Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by tcodina 2759 days ago
I'm sorry, I find your comment pretty ridiculous in multiple aspects, and I'm honestly surprised you truly feel this way about the platform.

What I understand from it, and the parent comment, is that you're simply stuck in the beliefs of "diversity has ruined men", men have it worse, etc. Unfortunately I might not be able to change your mind, but I hope you understand that the idea of the website was to make groups that were less easy to be found on Twitter (I'll ask, how many women, people of colour, LGBTQ+, people with disabilities and many other groups do you follow? Going to take the risk and say that not as many as men, by a big margin...).

If that upsets you that's unfortunate, I am grateful for the people who were happy with the platform and sent me awesome positive comments. If you want to have a men-centric platform, you may make it yourself, go ahead. It's ironic how you seem to be the kind of person who would have benefited from such a website, getting you out of an echo chamber and seeing multiple perspectives.

2 comments

This is a more measured, patient reply than I would have been capable of. Thank you for keeping the discourse civil, even in the face of obvious baiting.
> What I understand from it, and the parent comment, is that you're simply stuck in the beliefs of "diversity has ruined men", men have it worse, etc

No, don't put in my mouth words I never said.

I never said "diversity has ruined men". There is nothing in what I write that is even close to that. That's even a meaningless sentence for what I am concerned.

I also didn't say that men have it worse. They don't.

You are the one claming that women have it worse. They don't.

Some people have it worse, and they happen to be men and women. Some people have it better, and they also happen to be in both categories. So do people that face discrimination.

I am simply refuting is your claim that women are "underpriviledged". That is not true in any measurable way.

> If you want to have a men-centric platform

I don't. Where did I say that?

I only said that you provide narrow, politically-correct categories. The opposite of that is not reversing them and privilege another group. The opposite of that is to give everyone equal treatment, which you don't.

> I'll ask, how many women, people of colour, LGBTQ+, people with disabilities and many other groups do you follow?

Why should that even matter? Do you want to follow more women? Great, go on. Do you want to make a site for people that want to follow your specifically discriminatory categories? Please, have a go. But don't claim it's something else.

The ratio between the men and women I follow on Twitter, for what matters (which is 0) is pretty even. I follow them because they are individuials that have something interesting to say, not because of their gender or their skin color.

Why should I follow more (or less) people of color? Do you think they are different from white people? Do they all think the same to justify me following them just based on their skin color? Isn't that racist?

LGBTQ+ people and disabled people are a small percentage of the overall population. Why do you think they should have a higher number in the people I follow? And again, do they think differently from people not in those groups?

You can discriminate all you want, but you can't seat on the side of the "underrepresented".

>You are the one claming that women have it worse. They don't.

I don't see anybody arguing this. The most popular Twitter accounts are of white men, so someone built a tool to find the Twitter feeds of not white men.

By definition the app is to help find underrepresented people (on Twitter).

I'll be honest, your comment comes off as extraordinarily angry for what we're talking about here (someone made an app to help showcase certain minority Twitter accounts). Nobody's suggested the United States Constitution should be rewritten. Nobody's made value statements. So where's all this (I'm seeing) anger coming from?

FWIW - that's factually untrue, white men are actually a minority of the largest twitter accounts: https://friendorfollow.com/twitter/most-followers/.

There's nothing intrinsically wrong with showcasing accounts from underrepresented groups in technology or otherwise. The anger comes from being able to claim what is and what isn't diversity.

Women / people of color are underrepresented on executive management and boards of directors in tech. Guess what? So are Republicans... even moreso than the former. But diversity, as politically defined, only seeks to help the former.

That said, to the OP, great site, great design, and great video.

white men are actually a minority of the largest twitter accounts

Sure, but those are all celebrities. People who get on Twitter and follow mostly celebrities don't need this tool. But if your Twitter interest is mostly about an area of, say, software development and you start following popular people who tweet about it, you’re likely to end up following 90% (made up number) white men unless you go out of your way to prevent it.