Comment by marcus_holmes

7 years ago

He wrote the software, he gets to have whatever attitude and tone he feels like. If you don't like it, don't use his software.

4 comments

marcus_holmes

Reply
brianpgordon  7 years ago

I took what I see as a moderate position lightly criticizing his tone, but because you're going way farther than that and asserting that he can be as much of a jerk as he wants, let's address that argument.

I think it's nonsense. Rich is probably among the most brilliant software engineers on the planet but that has no bearing whatsoever on whether he needs to be polite and show human empathy and decency like everyone else does. You can be toxic and hostile and people will put up with it if you're useful enough (c.f. Linus) but we shouldn't be lining up, comment after comment after comment, to cheer that kind of behavior on.

Again, I don't think this is a big deal. I think that his rant is just a small indiscretion and we're all human, but I'm dismayed to see such an outpouring of support for exactly the position that you're putting forward. What I'm saying isn't "nauseating PC culture" as one GitHub commenter put it; it's just not being an asshole.

  • gizzlon  7 years ago

    I found the original rational, useful and straight-forward. It's not an "indiscretion".

    So, yeah, your comments are approaching "nauseating PC culture" because you can't read something like the original without being offended some how.

icebraining  7 years ago

Well, he and other 147 people, according to the GH contributors page. Though, granted, none with anywhere near the same level of contributions to the core.