what, exactly, did shuttleworth say to start the "sexist" contraversy?

[ericmc783]

Sorry, but I have searched all over (including the boards here), and I have yet to see a site that quotes what specifically he said that has caused such a fuss. Ive seen people talking about it, but noone has quoted what he said in the first place.

Just wondering. Thanks!

[sudoer541]

He said something like:

We have to make ubuntu easier so that even women can use it.

he also said:
we collaborate with the:
Gnome GUYS
KDE GUYS
firefox GUYS
launchpad GUYS
no women mentioned

You can see the video on Linux foundation site.

I think some important people have to watch how they talk because I already lost a good impression of him. Not because of his sexist comments but he swears. On the video he said that when they test software they bring it to someone who doesn't know how to use it and the developers are watching how the user uses the software and they cant say anything. He said "thats the shut the f*ck up method."
I even saw an interview of him on youtube he still swears. thats very unprofessional. If you want people to appreciate your work and your character, then behave professionally. I seriously lost trust and impression towards Mark Shuttleworth.
I hope he watches his mouth before he talks.

[ericmc783]

yeah, ill watch the video as soon as i can. (cant watch streaming video at work).

From what I can gather so far, it seems he was simply making a light-hearted joke, and people are taking it the wrong way.

thx sudoer.

[alphaniner]

I hope sudoer was being sarcastic. Here's the controversial bit as I've seen it:


"How many of you guys know Till [Kamppeter]... making sure that your
printer, your mom's printer, my grandma's printer just work out of the
box...if we can do the same with sound, if we can do the same with wi-fi, we
can do the same for various other amazing subsystems that are going to come
into the kernel...if we approach this from the perspective of saying "How do
we make this just awesome for end users" then we'll have less trouble
explaining to girls what we actually do."

[azangru]

it seems he was simply making a light-hearted joke, and people are taking it the wrong way

Most definitely, and it was met with laughter! Can't even make a joke these day without being accused of sexism, racism or other -cisms :(

[sudoer541]

I hope sudoer was being sarcastic. Here's the controversial bit as I've seen it:

see video @ Linux foundation (http://videos.linuxfoundation.org/video/1542)

[sudoer541]

its very unprofessional seeing how all those Linux celebrities act.

Richard stallman- picking cheese from his feet and posting it on youtube. As well as having sexists comments towards women. It looks like he hasn't had a bath long time now.

Mark Shuttleworth- Swearing like a frustrated construction worker and making sexist comments as a joke.
If I was a woman and a developer, I would stop making free software in an abusive environment.

[earthpigg]

He said "thats the shut the f*ck up method."
I even saw an interview of him on youtube he still swears. thats very unprofessional. If you want people to appreciate your work and your character, then behave professionally. I seriously lost trust and impression towards Mark Shuttleworth.
I hope he watches his mouth before he talks.

I am not a programmer.

However, I am fairly certain that swearing is acceptable, normal, and not considered unprofessional among Free Software Programmers.

wiki: (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Shuttleworth#Linux)

In the 1990s, Shuttleworth participated as one of the developers of the Debian operating system.

the following image contains the F Word.
http://linuxologist.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/07/swear-words-in-linux-source-code.png

actually, its the Linux Kernel itself contains the F Word.... :lolflag:

if swearing really bothers you, i suppose using Linux should bother you to an equal degree.

[earthpigg]

this also contains naughty words:
http://www.vidarholen.net/contents/wordcount/

[bodyharvester]

the following image contains the F Word.
http://linuxologist.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/07/swear-words-in-linux-source-code.png

nice :D

[sudoer541]

this also contains naughty words:
http://www.vidarholen.net/contents/wordcount/


show me a video of gates,balmer and jobs swearing.
regardless of free software developers or not its still very unprofessional to swear on public.
If swearing is ok, then I ask the mods to stop censoring inappropriate words.

[Methuselah]

Overreaction.

He's talking about impressing girls with what software developers do.
Most people are not computer savvy..he just said 'girls' because guys often try to impress girls with their jobs.
However, it can be tough to explain technological work, unless computers become very intuitive.

[ViperChief]

Why are people so sensitive these days?

So what if he swears? Big deal.

Even if he said "guys" who cares? This is just a way we talk. It doesn't mean he's sexist. I use "guys" all the time when referring to a group of people. To say "The KDE people (or whatever)" just seems unnatural to me. I know a lot of women who use "guys" also. It doesn't equate to sexism.

Seriously, people. Can we just stop being hung up about every little thing?

As for women in the computer world. It's a fact, women are the minority. Computers, historically, have been associated with nerdy and geeky guys in their parents' bedroom. Now, I personally think it's great that women are getting into computing (but let's not forget that, numbers-wise, men still GREATLY outnumber women in this field), etc. But, let's cut people a little slack, here. Look at how long some of these people have been in computers. They're used to it being a certain way. People don't change on a dime.

My point of all this. CALM DOWN. Quit making big deals out of non-events.

[koenn]

its very unprofessional seeing how all those Linux celebrities act.

Richard stallman- picking cheese from his feet and posting it on youtube. As well as having sexists comments towards women. It looks like he hasn't had a bath long time now.

Mark Shuttleworth- Swearing like a frustrated construction worker and making sexist comments as a joke.
If I was a woman and a developer, I would stop making free software in an abusive environment.

the actual quote posted by alphaniner shows that what Shutlleword said isn't even close to the "We have to make ubuntu easier so that even women can use it" you claimed he said.

that so-called sexist statement by rms that some bloggers made some fuss about, was equally altered to make it sound worse than it was.

but don't let facts stand in the way of your crusade ...


while you"re at it, not all countries/cultures share the US's aversion for theseso-called 4-letter-words. Imposing your culture's mores on others is probably also an -ism that we'd better be off without.

[ViperChief]

show me a video of gates,balmer and jobs swearing.
regardless of free software developers or not its still very unprofessional to swear on public.
If swearing is ok, then I ask the mods to stop censoring inappropriate words.

There's a difference.

Do you want Linux to be a mega-corportation or a community?

In a community, people feel more comfortable and speak more naturally.

And, by the way, I hear "professionals" swearing all the time. It does happen. I have no doubt there's video somewhere of any of those indivduals above swearing.

[Swagman]

I've lived in Both Australia and Uk and the term "Guys" when used to refer to a group means both male AND female.

Mountain out of a mole hill

[koenn]

Quit making big deals out of non-events.
this.

[Regenweald]

The feminist people kind of hijacked the statement before the nerds got out of the blocks. What about the: " So what are you trying to say! I don't know how to talk to girls!?' camp ?

So many regions of the world where women need someone to champion their rights on serious issues, but Mark Shuttleworth cracking a joke on a situation that every technically able man and woman in here has been in is the moral battlefield chosen. Laughable.

[earthpigg]

show me a video of gates,balmer and jobs swearing.
regardless of free software developers or not its still very unprofessional to swear on public.
If swearing is ok, then I ask the mods to stop censoring inappropriate words.

i'd rather have a sane person that swears develop the software i use than an insane dictator (http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=ballmer+insane) doing it.


also, re: the word "guys".

in the English language, a mixed group is referred to as masculine.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_in_English

lobby your complaints where they belong: The English Language.

Shuttleworth was not speaking Finnish (always gender neutral).



another thing to consider about Free Software Developers, and especially Linux ones: they aren't interested in conventional marketing.

to them, folks should use their stuff because their stuff is better (see: Unix) and Free (see: Free Software Foundation)... not because they wear business suits and prance around reciting marketing logo and issuing grave & formal apologies to pedantic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedantic) semantics (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantics).

[Jesus_Valdez]

I think that he was making a joke, wich is common when you are having a light lecture, as someone point out, we are suppose to be a community.

And I firmly believe that the bad words are war, starving, children abbuse, oppression, etc. Not the F word.

On a side note, as you know in spanish we have words for every gender (eg for male lawyer we have abogado and abogada for a female lawyer), nevertheless when you are refering to a group of lawyers the common thing to say is abogados, wich everybody know reffers to both gender.

[issih]

I shan't comment on the sexism issue other than to say that it seems to be something of an overreaction in this case. I have no doubt that the issue is real and exists in all Techie circles, but using trumped up exaggerated claims only weakens the point, and I hope that is something all of humanity learns soon.

That being said, I feel the need to point out that the paid software world is more than capable of being thoroughly inappropriate:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/09/05/chair_chucking/

Personally swearing doesn't bother me, and I actually think being offended by a word just because of the word rather than the idea backing it is pathetic (actually I think its dangerous but thats a separate issue), but either way, the linux guys are certainly no worse than the rest...

[hoppipolla]

also, re: the word "guys".

in the English language, a mixed group is referred to as masculine.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_in_English

Precisely, I was just about to say the same thing :)

As for the other comment... I really don't think it matters that much ._. It was probably accidental, I'm sure Mark Shuttleworth says a LOT of stuff, you could always pick something out ._.

[pwnst*r]

he also said:
we collaborate with the:
Gnome GUYS
KDE GUYS
firefox GUYS
launchpad GUYS
no women mentioned



^^that one in particular. talk about people being butt-hurt.

[hoppipolla]

show me a video of gates,balmer and jobs swearing.
regardless of free software developers or not its still very unprofessional to swear on public.
If swearing is ok, then I ask the mods to stop censoring inappropriate words.

This is the biggest criticism we have? Swearing? That really isn't that bad ._.

[jrusso2]

He said something like:

We have to make ubuntu easier so that even women can use it.

he also said:
we collaborate with the:
Gnome GUYS
KDE GUYS
firefox GUYS
launchpad GUYS
no women mentioned

You can see the video on Linux foundation site.

I think some important people have to watch how they talk because I already lost a good impression of him. Not because of his sexist comments but he swears. On the video he said that when they test software they bring it to someone who doesn't know how to use it and the developers are watching how the user uses the software and they cant say anything. He said "thats the shut the f*ck up method."
I even saw an interview of him on youtube he still swears. thats very unprofessional. If you want people to appreciate your work and your character, then behave professionally. I seriously lost trust and impression towards Mark Shuttleworth.
I hope he watches his mouth before he talks.

It might be a bad name but its a great way to test usability of software and should be mandatory for all open source software.

[sudoer541]

This is the biggest criticism we have? Swearing? That really isn't that bad ._.


well some of us dont like to hear garbage coming out of peoples mouth.
Some of us get offended by all the insults that people say.
Plus it does not make him a "cool" person if he is trying to become one by insulting.
would you people allow me to criticize you and insult you? I am sure you wont, so now you know how some of us feel.

best regards

[Mehall]

well some of us dont like to hear garbage coming out of peoples mouth.
Some of us get offended by all the insults that people say.
Plus it does not make him a "cool" person if he is trying to become one by insulting.
would you people allow me to criticize you and insult you? I am sure you wont, so now you know how some of us feel.

best regards

When did he criticize?

He was talking about the best way to app usability, and he is perfectly correct: the developer needs to let the end-users have a go, and the dev needs to shut the f*ck up. Were I allowed to type it on here without being censored, I would, because anything less than the fullness of it means a lot of people will have their "ahh, you just.." and your "up on the right..." and various other things, and try to explain to the user, but they cannot explain to every user.

If you are told to shut up and leave someone be, you'll probably try a few more times.

if you are told to shut the f*ck up, then you will do it, and let the process continue, so he was right to call it by it's name.


Also, as pointed out there is a lot of swearword usage in Linux code, most likely in Windows code too.


Most people don't care, if I'm honest, especially when we're a friendly, jovial community, not a corporation.


If the CEO of Red Hat were having a big conference talking about something new Red Hat was offering to their main customers, then I agree it is possibly inappropriate to use swear words (it all depends on the specific context, if I'm honest), but at linuxcon, as the a quick speaker, in a friendly setting, I agree plenty with sabdfl's usage of the word.

[hoppipolla]

well some of us dont like to hear garbage coming out of peoples mouth.
Some of us get offended by all the insults that people say.
Plus it does not make him a "cool" person if he is trying to become one by insulting.
would you people allow me to criticize you and insult you? I am sure you wont, so now you know how some of us feel.

best regards

Are we talking just about the raw swear words? Or about specific comments? Swear words, personally I really don't care myself and if I had heard him swearing it would just have made me laugh, and specific comments... well that's different but I just don't think there really were any.

He's just been put on a pedestal I think, so he's being watched more. Kinda like Barack Obama :)

I mean if he says anything really bad then of course I'll be concerned, but for now I just don't see anything worth getting worried over.

[koleoptero]

On a sidenote, the kernel just seems cooler now that I know of all those comments.:lolflag:

[renkinjutsu]

I am not a programmer.

However, I am fairly certain that swearing is acceptable, normal, and not considered unprofessional among Free Software Programmers.

wiki: (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Shuttleworth#Linux)


the following image contains the F Word.
http://linuxologist.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/07/swear-words-in-linux-source-code.png

actually, its the Linux Kernel itself contains the F Word.... :lolflag:

if swearing really bothers you, i suppose using Linux should bother you to an equal degree.
I tried it myself and F word only shows up when grep'ing the headers that came with Ubuntu, but not in the headers of my kernel (compiled from kernel.org) .. hmm

linux is still clean! *shines brightly*

[pwnst*r]

lol @ release and "happy ending". nice to see/hear he's pretty damn normal. also, lulz at the technical difficulties in the beginning. yes, kids, nothing runs perfect all the time, even in ubuntu land.

[tcoffeep]

These guys need to calm down about sexism.

(ps : i hope that was subtle enough. i'm tyring to be more subtle)

[Sean Moran]

Isn't it funny how 'guys' plural seems a lot less derogatory than 'guy' singular?
:lolflag:

[Shibblet]

show me a video of gates,balmer and jobs swearing.
regardless of free software developers or not its still very unprofessional to swear on public.
If swearing is ok, then I ask the mods to stop censoring inappropriate words.

The people who are "against" swearing, are the people that give the swear words power. Other than that, they're just words.

On a secondary note. Mark Shuttleworth's comments ARE sexist, the simple fact of the matter is he didn't think of them, or mean them as such.

This happens with a lot of public speakers Shuttleworth probably comes from a time when women didn't use computers, or didn't WANT to learn how to use them. So to him, he was talking about the "women" of his day and age.

It's sad to me how a person can't just say something without having to explain themselves as to why they said it. If a listener can use their brain for half a second, they'd realize the nature of his statement, and not playing up on it word for word.

i.e. White people aren't as good at Basketball as Black people.

That is an extremely racist remark. But, look at the ratio in the NBA. It's also a true remark. But unless I explain what I am talking about, or reword the statment to something significantly longer... people will take it the wrong way.

i.e. What I mean is, the talent on teams that have a majority of african american players seems to surpass the talent on teams that have a majority of caucasian players.

[lswb]

I just find it so ironic that when I clicked on the link for the video, my sound was not working. (had to delete ~/.pulse-cookie and rm -r ~/.pulse and reload the page to get it working again)

[MaxIBoy]

show me a video of gates,balmer and jobs swearing. Ballmer was the easiest one, I'm going to look for the others. You are so going down... ;) Video is not reasonable, you will need to be satesfied with quotes...
"I'm going to f*cking bury that guy, I have done it before, and I will do it again. I'm going to f*cking kill Google." - CEO Steve Ballmer (http://news.com.com/Court+docs+Ballmer+vowed+to+kill+Google/2100-1014_3-5846243.html)
EDIT: Still looking for an actual quote from Jobbs but this is pretty cool: http://www.edibleapple.com/old-school-steve-jobs-flicks-off-ibm/


What I'm trying to say is that you can dig up personally insulting dirt about anyone-- it doesn't mean anything and is not productive. You could find truckloads of me swearing on other forums, but what would that prove? Does that say anything about me as a person?!



regardless of free software developers or not its still very unprofessional to swear on public.
If swearing is ok, then I ask the mods to stop censoring inappropriate words.If it were not for the very rigid predetermined policy in the Code of Conduct, I would have made this request before. As it is, the mods tend not to consider suggestions for removing policies from the CoC, only for adding to it.

[doas777]

He said something like:

We have to make ubuntu easier so that even women can use it.

he also said:
we collaborate with the:
Gnome GUYS
KDE GUYS
firefox GUYS
launchpad GUYS
no women mentioned

You can see the video on Linux foundation site.

I think some important people have to watch how they talk because I already lost a good impression of him. Not because of his sexist comments but he swears. On the video he said that when they test software they bring it to someone who doesn't know how to use it and the developers are watching how the user uses the software and they cant say anything. He said "thats the shut the f*ck up method."
I even saw an interview of him on youtube he still swears. thats very unprofessional. If you want people to appreciate your work and your character, then behave professionally. I seriously lost trust and impression towards Mark Shuttleworth.
I hope he watches his mouth before he talks.


good on him. i don't take anyone seriously unless they can swear well. I rather liked his subtitle for the concept; it made me chuckle, which is somthing you have thus far been unable to do.

if you can swear well in klingon, then you have my respect.

[barthel]

On a side note, as you know in spanish we have words for every gender (eg for male lawyer we have abogado and abogada for a female lawyer), nevertheless when you are refering to a group of lawyers the common thing to say is abogados, wich everybody know reffers to both gender.

FWIW, the inclusive language camp would argue that forming the plural from the male singular constitutes inherent sexism in the language. It is my understanding that this criticism is made even when the language uses a grammatical gender (as opposed to natural gender, like English).

[Quick example: in English (natural gender), a pen and pencil are neuter, but auf Deutsch (grammatical gender), "der Bleistift" (pencil) is masculine, "die Feder" (pen) is feminine and "das Mädchen" (girl) is neuter.]

Since I could easily launch into an inappropriate soapbox rant on this issue, let me simply offer this observation, which I humbly call

Barthel's law:
Never ascribe to malice what can be more easily explained by ignorance, laziness, or stupidity.

In practice, this means there's no point in getting riled up about things. Why? The ignorant person can be educated. The lazy person can be encouraged. The stupid person is incapable. The few who are truly attempting to be hurtful disagree with you in the first place and aren't going to change merely because you said so. So get over it!

My 2 shekalim...

[MaxIBoy]

Good point.

Just like Spanish, English has no neuter singular third-person pronoun. Just like Spanish, the closest to neuter we have is "he," this is not sexisim-- it's a bug in the language, not an intentional feature.

[Frak]

well some of us dont like to hear garbage coming out of peoples mouth.

In the words of the Heavy Weapons Guy (http://tf2wiki.net/wiki/Heavy): CRY SOME MOAR! AH, HA HA HA HA HA!

Welcome to life. And moreso, welcome to the internet.

[Sean Moran]

Barthel's law:
Never ascribe to malice what can be more easily explained by ignorance, laziness, or stupidity.
My 2 shekalim...
Like pearls among swine, great explanation.

Thinking back on what I remember as the original quote from Mr Shuttleworth, wasn't it something about 'so easy that my Mother and Grandma can use it' to paraphrase from a few pages back?

If so, I think of the custom distros I've been experimenting with the last month or so, with the objective of passing a few CDs on to my friends that I might have some chance of supporting, and who do you think I delivered the very first alpha quality McUbuntu Live CD to? Fact of the matter, I left it in my my Mother's mailbox and she was the very first one to test it out on wireless ADSL, and I was that amazed at how she got it to go in one Saturday afternoon even down to http://192.168.0.1 router settings, proving fairly conclusively that what remains essentially Ubuntu is so easy that my Mother got wireless ADSL running from the Live-CD in just one Saturday afternoon?

I'm hoping to drop a DVD up to my GrandMother sometime when the Release Karmic is ready too. I hope that it will be so easy to use that even she can get ADSL to work straight off the Live CD. My Dad passed away in 2002 and my Pop went two years ago, and now the fact that they're both dead and gone makes me 'sexist' ? :confused:

Maybe the twain have different meanings, but that's about what I recall from the start of the thread, if I'm not forgetting something.

[ubuntu27]

He said something like:

We have to make ubuntu easier so that even women can use it.

he also said:
we collaborate with the:
Gnome GUYS
KDE GUYS
firefox GUYS
launchpad GUYS
no women mentioned

I am a guy and I call my girlfriends GUYS. I feel that if I use the word "girls" I would sound effeminate. For me, the word Guys (in plural) can be used as gender neutral just like the word "Man" has been used in the past to represented both Man and Woman.

I believe there are many other people like me.

EDIT: Actually, this is not just me. If I think about it, this is part of the English language. Many of us English speaker use the word "guys" to mean both male and female.


I am so tired of political correctness. Be Free~!

[Sean Moran]

Maybe a bit of ageism too, for 'guy' probably suited me more than 'man' at the age of 25, but by 35 the opposite was clear, (to me personally-wise). Now on the way to 45, 'bloke' fits better in some ways but 'guy' has sneaky sorts of blue-collar, untrustworthy and most of all youthful connotations that don't seem all that applicable nowdays except on rare occasions.

I look forward to turning 55 and finally earning the right to call myself an 'old codger' but the age of thinking of oneself as a 'guy' might not last forever for every fellow. IMHO it's under 30s only.

[HappyFeet]

Why are people so sensitive these days?

So what if he swears? Big deal.

Even if he said "guys" who cares? This is just a way we talk. It doesn't mean he's sexist. I use "guys" all the time when referring to a group of people. To say "The KDE people (or whatever)" just seems unnatural to me. I know a lot of women who use "guys" also. It doesn't equate to sexism.

Seriously, people. Can we just stop being hung up about every little thing?

As for women in the computer world. It's a fact, women are the minority. Computers, historically, have been associated with nerdy and geeky guys in their parents' bedroom. Now, I personally think it's great that women are getting into computing (but let's not forget that, numbers-wise, men still GREATLY outnumber women in this field), etc. But, let's cut people a little slack, here. Look at how long some of these people have been in computers. They're used to it being a certain way. People don't change on a dime.

My point of all this. CALM DOWN. Quit making big deals out of non-events.
I 100% agree. But leave it to the ultra sensitive, "politically correct" drama queens to stir the pot. Get a life instead of nitpicking every little nook and cranny in the world. Geez.

[Sunflower1970]

Shuttleworth swearing? Pffft. I could care less about swearing. I hear it all over the place and swear a bit myself (well a lot to tell the truth) from time to time.

But this quote:

"How many of you guys know Till [Kamppeter]... making sure that your
printer, your mom's printer, my grandma's printer just work out of the
box...if we can do the same with sound, if we can do the same with wi-fi, we
can do the same for various other amazing subsystems that are going to come
into the kernel...if we approach this from the perspective of saying "How do
we make this just awesome for end users" then we'll have less trouble
explaining to girls what we actually do."

bugs me a bit. If he's talking about little girls, making it easier for girls in grade school to use Linux and become interested in computers is one thing, but if he's using it as in girls are just not as smart when it comes to computers as men are, and he's using girls in place of women, I do find that a bit degrading. He's talking down to us.

I would hope some of the women in his life called him on it, and let him know to watch it in the future.

[hoppipolla]

Shuttleworth swearing? Pffft. I could care less about swearing. I hear it all over the place and swear a bit myself (well a lot to tell the truth) from time to time.

But this quote:


bugs me a bit. If he's talking about little girls, making it easier for girls in grade school to use Linux and become interested in computers is one thing, but if he's using it as in girls are just not as smart when it comes to computers as men are, and he's using girls in place of women, I do find that a bit degrading. He's talking down to us.

I would hope some of the women in his life called him on it, and let him know to watch it in the future.

heh, yeah I agree - some girls are wicked with computers, way better than me O.O lol

It is a bit of a strange and slightly blunt quote, but like I said out of all the things someone like this says in front of people regularly, there will always be the occasional poorly worded comment.

If anyone on here is that worried, email him! lol :)

[Sean Moran]

Shuttleworth swearing? Pffft. I could care less about swearing. I hear it all over the place and swear a bit myself (well a lot to tell the truth) from time to time.

But this quote:

bugs me a bit. If he's talking about little girls, making it easier for girls in grade school to use Linux and become interested in computers is one thing, but if he's using it as in girls are just not as smart when it comes to computers as men are, and he's using girls in place of women, I do find that a bit degrading. He's talking down to us.

I would hope some of the women in his life called him on it, and let him know to watch it in the future.
That's the part I forgot earlier. Fair point on that one. The only excuse I can think of is that like in psych school the girls outnumber the boys by 20:1, engineering and IT still seem to attract more students with Y chromosomes, but I admit that it's not a watertight excuse, depending on the context of the whole monologue.

[starcannon]

Shuttleworth swearing? Pffft. I could care less about swearing. I hear it all over the place and swear a bit myself (well a lot to tell the truth) from time to time.

But this quote:


bugs me a bit. If he's talking about little girls, making it easier for girls in grade school to use Linux and become interested in computers is one thing, but if he's using it as in girls are just not as smart when it comes to computers as men are, and he's using girls in place of women, I do find that a bit degrading. He's talking down to us.

I would hope some of the women in his life called him on it, and let him know to watch it in the future.

He was speaking of the non-geek girls he knows locally(at least that is what I see), not of all women globally. If you look for a misogynist, you will find one; what you said is not what I heard; if you know what I mean.

Mark's only offense was not realizing a small percentage of people would twist his words out of context, and then make something of it. At this rate he is going to need to divert resources to speech writers instead of software, then everyone will be happy that he didn't **** somebody off with something he didn't even mean to say.

[Sean Moran]

He was speaking of the non-geek girls he knows locally(at least that is what I see), not of all women globally. If you look for a misogynist, you will find one; what you said is not what I heard; if you know what I mean.

Mark's only offense was not realizing a small percentage of people would twist his words out of context, and then make something of it. At this rate he is going to need to divert resources to speech writers instead of software, then everyone will be happy that he didn't **** somebody off with something he didn't even mean to say.
Let's not forget that thesedays the standard of journalism foisted on innocent celebrities in the Western World by the lowly paparazzi has stooped to the sorry depths of chasing you into the mens' room with an hidden nokia camera to take snapshots of your willy while you use the latrine.
Forsooth! :P

[jperez]

If he's talking about little girls, making it easier for girls in grade school to use Linux and become interested in computers is one thing, but if he's using it as in girls are just not as smart when it comes to computers as men are, and he's using girls in place of women, I do find that a bit degrading. He's talking down to us.

I would hope some of the women in his life called him on it, and let him know to watch it in the future.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Someone already explained it, but it looks like it was not seen by some. When he's saying that, he's basically talking about impressing women/girls with what us "guys" do with computers. He didn't mean girls aren't smart, he's talking about us geeks/nerds easily impressing women. -_-;

Jesse~

[Sean Moran]

Wrong, wrong, wrong.
...
he's talking about us geeks/nerds easily impressing women. -_-;

Jesse~

Well it certainly ain't da money that inspires me! :popcorn:

[hoppipolla]

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Someone already explained it, but it looks like it was not seen by some. When he's saying that, he's basically talking about impressing women/girls with what us "guys" do with computers. He didn't mean girls aren't smart, he's talking about us geeks/nerds easily impressing women. -_-;

Jesse~

ooooooh! I get it! That's quite funny hehe :)

*shows off Ubuntu to all the girls down the local bar* ^_^

[jperez]

Yes, well, just trying to point out that what he said had no derogatory meaning. He was simply talking about us male nerds, myself included, impressing women. Mind you, I don't have to worry about that since my girlfriend is a new Ubuntu user and I barely had to tell her about it. :p

She a beautiful red-head...but also a nerd just like me. :B


ooooooh! I get it! That's quite funny hehe

*shows off Ubuntu to all the girls down the local bar* ^_^

:lolflag: That also made my night!

Jesse~

[starcannon]

She a beautiful red-head...but also a nerd just like me. :B
Jesse~
Quit objectifying women; they are not beautiful, they are just people! And the "redhead" distinction, was that really necessary, does that make her somehow less? sheesh! (*sarcasm*) I'm in agreement with you jperez.

P.S.
Really I'm in agreement with you jperez; I just realized that the placement of my *sarcasm* tag could be mis-interpreted, and wanted you to know that it was meant towards the text to it's left, and not to it's right. Good grief, PC has become so rampant that I am now making P.S. statements to make sure I do not offend the wrong persons. I'm heading in for my androgyny surgery in the morning, then I can be offended by both genders equally(Androgynism!).

[stinger30au]

Most definitely, and it was met with laughter! Can't even make a joke these day without being accused of sexism, racism or other -cisms :(


true

its a sad world we live in now days

[Sean Moran]

true

its a sad world we live in now days
As the name 'Ubuntu' suggests, there are still civilisations on the planet where peaceful mechanisms achieve the comical heights within these sorts of things.

[jperez]

Quit objectifying women; they are not beautiful, they are just people! And the "redhead" distinction, was that really necessary, does that make her somehow less? sheesh! (*sarcasm*) I'm in agreement with you jperez.

P.S.
Really I'm in agreement with you jperez; I just realized that the placement of my *sarcasm* tag could be mis-interpreted, and wanted you to know that it was meant towards the text to it's left, and not to it's right. Good grief, PC has become so rampant that I am now making P.S. statements to make sure I do not offend the wrong persons. I'm heading in for my androgyny surgery in the morning, then I can be offended by both genders equally(Androgynism!).

At first I was like ](*,), but then I was like :lolflag:

Yeah, I got ya, I hear ya. I hate people that actually are gender-biased/racially insensitive/etc. on purpose. What I saw and heard (yes, I saw that awesome video of Mark) was nothing but him talking about impressing women, which to be honest is a challenge most nerds have been trying to achieve for a long time. ;)

Jesse~

[Chronon]

But this quote:


bugs me a bit. If he's talking about little girls, making it easier for girls in grade school to use Linux and become interested in computers is one thing, but if he's using it as in girls are just not as smart when it comes to computers as men are, and he's using girls in place of women, I do find that a bit degrading. He's talking down to us.

I would hope some of the women in his life called him on it, and let him know to watch it in the future.

After a bit of reflection, it seems to me like he was talking about being in a situation where you're chatting someone up (in his case, a young lady) and inevitably the question about what each person does for work comes up. I believe his point was that some aspects of development could lead this work to be more accessible and interesting to the general public (and by extension to his hypothetical conversation partner).

I am not a software developer but I also have issues with explaining my work to random people of either gender. So, I would tend to give him the benefit of the doubt on that point.

This leaves his choice of noun (i.e. using girl in place of woman), which I defer to others.

[bigboy_pdb]

I don't generally respond to threads like this, but they are bothersome.

The comment is clearly derogatory. First he only makes comments about women having technological problems and then he refers to them as girls (indicating immaturity, lack of intelligence and knowledge, and so forth).

It's bothersome for a few reasons. The first is that when a person who is strongly affiliated with a Linux distribution makes comments such as these, it may deter people from using it. While some people don't think that's important, they should consider that many other people put significant effort into making it grow.

It's also bothersome as a reflection of the community.

The comments that I read in various posts signify that there are a number of prideful, prejudiced, non-critical, unintelligent, emotional, and fanatical people on these forums.

While the Ubuntu community and other Linux affiliated communities as a whole might not be those things, people will form a view of those communities based on these forums and that affects who helps and becomes a part of those communities. For example, I've never needed to ask for any help, but I've helped many other people and after seeing many of the comments in "The Backyard" (when it existed) I stopped using the forums until it was later removed.

The comments that many of you thoughtlessly state undermines the progress that other Linux users are making.

[Elfy]

I am closing this thread for 24 hours - it is the same thing as this thread http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1280276.

[macogw]

Thread's staying closed, but if you want an explanation of the issues (though Sunflower1970 is rather on-the-money), please see: http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/Mark_Shuttleworth_at_Linuxcon