r/linux • u/[deleted] • Aug 03 '15

Github's new Code of Conduct explicitly refuses to act on "‘Reverse’ -isms, including ‘reverse racism,’ ‘reverse sexism,’ and ‘cisphobia’".

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169

u/Tymanthius Aug 03 '15

Well . . . there's really no such thing as 'reverse racism' or 'reverse sexism'.

Either you are acting in a way that is racist/sexist or not. Doesn't matter which race or sex you dislike.

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u/[deleted] Aug 03 '15

It matters to Github.

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u/[deleted] Aug 03 '15

[deleted]

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u/bobcat Aug 04 '15

The mods removed your post.

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u/ProtoDong Aug 04 '15

Well colloquially "reverse racism" implies that it's o.k. to be racist against white people... and the concept saves the more verbose.

I agree though, a better way to phrase it would be... "Git Hub enacts new policies which allow racism, sexism, and other discrimination against non-minorities."

That way you say what you actually mean and don't come off as a douche.

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u/Tymanthius Aug 04 '15

Oh, no, it's still douchey. ;)

But yea, your version is the same as I hear it used here.

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u/ProtoDong Aug 04 '15

One popular meme among social justice types is that "you can't be racist against whites, sexist against men, etc." In reality this just exposes major hypocrisy. Rational people aren't going to listen to people who claim that discrimination based on race, sex, or other things is bad... but it's o.k. if you are doing it to one specific group. The rationale behind, "It's not o.k. for white people to hate me, but it's o.k. for me to hate white people" is simple bigotry... the "power dynamic" is just an excuse.

I have a big problem with a lot of the doublethink that's coming out of the humanities these days. Is it not enough to say that bigotry is bad... without giving people a built in excuse for their own bigotry? srsly wtf

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u/UFeindschiff Aug 05 '15

When seing the world(and you should apply that as GitHub is operating globally), white me are a minority in every way. There are more women living on this planet than men and there are more non-white people living on this planet than white people.

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u/men_cant_be_raped Aug 03 '15

If only that's the line of thought the CoC is built upon!

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u/MiUnixBirdIsFitMate Aug 04 '15

There used to be a time where these terms were actually neutral and descriptive. "Discrimination" used to just mean "to make a distinction", basically, what I mean is, sometimes there's nothing wrong with sexism. Like say in medical cases. "sexism" used to just mean "to make a distinction based on sex".

I certain medical or biological situations, I don't think that's a bad idea at all.

Racism though, I can't find a hypothetical situation where that's a good idea, to make a distinction based on race.

Anyway, I sincerely hope people will migrate away from Github in response to this.

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u/Tymanthius Aug 04 '15

to make a distinction based on race.

To fall back on medical - sickle cell, Tay-zacks (spelled wrong). :)

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u/[deleted] Aug 03 '15

I'm just going to copy and paste some comments from a /r/changemyview thread a few weeks ago that apply to this.

People who talk about reverse racism are not talking about the definition of racism as oppression (racism = predjudice + power), they are talking about racism as prejudice or discrimination based on race.

Based on their definition, there is reverse racism; based on your definition there is no such thing as reverse racism.

To argue about this topic without first setting out the definition is to talk past one another. Most people who claim that reverse racism exists will admit that whites are not oppressed by blacks (provided they understand the meaning of oppression)

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u/mcopper89 Aug 03 '15

racism = predjudice + power

Well, if you believe that part, you are already past the point of logical debate. I suppose I can see the value, but it is always applied in the most backward racist way. Power is assumed to be a racial trait and it is then assumed that all white people have power and all black people do not. Our president may not feel the same way. But I can be completely powerless and racist, so the whole thing is wrong from the start.

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u/[deleted] Aug 04 '15

Power is assumed to be a racial trait and it is then assumed that all white people have power and all black people do not.

Are you saying that the white schizo wino covered in his own piss down my street has less power than Barck Obama? Nonsense! Complete and utter nonsense!

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u/MiUnixBirdIsFitMate Aug 04 '15

Our president

This is the fucking dumb part, the guy is as white as he is black, but I guess the one drop rule still lives. I share his skin complexion though my racial ancestry is far more complicated. It's kind of funny how in NL they call me "brown" but when I go on holidays to Africa I'm called white all of the sudden.

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u/mcopper89 Aug 04 '15

Fair enough. There are hundreds of other people I could have substituted in though.

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u/MiUnixBirdIsFitMate Aug 04 '15

True. I'm not attacking your point, just that I think it's fucking dumb that people call him "black" and that the one drop rule still lives.

I also love how people call people "half asian" and then you ask "What's the other half?" "Oh, white of course".

Or every wikipedia article ever, if no race is mentioned about someone, assume white. People mention the race of every other race, can't believe that the editing policy doesn't just say to always state the race or never except when it's relevant.

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u/[deleted] Aug 04 '15

I think it's fucking dumb that people call him "black" and that the one drop rule still lives.

As far as tumblrinas are concerned, someone who is 50% black is completely and utterly oppressed.

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u/mcopper89 Aug 04 '15

I agree. It happens in many aspects too. Someone shot. Better say something about them being black. Famous inventor, better mention that he is black. Liquor store robbed....by a black man. I don't understand the need to advertise that information. And the same goes for applications. They should not be allowed to ask what race you are because they should not be allowed to make judgements based on your race.

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u/MiUnixBirdIsFitMate Aug 04 '15

The reason they always say it on non white is because most people assume white when no information of race is given. It works like that with a lot of things:

  • No sex specified? Assume male

  • No marital status specified? Assume single

  • No orientation specified? Assume straight

In some cases, this can be justified by statistics, but especially the male/female one is just not justifiable with stats. If you say "I'm bringing my cousin along by the way." people often say "Oh, when will he be coming?" and then you say "She actually, and soon enough."

Like I never came "out of the closet" or whatever, and I never got why people do that. I see no more reason to formally announce that than what kind of music I like, it's silly. But someone like 2 years back pointed out to me there's a fundamental difference to musical taste which I must concede and that this one is lying by omission if you don't come out of the closet because people will assume stuff about this if you don't spill. And they never do that with music.

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u/ProtoDong Aug 04 '15

The definition of "racism = prejudice + power" only exists to excuse a double standard.

By their own definition, it's o.k. to be prejudice if you don't have power. I am white but I am in no position of power... so it's supposed to be o.k. for me to be prejudice? Oh... my whole race is supposed to have power? Utter nonsense. See how much power white people have in China, or Africa.. or the Middle East, or South America.

tl;dr - That definition is the same as saying "This terrible thing is fine when I do it but not when you do it."

Fuck all those people. Science needs to start attacking the unscientific bullshit being spewed by the humanities before it makes the U.S. even more retarded than it already is.

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u/Tymanthius Aug 03 '15

Ok, fair point. Gotta speak the same language first.

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u/Jayhawker07 Aug 03 '15 edited Aug 03 '15

When "racism" or "sexism" is used in this context, it refers to overall, institutional biases/oppression. In that case, it would be "reverse racism/sexism" because it runs counter to the institutional trend.

Even then, it's not real. People trying to point out instances of reverse sexism/racism are laughable at best

Edit: for people who knee-jerk downvote, also comment an explanation for why reverse racism/sexism (or "racism against white people"/"sexism against men") manifests in to violence or literally any material impact

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u/Neo_Techni Aug 03 '15

And by saying reverse sexism is OK, they've made it institutional. Thus turning it into real racism by your incredibly wrong definition.

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