Thank you for speaking up. I imagine this is not the easiest time to do so.
> This doesn't portray women as badly as it portrays our entire tech culture badly.
With such a large audience there will always be extreme responses on either side. There will (and have been) DDoS attacks, personal phone calls etc. I don't think those represent the community as much as it represents the general population. Take large crowds of people people. Out of 10000 there will be a number of unstable, vile, and malicious ones to spew hate. It doesn't matter what the issue is. It could have been about vegetables or voltmeters.
I believe most others here are just as upset about those comments and actions as you are. I know I am.
> Oh, wait, I can...the coworking conference I recently attended, where nearly 50% of the attendees were women.
I can think of less hostile and more welcome environments too, a smaller conference usually is. I went to a small 100-150 people tech conference recently and it did feel much more friendly, open, and welcoming than something as large as PyCon. I don't think those people were just selected for kindness and sensitivity I think, statistically those few nasty ones just didn't happen to be there.
> I am hard-pressed to name a conference I've attended where one of these "borderline" sexist issues hasn't happened.
And that is why I like how PyCon recently has started to address the issue and encouraged reporting of such incidents. I think you should report such incidents and you shouldn't have to deal with it. It is unprofessional and creates a hostile environment. I want to personally apologize (for whatever an anonymous apology from a no-name on the internet is worth) for their actions insensitivity. I wouldn't want my wife, daughter, mom or sister to have to face this kind of hostility and will go out of my way to speak up and help when I can.
However, what the issue at hand is not the reporting but using twitter, her social an PR status, her job title, to do it. She did that first before she did the private message. She claims jokes were offending, she then posts racists and penis jokes on her twitter account. Not only does it smell of hypocrisy it smells of maliciousness. She weighed her odds according to her blog and decided this might play out well -- and it seems like it would have 0 to 100 in just one day. What more could a PR person involved with speaking engagements could ask for.
> sometimes you can't take it anymore and you just snap.
I can understand that. Adria confessed has has traveled constantly for day before that. She was exhausted. I can see that. We all make mistakes, we are humans. So what is the right thing to do later? Apologize, that is the right thing.
Now let's revisit what happened. There are 2 distinct things she did 1) she reported it privately 2) she slandered someone publicly. There are distinct. I think 1) was what she should have done. And I think 2) is completely un-acceptable. Talk about a hostile environment.
> This doesn't portray women as badly as it portrays our entire tech culture badly.
I wouldn't want to consider those vile comments and tweets as part of the community. They are just sad examples of humanity. Let's ignore them if we can. But I want to highlight one good thing about the tech community -- it doesn't tolerate injustice. Just like you say you experience sexism and borderline sexual harassment often, many in the tech community were "nerds" and have also experience harassment, psychological and physical abuse in schools. Bullying is not and should not be tolerated. Neither should backstabbing. Or taking credit and advantage of others at their expense. I think that what the community has riled up against.
PSF (PyCon) has gone to hide in the weeds on issue 2) save for a quick Github commit. Yes we noticed that. And it is still not cool.
Just like you feel unwelcome because of veiled and open harassment at conferences. I don't think I will feel safe at PyCon until I know they officially condemn public slandering of attendees (Gold Sponsors, none the less).
> She claims jokes were offending, she then posts
> racists and penis jokes on her twitter account.
> Not only does it smell of hypocrisy it smells of
> maliciousness.
Wow, so if your mother (or sister, or girlfriend, or wife, or daughter) has ever made an off-color joke in her life, that gives any man in the world the right to discuss penises with her in person?
I mean, wow. That's what you're getting at.
Twitter has elements of both a public and private space. It's public, obviously, but people read your Tweets voluntarily.
It's not at all comparable to making unwanted sexual comments to a woman you don't know on a bus, or in an alleyway, or in a convenience store, or at a conference.
It's not comparable to subjecting
It's
The difference here is that the jokes/comments were not made to her. She overheard them in the context of a semi-private conversation between two people, and took umbrage at them.
If they had come up and started making penis jokes to her, then it'd be a very different situation.
It's not as obnoxious as if they'd walked up to her and started telling her penis jokes, but on the other hand a person has to assume that the person sitting in front of them at a conference (seriously, they're what - three or four feet away?) can hear what they're saying.
Also, her site is down at the moment, so I can't verify, but didn't she actually converse with them? I might be wrong about that. I wish I could verify it.
I also wouldn't assume at a conference the person sitting in front of me is intently listening in on my conversation...
She exchanged a sentence or two, then a couple min later after she had turned away after they continued the semi-private conversation the guy made the penis joke.
> Wow, so if your mother (or sister, or girlfriend, or wife, or daughter) has ever made an off-color joke in her life, that gives any man in the world the right to discuss penises with her in person?
No but if they make those jokes and then turn around saying anyone making penis jokes is worth of public flogging I would also be the one pointing out the hypocrisy.
> I mean, wow. That's what you're getting at.
Yes. I am getting at hypocrisy. There was an element about her being so outraged at such anatomical jokes. Her credibility is slightly weakened because of her comments on Tweeter. Her credibility is even more weakened based on (what used to be) her job and community position. It more and more starts to point to her taking a calculated advantage of a situation, and also throwing someone under the bus in the process.
She also can't claim ignorance at how publicly broadcasting something like that would turn out for that person. That is what she does for a living supposedly. I think at this point, it would take a very strong argument to convince me this was a quick overreaction and an "oops".
Back up just a second there. As far as I can tell, posting jokes like that to twitter and hearing jokes like that at a conference are entirely comparable in every way. They're exactly the same thing - both are jokes of a sexual/race based background.
> As far as I can tell, posting jokes like that to
> twitter and hearing jokes like that at a conference
> are entirely comparable in every way. They're exactly
> the same thing - both are jokes of a sexual/race based
> background.
You don't think that context matters at all when it comes to a joke?
Do you just speak the exact same way everywhere, whether you're talking to clients, joking with your friends during an alcohol-fueled gaming session, in a locker room, or to your parents?
Or do you maybe think that some subjects are appropriate for some situations but not others?
Personally, I say a lot of extremely off-color things to my (male and female) friends that I wouldn't dream of saying to strangers. Even if I had some evidence that stranger had made an off-color joke at some point in their lives.
You seem to be jumping over the point here. Both the conference and twitter are public venues, and both the jokes are sexual in nature.
You seem to be arguing here that a joke at a public conference is a different situation to a joke posted publicly to twitter - I do not see the difference. Her twitter account is now irrevocably linked to Sendspace's image as she has claimed that Sendspace backs her views, which in turn claims that Sendspace is backing her sexual joke in a public space while also calling out a sexual joke at a conference. This is obviously paradoxical, and is also why I'm asking you to rethink your posts.
> You seem to be arguing here that a joke at
> a public conference is a different situation
> to a joke posted publicly to twitter
I'm sorry. Posting something on Twitter is simply not the same as saying something several feet away from a stranger in person. There are two primary reasons.
One, anybody reading Adria's Twitter account is doing so on a voluntary basis. Adria, on the other hand, did not volunteer to listen to a bunch of sexual jokes from these men she doesn't know.
Two, there's the issue of physical proximity. The overwhelming odds are, of course, that the men at this conference were not a physical threat to Adria. Nobody was arguing they were anything worse than some guys who made a joke at a sub-optimal time. However, please understand that sexual violence is depressingly common in America (http://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2011/p1214_sexual_violence...) and that it's one more reason why we don't subject strangers to unwanted sexual banter, even if that stranger said something off-color at some point in their lives.
Again, I have to ask: given that every woman you know has probably said something off-color at some point in their lives, perhaps publicly, does that give me the right to speak to them in whatever off-color way I wish?
I'd say that no, it doesn't. You say I do?
Or, let's try another tack. Forget Twitter. Let's compare apples to apples.
Do you think you have the right to go up to any female comedienne who's ever made an off-color joke, and tell her off-color jokes? You don't, because she is not volunteering to listen to your jokes in the same way that you did when you listened to her routine. And honestly, I think you probably do know that, and would probably not walk up to Ellen Degeneres and discuss lesbian sex with her even though she has publicly identified as a lesbian on national television.
Everybody has the right to discuss penises, or anything they like, provided participants in discussion willing to do it. If they do not, the preceding history does not matter.
However, in this case as far as I understand (please correct if I'm wrong) the person took offense not for something that was directed at her, but by something that is merely said in her presence, without her being the intended recipient or part of the discussion. Of course, it could still be unpleasant, but for one to expect they'd never overhear anything that they would not discuss personally would be an unwarranted imposition on others. It's one thing saying "don't talk that way to me", and quite another saying "never talk that way at all if I have even remotest chance of overhearing it".
> but for one to expect they'd never overhear anything that
> they would not discuss personally would be an unwarranted
> imposition on others.
If she'd walked by their table in a restaurant and overheard them, or eavesdropped on them by putting her ear up to a closed door? Okay, then they might be able to claim they never could have expected to be overheard.
But they were sitting directly behind her. Literally a few feet away. In chairs that were facing toward her. How could they not expect that their words would be audible to her?
They probably expected that she wouldn't be paying attention to them or just didn't think about her listening in. People talk about all kinds of stuff while on talks or other group situations all the time, and not every time they study the surroundings to see if somebody is listening or not. The point here the talk wasn't directed at her, and while it would be appropriate to point out to the guys that there are in a public space and can be heard, so they should tone it down or maybe go talk outside, blowing it into an incident of systemic misogyny and rampant sexism that is worth losing a job over seems to me way out of proportion. Not every time somebody behaves out of place or rudely it means he is $_-ist, $_-ist and $_-ist and probably loves Hitler. Sometimes it's just people not thinking about what they are doing too much and coming out as an oafs. Pointing it out usually quite enough and no escalation is necessary. Sometimes is is
> blowing it into an incident of systemic misogyny and
> rampant sexism that is worth losing a job over seems to
> me way out of proportion.
I agree: the response was out of proportion. I think literally every entity directly involved in this situation could have handled it better.
However, just because the response was out of proportion doesn't mean anybody needs to defend the men who were sitting behind her, or strain their credibility by pondering how - how? - these men could have possibly known that the person sitting directly in front of them, several feet away, could have heard their sexual jokes.
The point is that they did not intend it to be directed at her and probably were not regarding her as part of the conversation. Human perception is very selective, and you can literally look at things and not see them. There's nothing @-ist in this, it's just how the brain works. Should the guys be more aware when in public places? Yes. This can be handled by a gentle reminder, not by a public campaign. Of course, this does not produce a splashy effect of fighting @-isms and being on the forefront of the struggle for all good against all evil, but it is usually better for everyone involved. Which is the main point of it, and hopefully more people realizing it would be at least a little win in this huge heap of fail.
Ah, but they didn't make any comments to her, by her own admission.
Her story goes like this: She was sitting a row in front of them and they were having a private conversation with "dongle" and "forking" jokes.
It could have been me, making those jokes. Luckily nobody could fire me if somebody went nuts and posted my photo on the internet and tried to publicly shame me instead of asking me to stop doing it in her earshot. But perhaps more importantly, she probably wouldn't have said a thing, because I'm a woman. Who's been laughing over the word "dongle" since 1997.
Thank you for speaking up. I imagine this is not the easiest time to do so.
> This doesn't portray women as badly as it portrays our entire tech culture badly.
With such a large audience there will always be extreme responses on either side. There will (and have been) DDoS attacks, personal phone calls etc. I don't think those represent the community as much as it represents the general population. Take large crowds of people people. Out of 10000 there will be a number of unstable, vile, and malicious ones to spew hate. It doesn't matter what the issue is. It could have been about vegetables or voltmeters.
I believe most others here are just as upset about those comments and actions as you are. I know I am.
> Oh, wait, I can...the coworking conference I recently attended, where nearly 50% of the attendees were women.
I can think of less hostile and more welcome environments too, a smaller conference usually is. I went to a small 100-150 people tech conference recently and it did feel much more friendly, open, and welcoming than something as large as PyCon. I don't think those people were just selected for kindness and sensitivity I think, statistically those few nasty ones just didn't happen to be there.
> I am hard-pressed to name a conference I've attended where one of these "borderline" sexist issues hasn't happened.
And that is why I like how PyCon recently has started to address the issue and encouraged reporting of such incidents. I think you should report such incidents and you shouldn't have to deal with it. It is unprofessional and creates a hostile environment. I want to personally apologize (for whatever an anonymous apology from a no-name on the internet is worth) for their actions insensitivity. I wouldn't want my wife, daughter, mom or sister to have to face this kind of hostility and will go out of my way to speak up and help when I can.
However, what the issue at hand is not the reporting but using twitter, her social an PR status, her job title, to do it. She did that first before she did the private message. She claims jokes were offending, she then posts racists and penis jokes on her twitter account. Not only does it smell of hypocrisy it smells of maliciousness. She weighed her odds according to her blog and decided this might play out well -- and it seems like it would have 0 to 100 in just one day. What more could a PR person involved with speaking engagements could ask for.
> sometimes you can't take it anymore and you just snap.
I can understand that. Adria confessed has has traveled constantly for day before that. She was exhausted. I can see that. We all make mistakes, we are humans. So what is the right thing to do later? Apologize, that is the right thing.
Now let's revisit what happened. There are 2 distinct things she did 1) she reported it privately 2) she slandered someone publicly. There are distinct. I think 1) was what she should have done. And I think 2) is completely un-acceptable. Talk about a hostile environment.
> This doesn't portray women as badly as it portrays our entire tech culture badly.
I wouldn't want to consider those vile comments and tweets as part of the community. They are just sad examples of humanity. Let's ignore them if we can. But I want to highlight one good thing about the tech community -- it doesn't tolerate injustice. Just like you say you experience sexism and borderline sexual harassment often, many in the tech community were "nerds" and have also experience harassment, psychological and physical abuse in schools. Bullying is not and should not be tolerated. Neither should backstabbing. Or taking credit and advantage of others at their expense. I think that what the community has riled up against.
PSF (PyCon) has gone to hide in the weeds on issue 2) save for a quick Github commit. Yes we noticed that. And it is still not cool.
Just like you feel unwelcome because of veiled and open harassment at conferences. I don't think I will feel safe at PyCon until I know they officially condemn public slandering of attendees (Gold Sponsors, none the less).