Re: Social Reform
On Mon, Jun 11, 2001 at 05:19:26PM -0700, Daniel S. Wilkerson wrote: I would say Simon was the one ignoring an issue and attacking a person, not Vijay. You are wrong. Go back through the archives. Vijay has posted four messages: two of which are critical of Perl, two of which are pretty heated personal attacks on me. None of those four does anything useful for Perl 6. If he *hasn't* ignored the issue - which is Perl 6 - please show me a URL for a message. -- Masque It's all fun and games until someone loses an eye. purl Then it's a sport!
RE: Social Reform
If you have not been following this thread, then maybe that is the reason for the confused-sounding nature of your email. I would say Simon was the one ignoring an issue and attacking a person, not Vijay. I think Vijay was the one pointing out that this person (Me) was contributing to the discussion and that a personal attack from Simon was inappropriate (If I may paraphrase you Vijay. Correct me if I'm wrong.) You read it wrong, Daniel. I was comforting Vijay, not scolding him. p
RE: Social Reform
On Mon, Jun 11, 2001 at 05:19:26PM -0700, Daniel S. Wilkerson wrote: I would say Simon was the one ignoring an issue and attacking a person, not Vijay. You are wrong. Go back through the archives. Vijay has posted four messages: two of which are critical of Perl, two of which are pretty heated personal attacks on me. None of those four does anything useful for Perl 6. If he *hasn't* ignored the issue - which is Perl 6 - please show me a URL for a message. Then I'd point out all of them, Simon. Perl 6 reform is larger than language syntax and the innards of an interpreter. Perl 6 reform has been claimed to be a social one as well. I would therefore suggest that any email posted by any person, the goal of which email was to call to order a foul temper or misbehaving community member or to correct the formation of cliques among us, such an email would be precisely on topic for the reformation of this language. I consider this social reform of at least equal importance to the Perl community as any new syntactic differences and changes in underlying parser engines. I personally consider social reform to be far more important than the latter, but I do not expect everyone to share that particular opinion. Let us please not fall into the P5P trap of considering as valid contributions only segments of this or that code applied to the Perl core on a particular operating system. That is an old argument that cannot be won. All people contribute if they add value to the Perl language or culture, be it in documentation, related software, work on any operating system, or social rehabilitation. No subculture or group should consider itself of more importance or value to the language or community than another. No subculture or group should consider itself above reproof, whether from within that subculture, or from without. Tom Christiansen once argued contrawise, as did Sarathy to a large extent. It finally came out that Tom considered value only what directly improved perl within the perl core on his own system, meaning his own contributions. Sarathy argued that only contributors of code were helpful to the perl community, leaving out testers, documentors, module writers, and basically everyone else. Neither person was right, and neither position is remotely arguable in a movement whose (at least) /partner/ emphasis is on the reformation of the community and revocation of attitudes like these two expressed. If Vijay chooses to concentrate his efforts within the social-reform arena, I do not consider his contrubutions any less valid or any less efficacious than your own. p
Re: Social Reform
On Tue, 12 Jun 2001 08:54:13 +0100, Simon Cozens wrote: On Mon, Jun 11, 2001 at 05:19:26PM -0700, Daniel S. Wilkerson wrote: I would say Simon was the one ignoring an issue and attacking a person, not Vijay. You are wrong. Go back through the archives. Vijay has posted four messages: two of which are critical of Perl, two of which are pretty heated personal attacks on me. None of those four does anything useful for Perl 6. Well, I *have* been following the discussion. And to me, it looks indeed like you, Simon, were indeed attacking ME on non-technical grounds. Vijay just jumped in for him, like a lioness trying to protect her kittens. -- Bart.
RE: Social Reform
-Original Message- From: Bart Lateur [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Tuesday, June 12, 2001 10:48 AM To: Perl 6 Language Mailing List Subject: Re: Social Reform On Tue, 12 Jun 2001 08:54:13 +0100, Simon Cozens wrote: On Mon, Jun 11, 2001 at 05:19:26PM -0700, Daniel S. Wilkerson wrote: I would say Simon was the one ignoring an issue and attacking a person, not Vijay. You are wrong. Go back through the archives. Vijay has posted four messages: two of which are critical of Perl, two of which are pretty heated personal attacks on me. None of those four does anything useful for Perl 6. Well, I *have* been following the discussion. And to me, it looks indeed like you, Simon, were indeed attacking ME on non-technical grounds. Vijay just jumped in for him, like a lioness trying to protect her kittens. Which he does from time to time, as do most of us, myself likely included. And, when it does, it should be group-corrected. (Realize that you're doing the same thing right now, Bart. Note, I agree with you, and I point it out only to show how easy a trap it is to fall into.) However, Simon can also be reasoned with, and will admit a mistake. I've seen this in him: I've seen his heart in the right place, and I accept a bit of foot-in-mouth from time to time from anyone. However, I feel it would be more appropriate in this case to come to an understanding that when such things happen, and they will happen, that we group-correct the message, and not the messenger. If someone shows passion underlying a message, there's usually a truth hidden in the fumbled words. We should address the subject of passion, and not the passion itself. We are a group of mix-and-match volunteers. We have varying interests, varying skills, and varying passions. It is nearly impossible to say anything with passion without getting on someone's nerves. (On the other hand, if everything is said without passion, we end up just plain bored and boring.) To grow as a community and a culture, we need to accept the passion, ignore any verbal flubs, and address the underlying, pertinent sentiments, ideas, concerns, and brainstorms. I believe it was Richard Nixon who made a groundbreaking trip to (IIRC) some South American country. Talks went wonderfully well, and agreements were made, and everybody was happy. Upon leaving, however, Nixon gave his double peace sign. Well, lo and behold, that sign is approximately equal to american culture giving someone the finger. That so insulted the people of that country that everything that had been done and said became immediately undone and worthless. That's a pretty silly response from a civilized nation to a symbol the speaker expressed in good will. About a year and a half ago I sincerely and lengthily complimented the Python culture on its conduct. A couple of months ago I retracted that. They had not achieved that final stage of group cooperation, they simply hadn't enterd middle stage of rudeness and cliques where we are currently striving to climb out of. If we can accomplish this, we will be the first major group to do so in an online forum that I know of. If we can accomplish this, then Larry is wrong about one thing: we will be breaking tremendous new ground, and going where no language has gone before... to cooperation and acceptance within the community from the meerest of members to the crown itself. p
RE: Social Reform
Well, I *have* been following the discussion. And to me, it looks indeed like you, Simon, were indeed attacking ME on non-technical grounds. Vijay just jumped in for him, like a lioness trying to protect her kittens. Which he does from time to time, as do most of us, myself likely included. And, when it does, it should be group-corrected. I'll correct this before it's had a chance of being misunderstood. He refers to Simon, not to Vijay. Pronouns are making me nervous these days... ;-) p
Re: Social Reform
Excuse me, my mistake. David Grove wrote: If you have not been following this thread, then maybe that is the reason for the confused-sounding nature of your email. I would say Simon was the one ignoring an issue and attacking a person, not Vijay. I think Vijay was the one pointing out that this person (Me) was contributing to the discussion and that a personal attack from Simon was inappropriate (If I may paraphrase you Vijay. Correct me if I'm wrong.) You read it wrong, Daniel. I was comforting Vijay, not scolding him. p
Re: Social Reform
If you have not been following this thread, then maybe that is the reason for the confused-sounding nature of your email. I would say Simon was the one ignoring an issue and attacking a person, not Vijay. I think Vijay was the one pointing out that this person (Me) was contributing to the discussion and that a personal attack from Simon was inappropriate (If I may paraphrase you Vijay. Correct me if I'm wrong.) Me, it would help if you would use a name, even if its not your real one. Daniel David Grove wrote: Previously, on St. Elsewhere... Simon(e) writes... But of course, I'm sure you already know what makes good language design, because otherwise you wouldn't be mouthing off in here... Why is it that Me is *mouthing off*, but you're not? Why is that? What makes you so *special*? The fact you wrote a Perl book?! A book with more typographical errors than it has pages? *Zut!* Actually, Simon's not that bad. We don't always get along, and sometimes disgree less than quietly, but he generally makes sense. I HAVE NOT followed this thread, so I'm only talking in generalities. When trouble strikes, the type you're talking about, within a Perl forum, it has been my experience that it has the appearance of ignoring an issue and attacking a person regardless of what that person said. The more true the person's statements, the more aggressively people, specifically referring to Jan Dubois and Tom Christiansen in my own personal experience, attack the person with complete and utter nonsense, usually personal, usually untrue, apparently in order to avoid having to answer to anything or anyone. I have seen these attacks come in such a way as to specifically shut a person up by provoking him to wrath, then pointing out that he is impossible to have a discussion with... and quiet resumes with the issues still in place. This was a huge problem in the Perl 5 Porters, and it has recently begun coming into the Perl 6 groups. This is why I've been distancing myself from this group, including your previous call to arms. We will achieve social reform only by refusing to conduct ourselves in this manner, and without social reform, Perl 6 may as well not exist for all the good it does us as a community. Sure, it gives some overbrained geeks a chance to play around with language design for a while, but that's about it. And, frankly, I think Simon's been a bit nicer since his book came out. I'm just happy that it's red and doesn't have a trademarked animal on the front. ;-) Me may be s/wrong/clueless/... but I don't think any one of you has actually understood what he/she is talking about. Me is at least one level of abstraction higher than all of the rebuttals that have been fired back in this thread. HOWEVER, (again, not reading OR caring about this thread), my first reponse to me since his initial barrage a couple of months ago was that he had no good intention. He(?) has since changed his attitude somewhat, but that initial impression may be getting in the way for him. Right or wrong, Me or *you* for that matter...has the same right to post to this list...Otherwise, it should be a private list, perhaps: Unfortunately, if we keep going in the way we're going, this will eventually be a semi-private list the same what that P5P became one in order to keep from having to take responsibility for their own actions or lack thereof. This coin has two sides, Vijay. Larry Wall, Damian and the Acolytes of Doom debating Perl6 This particular acolyte (the writer of this email - I would say 'me' but that would make no sense in this context) just calls 'em as he sees 'em, nothing to hide, no book rights or contracts to protect, no financial reason to speak any way other than truth as best I know it. Just how much $foo can dance on the head of a dot operator Is that you really want? Why can't we (cough...) just get along? Think about it (for a change...). I read somewhere about the different stages of an online group. I believe it was referring to IRC channels or newsgroups, but this applies here as well. It describes that at first there is a lot of public interest because people discuss without being told to shut up. They address problems, and discuss things openly. In a later stage (there are several stages, but I forget what they all are), ego, conceit, and bad attitude creep in. You can see such attitudes on the P5P, EFNet #linux, and a few other places where people have gotten stuck in this trap. The final stage, which I believe that EFNet #perl has begun to achieve to some degree, and which we must strive to achieve, is an equilibrium. (Actually it forks three ways: a) equilibrium, b) dispersal to obliviion, or c) just plain stuck at the middle stage.) That middle stage is unfortunate, but it must come in order to advance beyond it, according to my reading. I'm not concerned about this or that butthead for the time
