Comment by DonHopkins
6 years ago
>Implying that all who do not agree with you are racist is a bit of a weighty allegation.
Quite the contrary. I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt that you're not one of his racist sycophants.
>> mansplain away his racism.
>Please don't use this term.
Every one of his racist sycophants I've ever encountered have been men. Perhaps his Sex Tips for Geeks don't make him and his ideas as attractive to women as he thinks they do.
http://www.catb.org/esr/writings/sextips/
>>Affirmative action _is_ racism, by definition
>This is a point agreed upon by many.
Many who have an extremely simplistic, distorted understanding of what racism is. That doesn't make them right.
>In summary, you make generally good points, but adulterate them with a political message hostile to many.
If anybody wants to ignore the objective facts I've presented because I hurt their feelings by implicitly criticizing their political beliefs by associating them with Eric Raymond's racist beliefs, then that's their problem. If they don't have a problem with the hostile political messages that ESR adulterates all of his arguments with, then they should be able to tolerate mine too.
Perhaps they should read ESR's Sex Tips For Geeks advice about Avoiding the Curse of Oversensitivity:
http://www.catb.org/esr/writings/sextips/oversensitivity.htm...
>"As one of my beautiful geekgirl assistants pointed out previously, women have egos too." -Eric S Raymond
> I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt that you're not one of his racist sycophants.
Much appreciated, but the way you word this implies that if some one disagrees with you, he is a racist sycophant.
> Every one of his racist sycophants I've ever encountered have been men.
But I've usually heard "man splaining" defined as a man explaining "at" a woman. Have all the targets of his "racist sycophants" been women? You are making sex an issue where it does not need to be one.
> Many how have an extremely simplistic, distorted understanding of what racism is. That doesn't make them right.
You can't just claim every one who disagrees with your point of view on this has a "simplistic, distorted understanding" without supporting that. My understanding is pretty simple: racism is deliberately treating people differently because of race. I guess you could take that as simple, but I view it as a stark moral wrong and so don't see the need for a more complex one. If you disagree, please feel free to discuss why.
> criticizing their political beliefs by associating them with Eric Raymond's racist beliefs
No reason to try to draw a baseless association between other stuff and bad stuff some one has said.
> objective facts.
Any thing you didn't provide a link for I consider subjective. You can't declare your opinions "the objective fact".
> If they don't have a problem with the hostile political messages that ESR adulterates all of his arguments with, then they should be able to tolerate mine too.
I don't like the political message with which he adulterates his beliefs, nor did I say I did. I opened my above reply by criticizing him. However, I see no reason why I cannot criticize you for adding unnecessary political opinions to a discussion.
> Perhaps they should read ESR's Sex Tips for Geeks
This whole "writing" seems to be contemptible. I'm not defending it.
In summary, I'm not defending this guy; I don't like him either. I just don't like the way you stated your objection.
> My understanding is pretty simple: racism is deliberately treating people differently because of race.
Out of curiosity, I looked through your history and found https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19727302#19737906 where you decided to use the Wikipedia definition of racism - "the belief in the superiority of another" - to support your argument that a facial recognition systems which provided more precise results for light skinned people was not 'unintentionally racist'.
Have you changed your mind in the last three months?
> My understanding is pretty simple: racism is deliberately treating people differently because of race.
That's precisely what I meant by a simplistic, distorted (mis)understanding of racism. I could refer you to wikipedia, but that would be leading a horse to water.
Merriam webster, 3: racial prejudice or discrimination
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/racism
Seems pretty simple to me. I could be sarcastic and snarky too, but I'm not going to. If you've got a reason to prefer your definition, I'm genuinely open to being convinced other wise. Affirmative action is, by that definition, racist. Do you have a different definition which is for some reason preferable which states otherwise?
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