Re: Nature of this list
Shlomi Fish
please read my entire response.
On Saturday 23 Apr 2011 22:22:13 Brian Fraser wrote:
> On Sat, Apr 23, 2011 at 4:15 PM, Marilyn Sander, Ken Armstrong <
>
> marilyn...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> > The F-bomb is totally unnecessary. Such language is for teenagers who do
> > not yet know how to communicate displeasure effectively. Please grow up.
> > Personally, I am finding this discussion fascinating. I have often
> > wondered why the "academics" at IBM would attack each other's
> > presentations.
> >
> > It appears that part of the process of getting a PhD is learning to give
> >
> > and take intense attacks. This discussion is most enlightening.
> > Marilyn
> >
> "There ought to be a room in every house to swear in. It's dangerous to
> have to repress an emotion like that." Mark Twain.
>
Well, there's a difference between repressing emotion (which is saying "No! I
am not feeling this way now") and realising you're feeling something and
acting in a rational manner in accordance or opposite the emotion. I many
times was frustrated at open source software applications having annoying bugs
and thought with many F-words and curse words, but when phrasing the bug
report, I phrased it politely, rationally, and factually (not always though,
of course).
Emotions are nature's guidelines, and should not be repressed, and one should
not feel guilty for feeling anything (Sermon on the Mount/etc. put aside),
including not a desire for murder and mayhem. But acting based on these
emotions by words or deed may not be a good idea.
You could have phrased yourself more calmly.
> It's part of the language, whenever you like it or not. Again, please look
> beyond the tone and see the substance of the psot - The swearing was there
> exactly to demonstrate that a few strong words shouldn't matter in your
> appreciation of a message.
>
> I guess that misfired, though.
>
One thing I agree is that this meta-discussion reduces the
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signal-to-noise_ratio of begi...@perl.org ,
because it is of little interest to people seeking help with Perl or those
wanting to help them. As a result, I suggest moving it to advo...@perl.org
(or maybe beginne...@perl.org or possibly perl...@perl.org , if Ask and
friends will be kind enough to set it up (modelled after the haskell-cafe
concept, where discussions are moved from the main haskell mailing list).
Anyone can send an email to advo...@perl.org , even if they are not
subscribed and everyone can subscribe to it by sending an email to
advocacy-...@perl.org . Anyway, it was a good place to discuss social
issues in the past, and it's very quiet now so I don't think people will mind
the action.
So pleaase subscribe to advo...@perl.org and de-CC begi...@perl.org .
Regards,
Shlomi Fish
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Shlomi Fish
moving to advo...@perl.org .
On Saturday 23 Apr 2011 20:24:36 Shawn H Corey wrote:
> On 11-04-23 12:53 PM, Casey West wrote:
> > 1. What did you do that doesn’t fit with our Lincoln School Rules? (Be
> > specific and start with “I”)
>
> Wow. The very first thing they have to think about is their contempt
> for the school authorities and not their victims' feelings. No wonder
> why they tought they could get away with it. All they had to do is hide
> their actions from the authorities. You know, there's something a
> little bit sick about a society that insists that the authorities are
> the only ones capable of deciding right and wrong.
As an Objectivist (both a Randian, and in the meaning of believing that
absolute Ethics and a shared, objective, reality exist), I agree with such
sentiments. The whole "a criminal is someone who violates the law" is quite
contemptible, and it is my opinion that a criminal is only someone who did
something that is wrong according to the absolute, objective, Ethics is a
criminal. A person who violated the law and was convicted as such is a
"felon", but not necessarily a criminal, and we can recall many past heroes
who were prosecuted by things that we now consider as non-crimes, and it's not
unlikely that many innocent men still get prosecuted as such.
I think explaining the difference between Laws/Regulations/Rules, Ethos,
Morality, etc. to schoolchildren is too big of an undertaking. (I had a
problem explaining the difference between "Ethical" and "Moral" to a very
bright and intelligent programmer, with a smaller amount of intuition and
knowledge than I do in Philosophy.), so imagine doing it for school children.
Still I think this question could be demoted because the rules is not the
worst thing that they could violate, nor should these children be instructed
to blindly accept the rules, or not challenge them (without rebelling or
violating them knowingly). See:
http://www.paulgraham.com/gba.html
Regards,
Shlomi Fish
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Uri Guttman
PLEASE (i am being nice but loud) get this off the advocacy list. it has
nothing to do with it.
uri
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Brian Fraser
Well, there's a difference between repressing emotion (which is saying "No! I
am not feeling this way now") and realising you're feeling something and
acting in a rational manner in accordance or opposite the emotion. I many
times was frustrated at open source software applications having annoying bugs
and thought with many F-words and curse words, but when phrasing the bug
report, I phrased it politely, rationally, and factually (not always though,
of course).
Emotions are nature's guidelines, and should not be repressed, and one should
not feel guilty for feeling anything (Sermon on the Mount/etc. put aside),
including not a desire for murder and mayhem. But acting based on these
emotions by words or deed may not be a good idea.
You could have phrased yourself more calmly.
Joel Limardo
Sincerely,
Joel Limardo
Peter Scott
> PLEASE (i am being nice but loud) get this off the advocacy list. it has
> nothing to do with it.
I agree. The description of this list is:
"A discussion list for Perl advocacy. There are usually success stories,
news stories about or involving Perl and discussions about how to make
Perl be accepted in the workplace."
Not sure where else it belongs (email?) but the current thread is a
netiquette debate. I can't see a sufficient relationship to advocacy.
Feel free to create a perl-flames list :-)
--
Peter Scott
http://www.perlmedic.com/ http://www.perldebugged.com/
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Shlomi Fish
On Sunday 24 Apr 2011 03:20:39 Joel Limardo wrote:
> I must have skipped the previous e-mails when all of this discussion about
> swearing started. I think there are times when a good curse word most
> adequately describes a situation, but these instances are exceedingly rare.
> When I look back in history and think of some barring my rights to vote or
> the starving masses of France glaring up at Marie Antionette's window or
> something like that I am totally for a good shout of "You dirty sons of a
> b****!" However, in everyday conversation, and this goes for mailing lists,
> foul potty-mouthed language is just not appropriate.
>
> And in truth, there are ALWAYS limits to freedom of expression depending
> upon the venue. For instance, it is illegal to scream "Fire!" in a theater
> if there is indeed no fire. It is illegal to call up someone and make
> harassing or threatening statements. Etc., etc. The rules of the venue
> determine the freedom. In most cases, if you are in the U.S., the limits on
> freedom of speech are normally very few and have more to do with public and
> personal safety. The Internet and other social gatherings on the web have
> to set their own standards. The restriction on swearing in many places is
> among them.
>
Joel, thanks for supporting and elaborating on what I said. I couldn't have
phrased it better myself. Joel++ .
I agree that there is a place for swear or unpleasant words, and some people's
styles seem to be uttering them consistently (e.g: reportedly
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Stern and Perl's very own
http://www.trout.me.uk/ ), but they are usually not appropriate and should be
avoided in most contexts. Paul Graham discusses it here:
http://www.paulgraham.com/resay.html .
As much as freedom of speech exists, a lot of things you say can get you in
trouble and even if technically legal, may be considered as a verbal offence.
For example, at one point, someone at a mailing list I'm on claimed that I
should take a shower, because after he visited the Technion, where I studied
for my bachelor's, he discovered that my body odour was still a legend after
my departure. I was told that spreading such rumours may be considered as
defamation, and one could successfully press charges against such things (and
yes, I had been guilty in the past of similar acts of defamation, which I had
conducted due to negligence and lack of awareness on my part.).
There are natural restrictions to free speech such as
defamation/slander/libel, conducting deceit or fraud, risking human lives,
matters of national security, privacy, secrecy and personal matters,
copyrights and trademarks (possibly even patents), and naturally there are
things you can say and are perfectly legal (and ethical) which will incur a
negative reaction and are not recommended. (see for example
http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html ).
Sorry for getting carried away here a little elaborating on what Joel said.
I'd like to return to the main topic of the proper conduct on
begi...@perl.org because I feel it could be improved. I'll reply to a
different message later.
Joel, thanks again.
Regards,
Shlomi Fish
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Shlomi Fish
> On Sat, 23 Apr 2011 19:08:49 -0400, Uri Guttman wrote:
> > PLEASE (i am being nice but loud) get this off the advocacy list. it has
> > nothing to do with it.
>
> I agree. The description of this list is:
>
> "A discussion list for Perl advocacy. There are usually success stories,
> news stories about or involving Perl and discussions about how to make
> Perl be accepted in the workplace."
>
> Not sure where else it belongs (email?) but the current thread is a
> netiquette debate. I can't see a sufficient relationship to advocacy.
> Feel free to create a perl-flames list :-)
Heh, well:
1. I suggested setting up a beginne...@perl.org or perl...@perl.org (or
maybe just ca...@perl.org) where we move discussions that go tangential. Of
course, I'm not a @perl.org mail admin (though I can create such list on
Google Groups, Yahoo Groups, etc., but these places tend to have worse spam
protection than @perl.org does[Spam].)
2. The focus of advo...@perl.org has changed a bit since the original
description that you quoted and now also covers some ways in which we can
better promote Perl. And I believe that proper treatment of newcomers in the
masters begi...@perl.org mailing list is such an issue, and a very critical
one. I'm aware of other mailing lists whose focus changed a bit or that
various rules they had changed in time (for better, or for worse, naturally).
3. I nonetheless agree that it may be of relatively little interest to most
people here, so I suggest that Ask (CCed to this mailing list) will set up a
$SOMETHING-cafe mailing list on @perl.org.
4. It's possible Uri referred to the fact that I went out-of-line in the
discussion of Ethics-vs.-Law, which is off-topic and inappropriate here, and I
apologise for that (I got carried away). So let's drop this particular
discussion.
Regards,
Shlomi Fish
[Spam] - God bless the souls of the @perl.org mail admins who make sure the
@perl.org mailing lists are almost entirely spam free, despite the fact one
can send an E-mail to most lists without being subscribed. It's a lot of work,
and often goes unnoticed.
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You name it - COBOL does not have it.
Jacinta Richardson
> wanting to help them. As a result, I suggest moving it to advo...@perl.org
> (or maybe beginne...@perl.org or possibly perl...@perl.org , if Ask and
> friends will be kind enough to set it up (modelled after the haskell-cafe
> concept, where discussions are moved from the main haskell mailing list).
> Anyone can send an email to advo...@perl.org , even if they are not
> subscribed and everyone can subscribe to it by sending an email to
> advocacy-...@perl.org . Anyway, it was a good place to discuss social
> issues in the past, and it's very quiet now so I don't think people will mind
> the action.
>
>
but because I do mind having a conversation dumped in here that doesn't
make any sense. This might be a good place to discuss social issues,
but only within the limits of how those social issues impact on Perl
advocacy. The conversation fragment we've been subjected to so far does
not seem to have any relevancy. If you want to have a different mailing
list set up, then go about getting that done the right way; not by
dragging an unrelated and irrelevant (and not particularly friendly)
conversation onto a list where it doesn't belong.
It is not this mailing list's responsibility to get you a -cafe set up.
In the future, if you feel you feel you do need to redirect a
conversation from one mailing list to another; and it is relevant to the
new mailing list, please provide context for the new mailing list
readers, rather than just continuing the conversation as if everyone
else has been following it already. (Context in the form of a link to
existing archives is better than nothing, but poor form all the same.)
J
Shlomi Fish
(top-posting)
Very good advice, thanks!
Yes, you are perfectly right.
OK, now we'll need to wait for the @perl.org mail admins to set up a
$SOMETHI...@perl.org mailing list (hoping they would agree.).
So I'm killing this thread here.
Regards,
Shlomi Fish
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