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Comment by yid | Hacker News Reader

You're asking people not to have a knee-jerk reaction to offensive language, but you're having a knee-jerk reaction to people being offended. Some people might choke on their morning coffee when reviewing a pull request for "pantyshot", but the majority of us just want a bit of civility (not unlike the rules of HN).

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Nobody chokes on their morning coffee when reviewing a pull request for "pantyshot". Such people ought to be sent to the front line in all-out war to learn to deal with some real issues in life.

Besides, men wear panties too. I've seen them do it.

I don't see the connection to being sent to war: It seems like you are trying to say "because this (war) is more unpleasant, you have nothing to complain about", which makes no sense.

I think he was trying to say that experiencing high magnitude discomfort puts low magnitude discomfort in perspective.

Also, knowing several Iraq veterans before and after, it seems to get you very comfortable with offensive language :p

>You're asking people not to have a knee-jerk reaction to offensive language, but you're having a knee-jerk reaction to people being offended.

Uh, yeah, and that invalidates his point in exactly what way? It's still true that people are overreacting. If somebody is offended by the name of a freaking software package, I'd wager that this person has other problems to work out.

It's also true that "sexism" (and various other *isms) is a completely abused term that simply serves as an "argument" that nobody can counter, since if anybody does, he must be a sexist.

Besides, I think that "civility" includes not whining to everyone over being personally offended by something.

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