled to cease work immediately AND receive compensation at tribunal for being illegally terminated. Media reporting of these incidents is usually hugely negative, enough to make avoiding them a priority if your company's reputation is of any importance.
Obviously if both the employer and employee are no longer happy it will usually be possible to agree some mutually acceptable way to end the relationship, and the courts won't interfere with that.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 24, 2013 16:53 UTC (Sun) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
> while it's trivial to fire people in theory, in practice...
I think it's an important point.
I've worked in countries/companies with very different Labour Laws and found that the difference between theory (= law) and practice can be huge. The culture also comes into play: in some places you are safer even when the law is less protective.
That's for firing ONE person though. When trying to lay off MANY people in tough economic times then Labour Laws do matter (for good or bad - not my point here).
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Apr 4, 2013 18:34 UTC (Thu) by Baylink (subscriber, #755) [Link]
> For example, sexist statements in the workplace would be appropriate to be on the "instant firing" list, IMO.
"Women tend to be smaller, lighter, and less strong than men, and this can negatively impact their ability to pass a firefighter's exam, where the weight of the overcome resident they have to drag out of a burning building will not conveniently change simply because they're female."
That's a sexist statement.
If you fired me for making it, I'd have you in court.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Apr 5, 2013 8:04 UTC (Fri) by smurf (subscriber, #17840) [Link] It's entirely factual and therefore not *ist in any way, despite attempts by some idiots to assert otherwise.Now if you had said "women are …", and thereby refused to hire any female firefighters at all, no matter how strong, now that would be sexist (and actionable).
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 22, 2013 16:44 UTC (Fri) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link]
In what universe is being fired for exercising your freedom of speech a good thing?
freedom Posted Mar 22, 2013 18:56 UTC (Fri) by michich (subscriber, #17902) [Link]
I understand why you may feel it is a bad thing, but please let's try to rethink the general issue more thoroughly. First I would like to say something about two phrases that you used in your comment:
"freedom of speech" - How do you understand the phrase? Does it mean the freedom to say whatever you want to whomever you want and never have to carry any possible consequences? In my view that would be a too wide definition. There is no way to prevent the people who hear me talking from making their own opinions and expectations about myself and consequently adjusting the way they act towards me. Freedom of speech means that I can say what I want to whomever I want and never have to fear the application of organized violence (i.e. the power of the state) for it.
"being fired" - Always both the employer and the employee are acting human beings. They associate because they both expect to gain from their mutual cooperation. They both value what they get more highly than what they give. If at any later time one of them no longer believes so, this voluntary cooperation ends. What right does anybody have to force him to associate with the other person any further?
My conclusion is that although the existence of the possibility of "being fired for exercising your freedom of speech" intuitively sounds bad at first, it is actually necessary for freedom. The alternative "being forced (by violence or threat of it) to associate with people against one's will" is truly bad.
freedom Posted Mar 22, 2013 20:07 UTC (Fri) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link]
Employers have a social responsibility. Firing someone has the potential to ruin that person's life, it should therefore only be possible in a limited set of cases. This is why many countries have employment protection laws. Expressing an unfavourable opinion about another company isn't one of those cases as long as you don't make stuff up.
> Freedom of speech means that I can say what I want to whomever I want and never have to fear the application of organized violence (i.e. the power of the state) for it.
freedom Posted Mar 23, 2013 5:12 UTC (Sat) by ghane (subscriber, #1805) [Link]
> Employers have a social responsibility. Firing someone has the potential to ruin that person's life, it should therefore only be possible in a limited set of cases.
What about:
Employees have a social responsibility, too. Leaving a job has the potential to ruin a company, it should therefore only be possible in a limited set of cases.
--
freedom Posted Mar 23, 2013 5:35 UTC (Sat) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link]
> Leaving a job has the potential to ruin a company
If that is the case, you're not running the company right.
freedom Posted Mar 23, 2013 11:27 UTC (Sat) by tialaramex (subscriber, #21167) [Link]
Sure, and you'll find most places which don't have "at will" likewise do not permit employees to just arbitrarily down tools and walk away from the job without consequences.
Our systems administrators had to give 90 days notice when they more or less simultaneously quit. That was enough time to identify any important work that hadn't been documented, start hiring replacements, figure out what our plans were for the interim and so on.
But if your business will collapse without just one person you're in trouble anyway due to Bus Factor. That one person might be kidnapped, have a mental breakdown or indeed get hit by an actual bus.
freedom Posted Mar 23, 2013 13:57 UTC (Sat) by ibukanov (subscriber, #3942) [Link]
> Firing someone has the potential to ruin that person's life, it should therefore only be possible in a limited set of cases.
If firing can ruin person's life, this is a big problem with society. Laws against management abuses are noneffective when the employees feel that they must work or face a possibility of ruined life. Consider if a social protection would be enough so prospects of finding new work are very OK, then the problem of bad managers would solves itself without any laws. People will simply leave.
freedom Posted Mar 23, 2013 17:05 UTC (Sat) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link] If firing can ruin person's life, this is a big problem with society. I don't think there's much one can do about that. For many people their job is among the things that gives their live a purpose. Therefore even if your material needs are catered for by social security benefits, being unemployed still bores the hell out of people and makes them miserable. And an elderly person in an ailing industry will have a hard time finding a new job in any society. Also, one of the (few) things that I remember from my economics classes is that there's a natural rate of unemployment, so as long as we live in anything vaguely resembling a market economy, full employment simply isn't going to happen.
freedom Posted Mar 23, 2013 19:29 UTC (Sat) by ibukanov (subscriber, #3942) [Link]
> I don't think there's much one can do about that. For many people their job is among the things that gives their live a purpose.
From my experience of living in Norway people here much less attached to their jobs. It could be a cultural thing, but a social protection must be playing a role here.
> And an elderly person in an ailing industry will have a hard time finding a new job in any society.
I know a person (as me he was also an immigrant) in Norway who, after loosing his engineering job here, first literally enjoyed few months of doing nothing while getting 75% of his salary, and then became a rather successful art dealer. Such stories of people of any age trying different things after quitting their jobs willingly or unwillingly are common.
I suspect that "alien industries" is a rather artificial notion caused by too much fear of loosing jobs so people stick to theirs even if long-term prospects are not good. Add to that corporate laws that favor executives like in US and the result in excessive number of big companies and industrial mono-culture and ghost towns when the companies finally die.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 22, 2013 19:15 UTC (Fri) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
> In what universe is being fired for exercising your freedom of speech a good thing?
Who ever said that freedom is free and that there should never be any consequences for exercising your freedom? And why do your freedoms matter and not your bosses? Why should his desires and freedoms be suppressed because he agreed to give you money for a while?
Your entire purpose in being employed is to be making your employer money. You are in a market selling your services, skills, and time just like somebody selling a toaster on ebay or somebody selling telephone service. There is really no difference.
No difference at all.
Your labor is just another product and you are just another salesman peddling your wares.
If you destroy your utility and threaten to cost your employer money because your behavior has damaged the relationships important partners then why should he be required to keep you employed?
This is why it's important to have a backbone in life. You just exercise your freedoms not because there is no consequence to your behavior or your actions, you should exercise your freedoms because they are right and just and you have convictions and that you are willing to stand up and be counted when it matters.
Also I think that discretion is the better part of valor. Which is why I am also a firm believer in privacy and against any sort of government encroachment or controls and I avoid disclosing information and using corporate 'cloud' services when practicable. Security matters. Strong and effective forms of encryption and plausible deniability and all that stuff matter, etc etc.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 22, 2013 20:08 UTC (Fri) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link]
> You are in a market selling your services, skills, and time just like somebody selling a toaster on ebay or somebody selling telephone service. There is really no difference.
There's a huge difference: employees are people. If you don't understand why that makes one heck of a difference, there's no point in even talking to you.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 23, 2013 8:48 UTC (Sat) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]
Employers do not, generally, have a problem with their freedoms being suppressed by their employees. There is a huge power gap there, which shows in contract negotiation as well as at other times, ruining the libertarian fantasy of 'if it's in the contract it must have been freely agreed upon without coercion'.
And employers that exploit their employees really *do* exist. At the extreme end they enslave their employees and work them to death. At the less extreme end they merely ignore their employees requests regarding unimportant matters like health and safety until those employees turn to the greater power of the state to force them to do so. This happens frequently, whenever a sufficiently ethically dubious employer thinks it can get away with it and thinks the employee will not jump jobs as a result. (Heck, if you stay in one job for long enough, the employer may consider that it can do this even though you are in a position with normally high mobility. My previous employer did, repeatedly, and if it wasn't for the existence of employment legislation would quite happily have worked me until I was crippled by RSI and forced to resign, rather than pay much less than one month's pay to me on a keyboard that would fix the problem. Heck, they did that to previous employees. Nobody said that employers' abuse of employees is necessarily *rational* -- in that case, it was founded in a pathological fear of any capital expenditure whatsoever. And don't say "employers who think like that will go bust", this is not so if sufficiently many employers think like that, *or* if it's shared by only part of the management chain in a larger company.)
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 23, 2013 15:03 UTC (Sat) by ibukanov (subscriber, #3942) [Link]
> you are willing to stand up and be counted when it matters.
...
> Which is why I am also a firm believer in privacy
This sounds like a contradiction. Anonymity allows precisely to escape the need to face the consequences.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 22, 2013 15:49 UTC (Fri) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] I've been fired myself before for less, frankly. Sure. And as a business owner, I appreciate the freedom that at-will employment gives me (though being in Canada, I'm a bit more constrained than in the USA.) I still think it might not have been right to fire the people in question, even if it was legal.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 29, 2013 6:05 UTC (Fri) by jmorris42 (subscriber, #2203) [Link]
> I still think it might not have been right to fire the
> people in question, even if it was legal.
Firing the guy was a mistake. But once this incident blew up she was toast. She won't ever be employable in any position that involves outside sales or contact with the public, inside the tech industry and likely outside of it. Google never forgets and this story is now everywhere.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 22, 2013 17:19 UTC (Fri) by smurf (subscriber, #17840) [Link]
The point is, she didn't "stand up". She took a picture without asking and then posted it, intending to harm the reputation of the guys in question.
"Standing up" would mean to turn around and tell them to stop the sexist offal they've been spouting. (How loudly to do that would be entirely her choice.)
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 22, 2013 17:57 UTC (Fri) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link] "Standing up" would mean to turn around and tell them to stop the sexist offal they've been spouting.There's no proof that they actually said anything sexist. A dirty joke isn't sexist by itself
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 23, 2013 4:02 UTC (Sat) by sjj (subscriber, #2020) [Link]
I'm not sure what linking to your own comment is supposed to prove or demonstrate.
Dirty jokes and sexualized language in general make people uncomfortable in a work environment because they don't belong there. Simple as that. Work is for work stuff. There is no freedom of speech issue at all in not behaving like a dick at work. If your coworkers are not comfortable talking with you, do you think you're going to be productive?
Yeah, people's comfort levels with jokes, "jokes", etc are different. If somebody is offended, there's a good chance it's because they honestly are. A woman who complains about sexist remarks in a male dominated workplace needs to be taken seriously because just the act of complaining is a big step - you're sticking your neck out on a delicate subject.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 23, 2013 5:08 UTC (Sat) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link]
How does your comment relate to anything you were replying to? I didn't say that telling dirty jokes at work is appropriate. I didn't say that women complaining about sexism should be ignored. I merely said that to date there's no indication that those two guys said anything sexist and linked to my own comment detailing that point further. Actually it's pretty sad I even have to explain this.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 24, 2013 8:05 UTC (Sun) by sjj (subscriber, #2020) [Link]
Sorry I was unclear. What I was trying to get at before going on tangent is that trying to separate "sexism" and "dirty jokes" in this context is meaningless. Both use sexual language that in a professional conference would sound the same.
I cannot change what some guy in the next row *thinks* (if he's sexist, racist, whatever), but I have the right to ask them to keep that shit in their heads without blurting it out for all around to hear in a public space.
Make sense?
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 24, 2013 12:42 UTC (Sun) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link]
> Sorry I was unclear. What I was trying to get at before going on tangent is that trying to separate "sexism" and "dirty jokes" in this context is meaningless. Both use sexual language that in a professional conference would sound the same.
No, it's not meaningless and no, sexism doesn't necessarily involve sexual language. Which is exactly the point I made in that other comment I had linked to.
Oh, and by the way, I don't consider puns about "big dongles" to be a big deal. It's more like picking one's nose: sure, you don't do it in public, but when it happens, why make a lot of fuss about it?
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 24, 2013 23:05 UTC (Sun) by sjj (subscriber, #2020) [Link]
You are arguing by assertion - why do you think it's a meaningful distiction in this case?
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 25, 2013 0:26 UTC (Mon) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link]
The culprits are being (probably falsely) accused of sexism, and whether they're guilty of that very much depends on what sexism is. So how is the distinction between sexism and obscenity *not* meaningful here?
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 25, 2013 0:51 UTC (Mon) by sjj (subscriber, #2020) [Link]
They were not accused of sexism, they were accused of behaving in an inappropriate way. Both sexist and obscene talk are inappropriate in that situation, so I still don't see your point.
Hint: they are not being accused of *being* sexist, they are being accused of *behaving in a sexist way*. It's not about what people think, it's about what they do. This matters in a public setting exactly because the two would sound the same. If you don't want people around you to think you're sexist or racist etc, don't say things sound racist or sexist. How are the people in the next row who don't know you supposed to tell the difference and just think "oh he's a nice guy, he didn't mean it, it's just a joke"?
Society/community/organization cannot police what people think, but they can police what they do.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 25, 2013 2:37 UTC (Mon) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link] This matters in a public setting exactly because the two would sound the same.Here's an example: All women are stupidis sexist, but not obscene. I have a really big dongis obscene, but not sexist. So no, they don't sound the same at all. Stop saying that because it's bollocks.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 25, 2013 3:37 UTC (Mon) by sjj (subscriber, #2020) [Link]
Sigh. Yeah, so what? Both are INAPPROPRIATE behavior in this context. So is smoking weed in a presentation and heckling a female presenter: http://term.ie/blog/how-to-get-banned-from-pycon/
Again, inappropriate behavior is the problem. There's no need to lawyer around which exact bin it belongs to.
I'm so out of this thread.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 25, 2013 8:20 UTC (Mon) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
> I'm so out of this thread.
... but apparently only as long as you have the last post in every sub-thread.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 25, 2013 10:30 UTC (Mon) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link]
By that logic, running a red light is the same as shooting someone because they're both forbidden by law. Of course, someone as unable to make distinctions as you will fail to see why that is a problem.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 25, 2013 0:32 UTC (Mon) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link]
OK, I think I understand now. You seem to consider obscenity to be just as condemnable as sexism. I don't, so that's probably why we were talking past each other.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 24, 2013 10:12 UTC (Sun) by aleXXX (subscriber, #2742) [Link]
+1
Very well put.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 22, 2013 20:14 UTC (Fri) by tjc (subscriber, #137) [Link]
> I've been fired myself before for less, frankly.
I haven't, but a coworker of mine was, and the event profoundly changed my behavior. For one thing, I never attend any social events outside of work with any of my coworkers. It seemed Orwellian at first, but after a few years I got used to it.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 22, 2013 21:55 UTC (Fri) by tjc (subscriber, #137) [Link]
> That's what jobs are like in the USA, sadly. Welcome to unbridled capitalism.
Capitalism in the United States is not unbridled -- in fact, it's heavily regulated.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 23, 2013 11:28 UTC (Sat) by deepfire (subscriber, #26138) [Link]
Same planet here?
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 24, 2013 8:29 UTC (Sun) by nhippi (subscriber, #34640) [Link]
I'm curious, if you don't consider for example <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SEC_filing">Sec filing requirements</a> heavy regulation, what do you consider heavy regulation?
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 25, 2013 12:44 UTC (Mon) by tialaramex (subscriber, #21167) [Link]
Wow. SEC filings are required in order that the people who own the companies involved (these are public companies, so their owners can include just about anyone) have some idea what's happening inside the company they own. Without those regulations the market would be completely opaque and thus non-functional. If these bare basics are your concept of "heavy regulation" then you have no idea.
In more civilised places you can't just fire people on a whim like this. Capitalism is a very fast way to get somewhere, but without stringent controls both the journey and the place you get to may be very unpleasant.
It is no coincidence that the best big companies I've worked for treat their US employees more or less the _same_ as the EU arms of the same companies, even though US regulations don't require that. The EU isn't mandating anything unreasonable it's just prohibiting the worst excesses, so chances are if you (as an employer for this hypothetical) are doing stuff in the US that would be forbidden in the EU, it's because you're a jerk. (e.g. the US has no "transfer of undertakings" rules, but if you use the fact that you've bought a rival company as an opportunity to cut wages and benefits for all the acquired employees yes, you're a jerk).
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 26, 2013 7:32 UTC (Tue) by nhippi (subscriber, #34640) [Link]
SEC regulations used to be a much more lightweight than they are these days (post-enron). Also many other countries (such as UK) have much less regulation on public companies than what SEC imposes. And I'm not saying that these regulations are bad - I'm just saying that the are heavy - and that US is certainly not "unregulated capitalism".
Now we have of course deviated far from the original article.
Back to the topic, workers rights - it is correct that the US At-will employment is harsh for workers. But here at the "civilized side of pond", we have seen the rise of temporary employment agencies, and the end result is not any better for worker than being employed at will...
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 28, 2013 18:09 UTC (Thu) by union (subscriber, #36393) [Link]
No offense, but SEC regulations exist to protect owners (stockholders) and potential buyers of Companies. And the reason they exist is, that said owners went and cried for governments help, when ever they were scammed by some mangers.
If you run your own private businesses there is a lot less regulation.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 25, 2013 14:31 UTC (Mon) by tjc (subscriber, #137) [Link] Yes, but I've been the recipient of a better education than some, so my worldview may differ. Hong Kong would be a better example of capitalism.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 25, 2013 15:41 UTC (Mon) by deepfire (subscriber, #26138) [Link]
Well, given that you cite a well-known laissez-faire capitalist mouthpiece to support your laissez-faire worldview, it appears as if a crucial element was missing from your curriculum - critical, independent thinking.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 25, 2013 19:49 UTC (Mon) by tjc (subscriber, #137) [Link] It was critical, independent thinking that led me to the conclusion that capitalism--even with its flaws--is superior to democratic socialism.Critical, independent thinking is something that is almost completely missing in higher education today. Most liberal arts students are intellectual automatons, accepting what they're told without thinking much about it. Diversity is celebrated, but only in areas that don't matter much, such as race and sex. Displaying any sort of diversity of thought is an invitation for ridicule. And ridicule is no substitute for a well-reasoned argument.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 25, 2013 20:24 UTC (Mon) by apoelstra (subscriber, #75205) [Link]
>, independent thinking is something that is almost completely missing in higher education today. Most liberal arts students...
For what it's worth, this problem is not nearly so bad in mathematics. To keep a place in academia, perhaps you are required to suppress independent thinking... but this is a "choice" in the sense that by the end of your degree you will at least be capable of thinking critically.
ISTM that most math majors leave academia for this reason, though much better off for the experience.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 27, 2013 4:19 UTC (Wed) by tjc (subscriber, #137) [Link]
> For what it's worth, this problem is not nearly so bad in mathematics.
Part of that is due the nature of mathematics itself -- it is a beautiful thing, a transcendent truth untainted by lesser things. Computer Science is nearly so, but not quite.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 25, 2013 23:59 UTC (Mon) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]
Anyone claiming that the effective subjugation and elimination of much of the human race from the pool of equally-treated employees 'does not matter much' is not only an intellectual automaton -- he's a *bad capitalist*.
Hint: doubling your employment pool by hiring people without regard for sex is a good thing for the employer for hopefully obvious reasons. Being forbidden from treating some of your employees like slaves (or, indeed, actually *as* slaves) is a good thing for the employer, because it prevents a race to the bottom where your competitors outcompete you by treating some of their employees like slaves and beating you on price, forcing you to do the same even if you don't want to.
This is the sort of thing regulation (and anti-discrimination legislation) is *for*. It's *why* unbridled capitalism doesn't work: without legislation to suppress perverse incentives like this, it contains the seeds of its own destruction. Legislation like this is a large part of the reason why Marx was wrong (well, that and the fact that some enlightened employers, like Ford, realised that they had to pay their employees enough that they could afford to buy things: that economic slavery was bad).
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 26, 2013 10:28 UTC (Tue) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] Legislation like this is a large part of the reason why Marx was wrong It funny: Marx said many different things yet you somehow talk without ever clarifying what exactly you mean as if everything he said was wrong. Well, that and the fact that some enlightened employers, like Ford, realised that they had to pay their employees enough that they could afford to buy things: that economic slavery was bad Actually it was not Ford's altruism but creation of FED which made it possible to expand markets which, in turn, made continuation of capitalist possible. Ford employees can only buy Fords because someone somewhere digs the ore for the food and shelter. As long as it was possible to expand markets capitalism ruled, when it struggled to do so (Germany and Japan in XX century) it become violent, when nukes made hot resolution impossible it stagnated and surged when new markets become available (it's easy to see things like the opening up of the country to foreign investment and collapse of USSR and other, smaller expansions on a graph), and of course when it finally covered the world it started disintegrating as expected (again on the same graph: extreme efforts by FED, ECB, PBOC and others were just enough to stop this collapse for a time and it's clear that these programs have limited lifetime). Now, if you talk about the next stage (utopia which will be achieved after capitalism collapse) then I agree that here Marx described something based solely on a wishful thinking - but it was well over hundred years ago, it's hard to blame him. P.S. And of course the fact that it's still one of the best available descriptions of the capitalism's collapse is just sad: we had a century to prepare to the event, did nothing and instead gave awards to people who just ten years ago explained how capitalism can go on expanding forever on a finite planet. Gosh. Pathetic.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 26, 2013 15:29 UTC (Tue) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
That sounds plausible until you actually start digging.
Economic growth in the US was NOT linked to exports. In fact, US exported hardly anything during the first post-war years (hardly anybody in Europe could buy imported stuff).
Ultimately, economic growth is not linked to external expansion - it is also linked to internal expansion. Slashing the cost of a $500 widget to $50 immediately opens up a lot of internal market - and that has been the main engine of US and European economic growth for quite a bit of time.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 27, 2013 15:14 UTC (Wed) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]
My Marxism reference was referring to his fundamental axiom, that capitalism would collapse when the marginal rate of profit was driven to zero and everyone ended up a slave with arbitrarily low wages. This didn't happen because (among other reasons) of the growth of the union movement, which Marx could hardly have predicted.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 27, 2013 15:35 UTC (Wed) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
I'd say that Marx also overlooked the explosive economic growth that allowed for quite a bit of time for wages to rise in real value.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 28, 2013 0:01 UTC (Thu) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]
No, he expected that -- he was writing a short time after the Industrial Revolution had truly gathered steam. Economic growth wouldn't slow the processes he identified -- it would accelerate them, as they're driven by competition. But of course he didn't foresee the labour movement or the modern welfare state, which has pretty much eliminated the race to the bottom he foresaw. (Other things might well have eliminated it too.)
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 29, 2013 6:46 UTC (Fri) by jmorris42 (subscriber, #2203) [Link]
> Hint: doubling your employment pool by hiring people without
> regard for sex is a good thing for the employer for hopefully > obvious reasons.
All other things being equal your statement is of course quite correct. But they aren't always like your textbook out in the real world.
Lets push an example to an extreme.. kinda like you do in the next one... and see where it might lead to a different conclusion.
We all know programmers tend to be a) a bit wierd, b) overwhelmingly male and c) tend to be socially inept in general and especially in interactions with MOTOS. We also know (heck, I know well enough from direct experience, know several at least as good at IT things as myself) that women can program but they are even less represented at the extreme high end than they are in general. We also know that those few extreme programmers can often produce more output than a dozen or more normal ones. The "A bit wierd" factor seems to correlate with the high output.
Theory holds that women and men are equal, thus adding women to a team shouldn't matter. But the reality above disagrees, adding women to an existing team of males (especially in this industry) always seems to involve drama, sensitivity/diversity training and changing the work environment in general to allow maternity leave, no more death marches, etc., all of which impact productivity. Btw, if you only apply the new kinder and gentler rules to the females, kiss moral goodbye. And if you figure the odds are non-trivial that one or more of your twitchy but highly productive ones will get sacked in an HR incident to boot, perhaps the wise course for a manager IS to exclude half the talent pool, pulling whatever tricks are required to keep the EEOC in the dark.
Discuss. And try to keep it rational. What proposed changes in social conditions would best work to mitigate/eliminate the perverse incentives in that scenario?
> a race to the bottom where your competitors outcompete you
Good grief, that is so epic stupid you must be college educated. That can only happen as a pathological extreme of an imbalance of supply and demand of labor, and guess what; given the condition the result WILL happen. But if labor isn't so abundant that employers can do that labor will always be able to bid up their price with or without unions even. Especially in industries like ours.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 29, 2013 15:21 UTC (Fri) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link] adding women to an existing team of males (especially in this industry) always seems to involve drama, sensitivity/diversity trainingIf it involves 'drama' the people causing the 'drama' need to grow up and realize that half the human race is female. If sensitivity training is even *needed* to interact with women this is even more true (FWIW I have never had any such training at any point, nor have I heard of it existing in the UK outside organizations in recovery mode from situations where actual sexual harrassment has been going on: this may be a US-specific insanity). changing the work environment in general to allow maternity leave, no more death marchesGood! Organizations that do not acknowledge that their employees have families and that those families deserve priority at times do not deserve to exist (and there is such a thing as paternity leave in decent organizations and sane countries, too: men have families as well, and expecting them to ignore a new child in favour of the latest deadline is inhuman). Organizations that are so incompetent at planning that frequent death marches are necessary do not deserve to exist (they're harming their employees by doing that, of whichever gender). That can only happen as a pathological extreme of an imbalance of supply and demand of laborYeah. That is a very frequent case in many industries: after all, there are always more people waiting at the gates. Guess why it doesn't happen? Because of, gasp, regulation preventing it from taking hold.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 29, 2013 17:01 UTC (Fri) by jmorris42 (subscriber, #2203) [Link]
> nor have I heard of it existing in the UK
Here in the US diversity/sensitivity training is a huge industry. Huge.
> there are always more people waiting at the gates.
Why? If wage rates drop people lose interest in training to enter it. There is a bit of a lag but a lot of people entered IT because they heard they pay was good. If pay ever dropped a lot those who came for the money and not because they have a burning desire for it would quickly leave.
Same theory applies in most industries. Here where I live the job most people without a degree lust for is the offshore oil & gas industry. It isn't because they love oil, they love the fact it is the highest paying industry in the area. If they cut the pay back few would line up for a shot at spending weeks at a time on an offshore platform. They pay that good because the job requires a certain sort of person, the sort who won't screw up, blow up a multi-billion dollar oil platform and rack up untold more billions in enviromental and PR damage. In other words, they don't need a degree but they do need clue and stability.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 29, 2013 20:16 UTC (Fri) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
> Here in the US diversity/sensitivity training is a huge industry. Huge.
Large companies have mandatory training for every employee once a year on diversity/sensitivity training.
A couple of years ago, the web-based training module at my company wouldn't let you complete the training in less than an hour. Even if you read everything (instead of watching the videos), if you finished in less than an hour, it forced you to keep interacting with it until an hour of interaction had completed.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Apr 1, 2013 14:16 UTC (Mon) by tjc (subscriber, #137) [Link]
> Anyone claiming that the effective subjugation and elimination of much of the human race from the pool of equally-treated employees 'does not matter much' is not only an intellectual automaton -- he's a *bad capitalist*.
This is projection -- I didn't say anything about subjugating or eliminating anyone from anything.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Apr 1, 2013 22:55 UTC (Mon) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]
Claiming that diversity of race and sex "don't matter much" is tantamount to that. But perhaps, just maybe, you didn't realize they were a problem? (If so, you're speaking from a privileged position and should probably talk to people more.)
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 24, 2013 9:57 UTC (Sun) by aleXXX (subscriber, #2742) [Link]
"I've been fired myself before for less, frankly. Specifically, I was once fired (in part) because I regularly made personal statements on my personal blog"
This is not "less".
Putting something on a blog is public.
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 24, 2013 10:21 UTC (Sun) by aleXXX (subscriber, #2742) [Link]
I mean, also in Germany you can get fired if you say bad things about your employer in public.
A blog is public, a private conversation between two guys is not.
Alex
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 25, 2013 12:48 UTC (Mon) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link] Yes, unfortunately there are no laws to protect whistleblowers in germany. There's a Bundestag petition to change that, but it didn't succeed so far :(
Was firing an over-reaction? Posted Mar 29, 2013 6:00 UTC (Fri) by jmorris42 (subscriber, #2203) [Link]
Lemme get this right. You think she should be able to sue to keep her job? A job that under no possible circumstance she will EVER be able to perform, for that or any other employer so long as memory (and Google) exists? And that condition exists entirely because of her own bad judgment and actions.
Whether you agree with whether it SHOULD be thus, the reality is what it is. After her little stunt no sane male of the species would be caught dead in the same convention center or sales presentation with her out of pure abject fear even if they were PC enough not to shun her for moral reasons. So how in the heck do you do Developer Evangelism in an industry that is, again we aren't talking about what should be but about what is, very male dominated when you are so radioactive that pretty much every new and legacy media outlet has now run at least one feature on your antics? And remember, Google never forgets.
For such things was the French Foreign Legion created.
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 25, 2013 20:45 UTC (Mon) by Nelson (subscriber, #21712) [Link] What I find disturbing was the two firings. Maybe the people in question behaved badly, but who among us hasn't overreacted occasionally or done something stupid in public? I don't think people deserve to lose their jobs over something like this.I'm struggling with this one. It seems to me, when you have 12,000 twitter followers and rather than addressing the guys directly or asking the conference to do it for you if you're not comfortable with it (let's not forget, there were at least 2 non-public ways to address this) shaming them is more than an overreaction. I'm not sure where the line lies, but at 12,000 followers, that's akin to putting it on the news. Referring to it as an overreaction just seems a little disingenuous. This is clearly a person that has done tons of self-promotion, has cultivated a following and has some idea how media works and knows the value of it. Firing a person that is supposed to represent your company and does that seems like a fairly sensible thing. Unless of course they want to go even more public and say what it was exactly that was said which was so offensive and make the case for what they did... That blows my mind too, I know I'll sound like I'm sexist or something but what exactly was this joke that was so offensive to just over hear? Likewise, if you're at a conference with your company name on your pass and you're telling some off color jokes and your company has a policy about that, what happens happens. Seems a little extreme but that's not exactly bringing good press to your company. An overreaction? Sure but we're talking about Playhaven and I had never even heard of them before this. Again, hearing the actual offending jokes or comments might sway one's opinion one way or the other, policy is policy though. And with this much attention, I don't see how they can't enforce policy. I'll say something else that a lot of the geeks and nerds will dislike. Why isn't twitter taking a beating for allowing all the anonymous sniping? There is something to be said for some anonymity and the ability to tweet with a pseudonym or something but rape threats?!? Seems like twitter could shut that down pretty easily or at least provide some mechanisms for tracking the offenders down.
Firing was over-reaction Posted Mar 26, 2013 0:29 UTC (Tue) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]
Twitter's not taking a beating because this sort of thing doesn't just happen on Twitter. Alas. :((
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 22, 2013 14:35 UTC (Fri) by epa (subscriber, #39769) [Link]
One has to conclude that if you value your job - or just being able to get on with your work quietly without the distractions of Internet outrage - the safest way is just not to attend conferences. Maybe you could still go as a private individual, but not if it relates to your work.
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 22, 2013 15:47 UTC (Fri) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
Or just find a job not working for people that are not so brain-dead that they get flustered over a twitter post.
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 23, 2013 4:07 UTC (Sat) by sjj (subscriber, #2020) [Link]
I would have thought that the best way to get on with your work in a professional conference is to behave like a professional, especially during a presentation.
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 23, 2013 17:14 UTC (Sat) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link]
You mean by not unsolicitedly listening to other people's private conversations, violating their right to their own picture by posting it on twitter and publicly humiliating them? Yes, that indeed sounds like a good idea. I'm glad that the person who behaved that way got what she deserved.
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 24, 2013 0:13 UTC (Sun) by rgmoore (✭ supporter ✭, #75) [Link] listening to other people's private conversations A conversation in a crowded room is not private. If you don't want people to hear what you say, don't say it where it's inevitable that other people will hear you. violating their right to their own picture There is no right not to have your picture taken and publicized when you are in a public area. You have some right to limit the use of your image for commercial purposes, but not to prevent it from being used to highlight your bad behavior. by posting it on twitter and publicly humiliating them? Unless their statements were misrepresented, their public humiliation was their own fault. If you don't want to be humiliated for what you say in public, don't say things in public that you would find humiliating were they publicized. Is this such a hard thing to grasp? I'm not trying to excuse Adria Richards. She escalated a situation that could have been handled more deftly. But the men she humiliated are hardly innocent victims. They were engaging in behavior that was against both the ordinary bounds of workplace behavior and the PyCon code of conduct. I don't know if firing was the right outcome (though it could be if this was not a first offense) but it sounds as if was at least worth a public shaming.
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 24, 2013 1:37 UTC (Sun) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link]
> There is no right not to have your picture taken and publicized when you are in a public area.
There is in more civilised countries than the US.
> But the men she humiliated are hardly innocent victims.
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 24, 2013 17:15 UTC (Sun) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
> The fact that such a big deal is being made of it tells more about the pathetic prudery of american society than about those two guys.
While I don't agree with everything HelloWorld said I can't resist reminding that the US has one the highest crime rate in the world and about 0.5% of its population behind bars: very few of them with a white skin.
To me these issues sound important enough not to waste any time or energy or electrons on futile things like increasing the chances of little girls to work in IT (assuming working in IT is a good thing at all)
Maybe some minorities have a "web presence" problem...
Now to take a break from any kind of political correctness I recommend: http://www.theregister.co.uk/data_centre/bofh/
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 24, 2013 20:21 UTC (Sun) by mpr22 (subscriber, #60784) [Link] To me these issues sound important enough not to waste any time or energy or electrons on futile things like increasing the chances of little girls to work in IT (assuming working in IT is a good thing at all) The polite thing I have to say here is: Activism effort is not fungible.
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 25, 2013 8:17 UTC (Mon) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
> Activism effort is not fungible.
Existing activism effort hardly is. On the other hand, putting things in perspective can possibly change the mind of people not involved yet, affect fund raising, etc.
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 24, 2013 23:45 UTC (Sun) by sjj (subscriber, #2020) [Link]
I don't really understand what you're trying to say here. I choose to be charitable and think "futile things like increasing the chances of little girls to work in IT" is some kind of misapplied sarcasm. Little girls or little boys seldom work in IT - adult women and men do. Are you referring to women in IT as "little girls"? Because if that's what you think, here's my advice: get a clue and grow up.
Your post sounds to me like you reached into your Bag of Derailment Arguments and pulled out paragraphs at random. In order: what is the relevance of American crime rate and incarceration statistics (which are appalling) to this discussion? Second graf, see above. Third graf is gibberish. And just in case some young up and coming sysadmins are still reading this thread: please don't take BOFH stories as professional advice (yes, I've had to make this point to people in my career, and I've had people from outside of IT/Operations come to me and tell me they think it's great they don't have to be afraid of talking to our department anymore). You don't want to be That Guy.
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 25, 2013 9:48 UTC (Mon) by pboddie (subscriber, #50784) [Link] Are you referring to women in IT as "little girls"? I think it's obvious that they were not, especially from the broader context of the discussion. I recommend not looking for offence at every opportunity, instead giving people the benefit of the doubt even if you don't agree with their general position.
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 26, 2013 0:16 UTC (Tue) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]
Curious. I read precisely the opposite from context than do you. Do you really think anyone is arguing that six-year-old children of any gender should work in IT?! Talk about straw women...
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 26, 2013 0:51 UTC (Tue) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
> Do you really think anyone is arguing that six-year-old children of any gender should work in IT?!
http://www.google.com/search?q=adria+richards+little+girl
(I wonder where you got the "six-year-old" part from)
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 26, 2013 12:14 UTC (Tue) by pboddie (subscriber, #50784) [Link]
Did you reply to the wrong post here? No-one was arguing that six-year-old children should work in IT. The encouragement of little girls and boys to become interested in computers (and one day in the future perhaps work in IT) was a theme at PyCon US, especially as they had tutorials for children and gave out Raspberry Pis to everyone. That's the wider context, not what the Internet mob had to say about it afterwards.
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 25, 2013 10:06 UTC (Mon) by micka (subscriber, #38720) [Link]
I think (but can be sure that) "little girls" was refering to the alleged cause of Adria Richards' snapping.
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 24, 2013 23:22 UTC (Sun) by sjj (subscriber, #2020) [Link]
Excuse me, but how does bringing out the broad brush about American society bring "something new to say and demonstrate the highest level of respect for others" (as the Grumpy Editor asked) in this discussion?
There may indeed be more civilized countries than the US. You may think that "the pathetic prudery of american society" is to blame. But the fact is that the conference we're presumably talking about here was held in Santa Clara, California, which is part of the US. "When in Rome, do as the Romans do" has been part of Western civilization since at least 390 CE.
St. Augustine said it pretty well: When I go to Rome, I fast on Saturday, but here [Milan] I do not. Do you also follow the custom of whatever church you attend, if you do not want to give or receive scandal.
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 25, 2013 1:16 UTC (Mon) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link]
> Excuse me, but how does bringing out the broad brush about American society bring "something new to say and demonstrate the highest level of respect for others" (as the Grumpy Editor asked) in this discussion?
I don't think anyone brought up the point before that the problem may not be the developer who made a dirty joke but society's attitude towards it. I should have phrased it differently, but I still think it's a valid point to make.
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 25, 2013 12:03 UTC (Mon) by pboddie (subscriber, #50784) [Link] I wonder how all this will affect the tendency of various people in the different Python communities to use Monty Python references in their materials. Making references to Romans, particularly visiting dignitaries, might be more trouble than it's worth.
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 26, 2013 0:19 UTC (Tue) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]
I dunno. Adria *is* a plausibly Latinate name, heck very close to that of at least one notable emperor. (I can't help noticing the social context of names here. The whole personality of said emperor seems to shift if you modernize his name by removing the first letter: Emperor Adrian...)
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 24, 2013 17:28 UTC (Sun) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
> > listening to other people's private conversations
> A conversation in a crowded room is not private. If you don't want people to hear what you say,...
There is difference between hearing and listening which I think is quite relevant here.
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 26, 2013 0:14 UTC (Tue) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link] There is no right not to have your picture taken and publicized when you are in a public area.A quote seems relevant here. As usual, he hits it out of the park: "You know, when I was in Paris, seeing Linter for the first time, I was standing at the top of some steps in the courtyard where Linter's place was, and I looked across it and there was a little notice on the wall saying it was forbidden to take photographs of the courtyard without the man's permission. [...] They want to own the light!"-- Iain M. Banks, The State of the Art, chapter 6.3 Halation Effect But, of course, Iain is one of those Scottish socialists...
Conferences may be more trouble than they are worth Posted Mar 26, 2013 10:55 UTC (Tue) by fb (subscriber, #53265) [Link]
@rgmoore
While the whole thread is somehow depressing and somehow instructive in its arguments, I would like to thank you for the cool headed and rational look at the situation. I mean it.
Kind regards,
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 22, 2013 17:06 UTC (Fri) by duffy (subscriber, #31787) [Link]
I think it iterates the importance of when you enact a harassment policy, you should also outline a specific process for folks to follow when they feel the policy has been breached.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 22, 2013 18:26 UTC (Fri) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] The PyCon US 2013 web site contains a very obvious »Code of Conduct« page (which comes right below »What is PyCon?« in the »About« menu). This states quite clearly that If you are being harassed, notice that someone else is being harassed, or have any other concerns, please contact a member of conference staff. Conference staff will be wearing "PyCon Staff" t-shirts.There is also a more detailed procedure that the »Code of Conduct« page links to. It is difficult to say how the conference organisers could improve on this. If people like Ms Richards prefer to take matters into their own hands instead there is little the organisers can do about it.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 22, 2013 20:53 UTC (Fri) by duffy (subscriber, #31787) [Link]
I can't find the article now but I'm fairly certain it was reported that the PyCon staff updated that page after the incident.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 22, 2013 21:49 UTC (Fri) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] Fair enough (I wouldn't know). However, even if the page was different before the incident, I doubt it said that if you hear somebody make what you think is an inappropriate joke you should photograph that person and post the picture to Twitter at once to shame them. Even in the absence of explicit guidelines it does not take a Ph.D. in psychology to figure out that a more reasonable reaction in this case might have been to ask the guys politely to tone it down. Given that the inappropriate nature of the banter is in doubt to begin with, maybe the most reasonable reaction would have been to concentrate on the presentation, or the swag bag, or anything else, instead and let the moment pass. Especially if, like Ms Richards, you're just listening in accidentally and are apparently not above making a »dick joke« yourself on occasion. It is very important to be sensitive to harassment issues but going around on a hair trigger, ready for all-out thermonuclear warfare, at all times does not really advance the issue. Sexism at tech conferences is very real and we should all contribute to stamping it out, but this includes dealing with your colleagues (of either sex) in a mature, reasonable, professional, and friendly way instead of gratuitously aggravating situations that are very likely really quite easy to defuse. There are other conceivable situations that might require immediate and decisive reactions in order to protect people's well-being or life but this one arguably wasn't one of those. It is safe to stipulate that attendees at PyCon are there because they share a passion for Python programming, and IMHO that should serve to establish a common ground and keep people from assuming by default that everyone else there is a monster who can't wait to harass them with sexist jokes or worse. If there are in fact sexist monsters around it does help if there are documented and well-known procedures to deal with them, and if tech conferences are wising up to this then this must be a good thing. Even if the PyCon staff added these procedures to their page after the fact, I would think that they will remain there for next year's PyCon, and for other similar conferences to emulate. While we would all welcome instant perfection, gradual improvement is better than no improvement at all.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 23, 2013 4:44 UTC (Sat) by laptop006 (subscriber, #60779) [Link]
Per archive.org this verbage appears to have been in there since March 2nd at least:
http://web.archive.org/web/20130302093840/https://us.pyco...
Why does everybody talk about sexism? Posted Mar 22, 2013 17:47 UTC (Fri) by HelloWorld (guest, #56129) [Link] Sexism is discrimination or prejudice based on a person's sex. Adria Richards' original tweet otoh only mentioned jokes and puns with a sexual connotation. Not every dirty joke is sexist, and not every sexist comment involves sexuality, and people should stop talking about sexism when they really mean obscenity. Case in point: this is dirty, but not sexist (indeed, it's arguably feminist). This otoh is sexist, but not dirty.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 22, 2013 18:53 UTC (Fri) by marduk (subscriber, #3831) [Link]
This is just another of a long list of examples where a person's pre-occopation with themselves is multiplied by their pre-occupation with the Twitternet. The only difference being this is tangentially related to free software.
Foucault's dystopia Posted Mar 22, 2013 20:30 UTC (Fri) by kerolasa (guest, #56089) [Link]
Most of geeks know Orwell's 1992 dystopia, in which government is monitoring everyone. Michel Foucault in his great book Discipline and Punish proposed similar, but different set up. Everyone is made to monitor everyone, with result of making the whole world as prison where only limited ways to be can be practiced without punishment. This PyCon case has horrible similarities with loss of freedom in terms of Foucault.
Foucault's dystopia Posted Mar 25, 2013 0:28 UTC (Mon) by sjj (subscriber, #2020) [Link]
Oh dear Ford, save us from the dystopia of oppression by self-organizing open source communities and their conferences!
How does the world look from the year 2021? Found life on any exoplanets yet?
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 23, 2013 0:24 UTC (Sat) by khc (subscriber, #45209) [Link]
as a non-native speaker male, could someone explain how "fork a repo" is sexist?
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 23, 2013 0:45 UTC (Sat) by Tobu (subscriber, #24111) [Link] Quoting from the interested party:Hi, I'm the guy who made a comment about big dongles. First of all I'd like to say I'm sorry. I really did not mean to offend anyone and I really do regret the comment and how it made Adria feel. She had every right to report me to staff, and I defend her position. However, there is another side to this story. While I did make a big dongle joke about a fictional piece hardware that identified as male, no sexual jokes were made about forking. My friends and I had decided forking someone's repo is a new form of flattery (the highest form being implementation) and we were excited about one of the presenters projects; a friend said "I would fork that guys repo" The sexual context was applied by Adria, and not us.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 23, 2013 1:02 UTC (Sat) by Tobu (subscriber, #24111) [Link] So that deals with innuendo and lack thereof. There's further to go from innuendo to sexism, and a ton of theories theorising the latter, but the application of gender studies to real-world blame assignment elevated to an internet art form sometimes loses perspective.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 23, 2013 10:13 UTC (Sat) by smurf (subscriber, #17840) [Link]
Thanks for the update.
All the more reason to talk *before* resorting to Twitter or other public blame-and-shame tactics.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 23, 2013 0:49 UTC (Sat) by tialaramex (subscriber, #21167) [Link]
The word "fork" sounds enough like "fuck" that you can play on the similarity (do not try this sort of thing if you aren't fluent in the language). That only gets you part way to "sexist" of course, since on its own it's just smutty (or another poster above said "dirty") but it could be part of a longer discussion that was sexist.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 24, 2013 20:43 UTC (Sun) by brooksmoses (subscriber, #88422) [Link]
I think there's a fair bit of conflation of "sexist" and "sexual harassment" going on here.
Making sexual jokes in a professional environment around people (men _or_ women!) who are uncomfortable with them is sexual harassment. See, for example, the jokes and audience in question here.
In a culture where generally women are more offended by sexual jokes than men (such as American culture and many other cultures, for a large variety of reasons that I won't go into), a workplace environment full of sexual jokes will tend to lead to a workplace where many women feel uncomfortable and are thus pushed out -- and that result is sexist.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 24, 2013 20:55 UTC (Sun) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
If you think sec related jokes only happen in male dominated settings, you are sadly mistaken.
Spend some time talking with male nurses about that goes on in their environments and you will hear horror stories every bit as ugly.
then the stories of what goes on behind the scene in fashion modelling or cheerleading are legendary for the infighting, backbiting, harassment, etc.
It seems that any time you have a group that's skewed so heavily towards one gender this sort of behaviour happens
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 24, 2013 23:47 UTC (Sun) by rgmoore (✭ supporter ✭, #75) [Link] Spend some time talking with male nurses about that goes on in their environments and you will hear horror stories every bit as ugly. This is a good point. As a man who works in an environment where women are a substantial majority, I can confirm that women can and do say things that make men uncomfortable. The kinds of sexual discussions men and women tend to get involved with are different, but women's discussions can be just as off putting to men as the other way round. And, of course, if it's a group of women making sexual comments that make their male coworkers sufficiently uncomfortable, that's just as much sexual harassment as if it were the other way around.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 25, 2013 0:04 UTC (Mon) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
> Spend some time talking with male nurses about that goes on in their environments and you will hear horror stories every bit as ugly.
While nurse stories would make IT persons blush like they never did before I don't think this is gender-related since doctors tell the same stories or worse. Gallows humour they say.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 26, 2013 0:24 UTC (Tue) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]
Quite. And, to be honest, I think cardiac nurses or neurosurgeons have more justification for gallows humour than do computer people (those working in non-safety-critical environments, anyway). When you've reached into someone's open chest on short notice in the middle of the working day you likely *need* to blow off steam afterwards. Dealing with idiotic IT support requests or random passing bugs is just not stressful to the same degree, at all. There isn't as much riding on it. (And I say this as someone who finds most computing jobs too stressful -- but I know this is a reflection on me, and not an indication that computing jobs are in some way super-stressful. They're not.)
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 26, 2013 0:28 UTC (Tue) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
I wasn't talking about cardiac nurses or ER nurses or any subset that is under especially high stress.
I'm talking about your run-of-the-mill nursing staff (the equivalent of the run-of-the-mill IT staff, or auto mechanics, construction worker, etc)
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 26, 2013 0:46 UTC (Tue) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
> (the equivalent of the run-of-the-mill IT staff, or auto mechanics, construction worker, etc)
Even though run-of-the-mill nurses don't often deal with open chests they still have to deal with things quite heavier than "equivalent" jobs. It does not need to be covered in blood.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 26, 2013 4:02 UTC (Tue) by raven667 (subscriber, #5198) [Link]
If I'm reading the research correctly there isn't any evidence that one source of stress is different than another, stress is stress and it doesn't matter if it is because of a life and death issue or a trivial one, it has the same effects and feels the same.
I'm sorry that you've internalized your difficulty with stress and don't think your feelings are legitimate because IT work isn't "important" enough, it's not a bad reflection on you to have stress. It reminds me of something I once read about ESPNs web operations, they remind themselves that he stakes are ultimately low, "We are not doctors, if we screw up no one dies, worst case is someone doesn't get their sports scores for a little while."
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 26, 2013 8:19 UTC (Tue) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
> If I'm reading the research correctly...
If that's not literally begging for a:
[citation required]
... then I don't know what is!
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 23, 2013 5:09 UTC (Sat) by nevets (subscriber, #11875) [Link] CBS News has an article on the incident. It contains a comment from the CEO of SendGrid, Jim Franklin:"Her decision to tweet the comments and photographs of the people who made the comments crossed the line," Franklin wrote in a blog post on the site. "Publicly shaming the offenders - and bystanders - was not the appropriate way to handle the situation." As well as a statement that the Associated Press was able to reach Richards, where she couldn't comment but did confirm the tweets and that she was fired. It also confirms that one of the guys involved was fired from PlayHaven.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 23, 2013 5:26 UTC (Sat) by nevets (subscriber, #11875) [Link] Also, you can support Girls Who Code and buy this T-shirt. But I wouldn't recommend wearing it to your next conference.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 23, 2013 5:32 UTC (Sat) by rahvin (subscriber, #16953) [Link]
I suggest you read the article if you haven't. She's a PR rep whose job was to evangelize developers and sell her companies ability to help developers interact. I'd say she did a darn good job of damaging her job by ensuring that other developers are afraid to socialize, joke or relax around her. She also potentially damaged her employer in the process and IMO they were justified in letting her go.
"Twitter shaming" is something that you should absolutely only do in situations where you are dealing with a public figure who you are unable to approach. It's nothing more than a call for mob justice and it's a Bullying tactic right out of the standard Bully playbook when used against ordinary people. Calling for the pitchforks and torches against an ordinary person is borderline criminal harassment IMO.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 23, 2013 5:48 UTC (Sat) by nevets (subscriber, #11875) [Link]
Yes I've read the article. I read her tweets before it got as big as it got. I've been debating this for the last couple of days. I even stated I felt she should be fired before she was fired, and I called her actions being that of a cowardly bully.
But Corbet asked for something new to add. This was the first I read of the CEO of SendGrid posting on his blog, and I decided to share that. Nothing more. I've been up too late discussing this that I need to get some sleep.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 24, 2013 0:56 UTC (Sun) by rgmoore (✭ supporter ✭, #75) [Link] "Twitter shaming" is something that you should absolutely only do in situations where you are dealing with a public figure who you are unable to approach. I'm not sure that I would go quite that far. It certainly shouldn't be the first response to bad behavior, but I can see it as a viable approach when other social methods have failed and there's no official recourse. For example, if you asked people politely to stop and they laughed at you, I could imagine using "name and shame" as a backup plan. That certainly doesn't apply in this case, though, because there is official recourse; you can report them to the conference organizers for violating the code of conduct. And if a report for violating the code of conduct doesn't work, it's the conference organizers who deserve the biggest criticism for failing to enforce it, not the people you reported.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 25, 2013 9:41 UTC (Mon) by jezuch (subscriber, #52988) [Link]
> "Within 24 hours, Adria was being attacked with the vile words people use only when attacking women. They called her a man hater (this was the nicest thing they said) who robbed a father of three of his livelihood. Then the threats began- on twitter, on her blog, on facebook. She should get raped, she should be fired, she should be killed, she should kill herself. A petition was started and people threatened SendGrid’s business. The company itself suffered a DDOS attack. All this ridiculousness made Adria look reasonable in comparison."
I wasn't following this story closely, but, man, I knew Internet was full of idiots and jerks but now I'm officially speechless.
...
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 25, 2013 23:16 UTC (Mon) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
The internet stopped being different from the real world some time ago now.
Blum: Adria Richards, PyCon, and How We All Lost Posted Mar 26, 2013 0:28 UTC (Tue) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]
Quite. This sort of self-organizing misogynist travelling death-and-rape threat-fest has been going for years (it's forced a number of women in the skeptical community out of the community entirely and into self-imposed internet silence, because every comment they make, on any subject, elicits hundreds of appalling threats from the same crowd). I wish there was a way to identify the people who do this and silently erase them from the space-time continuum, but unfortunately there is not.
|
|||||||||||||