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'Shirtstorm' Leads To Apology From European Space Scientist

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Which leads back to removing every trace of existing culture from a space so that $GROUP can feel welcome. This is what I was getting at before. What cultural elements can a subgroup of society retain ? In order to make all groups welcome , no group can be comfortable. How does this not lead to a formalized mode of interaction for everything so that none are excluded ? How do you propose that groups / people maintain any sense of individuality in the ideal world you desire to craft ?

The ones which aren't problematic? I mean every day on the TV people are on the news wearing clothing that expresses themselves. There isn';t this huge problem of people not being able to wear clothes yknow.
 
No, that's not what it is. It's about being contextually aware of your actions.

And in being contextually aware of your actions you cease taking any potentially offensive ones. Any actions identifying a group ('culture') are almost inherently potentially offensive to any one who is a member of other groups who may wish to join this group, therefore they cannot be taken.

So while not being the goal it does seem to be the only outcome that meets the desires.
 

berzeli

Banned
So now it would be my turn to remark that she started it? ;) At least calling him an asshole and so on.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no and if I'm not making myself clear enough: NO. Calling someone an asshole once is not harassment and is not comparable to receive threats of murder and rape. Rose is not to blame in any harassment Taylor received.

Well, not necessarily. The type of discussion also depends on which reactions you seem appropriate to offensive things and things merely a few people take offence at, respectively. That's why I'm making this distinction: it's the difference between "You're right to be offended" and "Get over yourself". Obviously everyone can get offended by everything they want, but that would be my reaction to it. Also, whether I find a larger-scale "outrage" justified or not.

If I'd say offensive == someone's offended that would mean I would never say "Get over yourself". And sorry, but the Internet showed me there are a fucking lot of people who definitely have to get over themselves.


So you're the supreme arbiter of what is allowed to be offensive?

Is the treatment of women in STEM fields not a thing worth getting offended over? Because yet again that is what this is about, the shirt just illustrates the culture.


To your point of marginalisation, well, I don't think being offended means you're automatically right. Everyone has their special snowflake status, but at some point also I as a very special snowflake have to realise that the only way everyone's little offending things would be kept in mind is this rather dystopic outlook a few posts above:

You do know that it is entirely possible to express yourself without offending someone right? Taking that post even remotely seriously is insanity. Not wearing a shirt that have scantily clad women on it in a highly public setting does not mean that we will all start wearing grey jumpsuits and all human behaviour being reduced to mathematical functions. What the fuck are you smoking if you find that a reasonable statement!?
 
Hang on a second. This shirt was an important facet of expressing culture? It appears you recognize the argument but now must attempt to push the remedy so far into the absurd that you can just ignore that the problem, as identified, is there in the first place.

"Oh well it's a problem, but I guess if we need to eliminate all form of expression to fix it we should just let it go."

I would have to say that how people dress and the freedom to dress in certain ways certainly is an expression of culture wouldn't you?

Yes, I am suggesting that if you need to eliminate all forms of expression to fix the problem, as you identify it, perhaps you need to reexamine your problem. There is a very real problem with female representation in STEM courses (females made up approximately 5% of a compulsory class in the final year of my IT degree) and gender discrimination in general. I just don't think that an issue where if the thing where perfectly genderflipped it would be a societal non-issue fits into that problem.

I'm not pushing the remedy into the absurd, because I'm in a thread where people are suggesting that shirt effectively shouldn't exist (which is the logical reading of the suggestion that is unacceptable for wear in society (or equivalent to showing people your junk)), the remedy has already been taken to the absurd.
 
I am absolutely useless at finding free journal articles, but here's the abstract with the study authors and other information. Also interesting in the related links: Interacting with sexist men triggers social identity threat among female engineers.
Whilst these are interesting articles I must ask if whether your use of the second article is implying that him wearing this shirt constitutes acting in a dominant or sexually interested way to female colleagues?

Also on the first study it would have been interesting if they didn't only use the male>female and male=female ratios but also a male<female although I'm aware that it probably wouldn't have been useful to their study.
 

berzeli

Banned
tumblr_nby6eo6E4b1snv6hwo1_400.gif


We're through the looking glass right?

You can express your identity without offending someone.

Wearing a shirt with scantily clad women is not an inherent and defining part of STEM-culture.

Feminists do not want to take away everything you find fun.
 

KHarvey16

Member
I would have to say that how people dress and the freedom to dress in certain ways certainly is an expression of culture wouldn't you?

Yes, I am suggesting that if you need to eliminate all forms of expression to fix the problem, as you identify it, perhaps you need to reexamine your problem. There is a very real problem with female representation in STEM courses (females made up approximately 5% of a compulsory class in the final year of my IT degree) and gender discrimination in general. I just don't think that an issue where if the thing where perfectly genderflipped it would be a societal non-issue fits into that problem.

I'm not pushing the remedy into the absurd, because I'm in a thread where people are suggesting that shirt effectively shouldn't exist (which is thelogical reading of the suggestion that is unacceptable for wear in society), the remedy has already been taken to the absurd.

This argument would prevent someone from being upset at a person wearing a shirt that says "Niggers Suck"

Explain how it doesn't, since I'm sure you disagree.
 

TedNindo

Member
Reactions like this make stem fields look worse to women than they actually are imo.

What a gross overreaction. Far grosset than that shirt.
 
Uh...what?

Anything unique to a group is potentially exclusionary to anyone that doesn't belong to that group (whether its not understanding the lingo/jargon, not 'knowing the handshake', not knowing the 'dress code' etc) and therefore potentially offensive by excluding them.

Again, I do not think this is the GOAL. I just have no idea how you plan to achieve 100% inclusiveness without inherently bringing about a dystopia.
 

Unbounded

Member
This really isn't a big deal. At all.

Legitimately every single person I've ever met who is involved in STEM wouldn't give two shits about the shirt he's wearing. It's a goddamn shirt.
 

The Technomancer

card-carrying scientician
Which leads back to removing every trace of existing culture from a space so that $GROUP can feel welcome. This is what I was getting at before. What cultural elements can a subgroup of society retain ? In order to make all groups welcome , no group can be comfortable. How does this not lead to a formalized mode of interaction for everything so that none are excluded ? How do you propose that groups / people maintain any sense of individuality in the ideal world you desire to craft ?

What? No, its not that hard to avoid marginalizing or objectifying people.
 
The problem is that there is never a right time. Probably totally inappropriate but

You're right, not appropriate. Dr King wrote that letter from jail, protesting the brutal, blatant segregation of the South. That's a bit more commitment than the chickenshit sniping from a website.

That aside, why not give the guy a couple of days to enjoy his victory? Or was it better to just shit on him right away, while everyone was still paying attention?
 

Irminsul

Member
So you're the supreme arbiter of what is allowed to be offensive?
No (or, well, to the same amount as you are).

Is the treatment of women in STEM fields not a thing worth getting offended over? Because yet again that is what this is about, the shirt just illustrates the culture.
Yes. No, and no, it doesn't illustrate that. You state that as if it were a fact. See, I can do that too, just with the opposite sentiment. Doesn't make it true either.

You do know that it is entirely possible to express yourself without offending someone right?
Is it? All the time? Without offending anyone? I seriously doubt that.

Do bear in mind that I don't say it happens often or I believe "some kind of people" are just born to be offended (or that I just want to be a "nice guy". Fuck no, I don't). It's just that I don't believe I'm (automatically) wrong just because someone takes offence at what I said or did. I'm also more repulsive to take their concerns seriously the more they sound offended.

What the fuck are you smoking if you find that a reasonable statement!?
It probably helps that the poster themselves doesn't believe that is what actually is going to happen, I guess.


Also, I do believe that applying Hanlon's razor more often would tremendously improve social interactions of human beings. I don't think I'm really great at applying it, but at least I'm pretty great at not liking it when someone alleges me of malice like you did in the first part I quoted. I guess that's something, at least.
 

berzeli

Banned
You're right, not appropriate. Dr King wrote that letter from jail, protesting the brutal, blatant segregation of the South. That's a bit more commitment than the chickenshit sniping from a website.

That aside, why not give the guy a couple of days to enjoy his victory? Or was it better to just shit on him right away, while everyone was still paying attention?

The initial criticism was live commenting on an unfolding world event. You know like how people comment on live sports, TV, etc.
 
Who decides what's problematic? 30 years ago they guy would probably never been hired because of his tattoos because those would be considered problematic.

The people who find something offensive talk about how it makes them feel and try to bring people to their cause via attention raising, activism etc, wider society then decides whether it wants to continue to offend those people or whether it wants to change it's ways.

Will you go around calling black people negroes and say that 50 years ago that was considered polite terminology? Times change and wont always get it right but responding to the feelings of others is a positive trait for everyone to follow.

The idea that a "space sluts" tshirt is unprofessional and can be considered offensive, especially when you make comments like "She&#8217;s sexy, but I never said she was easy.&#8221;, especially when "73 percent of women in tech-intensive industries felt like an outsider" should not be a highly controversial one.

I think the worse thing about it is that the guy has apologised, his apology has been accepted, but it's other people who are angry about the idea that a person would actually apologise and accept that he made a bad judgement.

Sometimes I get the feeling that if female exclusive sporting events were being created now there would be a huge uproar in certain places about "reverse sexism" and "SJW"'s wanting special privileges.
 
This argument would prevent someone from being upset at a person wearing a shirt that says "Niggers Suck"

Explain how it doesn't, since I'm sure you disagree.

My response to this has to be put in two distinct parts:
People are free to be upset about absolutely anything they like and I'm not going to take issue with it Its when major societal pressure is actively brought into force that I begin potentially taking issue. So they can be upset about said T-shirt all they like.

One of the details of free expression that I had to deal with in arriving at my current position is that in order for free expression to exist, that it must be possible for people to say things that I think shouldn't be said. This is one of those clashes of ideals , and we disagree on which should be the victor. Admittedly if there was some clear way of setting up a truly objective arbiter of areas where free expression is necessary for a free society then this is one of those things that should be restrained only to those arena's where its absolutely necessary (and those are few in number), I'd like most actual racial slurs in that category really, so I'm not nearly pure on this, but that's a necessity of applying any ideals to a messy reality its just that I perceive no such arbiter (such things are inevitably subject to societal whims and political efficacy) and I'd rather not have the free political expression that is fundamentally necessary to democracy potentially subject to political/social scrutiny.

As an addendum I'm not sure that your example is a perfect reflection: a) I'm not American, so I lack a great deal of the ingrained societal context that makes that so offensive on a gut level, my understanding of its offensiveness is intellectual and b) I'm not sure that female representation in STEM being genderflipped is equivalent to a raceflip which includes a significant period of time of literal slavery but I've done my best to address this ignoring these issues.
 
T

Transhuman

Unconfirmed Member
This argument would prevent someone from being upset at a person wearing a shirt that says "Niggers Suck"

Explain how it doesn't, since I'm sure you disagree.

But my black friend made it, how can it be offensive.
 

berzeli

Banned
No (or, well, to the same amount as you are).

Which is kind of my point, you not having an issue does not mean that an issue doesn't exist. Even if you really, really think that it isn't an issue.

Yes. No, and no, it doesn't illustrate that. You state that as if it were a fact. See, I can do that too, just with the opposite sentiment. Doesn't make it true either.

You are aware that the initial criticism came from women in the STEM field complaining that this was not welcoming to women in STEM. It is fact, not my subjective interpretation.

Is it? All the time? Without offending anyone? I seriously doubt that.

Sure, how is that hard to believe?

Do bear in mind that I don't say it happens often or I believe "some kind of people" are just born to be offended (or that I just want to be a "nice guy". Fuck no, I don't). It's just that I don't believe I'm (automatically) wrong just because someone takes offence at what I said or did. I'm also more repulsive to take their concerns seriously the more they sound offended.

But that is not really relevant to this discussion, I was trying to illustrate that dismissal of a minority opinion on the basis of it being a minority opinion was not a good argument. Now we're kind of discussing something totally different. Also it is possible for both parties to both be right, or both be wrong.

It probably helps that the poster themselves doesn't believe that is what actually is going to happen, I guess.

Uh, he really seems to believe it. Sorry to say:
Anything unique to a group is potentially exclusionary to anyone that doesn't belong to that group (whether its not understanding the lingo/jargon, not 'knowing the handshake', not knowing the 'dress code' etc) and therefore potentially offensive by excluding them.

Again, I do not think this is the GOAL. I just have no idea how you plan to achieve 100% inclusiveness without inherently bringing about a dystopia.


Also, I do believe that applying Hanlon's razor more often would tremendously improve social interactions of human beings. I don't think I'm really great at applying it, but at least I'm pretty great at not liking it when someone alleges me of malice like you did in the first part I quoted. I guess that's something, at least.

Trust me, I did not attribute your comments to malice.
 

Mumei

Member
Elaugaufein, no one in this thread who thinks that the shirt is a problem is also advocating, "formalized mode of interaction for everything so that none are excluded," or would be interested in seeing some sort of beige dystopia. It's a silly argument, frankly.

Whilst these are interesting articles I must ask if whether your use of the second article is implying that him wearing this shirt constitutes acting in a dominant or sexually interested way to female colleagues?

Also on the first study it would have been interesting if they didn't only use the male>female and male=female ratios but also a male<female although I'm aware that it probably wouldn't have been useful to their study.

No, I was not attempting to say anything at all about Matt Taylor by posting that. I just thought it was interesting.

And yes, it would've been interesting to try that scenario, though, as you said, probably not what they were going for.
 
What? No, its not that hard to avoid marginalizing or objectifying people.

I'm actually a pretty extreme introvert, with some weird social issues, and find that a great deal of standard social interaction and societal mores makes me somewhat uncomfortable (because I don't 'get' it although I can get by) , in order to avoid marginalizing me you'd pretty much have to rewrite our rules for interaction. I don't think that's a realistic outcome though and its not something that I want to happen because I perceive the costs as far outweighing the benefits (my mild discomfort is far less valuable than a widely understood system for human interaction).

To put it more generically: It's not hard for someone to avoid marginalizing or objectifying people to the point they feel is appropriate to avoid it, but I'd bet money there's no universally agreed upon line. And I have to add that I don't think treating the 'recipient' as an infallible judge is wise on this matter, we don't let the victim of a criminal act serve as judge or jury or set the magnitude of a punishment for a reason. They are allowed to speak on how the event affected them and that can be taken into account in such things but we don't treat it as an objective truth in society as seems to be the trend with these issues.
 

Loakum

Banned
.....folks are waaaaaay too sensitive these days. He wore a shirt that had underwear clad women on it. There are way more important things worthy of outrage, this falls way short.
 

KHarvey16

Member
My response to this has to be put in two distinct parts:
People are free to be upset about absolutely anything they like and I'm not going to take issue with it Its when major societal pressure is actively brought into force that I begin potentially taking issue. So they can be upset about said T-shirt all they like.

One of the details of free expression that I had to deal with in arriving at my current position is that in order for free expression to exist, that it must be possible for people to say things that I think shouldn't be said. This is one of those clashes of ideals , and we disagree on which should be the victor. Admittedly if there was some clear way of setting up a truly objective arbiter of areas where free expression is necessary for a free society then this is one of those things that should be restrained only to those arena's where its absolutely necessary (and those are few in number), I'd like most actual racial slurs in that category really, so I'm not nearly pure on this, but that's a necessity of applying any ideals to a messy reality its just that I perceive no such arbiter (such things are inevitably subject to societal whims and political efficacy) and I'd rather not have the free political expression that is fundamentally necessary to democracy potentially subject to political/social scrutiny.

As an addendum I'm not sure that your example is a perfect reflection: a) I'm not American, so I lack a great deal of the ingrained societal context that makes that so offensive on a gut level, my understanding of its offensiveness is intellectual and b) I'm not sure that female representation in STEM being genderflipped is equivalent to a raceflip which includes a significant period of time of literal slavery but I've done my best to address this ignoring these issues.

No offense, but that's a lot of typing to say absolutely nothing.

People can be offended and people can demand change. I find the shirt to be a problem and I can say so. No one is asking to have the government throw him in jail or otherwise infringe upon his right to express himself. People are asking that we, as a society, acknowledge and understand why it's an issue. Your hangups here don't make any sense to me whatsoever.

But my black friend made it, how can it be offensive.

Lol, exactly.
 
,,,
Uh, he really seems to believe it. Sorry to say:
....

No, I don't believe it will happen because I don't subscribe to your exact principles nor do I think enough people would for long enough to bring about such a dystopia. What I'm trying to extract is what measures you want taken for inclusiveness and what restraints are placed on those measures but all I ever get is 'We'd never do that./ We don't want to go that far./ We're not bad people. /Trust us. / The dystopia you bring up is an extreme slipper y slope we don't want to bring about '
 

berzeli

Banned
No, I don't believe it will happen because I don't subscribe to your exact principles nor do I think enough people would for long enough to bring about such a dystopia. What I'm trying to extract is what measures you want taken for inclusiveness and what restraints are placed on those measures but all I ever get is 'We'd never do that./ We don't want to go that far./ We're not bad people. /Trust us. / The dystopia you bring up is an extreme slipper y slope we don't want to bring about '
Elaugaufein, no one in this thread who thinks that the shirt is a problem is also advocating, "formalized mode of interaction for everything so that none are excluded," or would be interested in seeing some sort of beige dystopia. It's a silly argument, frankly.
.
 
Why is this thing being equated to virulent racism all the time? Is this really the direction we wish to go? Treat people with scantily clad women t-shirts the same as your local stormfronter? This is what I mean, a small mistake and you're being made to feel like the worst person in the world.
 

KHarvey16

Member
No, I don't believe it will happen because I don't subscribe to your exact principles nor do I think enough people would for long enough to bring about such a dystopia. What I'm trying to extract is what measures you want taken for inclusiveness and what restraints are placed on those measures but all I ever get is 'We'd never do that./ We don't want to go that far./ We're not bad people. /Trust us. / The dystopia you bring up is an extreme slipper y slope we don't want to bring about '

We suggest society should be in a place in which a guy is dissuaded from wearing that shirt in a professional setting and you follow up with questions about why we want to eliminate personal expression. It's absurd.
 

berzeli

Banned
Why is this thing being equated to virulent racism all the time? Is this really the direction we wish to go? Treat people with scantily clad women t-shirts the same as your local stormfronter?

Because people seem to be unable to emphasise with women who take issue with certain imagery.

So analogues, allegories, rephrasing is kind of what you have left.
 
No offense, but that's a lot of typing to say absolutely nothing.

People can be offended and people can demand change. I find the shirt to be a problem and I can say so. No one is asking to have the government throw him in jail or otherwise infringe upon his right to express himself. People are asking that we, as a society, acknowledge and understand why it's an issue. Your hangups here don't make any sense to me whatsoever.



Lol, exactly.

Which is why a Mozilla CEO wasn't recently removed from his position due to people asking for understanding why something is an issue, and people haven't lost jobs over making crude jokes between themselves at conferences that were overhead by others. In this age of social media the difference between an online campaign and political activism is approximately nil. So yes, I'm extremely wary of the consequences of people starting up major media issues without any clearly defined endpoint, restraints or goals.
 

Ayt

Banned
Why is this thing being equated to virulent racism all the time? Is this really the direction we wish to go? Treat people with scantily clad women t-shirts the same as your local stormfronter? This is what I mean, a small mistake and you're being made to feel like the worst person in the world.

It isn't. People bring up more readily understood examples to illustrate flaws in logic.
 

berzeli

Banned
Which is why a Mozilla CEO wasn't recently removed from his position due to people asking for understanding why something is an issue, and people haven't lost jobs over making crude jokes between themselves at conferences that were overhead by others. In this age of social media the difference between an online campaign and political activism is approximately nil. So yes, I'm extremely wary of the consequences of people starting up major media issues without any clearly defined endpoint, restraints or goals.

But how is "please don't wear that shirt" not a clearly defined goal?
 

KHarvey16

Member
Which is why a Mozilla CEO wasn't recently removed from his position due to people asking for understanding why something is an issue, and people haven't lost jobs over making crude jokes between themselves at conferences that were overhead by others. In this age of social media the difference between an online campaign and political activism is approximately nil. So yes, I'm extremely wary of the consequences of people starting up major media issues without any clearly defined endpoint, restraints or goals.

So you bemoan the right of those expressing themselves and leading to the firing of a CEO?
 

Dice//

Banned
Nothing better than some of the fellas here saying a that a shirt the degrades/simplifies a woman's representation and character isn't in bad taste....on national television to boot.

Honestly, I don't find the shirt nearly as offensive here as how some people feel about the situation itself (basically along the lines that feminists are being whiney or that it's "just a shirt"; which is a gross simplification of the entire thing).
 
Because people seem to be unable to emphasise with women who take issue with certain imagery.

So analogues, allegories, rephrasing is kind of what you have left.

It isn't. People bring up more readily understood examples to illustrate flaws in logic.

It doesn't mean you don't make people feel like the worst people on earth. Considering the issue, one would think this would be clear.

It sucks when the good guys stop adhering to their own standards.
 

joedan

Member
Just as much as there are trolls on the Internet saying offensive things, on the opposite side of the spectrum there are the self righteous perpetually offended. Both are equivalently disingenuous and use the anonymity of the Internet to pretend to be something they're not.
 
But how is "please don't wear that shirt" not a clearly defined goal?

Because that's not the goal. Even the loosest reading is "never wear a shirt like that one in a professional setting", with people in this thread going so far as to suggest that the shirt effectively shouldn't exist "never wear that shirt anywhere anyone can see it".

So you bemoan the right of those expressing themselves and leading to the firing of a CEO?


I bemoan the kneejerk reactions to people expressing themselves because a relatively new medium vastly amplifies the power of groups to the point actions are taking without appropriate periods for consideration and that peoples lives can be ruined as a result, yes. Such power without a demonstrated capacity for restraint (and this being the internet one could argue there's a demonstrated capacity for a lack thereof) does make me nervous of movements with ill defined goals that could potentially lead to bad places even unintentionally even if I agree with many of their goals.
 

berzeli

Banned
It doesn't mean you don't make people feel like the worst people on earth. Considering the issue, one would think this would be clear.

It sucks when the good guys stop adhering to their own standards.

Wait, using a hypothetical situation to illustrate the underlying logic in how the situation is perceived by the people in the real situation makes us accuse on of the real person of being the hypothetical person? Huh?

Because that's not the goal. Even the loosest reading is "never wear a shirt like that one in a professional setting", with people in this thread going so far as to suggest that the shirt effectively shouldn't exist "never wear that shirt anywhere anyone can see it".

Still a massive leap to your insanely silly dystopia, and please stop arguing that it might happen, it derails what little discussion there is.
 

KHarvey16

Member
I bemoan the kneejerk reactions to people expressing themselves because a relatively new medium vastly amplifies the power of groups to the point actions are taking without appropriate periods for consideration and that peoples lives can be ruined as a result, yes. Such power without a demonstrated capacity for restraint (and this being the internet one could argue there's a demonstrated capacity for a lack thereof) does make me nervous of movements with ill defined goals that could potentially lead to bad places even unintentionally even if I agree with many of their goals.

Asking a company to fire a CEO is a movement without a well defined goal?

Your strategy throughout this discussion has been to erect strawmen and extend position into absurdity. You're excessively verbose without actually saying anything.
 

Zephyrus

Banned
when can I get my apology from every boys band in the world for their offensive music?

It offends my ears. I want my apology.

On a serious note, society nowadays is disgusting as fuck. Bunch of whinners crying all the time.
 
Nothing better than some of the fellas here saying a that a shirt the degrades/simplifies a woman's representation and character isn't in bad taste....on national television to boot.

Honestly, I don't find the shirt nearly as offensive here as how some people feel about the situation itself (basically along the lines that feminists are being whiney or that it's "just a shirt"; which is a gross simplification of the entire thing).

I think it is kind of funny how the thread's bulk of pages are due to the awww-that-shirt's-not-that-bad crowd :>
 
Wait, using a hypothetical situation to illustrate the underlying logic in how the situation is perceived by the people in the real situation makes us accuse on of the real person of being the hypothetical person? Huh?

Would you say that it's the other person's fault for being offended?
 
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