JesperRavn

It seems like a borderline example. I feel that the "brogrammer" stereotype was invented up mainly because the nerd stereotype was too sympathetic. I'm genuinely curious if there are examples of the kind of stereotypes in the article being promoted right now by tech companies.

As an aside, these sorts of critiques of mainstream/White culture are somewhat contradictory in that they criticize any specific cultural identity as being exclusive and insular, and yet whenever this is lacking, they point to how boring mainstream/White culture is. Even lack of crime can be turned into evidence of boringness. For example, for every article on the negative effect of nerd culture on diversity, there is an article complaining about the decline of nerd culture and the rise of corporatism. The latter tend to be highly revisionist and pretend that the tech industry was founded by LSD taking hippies who coded inside isolation tanks. But the contradiction is still stark.

Did I say that persecuted nerds have the right to cordon off CS as a refuge for their culture? I thought that I said the opposite. Your later comments suggest that you break things down exactly as I do: it's ok for nerds to be nerds, and it's ok for nerds to cluster in tech, but it's not ok to promote the idea that only nerds can do tech, or to promote an stereotype that goes beyond reality.

Did you read my comment carefully? Was I unclear at some point? Do you disagree that a lot of male nerds are resisting the diversity movement because they feel that it attacks them, and that this article notwithstanding, often the diversity movement does attack them?

Note I'm submitting this article with with its title unchanged, but the story is more notable for having been removed from Forbes as a violation of their terms of service. I think its relevant given the recent discussion around internet.org, that controversial content is increasingly removed for violating a site's terms of service.

It makes sense. Advertising is inefficient, wasting people's time and attention for the gain of the advertiser.

Advertisements have long been used as a form of micropayment, to fund first TV shows and now websites, where a monetary payment would be infeasible.

There is no such reason to allow advertising in public property (private property is more complicated, but generally the outward appearance of buildings is considered a public good, and highly regulated). The person viewing the building or billboard is not a party to a transaction, so there is no reason to charge that person a hidden fee for viewing that space. In a way it is the ultimate hidden tax.

If one looks at GDP per capita or life expectancy, progress did not stop or slow in the 50's.

I think the main difference is that progress is now made in much smaller increments. E.g. smartphones have transformed our lives, and yet the smartphone era really begin with the iPhone, which was itself not revolutionary from a purely technological viewpoint. It was however, sufficiently better in its hardware and software to appeal to a much larger market.

I don't go out of my way to modify my language (although I can see how without extra context, like the fact that I met these people at a social event not a professional event, you might object in this particular case) because I don't believe that cultural attitudes to gender are the primary cause of this sort of harassment, or are a big problem in general.

On the contrary, I think that men whose behavior is harassing or otherwise immoral, are primarily responsible as individuals for their actions. This is closely related to my original point. I think that another bias is that people, especially men, who attain positions of power tend to be likable, either because that's what got them there, or because people tend to like powerful people. Therefore people make excuses for these men, blaming the culture in general for actions that are really the fault of the individual.

I thought the principle you and the other poster were arguing for, was to minimize conflict. In the case of "bro" the conflict arises from a feminist critique of the word's usage in the context of a male dominated industry. In the case of the menorah, the conflict arises from the political controversy of the state of Israel, and its relationship to the Jewish community[0]. I don't have a problem with pro-Feminist websites or anti-Feminist websites, I just think it's professional to avoid stirring up debate with terms or symbols that would likely offend people with a particular viewpoint.

Perhaps you think the feminist viewpoint in this case is objectively correct and therefore deserves more consideration. In that case I would counter that the pro-Palestinian viewpoint is objectively correct. But my original argument was neutral on this issue.

[0] A relationship usually asserted to exist by the supporters of Israel, as is the case here.

Sounds like the real asshole is the person who instead of trying to understand and critique people with different opinions, simply lambasts them as "assholes".

A great example of the author's inability to engage with opposing views is in the intro:

Afterward, one of the event organizers thanked me for coming, even though, she said, “I disagree with almost everything you said.” Seriously? So it’s okay to evict poor people to make room for new rich people? Is that what the SF Chron talked about today with a story called “psychology studies suggest rising wealth means more jerks in SF?”

Note how the author is more interested in psychology studies about people, than what those people would actually say for themselves.

I would like to see nerd elitism and nerd bashing both stop.

Some people claim that to be a programmer you need to have a certain personality or hobbies, and this is wrong.

But nerd elitism is also a reaction to having been excluded, ridiculed and sometimes bullied. That doesn't make it right, but it also means that bashing nerds and nerd culture, as is all to common amongst progressives, is both unfair and counterproductive.

What I would like to see more people saying is that it's ok that many people in tech have certain hobbies or personality traits in common, but that a person doesn't have to have these things to work in tech.

But people complaining about "corporate censorship" are smart well informed people? How is internet.org controlling what website people get to see different from, for example, YouTube controlling which videos people get to see? And how are the whims of whoever will control or influence internet.org different from the (mostly left wing) groups that (sometimes successfully) pressure companies to remove material from their websites.