Are people even reading the article before they comment on Hacker News with a bunch of trite culture war outrage these days?
The LGBT part is barely mentioned (one sentence of a couple paragraphs on the code of conduct), and the overall motif of this point (relatively minor in the article's context) is less "we are propping LGBT coders" and more "we attract a more diverse community because we discourage toxic assholes".
This ignores that the “LGBTQ” community and politics around it and support/non-support for it can become toxic. See things like pronouns, renaming of male/female terminology, minor disputes that are blown out of proportion because someone wants attention.
So much of coding culture needs to chill out and the tools should be let to diversity into different communities, if people wanna fight about politics/gender/inclusion/etc, they should use the appropriate channels for that instead of putting everyone into a situation where you have to choose sides.
While I do think there is some degree of clout-seeking in how grievances often get aired, I don't think it's fair to tell people to "use the appropriate channels" -- that's just a way for issues to get ignored and for the status quo to get upheld where in a lot of cases the status quo is not working for many people in the LGBTQ community. It's really only through this kind of very in-your-face way that anything changes. Whether you would like those changes or not is up to you, but it's not fair to tell people to stick to neat little siloes so people can free to just ignore their issues easily.
> I don't think it's fair to tell people to "use the appropriate channels" -- that's just a way for issues to get ignored and for the status quo to get upheld
No, it's a way for programmers to keep doing programming with less distractions, of which we already have a metric ton.
Forgive me if I don't want politics in my work. If I want to do political activism then I know where to go. Unlike many others, you included, apparently.
People who hate those who are different are out there, that's known. But they will not be defeated by annoying literally everyone else.
I know. You'll say something along the lines that not taking a side is defending bullies or whatever. These arguments are extremely tiring and borderline fanatic, so I'm just passing by to give you the perspective of a fairly average guy, and peace out.
It seems people will never learn that shoving stuff in others' faces is not supporting their cause. Oh well. History will keep repeating itself then.
Rosa Parks really should have just sat down in the right spot on the bus instead of shoving her politics in people's faces. There's a time and place for activism but it's definitely not the bus – I have to use it to get to work!
Political activism is not effective unless it inconveniences people, because otherwise people can freely ignore it and sequester it as something they don't have to care about.
If you insist on people bringing politics into work, you will open the floodgates to so many problems. And just because some group of activists is supported by management doesn’t mean it will always be the case, and you’re just supporting workplace bullying then of those who do not wish to conform to the activist culture.
Business and professionalism concerns would make it expedient to avoid bringing political conflicts into the workplace.
There is plenty of time to organize, advocate, etc without inflaming the workplace and creating a toxic environment.
It's like going to a Wendy's and instead of asking "how much for the burger" you start a conversation like "I am bald. Do you like bald people? Is this Wendy's aware of bald people existence? Do you recognize us as people? Do you stand by our side or not?"
Then you review the Wendy's: "Did not speak my language. Not bald. Probably racist. Won't come again."
The LGBT part is barely mentioned (one sentence of a couple paragraphs on the code of conduct), and the overall motif of this point (relatively minor in the article's context) is less "we are propping LGBT coders" and more "we attract a more diverse community because we discourage toxic assholes".