[danharaj]

Look at the gutter comments on this post to find out how 'unprofessional' it is. The problem is that men who act disgusting are present at all levels of the social hierarchy, men in general are concentrated at the top, and crucially, other men don't call out these gross dudes when they see it. There are more men who feel threatened by gender politics enough that they either dissimulate the problem away, protect their shitty colleagues, or rationalize it away than men who actively stand in solidarity with women.

Which is astounding to me.

[deciplex]

This guy at a minimum deserved a slap in the face and a firm command to get lost, and you don't have to be a third-wave feminist to think that. A lot people are of the mind that so-called "gender politics" solves fewer problems than it creates, and a "with us or against us" attitude doesn't help, either.

[danharaj]

What sort of problems?

[coldtea]

Getting a guy fired for privately telling a "dongle" joke to his male co-worker while at a conference for example. And then costing the woman who snitched on them and told the internet her own job. (true story)

This kind of BS over the top reactions, among other things.

[tptacek]

This is another thing that lands on these threads, like clockwork: one time, a woman freaked out over an overheard joke, complained publicly on Twitter, ended up getting someone fired, and was then fired herself. "And you are lynching the negroes."

That this has nothing whatsoever to do with the comment thread we're on about someone's daughter being called a prostitute at DEFCON is unimportant; what's important is to deploy as many countermeasures as possible to prevent sincere conversation about harassment.

[deciplex]

OP specifically asked for examples though.

[deciplex]

The same as with any other identity politics, really. It makes it really hard to get shit done policy wise, because when you view everything through the lense of identity politics, every disagreement becomes an attack on you personally even if it is just an honest difference of opinion. While some things should be polarizing, probably, identity politics tends to make things needlessly polarizing sometimes, I've found. It is a useful tool definitely, but when it's the only way you approach policy and political action, it often makes you feel really good and validated even while you're failing to achieve a lot of your goals.

Going into it any further than this is going to require more specific examples, which I'm not willing to do since it will derail the hell out of this thread. Sorry.

[idlewords]

You derailed a few paragraphs ago.

[vezzy-fnord]

Well, it's relatively easy to rile up identity politics on the web and place a collective responsibility with a reductionist solution like "calling out" as if it is absolute, more so than following these principles oneself.

For what it's worth, though it is convenient to analyze issues under grand models of identity and class warfare (and I've noticed your commenting patterns before as being quite reminiscent to that of a troll, one with far-left tendencies), people ultimately act out of varied individual motives. From my experience "calling people out" thus has a mixed efficacy.