[chez17]

Will people here show some fucking respect? Using terms like "bat shit crazy" and "inane" are extremely selfish and only serve to make yourself feel better at the expense of someone who is disabled. You don't need to qualify statements. You can appreciate this for what it is and not comment on the author's disability and the negative effects of it. The sad truth is that what was done here is too far advanced for most of us so people can't comment on the actual content and instead decide to publicly humiliate a disabled person.

[oinksoft]

Agreed, this place can be really disgusting in its intolerance of mental illness. Backgrounds and persepectives represented in a tech/startup-specific community aren't bound to be the most diverse. Most people here are successful Americans.

For what it's worth, there is a far more interesting and respectful discussion from last fall on Metafilter: http://www.metafilter.com/119424/An-Operating-System-for-Son...

My favorite bit:

  losethos:
    I did a flight simulator but it looks awful, at best.
    Boot it in VMWare. Get someone else to run it. It's
    called "/LT/Demo/GameStarters/EagleDive.CPZ" It's an
    eagle diving for fish. It's just a demo mostly. I often
    show restraint in making my demos simple.

  East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94:
    bro i think you can be proud of the flight simulator
    you wrote for the operating system you also wrote

[joyeuse6701]

No, I will not pity someone who you, and or society may determine to be 'disabled' for one thing or another. I will appreciate TempleOS as much as the author's other works including the rants for they are one and the same, expressions of self. So guess what, this is an interesting piece of work, you know what else? I don't like being called racial slurs. I'm not going to show any respect for anyone who thinks they can call me or my brethren a racial slur, disabled or not. To tell me to respect someone like that IS insanity. So no, no respect given.

[Zelphyr]

Respect is probably an incorrect word to use here. You rightly shouldn't be expected to respect someone's epithets regardless of the cause.

As has been mentioned, this man has a disease that is causing him to act in a way that in almost every other way he probably wouldn't otherwise act were he to not have this disease.

There was a man several years ago who was convicted of attempted rape. He had no prior history of anything like this yet when he was incarcerated he was constantly propositioning the female officers. It cost him everything including his wife and family. And rightly so. Except, just before his sentencing he was diagnosed as having a brain tumor. When it was removed the predatory behavior ceased and he was a normal man again. Two years later the tumor returned and he started trying to force sex on every woman he saw.

Was he a rapist? Technically, had he succeeded in raping a woman, yes. Should he be imprisoned for it? Probably hospitalized actually but either way I'm sure you'd agree he should not be allowed back into society.

So instead of "respect" how about "compassion"? Can you have compassion for a man who is provably brilliant but also suffering from a debilitating mental illness that just may be the source of his racial slurs?

[joyeuse6701]

Ah I know this story well and it sheds light on why we feel one way when someone presumably has no choice over actions (mentally ill) and another when we assume that they have a choice. To answer your question: I don't know. I can envision scenarios where I do empathize and sympathize with someone afflicted, and others not so much. It is mostly dependent on whether the afflicted is self-aware. I don't know how much pain and suffering people cause each other is our own choice or something that we could just 'cut away' with some surgery.

[sillysaurus2]

His brain is physically deteriorating. It's schizophrenia. His brain matter is rotting away. It's not an illness like the flu. His thoughts are not his own in the same way yours or mine are. We are all just collections of cells, but his are haywire. He is incapable of choosing to give respect in the same way he's incapable of not hearing voices.

[thefreeman]

I find it abhorrent that you are offended by the words of someone who clearly has no control over themselves. Are you that insecure that you will take the rants of a schizophrenic and use them to play the race card?

[jessedhillon]

...the race card

A word almost solely employed by racists, when expressing dislike about the fact that anyone dare identify a racial component in anything, anywhere. Just FYI.

People have a right to be offended by derogatory words, especially -- but not only -- if they are directed towards themselves or people like them. The issue here is that Terry most likely doesn't have the ability to use a different word, or express his fear/anger in controlled way. His vocabulary is an expression of the culture in which he lives -- if he were in Russia he would be expressing fears about the KGB, not the CIA, for example.

Someone else compared his writings to a Markov chain -- the n-word is part of the input corpus to his diseased mental processes then. I personally don't infer intent on his part.

[kristofferR]

Being offended by racist speach from someone with Schizophrenia is like being offended because the guy with Alzheimers couldn't remember your name.

Taking offence to those things isn't a good thing at all, it just shows a massive lack of sympathy and understanding in the people who chose to take offence to it.

[thefreeman]

Sorry I was typing on a mobile device and probably didn't choose the best words to describe my intent. What I meant by "the race card" was taking a situation that has nothing to do with race relations (ie. Temple OS) and turning it into a discussion about race.

[sixbrx]

>> ...the race card > A word almost solely employed by racists,

This is an absurd statement. I believe I've given as much justification as you did, BTW.

[joyeuse6701]

So wait, I'm expected to take TempleOS at face value for what it is regardless of the mental health conditions of its creator, but I can't take his religious or racial rants at face value? Seems somewhat arbitrary from my position.

To answer your question: No. I'm not. If I was, I'd be having a lot more altercations with the homeless in LA and SF. Though to play devil's advocate I could totally make the argument that one should heed the words of the racist mentally ill, as bad things can happen: (See Hitler). Having said that, If someone commands that I should show or 'give' respect and somehow separate the wheat from the chaff in arbitrary fashion to the benefit of the doubt of the mentally ill because he 'clearly has no control' seems somewhat like a disservice with that special treatment tied in, that's just an acknowledgement that this is acceptable. My stance is that it's not, regardless of your condition. How you handle that and prevent it is beyond the scope of this.

[chez17]

You need to get over yourself. The author of those clearly awful comments has a mental illness. For you to take those comments at face value and hold the author completely accountable is something I literally can't understand as an empathetic human being. You are simply being self-righteous at the expense of someone with a mental illness. That is a level of selfishness, obtuseness, and ignorance I can't understand.

[darklajid]

Big words and not quite respectful either.

For me? This is unacceptable. Any technical project that is tied into religion is already, by definition, not for me. TempleOS and its weird language are already far off the scale of sanity.

Believe is something very personal and I never attack someone for that. Unless.. they try to spread it, claim that this madness is superior in some sort of way.

So - that guy here might have medical issues. That's really sad and I do believe that he's impressive as a programmer.

But this submission cannot judge the OS without the bag of insults and religious madness it includes. I'm close to invoke Godwin (hey, at least I'm German. Now that'd be new..) to convince you that "But that's a neat project" isn't good enough if the message, the whole idea behind that thing is totally, fatally flawed and unacceptable.

I'm not trying to insult the man behind the project. Still, the project itself is worthless and not even remotely interesting to me, _because_ of the man behind that project.

People start judging startups because of the CEO here everyday. We still have anti-MS zealots, that throw Bill Gates jokes around. This project isn't 'protected' from being considered inacceptable, just because the guy behind it has a medical condition.

I flagged the submission. I heavily disagree with your idea of appreciating a piece of work while ignoring the dangerous ideas and opinions the creator shouts out - even if no one _wants_ to listen.

[jimminy]

I'm pretty sure chez17 was talking about the author. The comments here are despicable in regards to how they talk about him, especially when it was someone else that posted this.

By "appreciate it for what it is" it means you can appreciate it at 0 or even less, that's your prerogative. But we shouldn't be attacking this man. Judge the project for what it is, but the personal attacks against the man are unnecessary.

[darklajid]

I agree, to a point. No one should attack the man.

But that project shouldn't be here either. The author is banned from discussing his work. He is considered 'unwanted' already, in a way (and without us, the mere mortals that take part in the discussions here, having a say).

So while you're certainly right in some way (personal attacks are uncalled for), refusing to give him a platform to present his propaganda is still just fine in my book. And please look at the linked page, try to call it anything but that...

A medical condition, severe as it might be, is no reason to accept everything with a 'Ah, but look: That guy has a problem'. He needs help. Not a link to his 'I talk to God and dates start when Jesus was among us' .. thing.

[sillysaurus2]

No. He is not considered unwanted. He's hellbanned because that is the only reasonable course of action for this case. He can post his comments and people can see it if they choose to. He's respected as a human being and fellow programmer suffering from a terrible disease. And I assure you this post would already be dead or buried if the mods didn't explicitly approve of its presence.

[darklajid]

Hellban: "We don't want your stuff here and hope it takes you ages to figure out that we don't read it, before you create another account to write the same things"

"I assure you this post would be dead or buried if the mods didn't explicitly approve"? Really? You claim to know that? I call BS. You defend both project (meh!) and author (understandable, in parts) throughout this thread.

Now you're claiming that this post is 'signed off' somehow? With that brand-spanking-new account? Are you hiding some information? Do you sit in PG's office? Are you 'sillysaurus', the old/respectable account? And if that's the case, what leads you to this crusade with a '2' suffix?

[sillysaurus2]

"I assure you this post would be dead or buried if the mods didn't explicitly approve"? Really? You claim to know that? I call BS.

You don't need to take my word for it. The thread was sitting at #3 at 01:05 UTC. It was then manually adjusted by a moderator, or automatically adjusted due to flagging, or automatically adjusted due to the flamewar detector, to #26 at 01:10 UTC. http://hnrankings.info/6308017/ Also, mods are typically quick to bury stuff that they feel wouldn't be good for HN, especially during primetime hours. This post was #1-#3 for several hours, so this leads me to suspect this thread was either automatically adjusted by the flamewar detector or penalized due to flagging, and that a moderator had already seen this and decided not buried it. Also, for the stuff they truly do not want on HN, they bury the story by adjusting its gravity to be infinite, e.g. it's not merely moved to page 2 or page 3 but to >page 10. And this story wasn't buried.

Yes, I was sillysaurus. I was hellbanned for posting controversial comments and then deleting them. Now I make controversial comments and don't delete them.

[krapp]

He's hellbanned because that is the only reasonable course of action for this case.

Is it the only reasonable course of action or is it the only course of action the site or its policies allow? Does anyone get banned outright? Has that even been tried in his case?

[jimminy]

I've looked at the page, I do find the content offensive. The project itself (stripped of the bullshit) is somewhat interesting. Whether the project is worth any mention or platform is to the individual. I personally wouldn't have posted it for the fact that it is offensive.

My issue is that it wasn't him that posted this. The reason he's 'unwanted' is so he doesn't receive the platform. [ETA: sillysaurus says it much better than I.] The core of my issue is that it wasn't him that posted this. He's been dragged into the spotlight by a third party and then attacked.

And I agree that medical conditions are not a reasonable bye in most cases. In this case, it's an attempt to put forth some ground of understanding.

[darklajid]

We're not too far apart.

He didn't post it. No need to attack the person behind the project.

But the project (you saw the page) offers quite some opportunities for criticism already. I agree that we shouldn't bash the guy for his .. background. I still think that the "Oh, but this is so amazing" and even more, "Don't criticize the guy, he has a medical condition you insensitive clod" is useless, crap and no better than the "That guy is a nutjob" insults.

Judging the project on its own, looking at nothing but the link, I'd say that this in inappropriate. That's my position, nothing else - and I don't mean that guy any harm.