Even if he was talking about moms in general, it wouldn't be sexist. It's just an example, it doesn't matter if "my mom" is replaced with "my dad", "my parents" or perhaps "my dog".
And in my particular case I was refering to an old lady, a brillant and successful physician, but who like many people of that generation has no fascination for computers, and use them as long as they are simple and intuitive. Exactly like she would use a car, without any appetite to fix or tweak it herself. To go mainstream, linux needs to appeal to that kind of users.
He specifically didn't mention grandmothers though.
And anyway, do you believe that "grandmothers" isn't a good example of a demographic that's largely not tech savvy? That's not a stereotype, it's a fact.
And no, I don't think that "grandmothers" is a better example than for example "grandfathers". In any case, I'd be willing to bet that nobody would be spewing these absolutely absurd accusations of sexism if cm2187 had used "my grandfather" instead of "my mum".
No, he didn't, but it was still in the same vein as the trope (older woman).
> do you believe that "grandmothers" isn't a good example of a demographic that's largely not tech savvy
I think that there is less aggregate tech knowledge in that demographic than in others, but I still think it's a trope that should be avoided, in exactly the same way we don't use 'black' as a shorthand for 'criminal' even though that demographic is overrepresented in prisons. It's associating a negative attribute with a demographic as a lazy shorthand term.
The problem here goes deeper. The initial complaint about someone else mentioning observations has grown out of the attitude "it can not be what must no be". It’s dangerous when people deny reality in favour of ideology.
