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Comment by ta8645 | Hacker News Reader

There was nobody named Sophie Wilson at the time the ARM ISA was being developed, and the reason the docu-drama was called Micro Men, is because there was nobody who appeared to be a woman amongst the key players at the time. It's not a good example of women's contribution to the field.

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Apologies for the edits to my comment - wasn’t expecting such fast responses.

But as I said in an edit, it’s bad form to deadname someone even if you are referring to a period when they went by the deadname.

I think the OP was just saying that her role was underplayed more than they were complaining about the title. If you check their comment it says nothing at all about gender.

We talk about the past events all the time using names that weren’t applicable during the relevant time period. The Aztecs didn’t call themselves Aztecs. This shouldn’t be a difficult concept in general.

The OP expressed confusion about why the show didn't feature Sophie Wilson. But it isn't surprising that Roger Wilson, would be used in such a historical context. There's no shame in acknowledging that during that period of time, you went by a different name, and no reasonable argument that everyone else should pretend it happened differently, either.

If there was a docu-drama about my early days, I would expect them to use my birth name, rather than my married name. Unless the events happened after my marriage.

I think there’s some confusion here. I don’t think the OP’s point has anything to do with Sophie vs. Roger. I think they’re just saying that the individual in question had a relatively minor role in the movie. They are not expecting the character in the movie to be called Sophie; they are just referring to the individual in question using their current name.

The OP explicitly wondered why Sophie Wilson was not mentioned or properly credited in the production. My post was meant to allay any potential fears that it was due to sexism or desire to misrepresent events. Rather, Sophie wasn't mentioned because Sophie didn't yet exist, in the time period that the docu-drama depicts.

This is still the same confusion. Sophie did exist, she just wasn’t called Sophie. I believe OP is complaining about the minor role that (then) Roger has in the movie.

There is no confusion. The name Sophie Wilsion literally did not exist at the time the events transpired. So it makes sense that a documentary, set at that time, would not reference it.

Quoting the OP:

"Notably, no mention of Sophie Wilson"

The OP's question was literally asking about why the name Sophie Wilson was not mentioned or given proper credit for their contribution. Please stop twisting it to make it seem like there has been some transgression or slight, that simply does not exist.

You've misunderstood the OP's words. … *sigh* Time to point at the dictionary. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/mention#Verb sense 1:

> To make a short reference to something.

Sense 2 (the sense you were thinking about) is a specialised sense used in "philosophy, linguistics", and even then the context makes it clear when this sense is meant. 'No mention of "Sophie Wilson"' might conceivably be referring to the name, but 'No mention of Sophie Wilson' refers to the person.

Historical retrospectives show systematic erasure of trans women's contributions to STEM. (Certainly this happens in other fields, too, but I haven't studied them enough to notice the pattern.) This is worth talking about, if it has happened here, and does not need to be derailed by a pointless semantics argument.

You’re quoting what they said about the article, not what they said about Micro Men. If you thought the OP’s first paragraph was about Micro Men then maybe that’s the source of the confusion.

I am not accusing anyone of any transgressions. I think you’ve just misinterpreted the OP’s comment as being about gender (as they’ve now confirmed here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44939643)

Bingo. Thank you.

> it’s bad form to deadname someone even if you are referring to a period when they went by the deadname.

That's the general rule, but some people make exceptions. Sophie Wilson was involved in the production of Micro Men, so presumably signed off on however she was depicted in it. (Then again, Clive Sinclair was also involved, and per https://web.archive.org/web/20250711183307/https://www.indep... objected to his portrayal, so…)

> it’s bad form to deadname someone even if you are referring to a period when they went by the deadname

I try really hard to avoid getting anywhere near these contentious things ... but I think Wikipedia's handling of this seems reasonable, at least for some value of reasonable.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sophie_Wilson

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Sophie_Wilson

The only point I wanted to make is that it’s normal to talk about “Sophie Wilson” regardless of whether or not you’re talking about events that transpired when that was her name or about previous events. In other words, if someone is talking about Sophie Wilson’s role in ARM, they are probably just being polite and not trying to make some kind of point about gender.

I don’t see anything contentious about respecting someone’s preferences about what they like to be called. Take gender out of the equation and who would argue with a William who prefers to be called Bill?

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