You've been doing these for a while, so: thank you for taking the time! It's just that I get the feeling your "job" should be done automatically by a sidebar or something ;)
Seriously an automated element containing "previous discussions about this subject" would be a nice addition to HN.
I did have, but it's been permanently disabled. I got too much grief over it. I have scripts to assist, but all these posts are "by hand". They don't take much time, and occasionally during the search and confirmation phase I stumble across other things that are interesting, so there is some reward.
Script assisted manual commands are something I use a lot as well, I can hack up scripts and cope with minor changes in data format &c.
I'm interested in the reaction to automated posting but the comparative acceptance of 'by hand' posting. Is that simply frequency? Are you selecting which historic threads to run searches against?
I think in part many people were just upset at having a 'bot posting. Thin end of the wedge, and all that. Others didn't like the tone of the message, seeing it as a rebuke.
This is why when I do it "by hand" I make sure I hunt out previous discussions, and if there are none, make a note of that. I can script it all, but with the general hostility I've decided that I'll run the searches for myself because there are often interesting things turn up. Then I post my results because, well, why not? If I found it interesting, others may as well.
More than once I've caught myself constructing replies on negative results and deleted them. I may yet just stop entirely.
I deeply appreciate Colin's posts about previous submissions and routinely upvote them. What I like about them, as someone who has been on Hacker News 1838 days now, is that they answer the "Haven't I seen this before?" question that often pops into my mind when I see a recurrently posted story. Because this site's name is Hacker News, after all, I expect to see new stories submitted here, so when an old story is submitted it's helpful to know where the previous discussion is.
I think it makes sense to have that bot as an actual separate site feature. Personally, it's not something I'd want to be mixed in with normal comments.
I have taken the precaution of searching for phrases in titles of older pages before submitting (I submit seldom) and have not submitted if previously discussed.
Was this as ridiculous a pastiche of clichés when it was written in 1995 as it is now?
Or did programmers really only start to have social lives, dislike permanent crunch mode and plan before coding in the last 20 years?
It sounds to me like Card read through the Jargon file, i.e. the self-image of a considerably earlier subculture of programmers, took it at face value, added some hyperbole and wrote it up as a kind of revelation.
Aaah, the skinny hipster programmer sipping a latte is kind'o new. I recall sitting in a conference room with a bunch of programmers not to long ago and ~80% fit the description of the article. There were dudes sitting down the hallway with whom I chatted over IRC or IM more than I ever did in person. Sure the article may be a bit of a cliche, but that's for a reason.
I agree programmers now are arguably more "social", but then again a lot of the rest of the world now are probably more like what programmers used to be like, glued to a computing device.
Part of this is that programming has changed, or perhaps that there are new areas that require different sorts of people.The further you get from web applications, the more like this the people are.
What kind of work attracts people that prefer computers to other people?
Front end is about design, which means it is about people. Backend... less so, but most people do full stack these days anway. So if you do web, you do people (or you are unlikely to be good).
But the technology behind web is easier. That isn't to say web is easy - it is two problems, a people problem and a technical problem. But you are writing in a dynamic language which doesn't appear to be sentient and hate you, and a lot of the more technical stuff gets abstracted away.
In 1995, you wrote some C, you wrote some assembely, and as an afterthought, you made an interface featuring horrible IT guy art and an unforgiving number of buttons.
There was a people problem, but the engineers either ignored or didn't notice it. When someone did - MS windows, iphones... well they made a lot of money because caring about user experience was actually a diferentiator back then.
There are still fields of software for people that don't like people. They work in software research, on embedded systems. If they are not so good technically, maybe they work on government / defence software where the user matters less and the ecosystem still uses C++. A lot of them have moved into mathmatical modelling and HFT, because the money is really good there.
There are other reasons for the change - I think Redit and co have created a cultural change. Programmers go to the gym, and feel uncomfortable not having interests outside of LISP.
But yeah, things have changed. I'd say they have changed for the better. But to me, what we really need, is more diversity.
>> Or did programmers really only start to have social lives, dislike permanent crunch mode and plan before coding in the last 20 years?
Yes. Powerful hardware is tolerant of normal people and their normal code. You had to be a little "off" to get the camel through the eye of the needle in times past.
You need to remember - or know - that the Internet and software where THE thing to be writing about in science fiction circles back in the early nineties. See: Sterling, Bruce. Didn't matter if you're actually a writer, not an engineer, and have little idea what you're actually talking about.
I would live on pizzas and coffee. Seems the newer generation of programmers don't like that sort of thing!
I'm not old by any stretch of the imagination, but I always thought of programmers as beardy types with awkward glasses, brown trousers and a crumpled shirt/t-shirt. (I never ironed my shirts, that's for sure!). And coffee was always black. Programmers were more like engineers.
As stated, this brogrammer persona is a new thing. No lattes for me thanks!
Well, I think the difference is that now, the beards, awkward glasses and brown trousers are fashionable. So what was once ridiculed and avoided, is now praised and desirable.
His book Lost Boys contains pretty fair descriptions of the videogame industry and development processes in the 80's, and he did a good amount of videogames writing in the 90's, including Monkey Island, The Dig and the disaster that was Neohunter.
I was going to mention Lost Boys. That book provided my first exposure to an account of the life of a computer programmer, even if the character was fictional.
What was disastrous about Neohunter? It looks like an interesting idea, but other than the old box art (with description of the game) I can't really find any information on it.
The gameplay was stale and the visuals tried to abuse pre-3D technology to add depth and immersion to what was an oldschool 2D point and shoot, but the tech and art were simply not up for the task. Ed Kilham (of Tie Fighter fame) is an awesome guy but he can't make miracles. Orson Scott Card's story was essentially invisible behind the mess, and apparently he didn't care much for it either.
"a side-scrolling shooter that I’m not sure was ever published, since it was coming out just when first-person shooters completely took over the genre. However, for that game I came up with the slang that I later used in battle school in the Shadow books and in the movie scripts I’ve written for Ender’s Game. Nothing gets wasted."
(disclaimer: as they were finishing Neohunter, Ronin hired my bro to do their future tech and rendering, and IMHO things improved a lot for Ronin in that area)
We all know that OSC is a horrible bigot, right? I feel like any sort of fatherly advice he emits needs to be suffixed with "...unless you're gay, then you should be in prison."
If we ignore everything ever said by people with nasty beliefs, we'd basically never read anything written more than 100 years ago, and a decent chunk of the stuff written since. Anti-slavery campaigners in to 1800s used to beat their children. Pretty much every writer in antiquity was either a slaver or pederasts by modern standards. Where do you stop?
It's worth being aware of so you know to take such things into account, you never know when such views might introduce an unwritten assumption or colour a conclusion, but if it's not relevant to the material then it's a side issue.
Choice quote (after he had a chance to reflect on the response to his essay):
"...it has become clearer and clearer to me, since writing this essay, that gay activism as a movement is no longer looking for civil rights, which by and large homosexuals already have. Rather they are seeking to enforce acceptance of their sexual liaisons as having equal validity with heterosexual marriages, to the point of having legal rights as spouses, the right to adopt children, and the right to insist that their behavior be taught to children in public schools as a completely acceptable "alternative lifestyle." It does not take a homophobe to recognize how destructive such a program will be in a society already reeling from the terrible consequences of "no-fault" divorce, social tolerance of extramarital promiscuity, and failing to protect our adolescents until they can channel their sexual passions in a socially productive way. Having already lost control of the car, we now find the gay activists screaming at us to speed up as we drive headlong toward the cliff."
This is not a hateful position. It is a political position and a stance of how society should operate. I see no gay hatred there. Simply the strong need for family and society building. Just because you can't understand his reasons and emotionally react to some of his opinions does not a bigot make.
Sure, but it's really, really hard to believe it's all so sterile and impersonal.
"Hey, i'm sure you're a really nice person, I just think you should be legally discriminated against and denied certain rights solely on the basis of your sexual orientation because I have some ill-informed and antiquated ideas about The Sanctity Of Marriage (tm). Beer?"
Doesn't really seem realistic to me.
Oh, let's hear what he has to say:
"Furthermore, if we allow ourselves to be intimidated by our fear of the world's censure into silence in the face of attempts by homosexuals to make their sin acceptable under the laws of the polity, then we have abandoned our role as teachers of righteousness."
"The repentant homosexual must be met with forgiveness. Even hypocritical homosexuals must be treated individually with compassion. But the collective behavior of the hypocrites of homosexuality must be met with our most forceful arguments and our complete intolerance of their lies."
"That a few individuals suffer from tragic genetic mixups does not affect the differences between genetically distinct males and females."
Yes, it is stupid, ignorant and unscientific, but not hateful. It might be used by people with hateful intentions however. "Argument from authority" is logical fallacy but a lot of people are still tricked by it.
Let's define what's scientific, which parts of that writing can be considered scientific by that definition and return in 50 years here. Really. I can add that to my TODO list :) Chances that I will be still alive are not very high but I still have those chances.
I want to define what's scientific because after 50 years in pessimistic scenario religion can be considered scientific and pope might be The Chief Scientist.
Replace, "Gay people should not be allowed to marry" with "Black people should not be allowed to marry white people" or "Jews should not be allowed to work as professionals", or "Women should stay at home and take care of the children"
When you start identifying a group, and placing restrictions on rights which you enjoy, you are taking a hateful position.
If he's so concerned about the fabric of society and the family why doesn't he write about the evils of divorce? The divorce rate is like 50%, whereas gayness hovers around 5% depending on who you ask.
Somehow the lack of throbbing, purple-veined meatsicks must render it less compelling.
EDIT: withdrawing the above childishness, turns out he does write extensively about divorce.
How is that wrong again?! It is true that they are trying to gain legitimacy. It is no longer about rights but now it is about acceptance. The time has come now to the point where anyone who holds an anti-gay position is criticized and/or boycotted. Now we have not just reached giving gays equal treatment but making changes to accommodate a different lifestyle.
The second point OSC makes is sourced in a discomfort from social disruption. There is a tendency to blame many current state of affairs on the gay movement.
I think in summary we should all reflect on the amount of insight this guy has and the capabilities of prediction he possesses. Just by simply observing things, he makes some deep accurate predictions that are very remote in the future. The article you linked to seems to be written in 1990.
I disagree with who you are as a person, and on that basis, I think you should be denied rights that are routinely given to the rest of the population. Additionally, I find you personally foul and repulsive, and your very nature disgusts me. But it's nothing personal!
Wait, what? You're upset? You want to fight back? You think that just because you're a human being you should be given the same basic consideration under the law as anyone else? HOW DARE YOU PERSECUTE ME BECAUSE OF MY BELIEFS!
Just so you know, this is what you - and Orson Scott Card - sound like when you try to use this "argument."
Is "don't buy from Nazis" really the same as "don't buy from Jews"? It's not about attacking people who disagree, it's about withdrawing support from those who attack others.
Let's say, someone beats their wife brutally, but they're very good at bowling, and always treat you respectfully. Would you feel good about going bowling with them, regardless of how much objectively correct things about bowling they could teach you? Or would you realize the world is full of people who know as much and more, who don't come with quite such a bad aftertase?
It sounds equivalent to "don't buy scripts or other moviemaking services from Communists."
The distinction you are attempting to draw about attacking others makes little sense given the examples I cited. Opponents of polygamy, supporters of Obamacare and opponents of privacy all favor attacking others (polygamists, people who don't buy health insurance, and people who don't cooperate with spying). Most public policies involve attacking someone - all laws are ultimately enforced at the point of a gun.
There is still a difference between bigoted, chauvinistic superstitions and scapegoating, and disagreements about public policy happening in good faith.
You haven't answered my second question. Have you at least thought about it?
It's just music! Why can't people "just listen to the music" which itself has nothing to do with antisemitism? Oh, but that's different, because it strikes close to home for them, right? Well no, the same goes for any homosexuals or those having empathy for them. Or people who just don't like the idea of the US sinking into chaos (violent revolution) because some truly believe that what homosexuals do in their bedrooms or marriages is to blame for their own abysmal performance in both.
You could argue that you personally don't mind listening to Wagner, but that's not an argument for what others should do - surely you understand that. Likewise, the person that started this subthread didn't say everybody should not listen to OSC, but simply asked if anyone else has the same reaction as them. That's perfectly legit, and making such a fuss about is just silly.
Is the article really that good? It seems like the only good thing anyone has to say about this article, is that what someone else said in alleged attack of it is fallacious...? I found it cringeworthy personally.
Lastly, it's not like someone said OSC made good points with X and Y, and then someone else replied "but he's a homophobe!". The ad-hominem complaints are silly anyway: the post itself is only on here because of who wrote it, not because it's that good, and a negative ad-hominem is kind of a valid response to a positive ad-hominem.
I don't actually have a good answer for your second question. It's a tricky one, which is why I wrote nothing. In the specific circumstance you describe I probably wouldn't bowl with the guy - heck, I've cut people off for far less (e.g., slut shaming in my presence). On the other hand, my cofounder is a big proponent of all sorts of things I oppose (Obamacare, basic income, extreme feminism) and I have no plans to cut her off.
I suspect the reason this jumped out at me is that it's literally an attempt to ostracize a hollywood writer for his other views, and being the good liberal that I am (culturally speaking) this jumps out at me.
So I guess at this point I'm walking away with far less certainty of my views than I started with.
As for the article, you are right that it's not position #1 good. It's a well written version of the same sort of fluff that HN has way too much of, nothing more.
The problem with this logic is that by characterizing preferring one lifestyle to another as an "anti-X position" and therefore something that is by default wrong, we encourage the dismantling of our entire culture.
If we are to say that the only acceptable view is that being gay is as good as being straight, then we must logically do the same for the following
* Being transgender
* Being a sex worker
* Eating shit for sexual gratification (no chance of AIDS!)
* Having sex with animals (without harming them)
I'm not sure that any of the above are very immoral, but I'm not comfortable with teaching that they are ideal, or advisable. I'm also not comfortable with teaching children that becoming a sex worker is as good a career path as any other.
We as a society need to maintain a balance between protecting everyone's rights, and allowing people to have their own personal tastes and opinions. This balance should be based on enforcing the most basic laws that guarantee a person's right to life and safety. Gay people should be free from threats of violence. But so should everyone else, including groups who will never be considered as oppressed by liberals, like nerds in high school. As for tastes and preferences, this isn't something we can decide in a top down way.
The entire anti-bullying push is based on a narrative in which bullying results from our society being insufficiently inclusive. If people were more tolerant of differences, we are told, the motivation for bullying would go away.
However this reasoning only applies to certain kinds of bullying, such as bullying of gays (and [1] argues it doesn't even apply in this case). Nerds are bullied because of their actual weakness, not because they are different per se. The sub-culture is a response to bullying, not vice versa.
In order to deal with this kind of bullying, we would need a new narrative in which people have an innate tendency towards picking on other people, and that if not kept in check, this can reach to physical violence and other extremes.
The original essay was written in 1990, his follow up was October, 2013 - he stands by everything he wrote in it, with the only change in his position is that he's no longer seeking to criminalize sexual activity between gay people. That's the progress he's managed to make in 23 years.
Is this different from, say, the black movement? What if there were no longer segregated schools and bathrooms, but african-americans were prohibited to adopt children and black history were not allowed to be taught in schools?
edit: I'm not from the U.S. so I don't know everything as far as minority rights go over there. In my country there are laws agains racism, and they're trying to pass anti-homophobia laws too. I do have a problem with both of these, though, as anybody expressing a racist opinion can be simply jailed without bail. I find the U.S. stance on free speech much more... how do I put it... free?
It's not really any different from the black movement. People who defend institutionalized hatred of gay people don't seem to understand this, and are forever perplexed as to why people affected by it feel so strongly about the issue.
To go a step further, to those who want to continue denying gays rights on the basis of their sexual orientation, they think that allowing gays to marry is just as bad as jailing someone for expressing a racist opinion. They literally do not understand the difference between these two things, hence the virulence of argument.
In the US, it boils down to: you are free to be as much as a bigot as you like in your personal life (there are some special laws about renting and employment) but as long as you are not combining your bigotry with another crime (assault, harassment) you can let your hate flag fly.
I think this helps society blow of some of its racism and bigotry in a safer way than just repressing it, but it's an ongoing struggle between too much freedom and too little, like everything else in America.
The time has come now to the point where anyone who holds an anti-gay position is criticized and/or boycotted
You say that like it's a bad thing.
It is no longer about rights but now it is about acceptance
(a) There are still lots of rights that many states and organisations do not recognise. (b) There is no difference between rights and acceptance/legitimacy.
There is no difference between rights and acceptance/legitimacy.
In a society that hopes to remain free, there must be a difference between these. There must be space for dialogue, for experimentation, for uncertainty, for personal preference, for disagreement. "Everything which is not prohibited is mandatory" is a totalitarian motto.
For example, although I find Nancy Grace repulsive, illegitimate, unacceptable, unwatchable, and generally awful, at some level I realize she has the right to produce her execrable television programs, and I don't seek to undermine that right.
Perhaps I'm quibbling over a minor point, as I certainly have no quarrel with criticism and boycotts of OSC (or of anyone really), even though I don't choose to take part myself.
Your argument is nonsense. People can voice intolerant opinions all they like, but when they make laws that affect a specific group of people on the basis of that intolerance, they've gone a long, far step beyond just voicing an opinion. You want to be intolerant? Great, have at it. But you don't get to back your intolerant beliefs up with intolerant laws. Intolerance in this context isn't about personally disliking a group of people, it's about actively discriminating against them on a widespread basis because of that dislike, and yes, there should be zero tolerance for that sort of thing.
Nobody disputes that. The question is, I believe, if we should enable them and elevate them. Giving Card a platform and indulging him validates his entire personal concept, not just the good parts. It's not only a matter of giving credit, it's about choosing where your content comes from.
This person is still alive and relevant and subject to social acceptance. And even with dead people, we are reluctant to cite them if they have a bad reputation - it's only that we make certain historical allowances based on the perceived historical distance to us.
Especially in this day and age, it's easy to find alternative authors on pretty much any subject who convey the same ideas without the amoral baggage. Let's recognize them instead.
Do you think this essay contains unique insights? No way. It's here because it's written by Orson Scott Card.
You know if we practiced the same methodology a long time back, many prominent people may never have gained credence even if they came up with some amazing stuff simply because they were gay. Case in point: Alan Turing.
You could argue that "we" always practiced the methodology of penalizing people with beliefs that were perceived as abnormal. Case in point: Alan Turing.
However, this is not the level I want this considered at. Instead, I invite you to look at what you're comparing here. There is OSC's philosophy of hatred on one side, and Alan Turing's sexuality on the other (which was never about harming anyone and hence could always be considered ethically neutral). You can't meaningfully argue that the two are similar. Yes, they share the trait of being socially unaccepted at the time, but that's also where the similarities end.
I'm not proposing we shun people because their beliefs are unpopular. I'm talking about making a choice not to elevate people who are unethical.
You are trying to retrofit current sense of morality onto the sense held by people in the past. What if people during Turing's time actually thought that homosexual behavior was unethical (which I think is not too far from the truth)?
> What if people during Turing's time actually thought that homosexual behavior was unethical (which I think is not too far from the truth)?
First of all, I assert being gay is not unethical. And it never was. Sure, it was considered amoral, but that's not the same. Could you elaborate on why you think an ethical argument could be constructed in favor of being militantly anti-gay?
It seems like you're purposely misinterpreting his point. He's not saying what should be, he's saying what probably was. You might have been saying that homosexuality is unethical a hundred years ago with the same certainty with which you denounce Card. I'm sure nobody here actually thinks that being gay is unethical.
While we're accusing people of purposeful misinterpretation, let me pass that right back at you. I wanted to hear the rationale for calling being gay unethical. I wasn't about to allege anything. But if someone asserts that there might be an ethics argument against homosexuality, I'd really like to hear it.
Okay, I apologize about implying that you're being intentionally obtuse. About the ethics argument, you (or maybe someone else above) said that anti-homosexuality is a violent hateful position, and the homosexuality is just a sexual preference. I'm not disagreeing with you, but an opponent might claim that your arguments regarding both are extremely ad-hoc. You could just as easily claim that homosexuality is unnatural or that it's against god's will or that it goes against our national interests or any other bullshit. Why I didn't want to make these arguments is because I'm not interesting in debating this side. I don't think homosexuality is unethical, and hence carrying on this debate isn't pleasant to me. I'm just saying that thinking that both positions had the same ethical value in any time is presentism.
So you guys are calling me either stupid or malevolent, thanks for that. Aaron, there really isn't a lot of ideology in my posts - but how about yours? I've tried, patiently, explaining why I think homosexuality is not unethical in any historical context, and why I believe militant homophobia is. One is behavior which is deemed unacceptable but doesn't negatively affect anyone, and the other one is about harming and denigrating people who are not like you. There is no contest. If you really believe this is "presentism", there is not a lot left to talk about.
I mean, I don't know the arguments, but I imagine that some sort of argument comparing homosexuality to pedophilia could be made. Just to make it clear, this is not what I believe.
It's not about ethics, it's about beliefs vs qualities. Being gay is a genetic trait, it's not a formed belief system. Whether that was generally understood 70 years ago is neither here nor there. Furthermore, there is the question of liberty. Being gay and performing homosexual acts is a personal choice, it does not hurt anyone else the way bigotry does.
So does yours. It's impossible for us to have any non-modern perspective. It's a moot point to argue. My point is that there is a difference between a belief and biological trait. That distinction is timeless regardless of what contemporary morality says about various beliefs and actions.
>> If we ignore everything ever said by people with nasty beliefs, we'd basically never read anything written more than 100 years ago
Which of the two do you believe?
1) There is an objective Correct Set Of Beliefs, and we're closer to it now then ever before, hence you can judge people in the past.
2) There are no objectively correct beliefs, hence people in the past would be just as correct to say that you have nasty beliefs.
If #1, where do you get your objective set?
If #2, why do you make your statement?
I hope you don't take the inconsistent position many people do: say there's nothing objective when others judge you, but act as though there is when you judge others.
(Personally I believe there are objective truths, and each generation gets some things right and other things wrong. But that's a Christian view.)
Your characterization of OSC is incorrect. He only believes sodomy laws should be used carefully to make sure people don't "shake the confidence of the community", and that most homosexuals should not be jailed.
I don't agree with OSC, and I doubt he'd like me very much due to my propensity for casual sex and my desire to abolish state marriage.
That said, I do share his distaste for the gay rights movement's propensity to attack and attempt to blacklist and attack their opponents. I feel this tendency to eschew rational argument, push intellectually dishonest positions and attack those who disagree is very dangerous. And I won't be subscribing to your blacklist of Card and other folks who don't buy into the modern orthodoxy.
I'm curious though - Communism has been far more harmful to the world than opposition to gay marriage. Do you also favor bringing back the anti-communist blacklists of the McCarthy era?
> Your characterization of OSC is incorrect. He only believes sodomy laws should be used carefully to make sure people don't "shake the confidence of the community", and that most homosexuals should not be jailed.
Ah. Yes. My mistake. He thinks only the uppity gay folks should be thrown in prison in order to properly terrorize the rest, who can remain free as long as they understand how disgusting and shameful they are and don't try to corrupt decent folks.
You really think that's different? You really think that's better?
> I'm curious though - Communism has been far more harmful to the world than opposition to gay marriage. Do you also favor bringing back the anti-communist blacklists of the McCarthy era?
<facepalm>
No. Obviously. You're confusing me with the other guy. I reserve the right to approve or disapprove of anyone I please, but I don't advocate systematic and/or governmental oppression of people I disagree with. That's what bigots do, and specifically what Card does.
"Blacklist." For fuck's sake. Card wants me thrown in prison; I want people to be aware of his feelings and make their own decisions; and somehow I'm the oppressor?
The communist blacklist was merely a list of communists published the Hollywood Reporter, making studios aware of their feelings so studios could make their own decisions. It later expanded to include other communists, who's feelings the studios were made aware of in order to make their own decision.
I didn't call you an oppressor. I agree with you that Card, much like the Communists in Hollywood, is an advocate of oppression.
But I'm still curious - in addition to making everyone aware of anti-gay opinions to make their own decision, do you also favor making everyone aware of pro-communist opinions to make their own decision? Perhaps distributing photos of anyone wearing a Che t-shirts so others can make their own decisions [1]?
(I'm not asking why you don't do it yourself, obviously you pick your own personal causes. I'm simply asking whether you would support others doing it, and if not, why not.)
[1] Yes, I'm being very naughty mentioning Che, the guy who put gays into communist labor camps. Am I citing him as a homophobe or a communist? Who knows?
>>The communist blacklist was merely a list of communists published the Hollywood Reporter
Merely a list! You might feel a little differently in 1950s USA with your name on that list. A list that meant the end of your career, blacklisting by friends and family (even sympathetic for fear of association.)
You're the second person in 24 hours to downplay McCarthyism as no big deal and it's left me scratching my head in wonder. Either y'all are ignorant about history, or y'all are stupid, and I'm not sure which I'd rather admit to if forced to choose...
Thank you for pointing out option 3. I jumped the gun and for that I apologize. My reaction to the post was the "merely a list" bit and was definitely half-cocked.
> That said, I do share his distaste for the gay rights movement's propensity to attack and attempt to blacklist and attack their opponents.
Uh, what do you think that the gay rights movement's opponents are trying to do to them? That, and in many cases, much worse.
>I'm curious though - Communism has been far more harmful to the world than opposition to gay marriage. Do you also favor bringing back the anti-communist blacklists of the McCarthy era?
Once you realize that 100% of his writing is about the self-hating gay Mormon experience, you notice a lot more subtext. In this piece, the junior programmer who becomes a middle-manager to please the marketers is a metaphor for gay Mormons who marry women to please the church.
I've read a great deal of OSC's work, and I've found nothing to contradict (and much to confirm) your hypothesis. Several of the gay characters in Songmaster (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Songmaster) are stand-ins for the author, and the same themes and situations are addressed (perhaps in more oblique fashion) in the more popular Ender's Game.
Seriously, that makes sense. Ender with the weird sister (non)incest situation is a stand-in for the author. He's not actually a bad person, just really repressed?
We do, but that seems like a fairly off-topic comment in this case, since this is an article about software companies...
What I also know is he's a pretty terrible writer - Ender's Game is fantastic, but the sequels are progressively worse and worse in a horrifying fashion that boggles the mind until you realise that OSC is someone who has a very, very basic understanding (or lack thereof) of human relationships and politics... Makes one think that Ender's Game was a bit of a fluke.
The reason why people don't pick up on Card's shit writing while reading Enders Game is because in Enders Game he substitutes "actually writing complex characters that develop as the story progresses" with "child characters who merely become less foolish as the story progresses". It is a surprisingly common cop-out, making a character a child is a great way to disguise the fact that they only grow in one dimension.
I didn't even think Eder's Game was great or anything. Just an ok SF story. Now, reading your argument, it makes sense. Back in my mind I was probably thinking "What's so great about these little kids learning some shit and growing a couple of years?"
There is no reason to not listen his views on software, if he has weird views on homos.
He is a horrible bigot when it comes to gays. We as logical rationalists should stop labeling someone as 'Insert some hateful word' and ignore everything what he says.
This is occurring more and more these days, if we dont like someone's economic views we label him as communist and completely stop hearing him.
Few days back someone mentioned; Zed shaw is too cocky, so whatever he says is shit.
The article isn't about software; its about people who happen to working in the software industry. And the problem with people like Card is that their prejudices are a sign that their understanding of other people, and their capability for basic human empathy, is just fundamentally broken. Hence the lazy, stereotyped description of "coders", "players", etc. in the piece.
I do agree that we shouldn't ignore everything he says because of this. He might still have something useful to say about things that don't involve people. Trees, for example.
He may have better understanding of people who make software. His understanding of gays doesnt have a problem, his perception of gays has. According to his twisted value system they are bad people. However his understanding of software people is not clouded by his values.
In any case I am only trying to defend him because I saw people just read his name from article title and decided they should not read it full.
So please go ahead read what he has to say, then decide if he is correct or not instead of judging article beforehand.
My 2 cents.
"He may have better understanding of people who make software. His understanding of gays doesnt have a problem, his perception of gays has."
There is no such thing as "software people". Just as there is no such thing "farmer people", "construction people", or "aeroplane people". They are all just people. And I don't understand your understanding/perception distinction.
"So please go ahead read what he has to say, then decide if he is correct or not instead of judging article beforehand."
My comment was posted over ninety minutes after reading the article. I really don't know on what basis you assumed otherwise.
> Zed shaw is too cocky, so whatever he says is shit.
I don't find Zed's views on programming to be terribly insightful either. I have a hunch that one directly leads to the other. I watched a talk he did about Javascript, several times, making sure I understood what he was saying when he was calling it a pile of shit, and walked away with the realization that Zed either didn't understand basic OOP, or did at some point then decided that it wasn't sexy anymore. Because all the problems he found could be easily fixed with basic SOLID techniques.
I have a hunch that his "Learn XXX the hard way" books wouldn't be very helpful either, the tone set in the title indicates to me that instead of translating good principles to code, he's going to beat us over the head with a bottom-up approach to learning a language rather than the saner way.
All of this points to Zed as someone trying to fit the world to his personality, rather than trying to truly understand the world as it is. His first response to some programming thing not fitting in with the way he thinks it should is to lambast it as stupid, this goes with languages, other developers, pretty much anything.
Now, that's not exactly "Zed's cocky, so everything he says sucks," but what it does mean is that unless you have Zed's personality, you're not going to get much out of what he has to say. Because you won't approach problems the same way he does.
Personally I prefer Giles Bowkett, whose tone and personality doesn't get in the way of his ideas. When something gets in his way, he works around it (with a small amount of cursing) rather than call it shit for 30 minutes. His books solve problems rather than creates them.
So while criticizing a person's personality isn't, by itself, the way to enlightenment, you shouldn't completely ignore such things, either. Because if you look closely enough, these traits will point to the deeper problems with their ideas that you do need to come to a fuller understanding.
I would make an ad hominem attack, yes. I don't believe ad hominem is fallacious in this sense.
Orson Scott Card has expressed such a lack of humanity elswhere that I do not understand why I would spend my time deciding whether his other arguments have any merit. He has disqualified himself from my consideration.
I don't think that qualifies for an ad hominem at all. It's only ad hominem if the factor you're dismissing the author due to happens to be irrelevant to his current argument. That's not the case, I agree.
Having said that, I just want to make it clear that I don't know enough about him to agree with your position on him. I know he's anti-gay, and I've read the Ender books. That's about it.
Try reading "A Memory of Earth". It was the thirds and last Card book I read, after I read Enders Game and Enders Shadow, and disliked both, I was told that maybe I should just read a non-Ender book since I clearly just had something against the Ender universe. I saw "A Memory of Earth" at a yardsale for a dollar so I bought it without knowing anything about it besides that it was Card, and not Ender-universe.
Actually, don't try reading it. It is literally the worse book I've ever read. Confused and idiotic plot, cliched one dimensional characters, a serious sense of confused genre....
A few years later, I looked the book up on wikipedia and learned that it is his sci-fi version of The Book of Mormon.... yeah, the guy is a total hack.
Yeah, funny how it colors your opinion of a guy's reliability when he wants you and your friends thrown in prison as a warning to others. Crazy, I know!
It's understandable, but doesn't make it right. I personally dislike his opinions enough not to pay a dollar to watch his movies or read his books. I might even be loathe to give him enough respect to read this article, but that's a prejudice and it's not right.
This presumes that every belief and idea occupies an equal plane of legitimacy, and that everything is basically a matter of opinion. It's not.
His views are not acceptable. He's free to voice them all he likes, of course, but choosing to ignore him completely on the basis of some of his unacceptable views is not, in any way, "prejudice." Do keep in mind, please, that on the basis of just one thing - someone's sexual orientation - this guy is willing to give them legal status as second class citizens and incite armed rebellion against any government that would recognize their rights as people. If he's willing to do something that bad to someone solely on the basis of their sexual preferences, why on earth should anyone feel the least bit bad about choosing to simply ignore him on the basis of one of his beliefs?
I believe what you want to say is that you want to declare war on him for his beliefs. Go after his writing works, even decades in the past, go after him for his current works, and seek to destroy him because he has a difference of opinion with him.
No, I really don't. Like I said, he can have whatever opinion he likes, but once he starts advocating that laws should reflect his opinion, it's stepped over a line. The relevant logical fallacy that you and others using this argument, by the way, is the tu quoque fallacy:
Avoiding harsh words could look like a logical fallacy but it is just being polite. Essentially, attacking an article he wrote about software development years ago is a lot like my attacking an article on software development written by a lgbt person because of their sexual orientation. People have avoided saying that to be polite. That is why I likened it to declaring war on the individual for their thoughts for one thing, expanding it to all things.
A simple statement on distaste for the individual is perfectly appropriate, and personal, and many people would agree with you on that one.
I am pretty sure if I remember right his words against gay people was at a small conference and then was blown up by the lgbt community. No one would have otherwise known... If I were on LGBT mailing lists I would probably get emails helping to fight "orson scott card" and asking me to donate.
I see it how it is, Orson Scott Card holds no influence to change laws, the gay movement has won on marriage. It is just a matter of time until it is upon us all. Far right Republicans use it as a wedge issue but it is becoming a weak issue. Even surveys of church going people show that the idea has a majority of popularity in the positive. The Pope doesn't even want to focus on it. No one wants to touch the issue with a 10 foot pole, it's a loser, the issue is lost. The last few holdouts will get ran over.
"Avoiding harsh words could look like a logical fallacy but it is just being polite."
The logical fallacy is accusing people who consider intolerance unacceptable of themselves being intolerant. That is an example of tu quoque.
"A simple statement on distaste for the individual is perfectly appropriate, and personal, and many people would agree with you on that one."
You seem to be repeatedly missing the point that many people - including Card - are going far beyond a "simple statement on distaste."
"I am pretty sure if I remember right his words against gay people was at a small conference and then was blown up by the lgbt community."
In fact you do not remember right. He has written numerous articles advocating for the treatment of homosexuals as second class citizens and even armed insurrection against the government should they treat homosexuals as equal under the law. You could easily find these articles if you spent two minutes on Google. They make a lovely companion to his article about how Obama is going to recruit an army of "urban thugs" to do is his bidding.
"I see it how it is, Orson Scott Card holds no influence to change laws, the gay movement has won on marriage."
Given the widespread hatred directed at them - which goes beyond mere personal distaste - and the numerous discriminatory laws that still remain on the books around the country, and the fact that there are still 33 states that specifically outlaw gay marriage, I wouldn't say that the issue is "won" by a long shot. Don't confuse some high profile victories with total victory.
One shouldn't feel obligated to be tolerant of intolerance expressed by people with power and privilege against those who have less power and privilege (like a wealthy, straight, white male attacking LGBTQ folks). That's a very common tactic of bigots to claim that being told they should stop oppressing people is oppressive toward them. Demanding an end to oppression is not oppressive toward those who currently benefit from that oppression.
There are other good reasons not to listen to OSC, like having never run a software company or been a significant participant in the software industry.
But, I think it's OK to point out that the guy is a backward bigot and is driven by his religion more than good sense; it speaks to his character and to his approach to the world. If his views on life, society, law, and everything else, are shaped by a fairy tale (and they are), I'd like to know it.
It's not being tolerant of intolerance to consider his views on an entirely disparate topic. If his views on LGBTQ people were being discussed, then yes they are repellant and I would say so, but they have nothing to do with the topic at hand.
Judging all of someone's views as wrong because some of their views are wrong is foolish.
As for the article itself, I found it to be overly stereotypical and lacking in actual insight.
We should never tolerate intolerance, unless we are considering the intolerance of intolerance. That intolerance, and only that intolerance, must be accepted:
"The so-called paradox of freedom is the argument that freedom in the sense of absence of any constraining control must lead to very great restraint, since it makes the bully free to enslave the meek. The idea is, in a slightly different form, and with very different tendency, clearly expressed in Plato.
Less well known is the paradox of tolerance: Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them. — In this formulation, I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress the utterance of intolerant philosophies; as long as we can counter them by rational argument and keep them in check by public opinion, suppression would certainly be unwise. But we should claim the right to suppress them if necessary even by force; for it may easily turn out that they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin by denouncing all argument; they may forbid their followers to listen to rational argument, because it is deceptive, and teach them to answer arguments by the use of their fists or pistols. We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant. We should claim that any movement preaching intolerance places itself outside the law, and we should consider incitement to intolerance and persecution as criminal, in the same way as we should consider incitement to murder, or to kidnapping, or to the revival of the slave trade, as criminal."
--Karl Popper, The Open Society and Its Enemies (1945)
The problem with this line of argumentation is that you really don't need to invoke vague nominalizations like "power" and "privilege" to argue against this "i'm being oppressed because of my homophobic beliefs" nonsense. When you do, it invariably leads to the sorts of responses you're seeing from the likes of 127 and aaronem below.
It says that I believe a man who holds violent* and irrational hatred in his heart is unlikely to be a rational thinker, and his words on any subject should be give careful consideration. I stand by that, thank you very much.
*Yes, violent. Card has literally advocated armed revolution against any federal government that legalizes gay marriage.
"Advocating violence" = "violent beliefs" has been a feature of the English language for ages, and I was using it correctly. I'm sorry if you don't like the way the language works, but it's not my fault.
There are many people on this planet who are brilliant, but flawed. If you disregard all the brilliance because you dislike the flaws, you miss out.
Tom Cruise has made some fantastic films. But Scientology...
The Scopes Monkey trial eventually lead to evolution being taught in (most) schools... but Scopes was apparently pretty okay with Eugenics.
Mel Gibson was Mad Max... But he's a racist.
Fred Phelps won some important Civil Rights cases in the 60s... but Westboro Baptist Church, wtf man?
Card is a tool in his personal life, and I'll fight him tooth and nail on those issues. I still loved Ender's Game, and I still found this article cute and fun to read.
Maybe because, in every audience, there are some people who have been beaten, or know people who have been beaten or killed, because of beliefs like this? Folks who've watched someone get their teeth kicked out over the sexual orientation tend to get a little...passionate...when a known homophobe's name comes up. They might even mention this out loud!
This is curiously always stated, but never referred or quoted, even out of context. If you're going to make strong assertions on persons character you better have the ability to back it up. It's not my job to dig up this material.
I really like his writing though. I sort of view him a bit like a crazy old uncle, who can do amazing things, but you just shouldn't let him near your neighbors when he visits.
Personally, I suspect that he is in denial anyway.
Some of his essay is meant to be funny and I think some people are missing that. It's an interesting critique in the relationship between programmers and management. Just try to enjoy it.
I like some of what this essay has to say, but generally disagree with this:
When you emerge into daylight, you might well discover that you're a hundred pounds overweight, your underwear is older than the average first grader, and judging from the number of pizza boxes lying around, it must be spring already.
That's depressing, and unhealthy. Programming well is a marathon, not a sprint. Neglecting your health burns you in the long run. In fact, programming is so mentally intense that you probably shouldn't be doing it more than 50 hours per week. A couple weeks at 65-80 is fine, if you're in the zone and truly engaged, but you're probably not doing useful work if you're on your sixth 90-hour week in a row. In fact, I think the people who can truly sustain a solid 70 hpw (much less 90-110+, because long hours get exponentially more difficult) are less than 1% of the population, and not the most enviable for a bunch of reasons I won't get into.
Also, the ability to get to 100 pounds overweight without only mild loss of professional and social status (instead of the severe loss women face) is a male privilege of sorts.
I agree with the general message. Flow is important, and The Game is pretty engrossing. I had a few months in a managerial position (a while ago) where I never wrote real code and the itch to do something real got very strong. Coding is more fun than a video game, if you do it right. But I can't agree that neglect of health is a good thing (I've seen its end-stage, which is pretty horrible) and, if you let that sort of thing fester, it will make your work worse in the long run.
"Also, the ability to get to 100 pounds overweight without only mild loss of professional and social status (instead of the severe loss women face) is a male privilege of sorts."
Women don't face a severe loss of professional status if they put on weight, unless their employer enjoys being cleaned out in court. And as for a loss of social status - try being an obese man for a while and see how that works out for you. They get ripped on just as bad as obese women.
Sure, but this wouldn't be one of them. If a woman even suggested their employer had discriminated against them on the basis of weight, then lawsuit or not, their employer would be crucified. Sorry, but being overweight is no worse on a woman than it is on a man - not that it's peachy for either of them.
The majority of the conversation and comments are on these:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1866486 (netjeff.com) : 45 comments
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=552821 (carolyn.org): 23 comments
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5372726 (zoion.com) : 14 comments
There are also a few comments on some of these:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43842 (apocalypse.org)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=99568 (zoion.com)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1635094 (netjeff.com)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1637968 (zoion.com)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1654310 (zoion.com)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2523005 (fuzz-box.blogspot.com)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2734040 (fuzz-box.blogspot.com)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3993706 (zoion.com)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4776844 (zoion.com)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4956448 (cmu.edu)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6182867 (cmu.edu)