I don't know anything about Blow but a bully can actually be the one who suffers emotionally the most. It's sometimes worth listening to what they have to say. Key and Peele did an awesome skit on this:
I've spent a lot of time watching Jon on twitch, and have only read his twitter to keep up on stream announcements, but I find it difficult to believe that. Jon is opinionated, and doesn't sugar coat those opinions often, but I've never seen him harass anyone. Even if he has, that doesn't invalidate anything he's saying. Nobody is perfect.
> Even if he has [harassed someone], that doesn't invalidate anything he's saying
I just don't think there is ever a good reason.
He does have a tendency to say things about a person suggesting they are ignorant or stupid when they ask a question he doesn't like. There often seems to be a fine line between him getting annoyed and him belittling the contribution someone else makes to a discussion. He is extremely sensitive.
I just think if someone is going to seriously discuss how to be more emotionally stable, they should probably demonstrate more stable behavior themselves.
He gave the stream not because he considers himself some kind of expert on the topic, but because people were asking him how he personally deals with depression and malaise.
I continue to be amazed at the dilution of terms like "harassment".
> say things about a person suggesting they are ignorant or stupid
If that is what he thinks, that is a perfectly reasonable thing to say, particularly as no-one is forced to ask him questions. It is not "harassment" by any stretch of the imagination.
> He is extremely sensitive.
Maybe the one being extremely sensitive isn't him.
> If that is what he thinks, that is a perfectly reasonable thing to say [calling them ignorant or stupid], particularly as no-one is forced to ask him questions.
You are right, we have a different idea of what is polite behavior, and what is insulting behavior.
However, the bigger difference is that for me, someone not being polite is not the same as that someone being insulting, and certainly not guilty of harassment, and in fact even someone being insulting is not the same as harassment.
There are quite a number of steps in-between, with "insulting" being one of these steps, but certainly not the only one.
I don't think the difference is between polite or insulting - the difference is between harassment and non-harassment.
Someone being rude or short may bring down the tone of discussion and may not be condusive to proper discourse, but harassment is another beast entirely. People's lives are ruined by harassment and harassers may have their reputations ruined.
Suggesting that Jonathon Blow harasses people on twitter when in fact you mean that he is rude and insensitive is borderline libel.
This is true. I had to look over the last few comments and the payload is here:
>> Even if he has [harassed someone], that doesn't invalidate anything he's saying
>I just don't think there is ever a good reason.
If you'd have said 'I just don't think there is ever a good reason to be rude or demeaning' then people wouldn't have made the link to harassment. Or even address the word harassment explicitly.
>> perfectly reasonable thing to say [calling them ignorant or stupid]
Of course your rephrasing is also quite the distortion. Here's the original:
>> say things about a person suggesting they are ignorant or stupid
[my emphasis]
Saying something about a person "suggesting" they are ignorant or stupid is, in terms of polite interaction, radically different from "calling them ignorant or stupid". In fact, merely suggesting such things instead of saying them directly in the face of actual ignorance or stupidity is what one would consider polite but truthful. Going beyond that and avoiding anything that could suggest such an interpretation would be untruthful and a disservice to those asking questions. And IMHO much ruder than the unvarnished truth.
Also, the former ("suggesting") could be almost anything, for example a simple RTFM could be construed as suggesting someone is ignorant or stupid, no matter how politely you express it, but is also a perfectly fine thing to say. Directly calling someone stupid because they didn't RTFM would be quite different, and definitely more in the direction of rude and possible insulting (but still nowhere near harassment or bullying).
I never used the word harassment, myself. I did say "a bit of a bully," and I think that phrase is fine when referring to others who openly insult people. But apparently, my opinion is in the minority here, and that's fine. Surprised to see my comment turn into this thread.
I find that he comes across a lot better on video than on twitter, seems less dogmatic and his sense of humour is clearer. Most people aren't going to waste time on a stream, so his twitter personality is what they see.
Very true. It is extremely common for people to impose negativity into other people's textual comments. Very frequently some comment will be written that is flat, matter of fact, brief and trying to be helpful, and the writer will later be shocked by readers assuming sarcasm and insult. In general, the Internet does contain a lot of sarcasm and insult. But, I expect a huge amount of that is wrongly attributed. And, that extra dose feeds back into the assumption that negatively is standard practice on the net --leading to more legit negatively...
True, the restricted length makes it a terrible format for any sort of nuanced discussion on complex issues. Way too easy for folks to talk past each other.
I've seen Jon espouse opinions about technology that cut against the popular grain, but I've never seen him pull a full-Torvalds and try to belittle the people who argue against him. Jonathan Blow sticks to the tech and rational conversation about it.
He has a lot of terrible things to say about JavaScript and Electron in particular. And I agree with every point he makes. It's also not going to stop me from using them, because I have other reasons, other goals. If you can pay attention and avoid blindly interpreting criticism of the tech as a personal attack, it will make you a better developer.
I've seen him single out (and with rather insulting wording) people who disagreed with him politically or even on trivial topics, among other questionable, or at least insensitive, behavior towards individuals.
I haven't looked at the video, but it is funny that I spent most of last week procrastinating by playing (and finishing) The Witness... Great game, but really the best piece of advice I could have received was to not start playing it!
Ahh, the stream listings often don't load and the entire video infrastructure goes down from time to time. Any VPS provider could give you better reliability. IMO there's a code issue, likely due to their hipster web stack. Also the site is really heavy-weight, someone force these developers to use older hardware.
There are a lot, and NLP us used a lot to describe things that doesn't have anything with it. Self help took it like quantum entanglement and ran with it. So beware of that.
Founder is Richard Bandler and John Grinder, first one is your best source (he rants a lot and often tells same stories). I like approach of Robert Dilts a lot (just giving you keywords got google).
I read a book about it long ago and helped me greatly. I quit smoking, turn my life around. Essentially explains you how you can run your brain.
Bandler and Grinder were charlatans. Maybe Satir was serious, back in the day, but Bandler and Grinder didn't believe their own teachings in the end. Steer clear of NLP.
For the ones interested in an actionable way of dealing with depression (albeit one that does not replace professional help), here is a course in cognitivo-behavioral therapy, a technique that yields good results: https://www.getselfhelp.co.uk/step1.htm
It's free by the way.
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[ 7.6 ms ] story [ 252 ms ] threadhttps://youtu.be/CUvFeyGxaaU
I just don't think there is ever a good reason.
He does have a tendency to say things about a person suggesting they are ignorant or stupid when they ask a question he doesn't like. There often seems to be a fine line between him getting annoyed and him belittling the contribution someone else makes to a discussion. He is extremely sensitive.
I just think if someone is going to seriously discuss how to be more emotionally stable, they should probably demonstrate more stable behavior themselves.
> say things about a person suggesting they are ignorant or stupid
If that is what he thinks, that is a perfectly reasonable thing to say, particularly as no-one is forced to ask him questions. It is not "harassment" by any stretch of the imagination.
> He is extremely sensitive.
Maybe the one being extremely sensitive isn't him.
You are right, we have a different idea of what is polite behavior, and what is insulting behavior.
However, the bigger difference is that for me, someone not being polite is not the same as that someone being insulting, and certainly not guilty of harassment, and in fact even someone being insulting is not the same as harassment.
There are quite a number of steps in-between, with "insulting" being one of these steps, but certainly not the only one.
Someone being rude or short may bring down the tone of discussion and may not be condusive to proper discourse, but harassment is another beast entirely. People's lives are ruined by harassment and harassers may have their reputations ruined.
Suggesting that Jonathon Blow harasses people on twitter when in fact you mean that he is rude and insensitive is borderline libel.
>> Even if he has [harassed someone], that doesn't invalidate anything he's saying
>I just don't think there is ever a good reason.
If you'd have said 'I just don't think there is ever a good reason to be rude or demeaning' then people wouldn't have made the link to harassment. Or even address the word harassment explicitly.
Either way, the points were getting conflated.
Of course your rephrasing is also quite the distortion. Here's the original:
>> say things about a person suggesting they are ignorant or stupid
[my emphasis]
Saying something about a person "suggesting" they are ignorant or stupid is, in terms of polite interaction, radically different from "calling them ignorant or stupid". In fact, merely suggesting such things instead of saying them directly in the face of actual ignorance or stupidity is what one would consider polite but truthful. Going beyond that and avoiding anything that could suggest such an interpretation would be untruthful and a disservice to those asking questions. And IMHO much ruder than the unvarnished truth.
Also, the former ("suggesting") could be almost anything, for example a simple RTFM could be construed as suggesting someone is ignorant or stupid, no matter how politely you express it, but is also a perfectly fine thing to say. Directly calling someone stupid because they didn't RTFM would be quite different, and definitely more in the direction of rude and possible insulting (but still nowhere near harassment or bullying).
Not him, but I think that is in fact, insulting behavior. Everyone has a right to be insulting. It's just not harassment.
He has a lot of terrible things to say about JavaScript and Electron in particular. And I agree with every point he makes. It's also not going to stop me from using them, because I have other reasons, other goals. If you can pay attention and avoid blindly interpreting criticism of the tech as a personal attack, it will make you a better developer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7kh8pNRWOo + https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECwHZlvvVH4
Only time I have issues now is when I pop into a VOD of a stream in progress, and have to keep refreshing as the video gets longer.
Spoken like a true Casey.
He's talking about you HN! :D
Your feelings are tiny and you can control them and use beneficial ones. This in essence is NLP strategy.
I like NLP and had excellent results with it, so it helps me think in these terms.
Founder is Richard Bandler and John Grinder, first one is your best source (he rants a lot and often tells same stories). I like approach of Robert Dilts a lot (just giving you keywords got google).
I read a book about it long ago and helped me greatly. I quit smoking, turn my life around. Essentially explains you how you can run your brain.
https://www.amazon.com/NLP-Essential-Guide-Neuro-Linguistic-...
Here is one of the recent discussions with Bandler. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GfTNV6kDAYg
Hope this helps.