Wikimedia Foundation efforts to address this "gender gap" have so far remained fruitless.
Why must everything be gender balanced? Why not let women do what they want instead of trying to force them in to places that aren't necessarily their thing?
If women are actors instead of objects, they can make their own damn choices and do what they want to do without requiring others to try to sweeten the deal specifically for them to try to entice them.
I agree with your post, I brought it up mainly because someone said that we know something with certainty, my post was to remind people that we don't really know anything 100% and to always leave room for doubt, nothing more.
I see people claiming that something is without a doubt 100% certain and truth. Which is why I linked that speech.
there are plenty of scientists out there who know the limitations of what they know, and there are a few who are more certain than they should be. When measures are proposed from theories where the measures are likely to destroy some people's livelihoods,the amount of certainty people want can differ. Those who aren't likely to be adversely affected by the measures are the most likely to want to push forward. Those that will be adversely affected, want to be truly sure it is worth it.
wanting to protect the environment from people can be a nice goal, but people need resources. It doesn't matter if we become 30% more energy efficient across the board when the population doubles.
The scientist has a lot of experience with ignorance and doubt and uncertainty, and this experience is of very great importance, I think. When a scientist doesn’t know the answer to a problem, he is ignorant. When he has a hunch as to what the result is, he is uncertain. And when he is pretty darn sure of what the result is going to be, he is still in some doubt. We have found it of paramount importance that in order to progress we must recognize our ignorance and leave room for doubt. Scientific knowledge is a body of statements of varying degrees of certainty — some most unsure, some nearly sure, but none absolutely certain.
Now, we scientists are used to this, and we take it for granted that it is perfectly consistent to be unsure, that it is possible to live and not know. But I don’t know whether everyone realizes this is true. Our freedom to doubt was born out of a struggle against authority in the early days of science. It was a very deep and strong struggle: permit us to question — to doubt — to not be sure. I think that it is important that we do not forget this struggle and thus perhaps lose what we have gained.
Most lead acid batteries don't like being discharged really quickly, ones designed for cold cranking amps tend to not like being too deeply run down either. Right now for sixty dollars I can purchase an 11.1v lithium polymer battery that can output well over 250 amps co tinuously and 500 amps in bursts that's on a four amp hour battery. Up the capacity and the maximum current can get crazy
Were the dissenting opinions from within the organisation though? I remember a piece written by one of the gay employees that said while the revelation of his donation was disappointing that he had always been reasonable and treated them no differently than anyone else.
from a bystanders point of view, it looked like just a lot of hate directed towards him, with no end in sight until there was some form of admission that he was an evil evil person.
Considering I don't see gay marriage activists advocating polygamy be accepted yeah, they aren't for equal rights. The only sensible thing that would treat everyone equally in regards to marriage would be to eliminate it as a government thing whatsoever.
treating people equally can be a silly goal though at times, I would not treat the prime minister of great Britain. The same as I would treat a six year old on a special needs bus. Like it or not people are different and sometimes those differences can matter to their suitability to a task or problem.
what people would probably agree more to is not using criteria irrelevant to a task, but that then devolves into what are the criteria and why is it important.
anyway the point I was trying to get across is equality as a blind goal is not necessarily a good thing.
bigotry
ËbÉgÉ(TM)tri/
noun
intolerance towards those who hold different opinions from oneself
It is kind of sad, how the people calling others bigots in a negative fashion are often being bigots themselves. The word is used far too often by left-leaning people in hypocritical ways.
The scary thing is you think that women have been powerless victims for millennia completely unable to have any effect on society or men until an eyeblink ago.
You must think women are pretty inferior to men to maintain that belief.. because how else would that situation have been maintained?
When it comes to people sense of agency, agents are capable of making decisions that affect the outcome of things, and things simply happen to objects.
To say that women are unable to have control over their situation (as you do when you paint them the victim) is to objectify them.
It is often in this way that feminists are the biggest objectifiers of women that I know.
And I think the majority of women back then (who were _not_ feminists) had a better idea.
Women weren't granted the vote until over 50% of the women _wanted_ the vote. To say that it was unfair before then is to say that those women who didn't want to vote were wrong, in which case you are telling women what they should want.
I actually did a rather lengthy post on that topic somewhere else in this thread.
You are looking at things through a great deal of distortion today. Women have always been favoured (see the women are wonderful effect which feminism uses to it's ends), but being favoured has had different sets of trade-offs at different periods.
Oppression: prolonged cruel or unjust treatment or exercise of authority.
This also may take your interest, from the past.
Let us first take our existing marriage laws. We shall find that in England whilst the woman is practically relieved of all responsibility for the maintenance of her husband, he can be compelled by poor law to maintain her under a penalty of three months’ hard labour for leaving her without provision, should she choose to apply to the parish. On anything that by latitude of interpretation can be deemed ill-usage or neglect, she can, if rich, obtain judicial separation with alimony from the divorce court, or, if poor, a magisterial order for separation with weekly maintenance from the police court.
Jackson versus Jackson has decided that a wife can leave her husband at will, that he cannot raise a finger to compel her to remain with him or to come back, neither can she be imprisoned for contempt of court for refusing to obey an order for restitution of conjugal rights; in other words, it is decided that the contract of marriage is the single case of a contract which one of the contracting parties is at liberty to break without reason given, and without compensating the other party. But it is well to remember that it is only one of the parties that has this liberty, for Bunhill versus Bunhill gives the wife the right to follow an absconding husband and break into his house, if necessary, for the purpose of compelling cohabitation. He, on his part, is precluded by the decision in Weldon versus Weldon from obtaining restitution of conjugal rights even by way of action; he is liable, however, for his wife’s postnuptial torts, so that she has only to slander or libel some person without his knowledge or consent, and whilst she comes off scot free, even though possessed of property, the husband can be cast in damages. Trespass to land, trespass to goods, injuries done through negligence, all these actions coming under the legal definition of “torts,” render the husband liable, no matter what private wealth the wife may possess.
Is the ability for a woman to put a man in jail effectively at her whim if he is not sufficiently wealthy not injust? Would you consider it a form of oppression, or not?
I can give modern examples, actually far worse ones for men where the women are literally holding the power to end their lives with impunity.
But I'm wondering what you consider oppression first.
Unrelated to the thread at hand, apologies I didn't see it earlier as this very much is the kind of thing I'd chime in on especially in regards to feminists very skewed ideas of history.
Would just like swing you something nice to read that may take your interest, shows how little some things have changed.
Very little to do with the site it comes from, it's well written. here
A small excerpt from towards the end of the piece:
Nowadays any one who protests against injustice to men in the interests of women is either abused as an unfeeling brute or sneered at as a crank. Perhaps in that day of a future society, my protest may be unearthed by some enterprising archaeological inquirer, and used as evidence that the question was already burning at the end of the nineteenth century. Now, this would certainly not be quite true, since I am well aware that most are either hostile or indifferent to the views set forth here on this question. In conclusion, I may say that I do not flatter myself that I am going to convert many of my readers from their darling belief in “woman the victim.” I know their will is in question here, that they have made up their minds to hold one view and one only, through thick and thin, and hence that in the teeth of all the canons of evidence they would employ in other matters, most of them will continue canting on upon the orthodox lines, ferreting out the twentieth case that presents an apparent harshness to woman, and ignoring the nineteen of real injustice to man;
do a small group of elite men dominate society for their own interests?
What if they see "giving women what they say they want" as part of their interests?
Some interesting reading from the past (1907) here.
Let us first take our existing marriage laws. We shall find that in England whilst the woman is practically relieved of all responsibility for the maintenance of her husband, he can be compelled by poor law to maintain her under a penalty of three months’ hard labour for leaving her without provision, should she choose to apply to the parish. On anything that by latitude of interpretation can be deemed ill-usage or neglect, she can, if rich, obtain judicial separation with alimony from the divorce court, or, if poor, a magisterial order for separation with weekly maintenance from the police court.
Jackson versus Jackson has decided that a wife can leave her husband at will, that he cannot raise a finger to compel her to remain with him or to come back, neither can she be imprisoned for contempt of court for refusing to obey an order for restitution of conjugal rights; in other words, it is decided that the contract of marriage is the single case of a contract which one of the contracting parties is at liberty to break without reason given, and without compensating the other party. But it is well to remember that it is only one of the parties that has this liberty, for Bunhill versus Bunhill gives the wife the right to follow an absconding husband and break into his house, if necessary, for the purpose of compelling cohabitation. He, on his part, is precluded by the decision in Weldon versus Weldon from obtaining restitution of conjugal rights even by way of action; he is liable, however, for his wife’s postnuptial torts, so that she has only to slander or libel some person without his knowledge or consent, and whilst she comes off scot free, even though possessed of property, the husband can be cast in damages. Trespass to land, trespass to goods, injuries done through negligence, all these actions coming under the legal definition of “torts,” render the husband liable, no matter what private wealth the wife may possess.
Turning now from the civil law to the criminal law, we find a similar – or even greater – disparity of treatment. From the beginning of the nineteenth century, of course, whilst flogging, the tread-mill, and other brutal forms of punishment have been retained for male offenders, they have been abolished for females, so that though a man may be subjected to torture and degradation for mere breaches of prison discipline, a woman is exempted from them for the most heinous crimes.
As happened a few years ago in Ireland, a woman may torture her children to death and there is no outcry for the lash, yet surely if you do not flog the female child-torturer you have no right to flog any other human being. The sex-favouritism of modern penal law is made more conspicuous by the ever-recurring howl of the “base, bloody, and brutal” grand juror for the lash to be applied to new classes of offences (for men of course). But the most atrocious instances of sex-privilege occur in connection with the Criminal Law Amendment Act of 1885. Whilst the abduction of a girl under eighteen, or the seduction of one under sixteen, involves the man concerned in serious penalties, the girl or the woman gets off scot free, and this even though she may have been the inciting party.
This is carried to the extent that a young boy of fourteen may be himself induced to commit a sexual offence by a girl just under sixteen – that is to say, nearly two years his senior – and he can be sentenced to imprisonment, followed by several years in a reformatory, whilst the law holds the inciting girl abs
Feminism is basically a social criticism that in many spheres of our society an elite group of men has taken control for their own benefit, to the exclusion of others. Keep in mind that women only gained the right to vote last century, as late as 1970 in France,
You don't think female privilege exists? you don't think they don't have entitlements that men do not also? Do you think it is all entirely mens fault across the board? bullshit.
To say that women have been powerless to men for thousands of years unable to have any effect upon mens wishes or politics I'd consider an argument that they are inferior. Good thing I don't think that. What they lacked in rights they made up for in entitlements.
When men were first granted the right to vote, it was conditional upon them signing up for potential military service (US here) and doing so at an age long prior to when they were allowed to vote. In world war one millions of men went to their deaths without being able to vote. In fact when the draft was challenged a court of law simply said
"It may not be doubted that the very conception of a just government and its duty to the citizen includes the reciprocal obligation of the citizen to render military service in case of need, and the right to compel it. To do more than state the proposition is absolutely unnecessary in view of the practical illustration afforded by the almost universal legislation to that effect now in force."
In other words, men enjoyed the rights and privileges of citizenship granted by government *because they paid for it through the reciprocal obligation of the draft.* And the court considered this bargain to be so self-evident, it need do no more than state it.
And yet a few short years later women were granted the vote, without those responsibilities, as soon as the number of women wanting the vote exceeded 50%. While only three years earlier men were being literally executed for not upholding their end of the bargain that they were unable to opt out of. For men gaining the right to vote was still a condition of their service, for women it was a freebie, no responsibility required.
Sure, women weren't allowed to make that bargain for a vote, but neither could men refuse it. Most of the women who were against women voting back then were against it because of the assumption they would be held to the same standard as males and be required to sign up for potential service.
Hell, during the war the suffragettes (women wanting to vote) took time off their campaigning to shame any man who was seen not in uniform to sign up to war. In one instance even compelling a 16 year old boy who was sent back from the trenches after being discovered how young he was to sign back up. Such is the power of women, they controlled what it was to be considered a man and through this power compel men to do their wishes in such a way that the power is deniable, to maintain an image of weakness.
When times are hard, rights tend to only be given to those that have responsibilities to others, so that they may fulfil them. Since allowing others to have rights they don't necessarily require can impede on those who do have those responsibilities.
What I see today tend to be people that want the rights without the responsibility and without losing the entitlements. Mischaracterizing the situation of the past such to tell a very one-sided story, in order to let the entitled have their cake and eat it too.
I used to think it was unfair that women weren't allowed to vote in the early 1900's, but after seeing the conditions placed under men to be able to vote, no wonder so many didn't actually want to, if it was assumed they would have the same responsibilities and lose their entitlements (which they did not).
Within practical limits and within the confines of what is safe, women are given what they want. Men have no automatic own group preference unlike women. Partly why the idea of men "holding all the power" is ridiculous when they ar
Calling someone retarded is no less insulting than screaming nigger or faggot at them...are you telling me that is acceptable?
Linus generally insults code and sometimes companies actions, he'll only curse at people when he knows them well and knows they are capable of far better. I think swearing at code is acceptable.
he is not only giving FOSS a bad name, which is pretty bad considering what RMS did in public [youtube.com] left Torvalds pretty much the ONLY face of FOSS that didn't look like a loon, but he is also giving every stereotype of IT, that IT is full of maladjusted man children that behave like 14 year old punks, credence. We get enough of that shit without Linus acting like a fucking prima donna, thx.
He is being portrayed without the original context in order to advance an image that he is some lumbering monster, and from your reaction it is working. It is not linus' fault if you can't see through the "oh, think of the children" style media manipulation for extra eyeballs.
Drama sells, news at 11.
If the people complaining about it all actually followed the lists and followed the technical and social problems encountered there and how they are dealt with, we wouldn't have half of this bickering.
As it stands it's mostly people out there looking for fault, and I don't expect linus or anyone else to try to censor themselves in such a way that there is no possible way out of context to be misconstrued as the bad guy (it's actually pretty hard).
Linus is a perfect example of a no-bullshit engineer, with great insight into the work processes both technical and social that go on behind the kernel.
With the media having so much sway, and nobody actually giving a shit to see how things are and how they work, I fear the "oh dear that poor persons feelings" mob have already won.. at least until they try and stay away from any software project where any kinds of standards were enforced on moral principle, in which case.. at least they won't be on the internet anymore.
If I have a consistent set of conditions that set off the fault, it usually takes me a couple hours to make a fix. Usually it's only some small oss project though, the more popular ones tend to have their stuff a little better in order.
When you are as famous as linus, every time you swear at code you're likely to get media attention. So I don't think it is as prevalent as you may think it is.
I certainly know that if there a media circus every time I swore it would be a lot more frequently than what we've heard from linus.
Oh, I'll be polite when it's called for.
But when people who know better send me crap, I'll curse at them.
I suspect you'll notice me cursing *way* more at top developers than
random people on the list. I expect more from them, and conversely
I'll be a lot more upset when they do something that I really think
was not great.
For example, my latest cursing explosion was for the x86 maintainers,
and it comes from the fact that I *know* they know to do better. The
x86 tip pulls have generally been through way more testing than most
other pulls I get (not just compiling, but even booting randconfigs
etc). So when an x86 pull request comes in that clearly missed that
expected level of quality, I go to town.
Similarly, you will see fireworks if some long-term maintainer makes
excuses for breaking user space etc. That will make me go into
incoherent rages.
The "polite Linus" example that you point to? That was a maintainer
asking for direction for when things went wrong and *before* sending
me something dubious. Of course I'm polite then.
Sarah, I don't have Tourettes syndrome. You seem to think that my
cursing is uncontrolled and random. I argue that it has causes. Big
difference.
Yes. And I do it partly (mostly) because it's who I am, and partly because I honestly despise being subtle or "nice". The fact is, people need to know what my position on things are. And I can't just say "please don't do that", because people won't listen.
I say "On the internet, nobody can hear you being subtle," and I mean it. And I definitely am not willing to string people along, either. I've had that happen too—not telling people clearly enough that I don't like their approach, they go on to re-architect something, and get really upset when I am then not willing to take their work. Sarah, first off, I don't have that many tools at hand.
Secondly, I simply don't believe in being polite or politically correct. And you can point at all those cultural factors where some cultures are not happy with confrontation (and feel free to make it about gender too—I think that's almost entirely cultural too). And please bring up "cultural sensitivity" while at it. And I'll give you back that same "cultural sensitivity". Please be sensitive to _my_ culture too.
In effect you are whining that calling a crap code submission crap is not professional. Linus is a very pragmatic and practical man. That so many people want everything to go smoothly and politely even when shitty things are submitted/done reflects poorly on that "everyone is a winner" kind of culture that propagates that mentality.
We should not prioritize peoples feelings over code quality. If something horribly break things that we've known for a while and know they are capable of better, we should be able to tell people that that was crap and we expect more of them without them whinging to the political correctness police yelling "abuse".
This mentality seems to keep on spreading amongst the new generations, and I fear for what the software development industry will look like in fifty years with all of the pragmatic people thrown out by those more concerned of peoples feelings.
Oh, I'll be polite when it's called for.
But when people who know better send me crap, I'll curse at them.
I suspect you'll notice me cursing *way* more at top developers than
random people on the list. I expect more from them, and conversely
I'll be a lot more upset when they do something that I really think
was not great.
For example, my latest cursing explosion was for the x86 maintainers,
and it comes from the fact that I *know* they know to do better. The
x86 tip pulls have generally been through way more testing than most
other pulls I get (not just compiling, but even booting randconfigs
etc). So when an x86 pull request comes in that clearly missed that
expected level of quality, I go to town.
Similarly, you will see fireworks if some long-term maintainer makes
excuses for breaking user space etc. That will make me go into
incoherent rages.
The "polite Linus" example that you point to? That was a maintainer
asking for direction for when things went wrong and *before* sending
me something dubious. Of course I'm polite then.
Sarah, I don't have Tourettes syndrome. You seem to think that my
cursing is uncontrolled and random. I argue that it has causes. Big
difference.
Yes. And I do it partly (mostly) because it's who I am, and partly because I honestly despise being subtle or "nice".
The fact is, people need to know what my position on things are. And I can't just say "please don't do that", because people won't listen. I say "On the internet, nobody can hear you being subtle," and I mean it.
And I definitely am not willing to string people along, either. I've had that happen too—not telling people clearly enough that I don't like their approach, they go on to re-architect something, and get really upset when I am then not willing to take their work.
Sarah, first off, I don't have that many tools at hand. Secondly, I simply don't believe in being polite or politically correct. And you can point at all those cultural factors where some cultures are not happy with confrontation (and feel free to make it about gender too—I think that's almost entirely cultural too). And please bring up "cultural sensitivity" while at it. And I'll give you back that same "cultural sensitivity". Please be sensitive to _my_ culture too.
some people don't believe in going "oh I'm sorry dear, you are an awesome sugar plum fairy but your performance in this little area was below expectations, especially when it is quite clear said person should know far better given their position of responsibility.
He is clear, to the point, and gets things done.
This is not abuse, this is quite clearly saying that it is screwed, and how it is screwed. It is productive conversation.
All of linus' tirades are followed by an in-depth message detailing in what way they are wrong, being direct and to the point is his style, which he is entitled to.
If calling for standards of quality in a very direct way is abuse.. well.. start a new kernel where you accept any old tripe and see how it goes? And only interact/depend on with projects who have a similar standard and means of management.
Linus is a very pragmatic, practical engineer. Don't let feelings get in the way of practical needs people. His style works far better than most.
Nah, I'm just not under the illusion that we are special in any way. The universe doesn't give a shit about whether we survive or not, that we often want to is simply a personal bias, not an inherent truth, and those personal biases can vary..
Whether we survive or not is just a thing that happens, it's not inherently "right" or "wrong". No matter what happens to us the universe keeps turning, doing it's thing.
Perhaps the goal of preventing human extinction is the one arbitrary priority, the one "unicorn in the garden" [orain.org], as a starting point to make atheism practical.
You don't need that assumption to make atheism practical. Atheism is practical because "god" is not a falsifiable concept, this doesn't make it wrong, but it puts it in the realm of other things of that realm like the tooth fairy and santa. Things that even if they so happened by some freaky coincidence to be right there is no possible way to have evidence of it because of the lack of ability of the conjecture to be tested.
Critical rationalism allows atheism to function. Not in a hard "there is no god, for sure" stance, but in the "there is no reason, and can be no reason to prefer the conjecture that there is a god, so I'm going to totally ignore it like all other untestable things" sense.
add the axiom "Humankind ought to continue to exist."
Why? what justification do you have for this?
If you think this goal isn't right, feel free to remove yourself.
Just because someone doesn't think that it is an inherent truth that it is "right" that all people should continue to exist doesn't mean they think that people should not exist
Otherwise, you can continue by answering questions like this: Does the benefit to humankind of not living in fear of being murdered outweigh the benefit to humankind of having the freedom to murder someone?
What people consider to be a benefit or detriment depends entirely on their desired outcomes and priorities, which can be arbitrary. When what is "benefit" is arbitrary so too can be your morals if what is of benefit is your guiding light.
The main problem I see with people who talk about "morals derived from logic", comes from people not realizing that it all comes down to their own biases and their own preferences.
Sure, the system you've devised might be a reasonable and logical way to achieve the goals you intend.. but why do you have those goals? why are those goals "right"?
It all comes down to an a priori justification of their morals in the end. They just haven't recursively analyzed their own morals enough to realize it yet.
When all morals are effectively arbitrary (as the priorities and values that influence them can be) it is hard to say they are defined by "logic".
Slashdot Mirror
Wikimedia Foundation efforts to address this "gender gap" have so far remained fruitless.
Why must everything be gender balanced? Why not let women do what they want instead of trying to force them in to places that aren't necessarily their thing?
If women are actors instead of objects, they can make their own damn choices and do what they want to do without requiring others to try to sweeten the deal specifically for them to try to entice them.
I agree with your post, I brought it up mainly because someone said that we know something with certainty, my post was to remind people that we don't really know anything 100% and to always leave room for doubt, nothing more.
I see people claiming that something is without a doubt 100% certain and truth. Which is why I linked that speech.
there are plenty of scientists out there who know the limitations of what they know, and there are a few who are more certain than they should be. When measures are proposed from theories where the measures are likely to destroy some people's livelihoods,the amount of certainty people want can differ. Those who aren't likely to be adversely affected by the measures are the most likely to want to push forward. Those that will be adversely affected, want to be truly sure it is worth it.
wanting to protect the environment from people can be a nice goal, but people need resources. It doesn't matter if we become 30% more energy efficient across the board when the population doubles.
There are lots of things we know with certainty.
i think richard feynman put it best.
The scientist has a lot of experience with ignorance and doubt and uncertainty, and this experience is of very great importance, I think. When a scientist doesn’t know the answer to a problem, he is ignorant. When he has a hunch as to what the result is, he is uncertain. And when he is pretty darn sure of what the result is going to be, he is still in some doubt. We have found it of paramount importance that in order to progress we must recognize our ignorance and leave room for doubt. Scientific knowledge is a body of statements of varying degrees of certainty — some most unsure, some nearly sure, but none absolutely certain.
Now, we scientists are used to this, and we take it for granted that it is perfectly consistent to be unsure, that it is possible to live and not know. But I don’t know whether everyone realizes this is true. Our freedom to doubt was born out of a struggle against authority in the early days of science. It was a very deep and strong struggle: permit us to question — to doubt — to not be sure. I think that it is important that we do not forget this struggle and thus perhaps lose what we have gained.
Most lead acid batteries don't like being discharged really quickly, ones designed for cold cranking amps tend to not like being too deeply run down either. Right now for sixty dollars I can purchase an 11.1v lithium polymer battery that can output well over 250 amps co tinuously and 500 amps in bursts that's on a four amp hour battery. Up the capacity and the maximum current can get crazy
Were the dissenting opinions from within the organisation though? I remember a piece written by one of the gay employees that said while the revelation of his donation was disappointing that he had always been reasonable and treated them no differently than anyone else.
from a bystanders point of view, it looked like just a lot of hate directed towards him, with no end in sight until there was some form of admission that he was an evil evil person.
What people consider harm can be pretty arbitrary though
Considering I don't see gay marriage activists advocating polygamy be accepted yeah, they aren't for equal rights. The only sensible thing that would treat everyone equally in regards to marriage would be to eliminate it as a government thing whatsoever.
treating people equally can be a silly goal though at times, I would not treat the prime minister of great Britain. The same as I would treat a six year old on a special needs bus. Like it or not people are different and sometimes those differences can matter to their suitability to a task or problem.
what people would probably agree more to is not using criteria irrelevant to a task, but that then devolves into what are the criteria and why is it important.
anyway the point I was trying to get across is equality as a blind goal is not necessarily a good thing.
bigotry ËbÉgÉ(TM)tri/ noun intolerance towards those who hold different opinions from oneself It is kind of sad, how the people calling others bigots in a negative fashion are often being bigots themselves. The word is used far too often by left-leaning people in hypocritical ways.
The scary thing is you think that women have been powerless victims for millennia completely unable to have any effect on society or men until an eyeblink ago.
You must think women are pretty inferior to men to maintain that belief.. because how else would that situation have been maintained?
When it comes to people sense of agency, agents are capable of making decisions that affect the outcome of things, and things simply happen to objects.
To say that women are unable to have control over their situation (as you do when you paint them the victim) is to objectify them.
It is often in this way that feminists are the biggest objectifiers of women that I know.
And I think the majority of women back then (who were _not_ feminists) had a better idea.
Women weren't granted the vote until over 50% of the women _wanted_ the vote. To say that it was unfair before then is to say that those women who didn't want to vote were wrong, in which case you are telling women what they should want.
I actually did a rather lengthy post on that topic somewhere else in this thread.
You are looking at things through a great deal of distortion today. Women have always been favoured (see the women are wonderful effect which feminism uses to it's ends), but being favoured has had different sets of trade-offs at different periods.
Oppression: prolonged cruel or unjust treatment or exercise of authority.
This also may take your interest, from the past.
Let us first take our existing marriage laws. We shall find that in England whilst the woman is practically relieved of all responsibility for the maintenance of her husband, he can be compelled by poor law to maintain her under a penalty of three months’ hard labour for leaving her without provision, should she choose to apply to the parish. On anything that by latitude of interpretation can be deemed ill-usage or neglect, she can, if rich, obtain judicial separation with alimony from the divorce court, or, if poor, a magisterial order for separation with weekly maintenance from the police court.
Jackson versus Jackson has decided that a wife can leave her husband at will, that he cannot raise a finger to compel her to remain with him or to come back, neither can she be imprisoned for contempt of court for refusing to obey an order for restitution of conjugal rights; in other words, it is decided that the contract of marriage is the single case of a contract which one of the contracting parties is at liberty to break without reason given, and without compensating the other party. But it is well to remember that it is only one of the parties that has this liberty, for Bunhill versus Bunhill gives the wife the right to follow an absconding husband and break into his house, if necessary, for the purpose of compelling cohabitation. He, on his part, is precluded by the decision in Weldon versus Weldon from obtaining restitution of conjugal rights even by way of action; he is liable, however, for his wife’s postnuptial torts, so that she has only to slander or libel some person without his knowledge or consent, and whilst she comes off scot free, even though possessed of property, the husband can be cast in damages. Trespass to land, trespass to goods, injuries done through negligence, all these actions coming under the legal definition of “torts,” render the husband liable, no matter what private wealth the wife may possess.
Is the ability for a woman to put a man in jail effectively at her whim if he is not sufficiently wealthy not injust? Would you consider it a form of oppression, or not?
I can give modern examples, actually far worse ones for men where the women are literally holding the power to end their lives with impunity.
But I'm wondering what you consider oppression first.
Unrelated to the thread at hand, apologies I didn't see it earlier as this very much is the kind of thing I'd chime in on especially in regards to feminists very skewed ideas of history.
Would just like swing you something nice to read that may take your interest, shows how little some things have changed.
Very little to do with the site it comes from, it's well written. here
A small excerpt from towards the end of the piece:
Nowadays any one who protests against injustice to men in the interests of women is either abused as an unfeeling brute or sneered at as a crank. Perhaps in that day of a future society, my protest may be unearthed by some enterprising archaeological inquirer, and used as evidence that the question was already burning at the end of the nineteenth century. Now, this would certainly not be quite true, since I am well aware that most are either hostile or indifferent to the views set forth here on this question. In conclusion, I may say that I do not flatter myself that I am going to convert many of my readers from their darling belief in “woman the victim.” I know their will is in question here, that they have made up their minds to hold one view and one only, through thick and thin, and hence that in the teeth of all the canons of evidence they would employ in other matters, most of them will continue canting on upon the orthodox lines, ferreting out the twentieth case that presents an apparent harshness to woman, and ignoring the nineteen of real injustice to man;
do a small group of elite men dominate society for their own interests?
What if they see "giving women what they say they want" as part of their interests?
Some interesting reading from the past (1907) here.
Let us first take our existing marriage laws. We shall find that in England whilst the woman is practically relieved of all responsibility for the maintenance of her husband, he can be compelled by poor law to maintain her under a penalty of three months’ hard labour for leaving her without provision, should she choose to apply to the parish. On anything that by latitude of interpretation can be deemed ill-usage or neglect, she can, if rich, obtain judicial separation with alimony from the divorce court, or, if poor, a magisterial order for separation with weekly maintenance from the police court.
Jackson versus Jackson has decided that a wife can leave her husband at will, that he cannot raise a finger to compel her to remain with him or to come back, neither can she be imprisoned for contempt of court for refusing to obey an order for restitution of conjugal rights; in other words, it is decided that the contract of marriage is the single case of a contract which one of the contracting parties is at liberty to break without reason given, and without compensating the other party. But it is well to remember that it is only one of the parties that has this liberty, for Bunhill versus Bunhill gives the wife the right to follow an absconding husband and break into his house, if necessary, for the purpose of compelling cohabitation. He, on his part, is precluded by the decision in Weldon versus Weldon from obtaining restitution of conjugal rights even by way of action; he is liable, however, for his wife’s postnuptial torts, so that she has only to slander or libel some person without his knowledge or consent, and whilst she comes off scot free, even though possessed of property, the husband can be cast in damages. Trespass to land, trespass to goods, injuries done through negligence, all these actions coming under the legal definition of “torts,” render the husband liable, no matter what private wealth the wife may possess.
Turning now from the civil law to the criminal law, we find a similar – or even greater – disparity of treatment. From the beginning of the nineteenth century, of course, whilst flogging, the tread-mill, and other brutal forms of punishment have been retained for male offenders, they have been abolished for females, so that though a man may be subjected to torture and degradation for mere breaches of prison discipline, a woman is exempted from them for the most heinous crimes.
As happened a few years ago in Ireland, a woman may torture her children to death and there is no outcry for the lash, yet surely if you do not flog the female child-torturer you have no right to flog any other human being. The sex-favouritism of modern penal law is made more conspicuous by the ever-recurring howl of the “base, bloody, and brutal” grand juror for the lash to be applied to new classes of offences (for men of course). But the most atrocious instances of sex-privilege occur in connection with the Criminal Law Amendment Act of 1885. Whilst the abduction of a girl under eighteen, or the seduction of one under sixteen, involves the man concerned in serious penalties, the girl or the woman gets off scot free, and this even though she may have been the inciting party.
This is carried to the extent that a young boy of fourteen may be himself induced to commit a sexual offence by a girl just under sixteen – that is to say, nearly two years his senior – and he can be sentenced to imprisonment, followed by several years in a reformatory, whilst the law holds the inciting girl abs
2) Men aren't being oppressed
To say that no man or group of men has ever been treated unjustly (oppressed) is a really hard sell man.
Feminism is basically a social criticism that in many spheres of our society an elite group of men has taken control for their own benefit, to the exclusion of others. Keep in mind that women only gained the right to vote last century, as late as 1970 in France,
You don't think female privilege exists? you don't think they don't have entitlements that men do not also? Do you think it is all entirely mens fault across the board? bullshit.
To say that women have been powerless to men for thousands of years unable to have any effect upon mens wishes or politics I'd consider an argument that they are inferior. Good thing I don't think that. What they lacked in rights they made up for in entitlements.
When men were first granted the right to vote, it was conditional upon them signing up for potential military service (US here) and doing so at an age long prior to when they were allowed to vote. In world war one millions of men went to their deaths without being able to vote. In fact when the draft was challenged a court of law simply said
"It may not be doubted that the very conception of a just government and its duty to the citizen includes the reciprocal obligation of the citizen to render military service in case of need, and the right to compel it. To do more than state the proposition is absolutely unnecessary in view of the practical illustration afforded by the almost universal legislation to that effect now in force."
In other words, men enjoyed the rights and privileges of citizenship granted by government *because they paid for it through the reciprocal obligation of the draft.* And the court considered this bargain to be so self-evident, it need do no more than state it.
And yet a few short years later women were granted the vote, without those responsibilities, as soon as the number of women wanting the vote exceeded 50%. While only three years earlier men were being literally executed for not upholding their end of the bargain that they were unable to opt out of. For men gaining the right to vote was still a condition of their service, for women it was a freebie, no responsibility required.
Sure, women weren't allowed to make that bargain for a vote, but neither could men refuse it. Most of the women who were against women voting back then were against it because of the assumption they would be held to the same standard as males and be required to sign up for potential service.
Hell, during the war the suffragettes (women wanting to vote) took time off their campaigning to shame any man who was seen not in uniform to sign up to war. In one instance even compelling a 16 year old boy who was sent back from the trenches after being discovered how young he was to sign back up. Such is the power of women, they controlled what it was to be considered a man and through this power compel men to do their wishes in such a way that the power is deniable, to maintain an image of weakness.
When times are hard, rights tend to only be given to those that have responsibilities to others, so that they may fulfil them. Since allowing others to have rights they don't necessarily require can impede on those who do have those responsibilities.
What I see today tend to be people that want the rights without the responsibility and without losing the entitlements. Mischaracterizing the situation of the past such to tell a very one-sided story, in order to let the entitled have their cake and eat it too.
I used to think it was unfair that women weren't allowed to vote in the early 1900's, but after seeing the conditions placed under men to be able to vote, no wonder so many didn't actually want to, if it was assumed they would have the same responsibilities and lose their entitlements (which they did not).
Within practical limits and within the confines of what is safe, women are given what they want. Men have no automatic own group preference unlike women. Partly why the idea of men "holding all the power" is ridiculous when they ar
Calling someone retarded is no less insulting than screaming nigger or faggot at them...are you telling me that is acceptable?
Linus generally insults code and sometimes companies actions, he'll only curse at people when he knows them well and knows they are capable of far better. I think swearing at code is acceptable.
he is not only giving FOSS a bad name, which is pretty bad considering what RMS did in public [youtube.com] left Torvalds pretty much the ONLY face of FOSS that didn't look like a loon, but he is also giving every stereotype of IT, that IT is full of maladjusted man children that behave like 14 year old punks, credence. We get enough of that shit without Linus acting like a fucking prima donna, thx.
He is being portrayed without the original context in order to advance an image that he is some lumbering monster, and from your reaction it is working. It is not linus' fault if you can't see through the "oh, think of the children" style media manipulation for extra eyeballs.
Drama sells, news at 11.
If the people complaining about it all actually followed the lists and followed the technical and social problems encountered there and how they are dealt with, we wouldn't have half of this bickering.
As it stands it's mostly people out there looking for fault, and I don't expect linus or anyone else to try to censor themselves in such a way that there is no possible way out of context to be misconstrued as the bad guy (it's actually pretty hard).
Linus is a perfect example of a no-bullshit engineer, with great insight into the work processes both technical and social that go on behind the kernel.
With the media having so much sway, and nobody actually giving a shit to see how things are and how they work, I fear the "oh dear that poor persons feelings" mob have already won.. at least until they try and stay away from any software project where any kinds of standards were enforced on moral principle, in which case.. at least they won't be on the internet anymore.
If I have a consistent set of conditions that set off the fault, it usually takes me a couple hours to make a fix. Usually it's only some small oss project though, the more popular ones tend to have their stuff a little better in order.
When you are as famous as linus, every time you swear at code you're likely to get media attention. So I don't think it is as prevalent as you may think it is.
I certainly know that if there a media circus every time I swore it would be a lot more frequently than what we've heard from linus.
From linus at a prior time
Oh, I'll be polite when it's called for. But when people who know better send me crap, I'll curse at them. I suspect you'll notice me cursing *way* more at top developers than random people on the list. I expect more from them, and conversely I'll be a lot more upset when they do something that I really think was not great. For example, my latest cursing explosion was for the x86 maintainers, and it comes from the fact that I *know* they know to do better. The x86 tip pulls have generally been through way more testing than most other pulls I get (not just compiling, but even booting randconfigs etc). So when an x86 pull request comes in that clearly missed that expected level of quality, I go to town. Similarly, you will see fireworks if some long-term maintainer makes excuses for breaking user space etc. That will make me go into incoherent rages. The "polite Linus" example that you point to? That was a maintainer asking for direction for when things went wrong and *before* sending me something dubious. Of course I'm polite then. Sarah, I don't have Tourettes syndrome. You seem to think that my cursing is uncontrolled and random. I argue that it has causes. Big difference.
Yes. And I do it partly (mostly) because it's who I am, and partly because I honestly despise being subtle or "nice". The fact is, people need to know what my position on things are. And I can't just say "please don't do that", because people won't listen. I say "On the internet, nobody can hear you being subtle," and I mean it. And I definitely am not willing to string people along, either. I've had that happen too—not telling people clearly enough that I don't like their approach, they go on to re-architect something, and get really upset when I am then not willing to take their work. Sarah, first off, I don't have that many tools at hand. Secondly, I simply don't believe in being polite or politically correct. And you can point at all those cultural factors where some cultures are not happy with confrontation (and feel free to make it about gender too—I think that's almost entirely cultural too). And please bring up "cultural sensitivity" while at it. And I'll give you back that same "cultural sensitivity". Please be sensitive to _my_ culture too.
In effect you are whining that calling a crap code submission crap is not professional. Linus is a very pragmatic and practical man. That so many people want everything to go smoothly and politely even when shitty things are submitted/done reflects poorly on that "everyone is a winner" kind of culture that propagates that mentality.
We should not prioritize peoples feelings over code quality. If something horribly break things that we've known for a while and know they are capable of better, we should be able to tell people that that was crap and we expect more of them without them whinging to the political correctness police yelling "abuse".
This mentality seems to keep on spreading amongst the new generations, and I fear for what the software development industry will look like in fifty years with all of the pragmatic people thrown out by those more concerned of peoples feelings.
From a prior discussion from linus.
Oh, I'll be polite when it's called for. But when people who know better send me crap, I'll curse at them. I suspect you'll notice me cursing *way* more at top developers than random people on the list. I expect more from them, and conversely I'll be a lot more upset when they do something that I really think was not great. For example, my latest cursing explosion was for the x86 maintainers, and it comes from the fact that I *know* they know to do better. The x86 tip pulls have generally been through way more testing than most other pulls I get (not just compiling, but even booting randconfigs etc). So when an x86 pull request comes in that clearly missed that expected level of quality, I go to town. Similarly, you will see fireworks if some long-term maintainer makes excuses for breaking user space etc. That will make me go into incoherent rages. The "polite Linus" example that you point to? That was a maintainer asking for direction for when things went wrong and *before* sending me something dubious. Of course I'm polite then. Sarah, I don't have Tourettes syndrome. You seem to think that my cursing is uncontrolled and random. I argue that it has causes. Big difference.
Yes. And I do it partly (mostly) because it's who I am, and partly because I honestly despise being subtle or "nice". The fact is, people need to know what my position on things are. And I can't just say "please don't do that", because people won't listen. I say "On the internet, nobody can hear you being subtle," and I mean it. And I definitely am not willing to string people along, either. I've had that happen too—not telling people clearly enough that I don't like their approach, they go on to re-architect something, and get really upset when I am then not willing to take their work. Sarah, first off, I don't have that many tools at hand. Secondly, I simply don't believe in being polite or politically correct. And you can point at all those cultural factors where some cultures are not happy with confrontation (and feel free to make it about gender too—I think that's almost entirely cultural too). And please bring up "cultural sensitivity" while at it. And I'll give you back that same "cultural sensitivity". Please be sensitive to _my_ culture too.
some people don't believe in going "oh I'm sorry dear, you are an awesome sugar plum fairy but your performance in this little area was below expectations, especially when it is quite clear said person should know far better given their position of responsibility.
He is clear, to the point, and gets things done.
This is not abuse, this is quite clearly saying that it is screwed, and how it is screwed. It is productive conversation.
All of linus' tirades are followed by an in-depth message detailing in what way they are wrong, being direct and to the point is his style, which he is entitled to.
If calling for standards of quality in a very direct way is abuse.. well.. start a new kernel where you accept any old tripe and see how it goes? And only interact/depend on with projects who have a similar standard and means of management.
Linus is a very pragmatic, practical engineer. Don't let feelings get in the way of practical needs people. His style works far better than most.
Nah, I'm just not under the illusion that we are special in any way. The universe doesn't give a shit about whether we survive or not, that we often want to is simply a personal bias, not an inherent truth, and those personal biases can vary..
Whether we survive or not is just a thing that happens, it's not inherently "right" or "wrong". No matter what happens to us the universe keeps turning, doing it's thing.
Perhaps the goal of preventing human extinction is the one arbitrary priority, the one "unicorn in the garden" [orain.org], as a starting point to make atheism practical.
You don't need that assumption to make atheism practical. Atheism is practical because "god" is not a falsifiable concept, this doesn't make it wrong, but it puts it in the realm of other things of that realm like the tooth fairy and santa. Things that even if they so happened by some freaky coincidence to be right there is no possible way to have evidence of it because of the lack of ability of the conjecture to be tested.
Critical rationalism allows atheism to function. Not in a hard "there is no god, for sure" stance, but in the "there is no reason, and can be no reason to prefer the conjecture that there is a god, so I'm going to totally ignore it like all other untestable things" sense.
add the axiom "Humankind ought to continue to exist."
Why? what justification do you have for this?
If you think this goal isn't right, feel free to remove yourself.
Just because someone doesn't think that it is an inherent truth that it is "right" that all people should continue to exist doesn't mean they think that people should not exist
Otherwise, you can continue by answering questions like this: Does the benefit to humankind of not living in fear of being murdered outweigh the benefit to humankind of having the freedom to murder someone?
What people consider to be a benefit or detriment depends entirely on their desired outcomes and priorities, which can be arbitrary. When what is "benefit" is arbitrary so too can be your morals if what is of benefit is your guiding light.
The main problem I see with people who talk about "morals derived from logic", comes from people not realizing that it all comes down to their own biases and their own preferences.
Sure, the system you've devised might be a reasonable and logical way to achieve the goals you intend.. but why do you have those goals? why are those goals "right"?
It all comes down to an a priori justification of their morals in the end. They just haven't recursively analyzed their own morals enough to realize it yet.
When all morals are effectively arbitrary (as the priorities and values that influence them can be) it is hard to say they are defined by "logic".
Not necessarily. If you're a secular moral relativist you don't think there is any kind of absolute moral truths etc.
Imho, morals are a human construct, there are no morals as inherent properties of the universe, this is generally described as moral nihilism.