"If you’re a Rails programmer, or a Ruby programmer, and you don’t decry this sort of thing, you have no business calling yourself a professional. It doesn’t matter how large your website is, how easy it was to write, how much better it is over PHP or ASP.NET or J2EE; by definition, you do not belong to a professional community. That’s all there is to it. It’s incumbent on every Ruby programmer to either reject this sort of misogynistic sewage, or accept that you’re never going to advance the promotion of Rails in the public perception because members of the community still think it’s edgy or cool to put pictures of strippers in their public presentations. And here’s a hint: if your decided reaction is to talk about how unimportant this is, how much it doesn’t matter, or how much it doesn’t offend you personally, you probably don’t understand professionalism at all."
> "[Matt] had no idea [the pictures he used] are problematic in anyone’s book"
That's completely ridiculous. How old is this guy and has he ever had a job? There is something terribly wrong with education if professional interaction and respect are not getting passed on.
I flipped through the presentation and thought the inclusion of the images was immature at best...but you know what? -- big f'ing deal! Just because one guy uses these images as a form of self expression doesn't cast a shadow on the community itself as being culturally a "ghetto".
EDIT: Definitely off-topic, but does anybody have any experience with CouchDB/Rails? If so, what are the pros/cons...
No, it doesn't. The Rails community does tend to exaggerate a bit. I do think that good points have been raised about the issue of sexism in the Rails community and IT industry in general. That's something that people have been missing.
It's not just about this presentation. The only purpose this presentation serves is to illuminate that larger issue, and that's something that the whole industry needs to take a long, hard look at.
What made me roll my eyes while flipping through the presentation was the "in your face" attitude of inserting the images in the presentation to make a point. To me, the imagery exuded a certain lack of self confidence, but then again - big f'ing deal...it's not how I would get my point across. I see the insertion of the images as being a poor design choice and something that is not reflective of the larger community as a whole.
I disagree. It becomes reflective on the community if people focus on the small minority of people doing this. This is the same type of thing other groups around the world face where a small group gains a lot of attention and judgments are passed on the larger group as a whole.
I tried it out, using a few of the couch DB interfaces a couple months ago. I'd say it's not ready for prime time yet except in cases where couchdb's model makes so much more sense for your data you're willing to go through a lot more pain to use it.
In most cases where an RDBMS makes less sense it's usually the case that all the RDBMS oriented sugar rails has acquired still makes it easier to work with an RDBMS.
Again, I run screaming from the label "feminist", but I'm sufficiently well-read to understand that the first response would be "Even the title itself contains an assumption as to what external genitalia a VC 'should' have, and this is so gobsmackingly obviously sexist that people apparently don't realize its sexist at all!"
If you want you can find most things offensive. My boss, bosses, boss is a female as is her boss, but I still talk about my company as a fraternity because English uses the male gender as the default. My waiter might be a women, but nobody complains when I use the masculine term. females even use the term "jonesing" even though the term used to mean something else...
What I find amusing is the more historically gender separated professions don't have male/female terms. EX: Doctor, nurse, but people seem to want to add them.
PS: I find it offensive when people don't use the genders interchangeably.
OK good point in that case. It'd be more politically correct to say "How to get a VC randy/turned on" or something. Doesn't really have the same 'flow' though.
I am not weighing in on the original matter, I have not seen the presentation, and living in the United States, I'm very aware that the level of prudishness in this country means one person's porn is another person's string bikini.
However, where the author completely loses me is when he clearly says (to paraphrase), "if it offends anyone, don't do it".
That's wrong. Trying to please everyone will constantly keep you trapped in a cycle of mediocrity. Being entrapped and essentially enslaved by the most conservative members of a professional group or the public at large is utterly stupid.
Even the example given, taking off shoes to go into a temple, is marginally appropriate at best. By going into that temple, you've decided to enter the zone of another culture, you are on their turf. It's basic decency to remove your shoes.
By going to 4chan, you've also entered another zone. Prepare for teenage boys trying their best to wank all over your screen, but don't complain about it. Teenage boys are teenage boys.
By going to a rails conference, you most certainly are entering a cultural zone too, and you sure as hell better have your hazmat suit on. Maybe there's a lesson to be learned here, but that lesson is not in this article, this article just wants to homogenize everything.
I'm aware I lost the thread of my own point about the Hindu temple analogy and turned it on its head instead, hopefully the two points mumbled there are apparent, because I think they both apply, but yeah, I'm a dumbass ;-)
I think Matt chose the that theme for the same reason the author chose to play the Zed card -- it was sure to make a splash.
I have never met Matt, but I know him through several open source projects, and I have watched him answer question after question-day after day-to anyone and everyone looking for help on irc. It really grinds my gears when people talk about throwing him under the bus b/c he pushed it a little too far in one presentation. And it's unprofessional.
"This is not even about women, as I have seen both males and females on either side of the fence. This is about mutual respect - I don’t agree with you, but respect your feelings."
It's too bad the author doesn't take the women's rights approach, as that may be more easy to argue. The 'you offend me' or 'you hurt my feelings' card is extremely weak, especially in an opinionated, anti-conventional (or so it sees itself) community such as the ruby/rails crowd. In all honesty, if you refrain from this because 'someone may get offended', then where do you stop? Do you edit out all the cursing? there's lots of that in the Rails community. Do you speak only strictly in formal language? Present only in suits? I'm sure I can find people who think absence of any of these is problematic. But so what? There will always be someone who is offended.
And then comes the Buddhism analogy. Yes, I will take my shoes off when I enter the temple, because I am an outsider. But maybe a buddhist insider has the expreience, influence and respect to innovate in terms of Buddhist tradition, where I would be considered sacrilegious. To make things more difficult, 'proffesionalism' is derrived from 'professional'. It's simply a function of what most professionals do. That's why you don't call them 'professionalists', followers of 'professionalism'. I doubt the author can find a definition of professional that has anything to do with presentation style. Apparently, these ruby/rails/couchdb professionals make presentations like this. If that were unacceptable, then how would the professional presentation of someone from the Adult industry look like? Blured-out product images?
I'm not necessarily taking a stand on the topic itself, as I said, there may be better ways to argue. I am just noting an extremely weak argument on the part of the author.
As usual, this guy drones on and on for a long time while trying to make a point and fails to ever make it because his frustration and anger get in the way.
Except that's not all. Ruby and Rails now have a bad reputation, and this bad reputation has an adverse effect on people and companies adopting and continuing with the language and frameworks. It is extremely unfortunate that vocal and influential ruby developers ignore this.
First, vocal and influential Ruby developers talk about this. I've heard Chad Fowler, DHH, and Matz all talk about it at major conferences (RailsConf and RubyConf).
Second, I've worked with dozens of clients on Ruby projects, and talked with dozens more, and I've never heard these sorts of issues come up. Outside of the language war world, people don't really care if DHH swears or if an inappropriate presentation is given at a minor conference.
There's plenty of evidence that DHH and some other prominent ruby developers simply don't care at all about people having different perspectives, and they certainly don't respect it. These guys want to use their work in software at a platform for their little personal identities. The "community" is absolutely not welcoming; it's actually outright exclusionary. They don't care, and they don't even pretend to care.
I primary work with ruby and have for a few years now. I'd like to continue to do so. But I'm frequently discouraged by the fact that involvement with the community means dealing with people who are simply not nice people.
I'm not saying he's not right, I'm saying I couldn't stomach the post long enough to get to his long, drawn out conclusion. I refuse to read 1000 words when 25 would do. Every blog post by this guy is bitter shit. If he could control his rage long enough to compose his thoughts, he might not suck so much.
As it is he rants and raves and complains and it sucks. Just my two cents though, I could be wrong.
"If you’re a Rails programmer, or a Ruby programmer, and you don’t decry this sort of thing, you have no business calling yourself a professional. It doesn’t matter how large your website is, how easy it was to write, how much better it is over PHP or ASP.NET or J2EE; by definition, you do not belong to a professional community. That’s all there is to it. It’s incumbent on every Ruby programmer to either reject this sort of misogynistic sewage, or accept that you’re never going to advance the promotion of Rails in the public perception because members of the community still think it’s edgy or cool to put pictures of strippers in their public presentations. And here’s a hint: if your decided reaction is to talk about how unimportant this is, how much it doesn’t matter, or how much it doesn’t offend you personally, you probably don’t understand professionalism at all."
> "[Matt] had no idea [the pictures he used] are problematic in anyone’s book"
That's completely ridiculous. How old is this guy and has he ever had a job? There is something terribly wrong with education if professional interaction and respect are not getting passed on.