Aggressive language on python-list

[rusi]

On Oct 16, 9:27 pm, ru... at yahoo.com wrote:
> On 10/14/2012 10:36 PM, alex23 wrote:> On Oct 15, 1:22 pm, ru... at yahoo.com wrote:
>
> >> Thus when a member of this esteemed group
> >> was recently attacked as racist, for punning another member's
> >> name when responding somewhat heatedly,
>
> > Again, there is a difference between "attacking" someone "as racist"
> > and *criticising* their *comments* as *possibly* racist. When the
> > person whose name was being punned said that they themselves were
> > unsure whether it was intended as a racial attack, then the behaviour
> > was worth commenting on.
>
> I just went back and reread what you and some others wrote
> to make sure I was not misremembering and am comfortable
> sticking with my description.  (FTR, your initial response
> was "Please, don't be a dick.")
>
> My intent was not to reargue that issue but to point out
> that different people have differing ideas on what is
> "acceptable" and "unacceptable" here and that if Ben
> Finney's advice to respond (in moderation) whenever one
> reads an "unacceptable" opinion is taken, one will create
> an environment in which troll's will flourish.
>
> The best advise is to ignore such posts and encourage
> others to do the same.

Trolling posts certainly exist. And when 'troll' becomes a short-form
for 'one-who-regularly-trolls' its fine as long as we remember that
its a metonymy.

When we forget
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMEe7JqBgvg
should help by:
1. Showing how to deal with trolling
2. Reminding that such beings dont actually exist except as caricature

Coming to current misbehavior on the list -- specifically Etienne's
outburst against Steven,
I am reminded of a similar situation a year ago

Long thread -- Relevant starting is here
http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2011-May/604893.html

Abusive post
http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2011-May/604914.html

Maybe easier to read
http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.python/browse_thread/thread/17dca3bf467c9001/c53102a45da19386

The last thing that John Bokma posted (to the best of my knowledge)
was:

> Ben Finney <ben at benfinney.id.au> writes:
>
>>> Get a life. Or better, just fuck off and die. It will improve both the
>>> world and the Python community, of which you are nothing but a little,
>>> smelly shitstain.
>>
>> That abuse is entirely unwelcome in this community, against any person.
>> Please desist.

> You should have spoken up sooner, especially as the spokes person of
> "this" community. But every bully has is fan club.
>
> --
> John Bokma

If we think/feel that John Bokma was trolling then driving him off the
list was a good thing.
If not we need to question whether those actions were collectively
sound.

Specifically Steven's post that triggered Etienne's misbehavior is
this:

On Oct 5, 5:22 am, Steven D'Aprano <steve
+comp.lang.pyt... at pearwood.info> wrote:
> On Thu, 04 Oct 2012 14:10:46 -0400, Etienne Robillard wrote:
> > Dear list,
>
> > Due to lack of energy and resources i'm really sad to announce the
> > removal ofnotmmfrom pypi and bitbucket.
>
> Well that's just rude. Even if you don't intend to maintain the software
> any more, why are you removing it from pypi? Since you say you are a fan
> of Open Source software, just flag it as unmaintained and leave it for
> somebody else to pick up.
>
> If you are going to abandon the project, release it on PyPI with a dual
> MIT and GPL licence, and let it be taken over by somebody else.
>
> If you were looking for sympathy here, starting off by removing your
> project from free hosting, then complaining that you can't pay for the
> non-free hosting, was NOT the right way to do so.
:

> Steven

I read Etienne as saying: 'I need money (or at least some sympathy)'
Steven is unequivocally saying 'You are not getting it from here'

Technically he is correct; humanly I am not so sure.

[I have a personal regret that I did not rebut Steven's rudeness with
a '... that is not necessarily the view of the whole group...'
I hesitated to do so because I am not adept at giving sympathy without
giving false hope and keeping the post at reasonable length.
Anyhow this (too long) post is an attempt at correcting that.]

In the earlier (Quora-thread) Terry Reedy's voice was most balanced
and sane; unfortunately covered in the 'dog-pile' of all the rest.

Hopefully he will put in his word here as well.
[And Zero thank you for starting this thread]

Rusi

- http://blog.languager.org