[endlessvoid94]

I thought that was the point of the essay. We're all old (and hopefully mature enough) now to accept that maybe it wasn't completely the jock's (or whomever's) fault that the nerds were unpopular.

An outside perspective is almost always useful in figuring things out. I found this essay hit home. I was definitely in the nerd group, and if I had read this in high school, it would've helped.

[chairface]

> maybe it wasn't completely the jock's (or whomever's) fault that the nerds were unpopular.

I can agree with this to a point - by the time high school rolls around, yeah, the unpopular kids probably have adopted a set of behaviors that contributes to them being unpopular. However, those behaviors are probably defenses developed against some early damaging experiences. And who is responsible for those experiences? In my experience, it was those same jocks (or whatever) inflicting their damage all the way up.

Personally, I find it much more helpful not to worry about who to blame for unpopularity itself, and to focus more on what is _done_ to the unpopular. And the responsibility for that is much more clear.

[rorymarinich]

To be completely honest, if I were to go back to elementary school and look at when I first started being divided from other kids, I'm almost certain it would have begun with me being an arrogant brat because of my intelligence. When you're bright, it's too tempting to try and rise above teasing by claiming superintelligence. I'm not saying that arrogance is a bad thing, but I feel that people who are persecuted for arrogance should at least admit that their own attitude is partly at fault. Of course, such an admission makes persecution less likely to happen. It's a nice circle.

Personally, I find it much more helpful not to worry about who to blame for unpopularity itself, and to focus more on what is _done_ to the unpopular. And the responsibility for that is much more clear.

To discuss a problem, you need to get to its root. The root of the problem is twofold: people on one side are too willing to ostracize themselves, and people on the other side don't want to spend time learning about people. My belief is that it's not the responsibility of others to spend time trying to understand you. I think that bullying is a problem, but frankly, if nerds were ostracized but not actively bullied I would find a hard time blaming the other kids and not the nerds. I actually discussed this problem with a professor: my solution to this problem would be twofold. First, get the other kids to realize why nerd things are cool. If people think programming is really super neato, then suddenly programmers are neato too. (It worked with math in my school: once you like math, then math geeks are pretty awesome kids. By my junior year all of the math kids hung out with the jock/class clown group.) At the same time, though, you've got to do the same in reverse. Teach the nerds to appreciate the non-nerds. Intolerance works both ways, and there are a lot of people willing to dismiss sports players or actors or musicians or artists or preps as stupid and meaningless, and what this essay's all about is that in my experience, the nerds are usually a lot less tolerant than the other people. My first day in college, when my roommate arrived, I was unpacking a virtual library, and he was carrying a volleyball, and my first impression was that we wouldn't get along because he wouldn't "understand" me. This year's taught me a lot about how you can be smart and not be a nerd, and I honestly think that the nerds are less aware of this than the other groups.

[chairface]

> I feel that people who are persecuted for arrogance should at least admit that their own attitude is partly at fault

Again with this theory. Should battered wives admit that they are partially at fault because they annoyed their husbands? Should rape victims admit that they are partially at fault because they led a guy on? People are responsible for _their own actions_. No more, no less. If this means that the people you're talking about are guilty for being arrogant and annoying, then fine. I have no problem with that. But they are not responsible for the crimes committed by others.

> my solution to this problem would be twofold.

I think it's funny that you think you can solve this problem, and that we can all live in egalitarian bliss.

[rorymarinich]

I think it's funny that you think you can solve this problem, and that we can all live in egalitarian bliss.

You know that you're the reason I wrote this article, right? This is exactly the HN attitude that made me freeze my main account away. People who take things that other people say and extend them to drastic proportions just so they can be dicks about it.

No, we're not going to have egalitarian bliss. We're human beings. We have flaws. Those flaws won't go away. My "solution" is one that I think would work better than the endless "be diverse" speeches kids get. I think that it might make a lot of smart people a lot happier. It won't fix everything, but it might at least help. But no, you won't address the ideas I put forth. You'll nitpick. You'll be an absolute snot just so that you can gain the upper hand in an argument. And so you might reach a point where I and people like me get tired of your bullshit and walk away, and then you'll declare yourself the victor because you were the last person to make a post in my comment thread, but all you're doing is making the person on the other side want to punch yourself in the face. In a microcosm, that's my essay: you're probably not a stupid person, but you're deliberately avoiding facts to paint a one-sided portrayal of what I'm saying, and it's pissing me off. If we were having this argument in real life and I was a more naturally violent person, I'd probably hit you, and then in your eyes I'd become the bully and you wouldn't be guilty of anything. That's the problem here, and it's incredibly common amongst programmers, and it sucks.

I have no problem with that. But they are not responsible for the crimes committed by others.

They're interconnected. You're like the American attitude after 9/11 that terrorists were wholly evil Satanic creatures with no motive. I'm arguing back and saying that the people on the other side are doing bad things, but that that's a separate issue from what I'm talking about. If you're guilty about being arrogant and annoying, then when you get teased and beaten up it's not causeless. You caused this. And the other side is more at fault then you are, but don't act like you're a saint.

Should battered wives admit that they are partially at fault because they annoyed their husbands?

If you get beaten and do nothing about it, it's your fault that it goes on. See, two sides of the same struggle can both be guilty. The husband is more at fault, but if the battered wife acts like there's nothing she can do then she's to blame for it going on.

Same with rape. If you get raped and do nothing about it, you're letting the other guy get away. The other guy isn't innocent. This isn't a blame game where it's the victim's fault entirely. But the victim does not exist in a vacuum, and the fact that the problem still exists suggests that in some way the victim is complicit about the problem.

Is McDonald's to blame for making people fat? Partly. But they exist to provide something for people who are asking for it. Fat people are to blame for their being fat. Perhaps not entirely 100% to blame, but they can stop themselves, and they're not, and so it's partly their fault.

One day I might write something about how much bullies suck, but other people are already doing this. I don't like being generic. So I thought I would write a little thing about how nerds are often partially to blame for their oppression, and that they refuse to take responsibility for themselves, not expecting anybody to submit it to a place where people like you would get to spray their spittle around without ever once addressing what I'm saying.

[zedshaw]

I never comment on HN. I just observe. But what you just wrote above deserves a response, and much more to come.

First off, on what planet do you think it's alright to hurt someone physically for anything they say? You'd actually punch someone in the face who's arguing with your stupid comments?

Second, if you get raped and do nothing about it that's your fault? I think Andrea Dworkin just ate her fist. One of the most vile offensive acts a person can do to a weaker person and you say it's the victim's fault? That they're somehow complicit?

Third, battered women deserve their beatings? Didn't you say that you wrote your stupid poorly written blog post in response to the whole Porno Ruby Conference Offending Women news lately? How in the _hell_ can you even pretend to claim you give a rat's ass about women if you think any of the above?

Alright, I gotta stop before I step into territory where I get banned from HN. However, I have one statement I'd like to see you fumble a reply to:

I can fully understand your hatred of geek arrogance, since I can't stand it myself, but even at my most obnoxious I never said that rape, beatings, torture, and abuse of the weak were defensible.

Every person who has been abused never deserved the _level_ of abuse they received. Whether it's children, or women, or just someone who's different, the abuser is always more powerful and enjoys hurting people weaker than them. Because of this, they take any tiny little offense and turn it into a reason to nearly kill another human being. Even if the victim changes every single thing about themselves to please the abuser, it's not enough.

The abuse continues, not because of the victim, but because it satisfies the abuser.

[rorymarinich]

No! Of course it's not okay to hurt somebody. If I made it sound like that I fucked up big-time.

What I said was that it's the attitude above that leads to physical violence. When somebody starts wanting to punch somebody in the face, it comes from that particular level of dickery.

I am not at all a violent person. I don't fight people, I don't hit people. I don't have a personality that leads to fights. The closest I get to violence is posting angry things online. And I'm certain that writing all these responses at 7 in the morning might have dimmed my writing a bit, but I never once implied violence.

What I said, again, was this:

If we were having this argument in real life and I was a more naturally violent person, I'd probably hit you, and then in your eyes I'd become the bully and you wouldn't be guilty of anything.

That's not me threatening. In fact, the one "threat" I made was the one where I lock out my Hacker News account because debates like this are a waste where nobody learns a damn thing. The point I was making was that chairface's comment was aggravating and glossing over points in a way that was smarmy and obnoxious. (His response to the parent post clarified a lot, so props to him.) That's an attitude that's not just on Hacker News. A friend of mine had it when he'd constantly pester a violent kid just to provoke a reaction. He'd get clocked in the eye and tell us all what a savage that other kid was. The point of my stupid poorly written blog post was that this is a common attitude amongst nerds when they handle things socially. They'll do things that they know will alienate them because they think the alienation is forthcoming anyway. In doing that they give themselves some "control" over their hopeless state.

I mean, I'm certain I'm talking to somebody who knows what I'm talking about. I've seen a lot of people dismiss your blog posts because of the "ZED'S SO FUCKING AWESOME" logo or because of your many elongated, poorly written rants. I'm too lazy to search back, but I've gotten into a lot of Zed debates on this site where you get slammed because your old web site was just begging for people to call you immature. You obviously knew that would happen and you went on doing it anyway, so you fit into the category of people I'm talking about here.

You're quoting me saying a lot of shit I didn't say, Zed. Cut that out; if you're going to get pissed off at me get pissed off at me for what I believe.

I never said violence was defensible. I have friends who have been molested and harassed and hurt. I think it's one of the most terrible things there is. And this entire argument is such a loose tangent from the argument I originally made that it was stupid of me to respond in the first place. I'm aware of that. There's a difference between an abused woman and an abused nerd. Nerd abuse is largely petty in nature. I know maybe two kids in my nerd group who got into fights, ever, and neither of those was a case of random abuse: both sides wanted to pummel the other side. So when the argument sifted away from petty and towards serious, my response should have been: that's not the same thing. Abuse and rape stem from an entirely other side of human existence than things like teasing and name-calling.

Child abuse is not name-calling. If you're suggesting that calling somebody a name is child abuse, you're off your fucking rocker. If a nerd is getting hit and hurt for what he's saying and doing, there's something pathological behind that happening; when a nerd is ostracized because he acts like a jackass, he's responsible for its happening.

The point I was trying to make, half-asleep, earlier today was that people who are getting seriously abused should take action to stop the abuse. If you're getting beat up or raped then you should take action to stop it from happening, because otherwise you're letting a guilty person get away with a crime. The only blame on the other person is letting the criminal get away. They aren't responsible for the horrible things being done to them.

But now I'm just repeating myself, and to be honest I can't tell if you just flew off at me because you think I said a terrible thing or if, like your critics claim, flipping out just gets you off. If it's the former, then I've clarified myself, and I'm sorry for sounding like I meant something I absolutely do not. If it's the latter, we've got nothing left to talk about.

[dkarl]

You crossed a line here. A woman who annoys her husband and is beaten as a result is guilty of being annoying. She is not guilty of domestic assault, not even a little bit. A woman who leads a man on and is then raped by him is not a little bit guilty of rape. She is guilty of leading a man on. I agree it's important to focus on things under our control, but there's a difference between taking active control over one's life and taking moral responsibility for other people's actions. The fact that we use the word "responsibility" to refer to both these things -- the common aspect being an attitude of initiative and self-reliance as opposed to helplessness and blaming -- confuses rather than clarifies the issue.

Using the dual nature of the word "responsibility" is a common ploy to distribute blame to everybody equally when discussions of blame become counterproductive. That can be appropriate in some situations, especially team situations, but applying it to rape and domestic abuse is way over the line. It's repellant.

[rorymarinich]

I clarified what I said in my response to Zed's post. I should have thought before making that previous response.

[chairface]

> You know that you're the reason I wrote this article, right? This is exactly the attitude that made me freeze my main account away. People who take things that other people say and extend them to drastic proportions just so they can be dicks about it.

Look man, you said you had a solution to the problem. What I said is hardly a leap. You have a funny definition of "drastic proportions".

> But no, you won't address the ideas I put forth. You'll nitpick. You'll be an absolute snot just so that you can gain the upper hand in an argument. And so you might reach a point where I and people like me get tired of your bullshit and walk away, and then you'll declare yourself the victor because you were the last person to make a post in my comment thread, but all you're doing is making the person on the other side want to punch yourself in the face...

You're descending into ad hominem territory here. Please don't.

I didn't address your solution because I don't think there is one, and I don't see value in arguing about it. Perhaps I misunderstand the problem you're trying to solve.

> They're interconnected.

I never said they weren't - I limited my discussion to the assigning of blame, which I took to be your primary subject as well. But now, it seems to me that you are not separating the issues of "cause" and "blame" the same way I am.

To be clear, of course the victims are part of the cause of any particular confrontation. It couldn't happen if they weren't there, so there's at least that. What I object to is assigning _blame_ to them. Causes for these things are shared - blame is given to one side or the other for their own actions.

Your commentaries on battered wives and rape focus on what happens _after_ the incident. I am asking about the incident itself. The blame for the raping and the beating lies solely with the aggressors.

> Is McDonald's to blame for making people fat? Partly.

No. McDonald's is to blame for making fatty food. There's a difference.

[rorymarinich]

Look man, you said you had a solution to the problem. What I said is hardly a leap. You have a funny definition of "drastic proportions".

I use hyperbole. I ought to have said "proposed" solution. Either way, your response was snide and still hasn't addressed what I said in that point. I think that what I proposed would help the two sides understand each other in a way they don't know, and in my experience the more people get to know each other the better they get along. The disconnect at the moment is that nerds think other people are wasting their time, and other people think nerds only do what they do because they haven't got anything else going for them. When you make people like stuff, they form bonds.

You're descending into ad hominem territory here. Please don't.

I need to apologize to the people I've argued with in this thread, because I've been much angrier and snappier in these responses than is appropriate for Hacker News. This morning I woke up to find a bunch of emails from people telling me my blog was broken in IE and I found this on the top of Hacker News. I've been writing a post for a little while now that I was going to submit here; I only submit things here if they're quality things. This is part of my daily writings, where I spill out a bunch of things on my mind without thinking about them, admitting all the while that I'm not putting careful thought into my writings. So to find that sort of thing here and discussed by people calling me a sad angry little man really just isn't a good way for me to start the day, and it's not how I want to approach my work. So I'm mad because I'm finding myself seriously debating something I wasn't exactly serious about in the first place, but I've got a sense of propriety about my writings and so I refuse to let people dis what I've said without defending myself. You've stood out to me as one of the people who's most deliberately ignoring the things that I'm saying, though this response was a lot better. Again: apologies.

Causes for these things are shared - blame is given to one side or the other for their own actions.

Okay. By that standard I'm blaming the nerds for deliberately setting up a situation wherein they're persecuted, when they could easily avoid the entire situation by not being so deliberately hostile. Does that work?

[dkarl]

For fairness' sake you should also focus on what the unpopular do to other people: how they bring down a conversation, unwittingly sabotage their friends' efforts at looking sane and approachable, pick the wrong moments for racy jokes, and hijack conversations towards topics they find interesting but nobody else does. In hindsight, I can see that I wasn't always a pleasant person to be around. High school kids don't feel like they have a lot of social capital to blow on dorks.

[chairface]

The entire article and most of rory's comments in this thread are about what the unpopular do to other people. I'm balancing that.

[dkarl]

I'm pretty sure it was already balanced by the preponderance of extended meditations on the indignities suffered by nerds. It's not like jocks blog insightfully about their social anxieties. Hell, I don't think most popular kids understood what was going on at all. They were just going on instinct. It's nice to see some actual analysis about the other side of the equation for a change, and it seems like a bad idea to immediately swing the focus back to the side that we already understand.

[chairface]

Well, that's what discussions are made of. I think it's silly of you to suggest that I shouldn't say anything without making sure to reiterate the original author's points.

[dkarl]

I think it's silly of you to say it's "much more helpful" to "focus more on what is _done_ to the unpopular" when we've all been over that ad nauseam. Everybody knows it's bad to be mean to people. There's nothing to be learned from it. Plus, it's somebody else's pathology, not ours. Since we already understand it and can't directly fix it, the only possible effect of us dwelling on it is to distance ourselves from responsibility by focusing on the aspect of the problem that isn't under our control. Not only is that behavior pointless and self-serving, it's actually psychologically damaging because it externalizes our locus of control.