Someone also raised the point that Noordhuis is not a native English speaker, and his native tongue uses gendered nouns to begin with. Someone with that experience is probably less likely to see a problem with the concept of gendered nouns. While it's common for the Dutch to speak several languages, English is the only one I am aware of that doesn't gender nouns.
The irony is that if Joyent had've shown the empathy they demand, they might have allowed some leeway for error, and strove to have done better next time. I was significantly disappointed in that Joyent blog post. Hopefully Cantrill has learned his lesson and next time will seek to heal rifts rather than exacerbate them. It's actually still not too late to use the same channel - the commercial blog - to do a mea culpa apology and promise to be more reserved in future.
Interesting point. The plot thickens further, to the point where in one day I've gone from respecting Joyent (for their support of node contributors and thus node itself) to; I really fucking dislike this company, their people and the way they think. Equating lack of empathy (as quoted by your parent) to technical incompetence is just mind bogglingly infuriating.
This politically correct at all costs way of thinking needs to be bludgeoned to death.
The irony is that if Joyent had've shown the empathy they demand, they might have allowed some leeway for error, and strove to have done better next time. I was significantly disappointed in that Joyent blog post. Hopefully Cantrill has learned his lesson and next time will seek to heal rifts rather than exacerbate them. It's actually still not too late to use the same channel - the commercial blog - to do a mea culpa apology and promise to be more reserved in future.