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Comment by Jun8 | Hacker News Reader

"The charming side of Richard helped people forgive him for his uncharming characteristics. For example, in many ways Richard was a sexist. Whenever it came time for his daily bowl of soup he would look around for the nearest "girl" and ask if she would fetch it to him. It did not matter if she was the cook, an engineer, or the president of the company. I once asked a female engineer who had just been a victim of this if it bothered her. "Yes, it really annoys me," she said. "On the other hand, he is the only one who ever explained quantum mechanics to me as if I could understand it." That was the essence of Richard's charm."

A good counterpoint to the "I don't care if you landed a spacecraft on a comet, you're still a sexist pig" crowd.

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Rather than thinking about it as a "counterpoint," I think it's an excellent illustration of the fact that people are complicated, and are capable of simultaneously being sexist pigs in some ways and progressive and gifted educators in others.

Something that I think really complicates these kinds of discussions is our propensity to think of people in zero-sum and reductionist ways. Examples: "I don't care if you landed a spacecraft on a comet, you're still a sexist pig!", "I don't care what a sexist pig you are, you landed a spacecraft on a comet!".

The one does not somehow "cancel out" or "make up for" the other; both facts ("sexist pig", "landed spacecraft on comet"[1]) can exist and be considered simultaneously. We contain multitudes, etc.- something that the female engineer quoted clearly understood. She made no bones about the fact that she found certain aspects of Feynman's behavior toward her offensive, but was also clear that there were other aspects that she found admirable. This is how socially mature human beings think and talk about one another, IMHO.

1: Or, in the case of Feynman, "had horrifically retrograde and damaging opinions about women's roles in society" and "was ahead of many of his peers in some respects".

I think the contradiction is most _ist people think group X in less capable of some activity. So, someone that says you’re an intelligent and capable person, but cultural norms let me dump demeaning task Y on you is not really the same thing. The closest neutral example I can think of is how the new person in a group is often dumped on.

However, much like the thousands of people who emulate the Steve Jobs misanthropy but don't emulate his great vision and talent, thousands of people emulate Feynman's sexism but not his genius and teaching.

Some girls may enjoy fetching a coup of soup and some girls don't.

What is wrong with requesting girls to do that? Maybe he just find them charming, cute, enjoy the interaction with them. It is always the person who is being asked's responsibility to accept, deny or counter offer the request.

Asking a girl to get soup for you does not make one a sexist pig!

I do find these political correctness is being taking way out of hand for political reasons to dived up groups.

What's wrong by it is that some people are genuinly offended, insulted or even frightened by such a direct approach and you really have no way of knowing this before you try it.

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