Playhaven developer fired for sexual jokes | Hacker News Reader

Playhaven developer fired for sexual jokes

venturebeat.com

78 pointstapan_pandita139 comments

This woman saw an opportunity to pick up some Twitter followers, knowing that at least one or two people would be upset by her embellished explanation of what happened. In the process she took away someone's livelihood, which is despicable in my opinion. She would have simply asked them to be quiet if she were truly offended. Instead she smiled, photographed them, and let them continue their private conversation. It's pretty clear that she wanted publicity - nothing more. #FameWhore

You are speculating about someone else's motives and conduct. Unless you have evidence to back up the assertions you are making, you are behaving in exactly the same manner for which you are criticizing others.

Also, private conversations held in public are no longer private.

Her actions reveal her motives. When someone offends you, are you more likely to ask them to be quiet, or take to your blog to write a lengthy post about it, trash them on Twitter, and get them fired? I'd hate to see what she's done to her ex boyfriends or girlfriends if this is truly just her standard reaction to being offended.

By the way, she has posted a message on that blog post thanking HN users for stopping by and taking interest in her. That pretty clearly reinforces the idea that she is quite happy and cognizant of the fact that she managed to turn this into something far more than it was.

Let's start with a disclaimer. I wasn't at PyCon, i don't know what actually happened and i think this entire affair is a disaster for everyone involved. I don't know who is right, but i do know there are a whole lot of people being assholes.

Along those lines, why do you feel comfortable to sit in judgement of this woman, because she didn't do what you would have done?

Try looking at this from another perspective. If the issue that she is concerned about is not this particular incidence of sexism that happens to be happening near her (if it did), but instead that the mindset of those in her community, telling these particular guys to STFU is not going to address the problem. If they're going to blow her off and just go somewhere else and continue being jackasses (again, if they actually were being jackasses), then what could she hope to achieve by confronting them directly?

If on the other hand, her goal is to call out a particular type of conduct as unacceptable, then her behavior seems sensible. She's not going to change these dudes' minds, but she might reach others. So, post to blog, post to twitter.

I wish everyone would stop jumping immediately to evil plots, and accusing others of intentionally gaining at the expense of someone else.

It's not an evil plot, it's just very opportunistic and shows a complete lack of concern or empathy for the effects of her actions on others. She probably thinks she came out on top of this because her follower count may have gone up slightly, but I think that in the end she has cost herself future opportunities with this.

The message she sent was very simple: Being anywhere near her is a liability. You never know what will offend her, and how she will react to it. Do not hire her or take a job that would involve interaction with her. Stay away. Don't even eat lunch near her, as she may broadcast your lunch conversation if she finds the content to be objectionable.

And where has she shown to have a complete lack of concern or empathy for the effects of her actions on others?

Has she gloated that her follower count has increased? Has she expressed any glee over these firings?

In fact, if you've read the Venture Beat article they assert directly the opposite:

Richards, while standing by her actions, has tweeted that she did not think the developer should lose his job. It’s fairly clear that getting him fired was not her intention.

"Has she expressed any glee over these firings?"

No, but she did compare herself to Joan of Arc and say that she stepped up when the future of women in tech was on the line. A tad bit dramatic.

But surely even an overly dramatic defense of her own actions does not directly imply that she was trying to get anyone fired, or that her goal was only self-aggrandizement.

She can be both obnoxious, maybe even wrong-headed, and still act in good faith. (even if her actions did not have the consequences she intended)

No I don't think she was trying to get anyone fired and did not mean to imply that. She just decided to create a mess and try to turn this into something about sexism. I can't know her intentions but my guess is that her passion for this issue prevents her from acting reasonable and in fact, did more to hurt the cause than help it. It just provides ammo to all those who are afraid to hire a woman and that's a shame.

I'd say an appropriate comparison considering how the flames are tossed at women who disapprove of sexual objectification in professional environments.

> The message she sent was very simple: Being anywhere near her is a liability. You never know what will offend her, and how she will react to it.

I agree, this is how you'd expect kids to behave.

No, the impulse to take everything to the principal level immediately is what kills fun and empowers busybodies in HR. Is two guys sharing a snicker over a mild sexual innuendo really what's keeping women from going into IT? Is the key feature of more gender-equal industries really that no-one ever makes an inappropriate joke?

If the joke offends you, say so, in so many words. If the offender doesn't respect that, then, fair enough, take it further.

Let me be clear, I always prefer a strategy of direct engagement as a first option. I do not think this was an effective strategy for addressing the problems that happened, or were perceived to have happened. I think that the way this has shaken out has been a fiasco, and the fact that we're arguing about it on HN is a pretty good indicator of that.

But my point isn't about what I would have done, or what should have been done. It's whether or not Adrian Richards was behaving maliciously, which is what GP and a long list of others have insinuated or asserted without any good evidence.

>You are speculating about someone else's motives and conduct.

Speculating? There were actual actions.

Not to mention that she speculated about someone else's motives -- that he told a casual fucking joke to his pal because he was sexist, that he was responsible for women not going into tech, etc.

Was the joke immature? Maybe. Should we socially crucify Kevin Smith and anybody that ever made a similar joke?

And more importantly, was it addressed to her? No.

I'm beyond outrage by such disgusting behavior.

Not only did she EAVESDROP on a private conversation (which is horrible in itself), she also made it public, with a totally unnecessary picture of the persons talking, and made someone lose his job over a joke.

She deserves to be taken out of the tech world and fired to taste her own medicine.

>Also, private conversations held in public are no longer private.

Really? Talking to your friend in the cinema, a conference or anywhere, is as private as it gets. He didn't say it addressing a large company. How you'd like to be followed in public by someone with a recording machine and expose your every idiotic comment to the world?

All things being equal, working together with women puts you at risk (they might get accidentally offended, go ballistic and ruin your life), working with men much less so (harrassment claims much less likely). Conclusion: it is prerferrable to not work with women. Just saying how it is, rationally. To be honest, it sometimes felt weird to work at places with 100% guys as developers. But at the end of the day, I just want to get my job done then get home to wife+ kids. Exactly why should I care about getting more women into IT?

Honest question - I see the appeal of lower wages for employers (more devs- they get cheaper). That would lower my wages, too. As for nicer atmosphere at work - flirting and being nice is too dangerous, so having women around would actually make things worse.

Note: I don't really have a problem with women in IT, just wondering about the future.

I know someone who thought exactly like you. He and the rest of his colleagues evaluated a woman and they wondered if she could really integrate into the group (because of dirty jokes), so in the end they decided not to hire her.

I don't even like dirty jokes. But to be honest, it seems fair to me that people prefer to hire people who share their sense of humor.

Indeed. It could have been another trait as well like the work philosophy which could be conservative or fast paced (and more prone to errors) for example. There's also the saying when in Rome do as the Romans do.

In the future engineering will be just like most other workplaces: men and women working together mostly respectfully without incident. This will happen whether you care about it or not. Your side (the side that concludes that "it is prerferrable to not work with women") will lose. Your "logic" and your "rationality" will surrender to justice, fair play and equality.

Now, please stop fighting for your side so men who recognize the benefits of having women colleagues can enjoy those benefits sooner.

I'm not fighting against women becoming engineers, but against the reasons that make it undesireable to have female colleasgues.

So, making a joke about a "dongle" with your friend is a firable offense, but taking a photo of someone without their permission and publicly calling them an "ass clown" is okay?

Because she was offended at crudeness directed at no one and merely overheard, that means crude insults directed at people are appropriate? And in a way that's meant to harm them publicly?

What a damn strange time we live in.

So, making a joke about a "dongle" with your friend is a firable offense, but taking a photo of someone without their permission and publicly calling them an "ass clown" is okay?

It's not about what was done, it's about who did it. Because the latter offense was done by a member of an oppressed class, it's automatically OK. Because the former offense was done by a member of the oppressor class, it's punishable.

(Some people actually think this way.)

And there is some validity to that view.

I'm not happy with the way this particular incident has panned out but arguing we should just ignore power relationships when analysing a situation is throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

I think the power asymmetry was rather limited in this case.

All the people involved in the incident were rather privileged - attendees of a conference that costs hundreds of dollars to attend (not including travel and accommodation).

For those keeping score, this is also OK: @adriarichards Black people CANNOT be racist against White people. Racism is a position of the oppressor who has the power - http://i.imgur.com/ou8JZVu.jpg

And what score are we keeping?

What are you hoping to accomplish by highlighting this particular tweet? What does this have to do with the incident at PyCon? What does this have to do with determining the facts of what happened at PyCon?

Even if you disagree with this tweet (which i do), aside from the obvious character assassination, what exactly are you asking us to infer here?

"What exactly are you asking us to infer here?"

That in this situation she's playing a victim when she's actually the one with the power. Granted, old tweet.

And you think she has the power because...?

She has a twitter account? Or because she works in developer relations for a startup? Or because she's got two X chromosomes? Or because she's black?

It's pretty obvious - she was able to get a guy fired for making a Jr. High joke to his friend (sexual joke, not sexist) and stir up a hornets nest with a simple tweet.

She didn't fire anyone. And frankly, do you think she expected him to be fired? Do you think that was her intent when she posted?

@knowtheory The person being fired is a direct consequence of her tweet. While it isn't likely she directly intended for anyone to lose their jobs, it is equally unlikely she expected absolutely nothing to come of it.

Edit: changed wording.

I think it's fascinating that every single instance of this argument, in this and related threads, posters conveniently decide to begin tracing the chain of events that lead to the firing at the tweet--not the jokes.

Maybe the part you're missing is that the jokes aren't the unusual part. Just run of the mill banter between a couple guys when maybe they should have been quiet so they weren't distracting people from listening. Tweeting a photo to shame people at a conference is highly unusual. Getting offended at a dongle joke not directed at you is highly unusual. That's why the story normally starts there.

Not trying to be a jerk - if you feel the jokes are somehow unique or offensive. Most people just don't see it that way though.

I'm sorry but you're incorrect. Getting "offended" by a sexual joke is not unusual, nor does its normalcy matter in this situation. What they did was create an unwelcoming environment around them by engaging in locker room-level humor.

I personally am not offended by the joke nor do I think they are clever or unique, but saying that they don't matter because they're the status quo is a really weak argument and it speaks to the lack of progressive thought in this community when it comes to diversity.

Lack of progressive thought on diversity? If you want an argument about dongle jokes creating an unwelcoming environment look elsewhere. The most sensitive among us don't set the rules. https://amandablumwords.wordpress.com/2013/03/21/3/

I think everyone following this has read the article you linked, and you have a valid point. But I think that you are in error if you're endorsing the idea that because something is normal or happens often (like casual banter between males) that it is inherently non-harmful.

The tone of conversations between other males often repels me, but the reaction to calling them out for it is worse often then simply putting up with it, as Adria Richards is experiencing. The focus is shifted to examining the complainant rather than truly evaluating the matter at hand. It's extremely unfortunate to witness or experience and is undeniably regressive in my opinion.

It's simple, really. You start at the result - the termination of someone's job - and work backwards. The first action thats absence changes the result is a direct cause of the result.

A direct result of the tweet is the termination of the employee. Without the tweet the parties involved wouldn't be identifiable, and no one would have lost their job.

Is the joke a direct cause of the firing? No. Many subsequent actions must take place to get from the joke to the firing. The joke isn't even required in the sequence of events. Because tweeting a picture of someone and labeling them a sexist is enough to get them fired from a certain employer.

It's relevant for the context that she certainly seems to have a political cause to further that isn't necessarily directly relevant to the appropriateness of jokes shared between members of the audience of a conference.

It's well known that political activists are quite more able to see the enemy that "laymen" - eg. when FOX Newsers call something or someone "communist" for an example from the opposite end of the spectrum.

While I might have some issues with that statement I think it's a valid and defensible argument. It's a fairly common one within anti-racist discourse. I don't see it's relevance here at all.

Implying that someone should be vilified for holding a political opinion you disagree with is fairly horrible and remarkably similar to the thing you're (and I with some caveats) disagree with Adria for doing in the first place.

How is this defensible? Asserting that by virtue of their powerlessness black people can't be racist? That's a statement that should offend anyone, especially black people.

Racism, sexism, etc. are characterized by the desire to damage a certain group while propping up another by making broad-scoped and baseless inferiority/superiority statements, often followed up by aggressive actions. It's not necessary for one group to be "in power" for this to happen. Racism in cases where minorities are the perpetrators is exactly as unacceptable as in any other circumstance and people who defend that should be called out for it.

In short, and conveniently looping back to the actual topic at hand: behaving like an asshole is never OK.

The difference between racism (an institutionalized system wherein a majority race discriminates against minority races) and racism (an arbitrary action that reveals a preference of one race over another) is a constant source of confusion in these discussions. The former definition is used most often in academia; the latter definition is much more common in casual conversation.

When one person says "black people can't be racist" and another person says "black people can indeed be racist," they are using the word two different ways and meaning two different things. It has derailed more threads than I care to remember.

Is there a good source for your first definition? I've never come across this distinction so directly before, and the line between the two is still a little blurry. I hate to get all [citation needed] on you, but it just seems to me that the 'institutionalized system' is nothing more than the vast repetition of many 'arbitrary actions'. Is there a simple textbook example contrasting the two?

Take a look at the sociological definition of racism on the Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism#Sociological

Hey thanks, that's definitely helpful. I wanted to read the Cazenave paper (paywall), but 'centrality' led me to a Google Book [1] which briefly explains MMRI (salience, centrality, regard, ideology). Understanding the differences between these basically answers my question.

1: Culture, Motivation, and Learning: A Multicultural Perspective edited by Farideh Salili, Rumjahn Hoosain, p. 327-328

I would say you are confusing 'defensible' - a reasonable, sane person could hold this view with the concept of 'I agree with this'. I happen not to agree with it but I could have a reasonable exchange of views with someone who did.

I'm keeping score: You lose 10 intelligence points for lacking understanding about racism.

Is this about sexism again? The culture has lost when political correctness is taken too far. Perhaps the guy behaved like an a*e for disturbing other people, but this is not how you handle it. You turn around, and tell them to STFU. But perhaps she was offended by the nature of the jokes.

Possibly off topic, because I didn't follow the incident at all. But I just thought of Derek Sivers' summary [1] of PG's "Hackers and Painters" (which I haven't read yet) and there he writes:

"What exactly is "hate speech?" This sounds like a phrase out of 1984. Labels like that are probably the biggest external clue. If a statement is false, that's the worst thing you can say about it. You don't need to say that it's heretical. And if it isn't false, it shouldn't be suppressed. So when you see statements being attacked as x-ist or y-ic (substitute your current values of x and y), whether in 1630 or 2030, that's a sure sign that something is wrong."

[1] http://sivers.org/book/HackersPainters

For what it's worth, he shouldn't be too upset for not working there anymore.

I agree, it is in peoples nature to make fun of those who are different, be it by gender, etnicity, height, intelligence or whatever. But in most cases, this is harmless fun between two people that don't share that trait.

Only when you are actively, openly insulting said people and treating them different then anyone else you are doing something very wrong.

Some racist jokes are just really funny, but that doesn't mean I'm racist.

Also, I feel like this is more of an issue in the US then in Europe. I really couldn't imagine someone being fire for a picture posted on twitter by someone else accusing you of something nasty in The Netherlands.

It is also in people's nature to make fun about those that are similar, the same, or even about themselves.

I make a lot of jokes. About women, blacks, jews, ... also, about men, whites, programmers. I don't discriminate; I make fun of everything and everyone!

"I make a lot of jokes. About women, blacks, jews, ... also, about men, whites, programmers. I don't discriminate; I make fun of everything and everyone!"

The existence of dirty joke books that include every possible person and group doesn't make it a good idea to bring any one of them up at a professional event.

There are few valid arguments you can make which start by appealing to "peoples nature." This is not one of them.

It's a natural thing to take a dump. But you most certainly don't to that in the audience of a Python conference presentation. Even if it is harmless, because you used your own bucket and cleaned up after yourself. Even if you and your family usually leave the door open when using the toilet at home. Even if there are some hilarious poop jokes.

If people can control when they use the toilet, when they eat, when they have sex -- all much more important parts of people's nature than telling sexist jokes -- then I see no good reason why they aren't also able to control the use of sexist language in the workplace.

(There are rare exceptions. Some people have fecal incontinence, and can't control when they defecate. Others have mental problems which prevent them from controlling what they say. Dealing with those exceptions is far outside this current debate.)

Now, there may be other reasons (though I can't think of any) which justify sexist behavior in a work environment, or for that matter justify making fun of someone who doesn't want to be made fun of. But an appeal to natural behaviors does not provide that justification.

And please do note that you said "harmless fun between two people that don't share that trait", but as this was a public meeting, where the conversation was easily overheard by others, your situation does not apply because more than two people were involved.

"If a statement is false, that's the worst thing you can say about it. "

I have to disagree with that. There are many possible things worse than being false. People are not computers and speech does not happen in an ahistorical vacuum. It would be nice if we could debate everything dispassionately, but it's simply not the case.

Let me give an extreme example. A few years ago in an English football (soccer) game, one player had his leg horribly broken in a bad tackle. He was out for about a year and a half. As he was being taken from the field, a few of the opposing fans were chanting, "You've only got one leg!" Now this was not literally true, of course, but it was to most intents and purposes. I don't think many people would think this behavior was all right.

Just to be very clear, I'm citing this example to explain why I disagree with the statement I quoted at the top, not to draw a comparison with today's story.

But not all examples are so obvious and concepts like 'hate speech' are introduced in an attempt to point out the sometimes subtle problems with particular examples. Of course, such concepts are like any other tool or shortcut: they can be abused as easily as used for their intended purposes.

Your football example isn't too good. Football galleries yell worse things than "You've only got one leg!". They also have hooligans who destroy stuff and beat other people.

So? The point of the example is that being factually inaccurate is not the only possible problem with a statement.

What I mean is that is hardly hate speech.

The point of the example was not to define "hate speech" it was to disagree with the assertion that "The worst thing a statement can be is false". Let's not be children by playing the game of "Well, your central point was fine but this peripheral unimportant point that only I perceive is wrong and therefore the whole post is wrong"

Of course statement can be worse than false:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_even_wrong :-)

This isn't about culture in general. This is about PyCon. They are trying to be extra-specially welcoming to women, in particular. They don't pretend this isn't artificial! You don't have to guess what's allowed; PyCon has a code of conduct https://us.pycon.org/2013/about/code-of-conduct/ that spells it out for you.

Edit: they guy who got fired agrees: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5398681

I think many people - even smart ones - still don't realize how big the possible consequences are when publicly bullying someone.

My thoughts on this: don't do it. You might feel like venting right now, and you might have good reason to do so, but do it in your immediate vicinity, not on the Internet. You might find out later that you overreacted, and you won't be able to take it back.

Also, I find it ugly to put someone in the pillory who has a lot less clout than you do, no matter how justified it seems to you. It seems like applying mob law to me, which I have an aversion to.

Wow, that's pretty tough isn't it?

I mean, imagine going to a conference, joking around with a friend and the next day you get fired for it!

I wouldn't even go so far to call this (yet another) discussion about women in tech. I mean there are many topics not gender-related that could potentially offend people. The thing that I don't get is: Why did she decide to take a picture of them an put it on Twitter?

If she really didn't want to talk to them in person, which I wouldn't blame her for if she was offended by ther attitude, why didn't she just report them to the staff and get them escorted out?

Does anyone know if the people involved here ever talked to each other?

According to the post they didn't. She just made a picture and posted it to twitter.

If she just had said: "Guys that's not appropriate" Then they would probably pardon themselves!

Sorry but they way she acted is not appropriate in my eyes. Just make a picture of somebody and put it online! C'mon that's against normal privacy etiquette.

> If she just had said: "Guys that's not appropriate" Then they would probably apologize!

Which they did when taken aside by PyCon staff to discuss the incident: http://pycon.blogspot.be/2013/03/pycon-response-to-inappropr...

There's a couple of things that really suck about this. One, the misogynistic reaction from the masked avengers of the internet is shameful, and has actually made the situation much worse now. The second being, how did we end up here at all? I get that someone might feel uncomfortable about dick jokes, but given dick and fart jokes have been staples of low brow humour for a pretty long time it's pretty petty to name and shame over it.

We all should be concerned about sexism in the industry, in this case it seems like it's been taken too far and Playhaven should be ashamed to have not had some faith in their member of staff. The last time a discussion on sexism came out I made a comment about how we need to have responsible disclosure about these issues, for this exact reason. It's turned into a witchhunt, and it's turned nasty and vicious.

Massively discussed not 11 hours ago https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5410515

This is a completely different story with new information on the topic.

It's not and there isn't. The old thread has way more info, because the people involved were discussing things there directly (including the guy who got canned who replied to several comments and questions)

C'mon! Jokes about sex are just as common between girls, maybe even more so. Sorry but why the hell fire somebody with humor?

I actually miss the github message "hardcore forking action" when i fork a repo. That was humor!

I don't get the point.

1. A said something to B (doesn't matter what he said)

2. C overheard and found it offensive.

3. Honestly, why should A & B care? (that wasn't intended for C!)

I shudder to think of a society where I must consider every word I say, just to avoid offending someone. Doing this will lead us to the kind of world described in Fahrenheit 451, where nobody can really write about anything or anyone because their opinions might offend someone.

Also, I guess someone doesn't understand the difference between `sexual` and `sexist`.

> 3. Honestly, why should A & B care? (that wasn't intended for C!)

it was a public event with a code of conduct in a crowded room with children in attendance.

So C was free to report it to the conf. Sadly that's not what C did (when the conf staff got aware of it, they took everybody, discussed it and as far as I understood basically told A and B to be a bit more careful, then let everybody go and have a good time).

I can understand her reaction at the conference. PyCon has a specific policy about this. Since they were in earshot of at least a dozen people around them, it was not a "private" conversation. The PyCon workers took her complaint seriously and didn't seem to have any problem helping her out. The only thing she was out of line about was shaming the guys publicly on twitter.

Edit: just found this on the other thread, where someone claiming to be the guy who got fired makes pretty much the same point. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5398681

> The PyCon workers took her complaint seriously and didn't seem to have any problem helping her out.

Indeed, leading to this: http://pycon.blogspot.be/2013/03/pycon-response-to-inappropr...

> Both parties were met with, in private. The comments that were made were in poor taste, and individuals involved agreed, apologized and no further actions were taken by the staff of PyCon 2013. No individuals were removed from the conference, no sanctions were levied.

Right. So is there an official statement from Playhaven that this is why they let him go? Seems we only have his word on that at this point, and it just seems kind of unlikely. (edit: wrong company)

I think you mean PlayHaven? Unless I'm mistaken, SendGrid is Adria's employer (she's a developer evangelist for them), not the fired guy's.

already fixed, thanks ;)

Here's a blog post from playhaven: http://blog.playhaven.com/addressing-pycon/

Basically no additional information, they declare having conducted a "thorough investigation" but provide no information and basically don't add anything to "mr-hank"'s (the fired-guy-who-is-not-alex-reid) previous comments.

The point of contention here seems to be whether what he said was offensive or not. A large majority of people I know (including women) would disagree. Inappropriate, maybe, but definitely not offensive.

PyCon's policy states that sexist jokes aren't allowed. See my comment re: sexist vs sexual.

The main point of contention is that she took a photograph of a bunch of people, and posted it to Twitter, and called 2 people in the photo (but without specifying which 2) sexists.

People have differing opinions about language. What's important is how that's handled.

PyCon must have been pretty boring, to have to create controversies such as this.

Unrelated, but I would definitely fork this guys repo: https://github.com/snsn/dongle

Language!

pycon isn't unique, or special, in this regard.

I've lost count how many conferences I attended, or read about, that had some form of sexism scandal.

My initial response to pycon-gate 2013 was just 'every.fucking.time!'

It's a good thing you don't have contact info in your profile or you'd probably end up getting fired.

Well if i was the little girl on the photo in the slides.. I guess I would rather work in an industry with occasional sexual jokes then in an industry where the reaction to hearing something you don't want to hear, even though it is not directed at you, is snapping a picture of someone without their permission, posting it online without their permission and proceeding to insult them, instead of just asking them to stop or minding your own business..

This entire situation makes me upset, and frankly, makes me feel I should watch my toungue when joking with mates and someone could overheard me.

That doesn't advance the fight against sexism. In fact, it makes it more adversarial.

Besides, offended != sexism. I hope she's happy.

Why would you even make jokes except anonymously over the internet?

Let's keep Real professional!

"This entire situation makes me upset, and frankly, makes me feel I should watch my toungue when joking with mates and someone could overheard me"

So it's not okay for you to feel uncomfortable, only for the woman to.

Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with that woman? She could've turned around and told them to stop making these kind of jokes. That she made a similar joke before is even weirder.

Is this Victorian England? Dude better cover up his ankles.

We are policed far, far more often, and more thoroughly, than the Victorians could have dreamed. In that sense, Victorian England was a far freer society than ours.

Is someone who doesn't know what life was like as a Victorian.

But we have laws that are (on the whole) more liberal than the Victorians.

We, male developers, actually benefit from her actions. One guy may have lost his job, not a big deal, gonna get another, after all this publicity he got quite famous, but the main thing is that less woman will want to take the job of software development, less employers will want to hire woman because of the possible problems like this and so less concurrency for us and bigger salary.

Until they introduce mandatory hiring quotas

Really? Why is Adria Richards tweeting about a private conversation between two guys joking about sex? She needs to get out more often.

"I like offending people, because I think people who get offended should be offended." - Linus Torvalds

Hehe, yeah, he should be fired for saying "Fk you nvidia" on school premises.

Linus is aggressive WRT policy and technology, he's not making it okay for you to tell racist jokes and remain employed.

With which right did she anyway take picture of the guys and posted them on the internet without permit? Hypothetically she could just have built up the entire story. What scares me the most is how having a wide (social) audience can give you a position of power: the followers become your minions and you can easily start your personal battles. Managers at Playheaven rushed too much, IMO.

Oh come on, Amy Poehler made a dongle joke in Best Buy's Super Bowl ad!

Link to the video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61fXa9hTowY

I believe if you're a human being of any gender, if you cannot handle innuendo (whether intended or unintended) then you shouldn't be in a job. And if you're not a party in that conversation you have no right to complain to other non-parties. just ask the people you are uncomfortable with directly if you must. learn humour.

Stunning that the outrage over this over-reactive firing is made manifest by rage--expressed as professional disrespect, name-calling, and sexually violent attacks--at the woman who called him out, with nary a peep about his over-reactive employer. <---- This is evidence of deep and corrosive sexism.

This is a case of everyone behaving badly and it turning into an ulgy fight. Who's side do you choose?

None of the above. Watch, learn, but stay the hell out of it.

There is nothing in this link that was not discussed at HN already.

Adria Richards published private conversation she eavesdropped on and also the picture without asking. She must be fired at least for that

Woman complains of feeling uncomfortable in a tech conference due to juvenile jokes. Hacker News commenters ranging from indifferent to hostile to that notion. Number of people surprised by this outcome: miniscule.

https://twitter.com/search?q=%23donglegate&src=hash <grabs popcorn>

The issue here is not sexism. It is surveillance. In this case, sexism is a red herring.

Why people are mad at Adria? She just reported something that disturbed her.

I'd be rather angry at PyCon organizers for kicking out people for something that was neither sexual language, nor sexist joke. Unless sexual innuendo jokes count as sexual language? They should really clear that up in their code of conduct.

Of course top idiots here is Playhaven who kicked out dev for making sexual innuendo immature joke to his friends bit too loud.

The issue most people seem to have is that she posted a photo of them publically on twitter before the conference organisers had a chance to sort it out in a less public manor.

I guess the real issue at the heart of this is that having a high follower count gives one a pretty big gun in the court of public opinion.

What ever happened to talking to people and resolving a conflict without involving the internet? :)

Twitter seems to be new talking.

She is a person with quite some outreach and publicly posted a picture of the person in question instead of leaving the matter fully up to the organizers. If you invoke a Code of Conduct, you should also leave matters in the organizers hands - they put it up, they enforce it. Especially as the organizers reaction seems appropriate.

I think the problem is that most people see this as problematic and up to interpretation and Adria seems portrait it like a clear-cut case and justified in all aspects.

No reason to insult or threaten her, though. Anyone doing this really deserves to be fired. :/

The case here is wether or not she should have posted a public twitter message and picture of the two guys offending her (and women in general). Imho she shouldn't have done that, it was wrong and she should apologise for it.

The fact that the guy got fired is another mater. Since the conference organisation kicked them out during the conference he would have had to explain his actions to his employer anyway (who probably paid for the conference) and held accountable for it. Wether or not that resulted in him getting fired is up to his employer.

But ... Adria's actions made it a public discussion which directly affected Playhaven's reputation and thus made the mater far worse for all parties involved. That's on Adria.

Guys: Haha! Dongle! Haha!

Adria (of thousands friends and iPhone): Those guys are not cool!

PyCon: Let's resolve the matter. Guys, apologize! That's good! Now let's continue.

Playhaven: Huh? Somebody mentioned us? That's bad! Our reputation is at stake! Let's trash it thoroughly by firing father of three for something he said!

I'm probably lacking proper sensitivity but for me it's obvious when it got all messed up. It's when the exchange of information unnecessarily triggered harsh physical action.

Note that playhaven has broken out a blog post, though as far as I can see it does not explain anything and provides no information beyond what is already known: http://blog.playhaven.com/addressing-pycon/

I probably should stand corrected because pycon did not remove the offenders from the conference [1] but settled it between all parties involved.

That actually makes maters worse tbh because if Adria hadn't posted their image on twitter for her 9000+ followers to see, it would have remained an issue settled between pycon, adria and these guys. Now the case is closed for Adria and pycon while the guys are far worse off with one of them being fired. Not good!

[1] http://pycon.blogspot.be/2013/03/pycon-response-to-inappropr...

I don't think the thing is done for Adria.

By the fact that this thing was blown out of proportion by Playhaven she had accidentally got painted a troll target on her back that draws attention even from half baked misogynist trolls.

I think that in a month the guy that got fired will be better off than any other party involved. For one he might be employed by a company that won't shed him off like a hot potato whenever spotlight will shine in their direction.

Who said that PyCon organizers kicked him out? Aren't you getting your stories mixed up?

There's a lot of bad information going around.

What would be useful would be a collection of Adria's and mr-hank's posts from the original thread.

I've seen people saying Adria should never have confronted them because "men are abusive". Leading me to believe these people never read the part where Adria said she didn't talk to them because she was tired of having to explain herself, not because she feared for her safety.

She posted a picture of people online without their consent.

I know people do that all the time, and I don't know if it's legal in US, but it's illegal in most countries.

In general, it's legal to post pictures of people taken in public without their consent in the USA, especially at a large event like this where there is no reasonable expectation of privacy.

As far as Playhaven is concerned, I'm nearly certain that the person in question wasn't simply fired for making a sexual joke (I could be wrong on this, but that would typically be a pretty strong reaction).

They were forced into making a strong, public response by having one of their employees, wearing their shirt, being called out as a sexist. Think of it from the perspective of the company - the potential downside if you choose to protect this employee is huge, and it's far safer to err on the side of political correctness and quickly eliminating any hint that your company supports and protects sexist employees.

Once pictures are posted to Twitter clearly associating your company with sexism and harrassment, it ceases to be an HR problem, and becomes a PR problem.

I get the mechanics. I just think that lack of proper investigation, common sense and shedding employees did make them a strong disservice.

The message they managed to send is: We don't care about our employees or the truth, or proper conflict resolution, we just don't want name of our company to occur anywhere near word 'sexism' and we are going to do everything to avoid that. Which is silly because damage to their reputation was already done.

> I'd be rather angry at PyCon organizers for kicking out people

PyCon did not kick out anybody involved in this incident. Here's the incident report for this case: http://pycon.blogspot.be/2013/03/pycon-response-to-inappropr...

Please note:

> Both parties were met with, in private. The comments that were made were in poor taste, and individuals involved agreed, apologized and no further actions were taken by the staff of PyCon 2013. No individuals were removed from the conference, no sanctions were levied.

(emphasis mine)

In the previous thread on the subject (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5410515), mr-hank (the guy who got fired) very specifically notes this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5412553 and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5404365

> The PSF did not kick us out, they pulled us from the main convention and got our side of the story. I gave a statement, apologized and thanked them for upholding the cons integrity. They felt I was sincere and let us leave of our own accord.

Thanks for clearing that up for me. Too bad I can't edit grandparent comment anymore that, as I see now contains false information.

Just had a nightmarish vision: people behaving like her AND Google Glasses.

No privacy for anyone -- and prudish allegations to top it.

I was searching for what sexual language is. I found this http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/elderhealth/9356287/Crude-... Not sure what to think about this so I'll just leave it here.

> "but when she saw a picture of a little girl onstage, she felt she needed to make a stand for her"

This is outrageously pretentious.

This is not about men or women. Some people are just twats. Without exactly knowing the context in which this happened we don't know who the twat was in this case. I probably wouldn't want to work with either of them.

Gendered slur. Where can I report you for firing?

Shame that this is the biggest news to come out of PyCon.

Far from being an intelligent move, it's bad PR.

Another thread of soapboxing. It's rare that I come this close to using the flag button, but the story does have some details I missed, so it has some value.

Take a look at the world and all the shitty stuff happening every single day again. Then, think about a joke referencing a penis.

Do you really feel the need to be offended? Do you really think it is worth to tell the world someone touched a broken braincell in your head because of a penis joke? Clearly, you have your priorities wrong miss Richards. Same goes for the company firing the guy, why would you care about a crazy woman with penis issues?

So how do you justify where you draw your own line? Is it okay for you to murder someone because every day somewhere there is a massacre? No? Well then, is it okay for you to shoplift because someone else, somewhere, is stealing much more than you? Is it okay for you to push someone over because every day, somewhere, someone gets assaulted?

The list goes on and on. If you draw the line anywhere then you've applied the exact same principle you just espoused against; you just choose to draw the line in a slightly different place.

I think you miss my point. Where I come from, nobody - and that can be taken very literally - will be offended by a joke about penises between to friends. Why not? Because it is not something to be offended about. There is a lot of crap happening in the world today and jokes about penises is not one of them. That's all there is to it. If you do make this a big priority in your live, and even feel offended by it, your brain is kind of broken. Like when you believe in God and thus think it's OK to murder others that don't follow your beliefs. That's a broken brain symptom.

So it's not so much about drawing a line as there should be no need to draw it.

It's a bit - in a far fetched way - like the song Tim Minchin sang about the pope: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sph8Qu8wLAk

"Thats all there is to it."

An unbending, absolute rigid belief? Sounds like a religous style "broken brain".

I think what you are looking for is called "common sense".

You won't be going around murdering people since it is common sense and you are brought up this way.

Murder and dirty joke is not the same thing if you have any common sense and that's why usually murder has priority over dirty jokes in court. You usually don't get sued for dirty joke. That's why we don't call dirty jokes a murder nor we call murder a joke.

And the common sense is what should set our priorities. Who would you rather see in court first mass murderer or a thief? And on what grounds do you decide this? How do YOU decide which is more offensive? Do we have scales for it?

"Common sense" is not much more than a myth now that (many, including those of the majority of the posters here) societies are not homogenous and not filled with people all subscribing to a very narrow view of what is right and wrong. I believe "common sense" is, in this context, a way of stating a belief without feeling that any evidence is required. A bit like religion.

There was a thread around here somewhere in which the correct, acceptable behaviour of a society (real, not an imaginary example, unless I radically misread it) involved boys becoming men by giving oral sex (and swallowing) to older men. A neighbouring society decided anal sex was the way to go. This is simply "common sense" in those societies. Everyone agrees.

We live in societies where one person's "common sense" is another person's completely unacceptable behaviour.

"Who would you rather see in court first mass murderer or a thief?"

Will you be petitioning the courts to refuse to try thieves unless everyone accused of murder has been tried already? That would essentially legalise theft.

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