[parenwielder]

Firstly, the high rating that Butterick received for his teaching (the highest of all the instructors) was given by the students, not Matthias.

Secondly, Matthias has lived in the United States for virtually his entire adult life. Longer than probably the majority of the posters here have been alive. The issue is not one of cultural differences or a misunderstanding. Matthias behaves this way consistently, is unapologetic for it, and when pressed will explain that his "challenging behavior" (i.e. abuse) is some kind of test of your ideas, your willpower, or your capacity for success.

[desine]

>Matthias behaves this way consistently, is unapologetic for it, and when pressed will explain that his "challenging behavior" (i.e. abuse) is some kind of test of your ideas, your willpower, or your capacity for success.

This would also change the context, but I haven't heard anything else about this, which again is why I'm deciding to pay more attention, but not quite ready to demand any sort of community uprising against him.

[parenwielder]

Frankly, if you haven't heard anything about it, it's because you are not a part of the community that Matthias is in (whether that be Racket or Academic Programming Languages). It's very far from a secret, though obviously people's individual tolerance for his behavior varies.

[desine]

Yeah I just started picking up Lisp with SICP during the lockdown. AFAIK this is the first time it's hit the front of HN or any other pages I follow

[watwut]

So, you know nothing about the situation, but are confident to claim that it is all misunderstanding, that Matthew Butterick is essentially not understanding situation and so on.

It is unfair to Matthew Butterick and to anyone in his situation.

[desine]

No, my entire post was that I wasn't confident about anything, getting just one viewpoint. I rather dislike the implication you're making here. I'm not going to crucify Felleisen over a single blog post, even from a source I respect. I'm also not letting it go, committing to paying more attention to the racket community.

[aseipp]

I mean, I was in the Haskell community for many years and have stepped away many years ago, have never attended anything related to RacketCon, and only recently found Pollen from Butterick. I still had already heard about Matthias and his "teaching style" well before any of this, from merely being in the general functional programming community atmosphere. I've seen rumblings about it on HN more than once too.

Like, I think the thrust of the claim here isn't that you're necessarily arguing in bad faith or something. It's more likely a sense of frustration that something which is so relatively out in the open and obvious is even being "contested" at all (not to shove words in your mouth but just for lack of a better one.) And to be fair to you, this dynamic of "open secret" is very common with abusers, for the literal exact reasons Butterick outlined in the post. So it's not like an original sin or anything...

[watwut]

You dont express uncertainity nor ask questions. You as much as you make claims about it all being (paraphrasing) "just normal harsh" or "cold German personality". Those are statements.

No one asks you to crucify anyone. Nor to pay attention to that community. If it is pit od way for you that is perfectly fine.

What I took issue with is that reflexive impulse to assume that if someone complains about bad treatment, that person much be wrong, weak or some such.

[yawaramin]

The thing is, you know nothing for sure, everything you say is pure speculation, and you are confidently commenting about the situation. If you know nothing, why make up speculation out of thin air?