Shanley Kane, Tech Diversity, and Free speech on Twitter

[harrylyme]

Anyone have thoughts/info on the recent @shanley Kane @Medium meltdown that was brought about by the news that journalist Elizabeth Spiers was doing a profile article on Kane. Shanley responded by characterizing the profile as a violation of boundaries and a potentially violent act -- even though it's hard to imagine why Medium.com would 'attack' one if it's better known boggers.

Here is how Medium.com responded:

https://medium.com/@bobbie/on-reporting-65077a5c9047

[shanleyisanass]

Shanley is a divisive wannabe celebrity - ie: what can I do to piss people off and bring attention to my self? Total attention whore. Yeah - there are dickheads everywhere - why do you want to do battle with them and draw stupid people to the attention you garner - OH - that's what you want... Ass

[tptacek]

Let's please not invite drama onto HN.

If you have a story to submit about how a magazine chose to report on a subject or how that subject responded, submit it. It might still be too superficially dramatic for HN, and it might get buried or flagged off the site. But it might not, and if you really believe the story has substance, there's not much harm in a good-faith submission.

This, on the other hand, is merely a solicitation of opinions --- not even informed opinions --- about interpersonal drama unrelated to HN.

I flagged it and, for my part, would be thankful if people didn't post stuff like this to HN.

[harrylyme]

Sorry you feel that way: It's really more about how free, reasonable, expression is being suppressed on twitter.com based on a somewhat radical slant on what is acceptable speech in the tech community.

Shanley Kane writes on tech, with an emphasis on venture capitalist like YCombinator. Actually YCombinator is often the focus of Shanley Kane's criticism of VC in Silicon Valley.

http://bit.ly/1impCn6

Hacker News, to it's credit, seems to be more open/less gameable than other sites, and being able to express your own opinions on tech culture/community -- is a very significant issue.

[wmf]

Somebody's either got a secret or is over-managing her image.

[harrylyme]

There is an amazingly intolerant environment on twitter: simply reposting Shanley rants (something she did routinely to others) -- will get you shut down, apparently by the back-channel of supporters who want to cover up her routinely abusive, polarizing language. It's a little bit frightening.

I think that regardless of how critical the article is (or isn't) -- her reactions already suggest that her views on tech culture are histrionic distortions of reality, where any disagreement is equated with violence: even a fellow woman journalist is castigated for contributing to 'harassment and violence' for simply writing a profile that was probably, on balance, originally leaning positive.

The key word here is histrionic:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Histrionic_personality_disorder

[parasubvert]

Flagged. I'd note that Harrylyme was suspended on Twitter for harassing Shanley and is trying to carry it over here.