who only by moving can balance

(All of this via Chris - thanks!)

CONTENT NOTES: misogyny of all the kinds, rape culture.

First up, Adria Richards of But You're A Girl posts the eminently reasonable Forking and Dongle Jokes Don't Belong At Tech Conferences.

In summary: she was at PyCon, a technical conference on the Python programming language. Two men sitting behind her were making sexual (and sexist) jokes inappropriate for a professional setting. She tweeted photos & descriptions to the ConCom; they - to my surprise, and their credit - thanked her for bringing inappropriate comments to their attention and took immediate action.

Both gentlemen had a discussion with the ConCom, (eventually, reportedly) agreeing that their behaviour had been inappropriate - and one was eventually fired by his employer.

Sensible enough, I'd have thought, for behaviour bringing his company into disrepute in a professional setting.

Unfortunately, goes the story, 4chan disagreed... and decided an appropriate response was to launch DDoS attacks against Richards' personal website, and against her company's website.

Her company's response?

To fire her.

I suppose at least the people who thought it was a good idea to set up and sign a Change.org petition requesting that she be let go will be happy.


[Screenshot (taken ~22h15 GMT, 21/03/2013) of SendGrid's Facebook page containing an official statement, which reads: Effective immediately, SendGrid has terminated the employment of Adria Richards. While we generally are sensitive and confidential with respect to employee matters, the situation has taken on a public nature. We have taken action that we believe is in the overall best interests of SendGrid, its employees, and our customers. As we continue to process the vast amount of information, we will post something more comprehensive.]

Comments are predictably vile - in all the wrong ways. I'm sorry: I'm not wading through all 1500 comments to pull out the high- and lowlights.

SendGrid has issued a longer statement; I disagree with their position, particularly that Richards' actions in making public inappropriate behaviour were bad for the company image. Me? Well, I'd definitely have gone out of my way to recommend them - and quite probably looked for ways to give them money - if they, like PlayHaven, had acted in ways supportive of women and minorities in tech.

Unfortunately, the rest of the Internet also contains pushback. Most notably:

• The Pycon Code of Conduct has been edited: it now contains the line "Report the harassment incident (preferably in writing) to a conference staff member - all reports are confidential, please do not disclose public information about the incident until the staff have had sufficient time in which to address the situation." Because, of course, we have never heard of con committees who attempted to ignore or downplay reports of harassment until they were made public; and there is no value whatsoever in the grapevine that lets people know that, if at all possible, This Dude Is A Serial Harasser, Let Us Know If You Need Help Avoiding Being Alone In A Room With Him. (And then, of course, we are asked: well, why were you alone with him?!)
  
• Amanda Blum has decided an appropriate response is to attack Richards' decision to take the matter directly to the ConCom, rather than engaging with it personally - in the middle of a talk. Blum appears incredibly invested in a fantasy world in which sexist men behaving inappropriately, when challenged, will realise what they did and apologise. Spoiler alert: this has never, ever happened to me.
  
• I'm not clear why this account is hosted on pastebin (!), but it is: an awful lot of description of the poor, poor man who is suffering from a tarnished reputation because he was making a professional conference an unsafe environment for female members of his community.
  
• TechCrunch writes A Dongle Joke That Spiraled Way Out Of Control, again taking the attitude that Richards' reaction was an over-reaction. Spoiler: I disagree.

Ladies, gents, and everyone else: there is a reason for the Open Source Women Back Each Other Up Project and Gentlemen's Auxiliary. Actually, there are lots of reasons.

This is just one more example to add to the pile.