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Bullshit I had to go through while organizing a software conference

headcanon 7y ago
Sorry to hear about the harassment, thats never fun to deal with. On the plus side, sounds like OP made the right call to disinvite the person from the conference. You can tell an awful lot about a person by how they handle rejection.
- londons_explore 7y ago
  As long as that speaker was one of many, I wouldnt have uninvited them. If the audience has an issue with one speaker out of 10, they can take a lunch break then. If it's one out of 2, I can see why they might not want to attend. Using inclusion or exclusion to punish someone for past actions I would try to avoid at all costs. If someone has broken the law, the legal system is there to do punishment. It isn't your role as conference organiser/colleague/etc. to punish. You are not qualified to make decisions as to the veracity of the claim. Perhaps the furthest I'd go is saying to them "you (rightly or wrongly) have a reputation for X. Please make sure none of that happens during the conference."
  - village-idiot 7y ago
    I feel that such policies fall apart when faced with truly toxic people. If the claims of the above article are true, I would consider the people being mentioned to be truly toxic.
  - lawnchair_larry 7y ago
    This is how adults should behave. And if people have a personal problem with the person existing at the conference (as in, this isn’t actually a violent person, and it’s an issue of discomfort as opposed to safety) that cannot be solved by avoiding them, then it’s probably those people who shouldn’t be there. Or anywhere else really.
commandlinefan 7y ago
It sounds like you compromised on your principles and are now paying the price. Lesson learned?
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- danharaj 7y ago
  Could you elaborate?
- mrec 7y ago
  Which principles do you think they compromised on?
  - hitekker 7y ago
    The GP saw a victim and a chance to hurt them. Pure sadism, that's all.
leereeves 7y ago
How can we know if your side of the story is the truth? Either way, this is an excellent example of why the Twitter Justice System is a bad idea.
- duxup 7y ago
  One thing is this person didn't mention the other people. Telling this story this way isn't likely to be seen as attacking someone else / not a huge benefit to them / perhaps LESS of an incentive to lie..
  - wccrawford 7y ago
    From the article, it sounds like the only reason they didn't name the people was that their lawyer told them not to.
    - duxup 7y ago
      Maybe, but that doesn't change that there's not a lot of value here as far as any given he said he said type situation. I can belive the writer, it really changes nothing as far as who they're describing as I've still no idea who they are / the author isn't really changing my opinion about anything.
    - unbalancedparen 7y ago
      That is not correct. I have no interest in damaging anybody. That is why I did not write names and other things that happened in the article. He has already been banned from other conferences. I am trying to protect myself based on what happened and other people told me, I assure you the last few weeks have been a hell for me. My only objective is to be able to run my conference as I want and not to be harrassed.
      - leereeves 7y ago
        But you did identify the woman on Twitter. I won't link to it because I don't think we should share it further, but someone posted it in this discussion. I sympathize but I think the court of public opinion is unlikely to do anything other than further escalate things.
duxup 7y ago
>Nevertheless, we didn’t expect a threatening reaction followed by several emails, Twitter DMs, persistent phone calls and Whatsapp messages. She even texted my girlfriend, one of the organizers of the conference, whose telephone number is not public and wasn’t given to her at any moment. At the same time, she started contacting other speakers of the conference. At that point you know you made the right choice... the rest is mind boggling.
- igaray 7y ago
  Exactly this, you want to make the right choice and not be judgemental or act out of fear, but once the other party becomes needlessly belligerent one knows what to do.
- bduerst 7y ago
  Right? If you're asked not to speak at a conference, why would you go on to consistently prove it was the right decision to remove you?
  - somebodyelse1 7y ago
    She was not asked. She was invited, and then kicked out of buzzconf (said conference), and the motives are not clear. Then he said there was some kind of harassment of which we don't have any proof except what he say. Then the guy justifies the ban saying it is because of commercial reasons, but before that he said it was because of some mysterious people were not comfortable WITH THE BOYFRIEND (are we in china were we ban people because of their associations?). He changed the narrative. Ok, so which people? can he name them? are they anonymous? are they the guy's angry ex-girlfriend? (VERY likely) Do we have to believe him in this too? That's many things to believe.
    - unbalancedparen 7y ago
      Hello somebodyelse1. We had our commercial reasons to change the lineup. After living this, I think their reaction speaks for itself.
    - 7y ago
jawns 7y ago
> There is no way of making a technical conference if some people feel insecure or uncomfortable. I'm surprised to hear a conference organizer say this, because I think it's an unrealistic goal. There's a difference between people feeling as if their safety is being directly threatened by someone at a conference and someone feeling uncomfortable with a speaker because of, for instance, some of their personal views that they strongly disagree with. (Edit: In the original version of OP's blog post, it did not say why people were uncomfortable with the speaker. It said, "My team and I were contacted by different people to warn us that they were uncomfortable with the participation of a speaker and her partner in our conference. They told the organization of the conference that we would have problems with the speaker and his partner. his communication took us by surprise since we had performed a basic background check on the chosen speakers to avoid these kinds of issues." The blog post was later updated to clarify, "They told the organization of the conference that this couple had caused problems to women in the community," which is still pretty vague.) Obviously, conference organizers should be taking attendees' safety seriously and making sure they're not being subjected to harassment or unjust discrimination. But if you take a "comfort is priority #1" mindset, it gives a lot of ammunition to people who dislike a speaker's political views or choices they might make in their personal life. HN has had a bunch of previous threads about how welcoming conferences should be to speakers who hold unorthodox or unpopular opinions -- stuff that potential attendees might object to. I think the general consensus has been: If there is real evidence (e.g. past conduct at similar events) that they are likely to engage in conduct that directly threatens the safety of other attendees or otherwise violate the conference's code of conduct, it's a no-brainer. Disinvite. If they hold unorthodox, potentially objectionable opinions, but there's no evidence that they're going to violate the code of conduct, and the issue is that people merely feel uncomfortable being around someone who holds such views (or they feel as if the conference is implicitly endorsing such views by having the person as a speaker) then you take one of several paths: If the opinion is unquestionably beyond the pale, like something that 9 out of 10 attendees would say, "Yeah, that's truly awful," then it's a pretty easy decision. Disinvite. If the opinion is about an issue that is merely controversial -- meaning that in mainstream society, there is a wide range of opinions (e.g. any strong opinion about abortion or guns) -- then you have to do some weighing of principles vs. practical considerations. If maintaining the person as a speaker is going to tank your conference, then even if you don't support disinviting them as a matter of principle, you might decide it's necessary on a practical level. But if it's not going to tank your conference, then you might be able to lean more heavily on principles.
NewTexasKubern 7y ago
I read the whole thing. Sorry there are several things that do not match. First, you kicked out a female speaker because some people contacted you saying that they weren't 'comfortable with her and her partner. What the partner has to do in all of this? I think she was right in taking it badly, don't you think? Second, you saw her in another conference just a day after that. How is that possible? that cannot be a coincidence. Do you realize that if she finds you in another conference, you would look like a stalker to her. What she was doing in this conference? What were you doing? you don't specify that. Third, and most important. Who were those persons that contacted you at first? are they trustworthy? are they anonymous persons? because this smells too much like a smear campaign by a bunch of women and you are being played like a pawn. EDIT: Fourth: you seem to imply that you are being attacked by someone with knowledge of the Signal messenger. Do you really think that someone would use an attack like that on you? those attacks are very valuable. Sorry but it all points to you being very paranoid.
opportune 7y ago
Perhaps I missed it but is it known specifically why that person was uninvited to begin with?
- gregmac 7y ago
  > My team and I were contacted by different people to warn us that they were uncomfortable with the participation of a speaker and her boyfriend in our conference. They told the organization of the conference that this couple had caused problems to women in the community. > Several people who knew both of them confirmed that they had had problems with them in the past. We also talked with the organizers of other conferences and with dev that are part of gender groups focalized in technology and all of them recommended us to take distance from them.
  - opportune 7y ago
    I was hoping for something more specific i.e. concrete actions
    - emilfihlman 7y ago
      Probably controversial views on the internet, ie. nothing actually bad.
      - AgentME 7y ago
        I'm going to make a wild guess that it was more than that, given that they were the type of person to harass the conference organizer after the fact.
        lawnchair_larry 7y ago
        To be fair, most of the harassment allegations were vague and not even alleged to be perpetrated by the woman who was disinvited (like “a famous hacker knows her, and my Signal started doing weird things”).
    - 7y ago
gumby 7y ago
I am glad this was written without naming the people involved. Although I see nothing wrong with naming names in situations like this (see below) the lack of specific names meant I could focus on the experiences (as related by the poster) rather than having the specific people colour my opinion. The reason I think specifying people by name would have been OK is that 1 - they were presumably an issue for a number of attendees due to (prior) publicly stated positions and 2 - they apparently made subsequent statements via "broadcast" media such as Twitter, for anyone to peruse. This would be quite different if the people were more private, and if all discussions had been private and/or via non-broadcast tools like SMS or WhatsApp. Plus naming names could cause me to read what they had said and even disagree with the OP, at least on the baseline of non-inviting them. However the anonymity made the post much more interesting.
- electricslpnsld 7y ago
  > I see nothing wrong with naming names As he is pursuing legal options, I’m guessing his counsel told him not to.
  - baud147258 7y ago
    He named people (and showed pictures of messages) on Twitter in this convo [1], FWIW. At this point, I think it's more to avoid further escalation, as said in the article. [1]https://twitter.com/unbalancedparen/status/1122307059154870273 https://twitter.com/unbalancedparen/status/11223070591548702...
    - revvx 7y ago
      I watched this unfold on twitter, and in the organizer's defense, he only addressed the situation and the culprits after those people started a public discussion regarding the ban. The organizer was defending himself. It's a difficult situation to be in.
      - ambicapter 7y ago
        Moral of the story: Strike first, strike hard, no mercy? More reasonably but still on the aggressive side, does this mean that now we have to publicly announce when speaker invitations are rescinded to get ahead of the story?
Mirioron 7y ago
I was with the author until the diversity and equity part. Why does everything have to boil down to skin color and gender? I don't see why you need to offer this for a tech conference. It should be about ability and topics. Edit: I already regret making this post.
- wccrawford 7y ago
  Because there's a well-known imbalance, and not everything balances itself. Sometimes fairness requires stepping in and lending a helping hand to right an imbalance.
  - gameswithgo 7y ago
    should we be aggressively encouraging men to take up nursing?
    - lostdog 7y ago
      We are aggressively encouraging men to take up nursing.
      - donthate 7y ago
        I don't think I've ever seen a "Black Men Nurse"
      - CydeWeys 7y ago
        And for good reason. Nursing is physically demanding, especially seeing as how the majority of American adults are now obese. It's common for nurses to physically injure themselves trying to move a patient that they're simply not strong enough to handle. So yes, nursing needs more men, as the job shares a lot of the same physical requirements of other strength-requiring occupations such as construction.
    - MattGrommes 7y ago
      Sure, go for it. But I know a male nurse and he's never experienced anything remotely like what a lot of women I know in tech experience so it's not the equal thought you might think it is.
alexanderlabrie 7y ago
Small potatoes. I can't imagine legal action helping much. Move on from the unpleasant experience and help others who face greater injustices.
- duxup 7y ago
  >I can't imagine legal action helping much. If they're continuing to harass them as described, it seems like a prudent choice.
  - NewTexasKubern 7y ago
    Do you realize he is harassing them back, writing this post and posting all around internet?
  - alexanderlabrie 7y ago
    What's outlined in the article doesn't meet the burden of proof. There was a conflict and OP solipsistically experienced it as a big deal. Meanwhile, there's plenty of oppression and destitution in the world, but let's all focus on some low-level drama because it's more entertaining.
    - duxup 7y ago
      >doesn't meet the burden of proof. What burden of proof?
      - deleted 7y ago
        [deleted]
    - bradenb 7y ago
      It may be low-level drama to you, but clearly the author felt threatened by the couple. The spam messages, the threats to release personal information, etc. I would have no qualms with seeking legal action.
      - 7y ago
srpguy 7y ago
Insanity. If only her name could be published. People like that deserve to face consequences for their actions.
- NewTexasKubern 7y ago
  Dude, you created your account 12 hours ago and only posted in this thread. Who do you think you are fooling?
- baud147258 7y ago
  The name can be found by searching for 5 min on twitter, starting with the name of the conference and going down until you reach posts that are not announcements.
  - village-idiot 7y ago
    Let’s not encourage an internet mob.
    - baud147258 7y ago
      That's why I did not post any name. I just said that it was easy enough to be found (right now since tweets had been deleted it might be more complicated)
MagicPropmaker 7y ago
I'm a big fan of "unbalancedparen". He's a great guy; smart and considerate. I think the Industry has invited this sort of bad behavior by rewarding Cry Bullies at conferences. People act enititled and they're not willing to put up with speakers who they may have political or philosophical problems with. Similarly, speakers are expecting privileged treatment too, like the spurned speaker in this blog posting. When there is a real problem, we're unsure who or what to believe. People will complain with the same force whether the problem is big or small. And everyone tries for a "gotcha" and then to have a Trial by Twitter.
- duxup 7y ago
  In the example ... there appear to be no "Cry Bullies" or similar action.
  - 0815test 7y ago
    > ..."At that precise moment I saw the former speaker. She was calling the security of the event and using her cellphone to record me. She yelling that I was at the conference to stalk her, and that I was harassing her and following her. I never thought something like this could ever happen. It is worth noting that, at this point, I had only talked over the phone with her once, met her in person also once and, as I stated before, I had received several persistent communications on her." Sure sounds like a "cry bully" to me. Despicable behavior for sure, and it does validate his decision to not have her at the conference (after he was made aware that her participation at the conference would be highly problematic to others - particularly women, in fact). Edit: Also a representative example from the twitter threads that were linked elsewhere in this comment thread: `"uh these people are like that, be careful. they take it out on someone, they see em as the enemy and they start to fuck legally, and you also start getting anonymous complaints". I feel like a fool, many knew and I did not. That's why these things have to be SPOKEN about, they shouldn't be hidden`
    - duxup 7y ago
      I'm not sure what you mean by "cry bully" at this point.
jacquesm 7y ago
Sounds like he made the right decision not to have her present. Any rejection that generates such a wave of hatred and downright threatening activity was certainly on good grounds, regardless of the situation before what happened afterwards validates it.
bquinlan 7y ago
I've been a co-convener for two Python conferences in Vancouver. The conferences were small (<200 people) but I don't remember the organization being as stressful as the article describes. For me, the key sources of stress were: 1. hoping that tickets and sponsorship would cover our costs (at some point you have to pay for your venue, flights for your keynotes, etc. and this happens before ticket sales open). I think that we lost a few hundred dollars on the first conference and donated a few hundred dollars to the Python Software Foundation on the second one. 2. the BBQ. For both years, I arranged a beach BBQ but didn't have enough budget to deal with contingencies in the event of rain (remember this is Vancouver so the chance definitely exists). My plan was to refund attendees if we canceled the BBQ but that would have been thousands of dollars out of my pocket and lots of disappointed people. Fortunately, it didn't rain in either years. I would say that convening a conference in a city where you have lots of connections really helps. For example, I was able to buy salmon direct from the docks for the BBQ because I knew someone who was willing to help me. I also used my family as the chefs (https://photos.app.goo.gl/C6yNzqMnBG98GxE36 https://photos.app.goo.gl/C6yNzqMnBG98GxE36). What I do remember being hard was not the planning but going without sleep during the conference itself. As a convener, I had to be at the venue before any attendees arrived, had to leave after the last attendee left and then still had to deal with issues, etc. for the next day. Still it was tonnes of fun!
- unbalancedparen 7y ago
  Some simple things (logistics, catering, etc) in countries like Argentina are more difficult. However, your are right. We had a LOT of fun last year. I think I am pessimistic because of everything that happened these last few weeks.
  - juliusmusseau 7y ago
    Good luck in the courts. Unfortunately that route is very slow. (You're probably looking at 1.5 to 3 years before you obtain any final orders - and then there's the issue of enforcing any orders you might obtain!)
- Ragnarork 7y ago
deleted 7y ago
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myself248 7y ago
Sounds like the same reason the Derbycon organizers aren't doing it again: https://www.derbycon.com/blog/derbycon-9-0-every-beginning-has-an-end/ https://www.derbycon.com/blog/derbycon-9-0-every-beginning-h...
- duxup 7y ago
  >This year, we had to handle issues that honestly, as an adult, we would never expect to have to handle from other adults. I had a similar experience in a class recently. I couldn't help but keep thinking "my 9 year old knows better than to behave like this" (and my 9 year old has his own developmental challenges). The behavior was really shocking considering everyone in the room was an adult. Unfortunately there wasn't much I felt I could do. It was a short class, and I had the impression that this person was well versed in pulling the appropriate levers to protect themselves from any negative reaction to their behavior whatever they didn't like by claiming privilege, race, sex etc whenever possible (this person made lots of conspicuous references the very first day and the second .. .and so on before trouble started). They were also always just some terrible victim of something or other ... but as time went on it was pretty clear that it was all just a system that allowed them to behave poorly, make outbursts and bully others. I specifically asked not to be in any groups with this person and my request was honored thankfully. To be clear I mentioned privilege, race, and sex, any consideration of those things was NOT the source of the problem, had there been none of that I'm certain that the person in question would have found other ways to manipulate the situation, their behavior was the real issue.
  - deleted 7y ago
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- xvector 7y ago
  > To put it in perspective, we had to deal with an individual that was verbally and mentally abusive to a number of our volunteer staff and security to the point where they were in tears. It sounds like the proper response to this is to tell the individual to "fuck off and never come back", but looks like popularity mattered too much to the Derbycon organizers: > Admittedly, we had no idea how to handle this person, and in fear of repercussion of removing this person, allowed them to stay at the conference in order to “not upset the masses”. Guys, the response to adults acting like children is to completely ignore them and kick them out of your discussions. They do not deserve to be a part of your forum. Perhaps tell them why you're doing so, so they can improve themselves, but there is no need to deal with their shit.
deleted 7y ago
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- deleted 7y ago
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emilfihlman 7y ago
https://twitter.com/unbalancedparen/status/1122307059154870273 https://twitter.com/unbalancedparen/status/11223070591548702... >Apart from this, @joycftw is related to people that doesn’t follow our code of conduct. Seems like Google's "by associating with these people we ban you" or China's social credit system. OP is hardly any better than the idiot harassing him.
deleted 7y ago
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draw_down 7y ago
The conference scene feels like such a hostile environment. I have my own reasons for not being interested in speaking, but even absent that, my desire to avoid anything resembling the above is much stronger than whatever desire to have people listen to me talk about computers. And that's just speaking; organizing is something I would never do, and really can't imagine how people put up with it. There is a conference I've gone to twice now and really enjoyed, so I'm going again this year. But I expect as this conference grows, eventually this stuff will come along with it and I'll stop attending. It's a shame, but I don't really pin this hostility on any particular group (ie, I'm not mad about "SJWs" or whatever). A lot of people acted in bad faith for a lot of years for us to reach this point. There is another poster in this thread talking about how "cry bullies" caused the problem. That kind of shit is not helping.
- 0815test 7y ago
  > The conference scene feels like such a hostile environment. It's a hostile environment either way - even the male speaker in this whole drama was widely known as "a male chauvinist who persecutes and intimidates women at sector conferences" - which is why he was so unwelcome in the first place! But sunlight is the best disinfectant - throw out with prejudice ANYONE who is publicly known to engage in intimidating behavior, whether they're of the "male chauvinist" or the "SJW" sort. Let the pox fall on both houses. (edit for the avoidance of doubt: I mean the dude who was disinvited by OP, of course.)
  - draw_down 7y ago
    I don't understand how that's supposed to solve the problem that the conference scene feels hostile. To the extent that there are "two sides", sure, condemn bad people on both sides. But that's just making sure the shittiness is distributed evenly. In other contexts, cancel culture is making everything terrible. This just sounds like more of that. (By the way, I'm not allowed to post more than twice in 2 hour spans so I can't respond further)
  - somebodyelse1 7y ago
    Dude, you are just repeating what he said in the post. He is not 'widely known as' nothing. Its all what he say. We dont know the other side.
enriquto 7y ago
The reaction of the organizer is very sad. Civilization is based on the peaceful collaboration of people who may hate each other. Disallowing such collaboration is, by definition, uncivilized. Being able to deal with people that make you very uncomfortable without creating a fuss is a fundamental requirement of adulthood. Regardless of the callous reaction of the un-invited person, it was not OK to un-invite them, at least for the reasons exposed in this article. The organizer says: > Being accused like that caused me harm. of course it did. Just like the harm you did by cancelling invitations on behalf of a hypothetical discomfort of other people. It is exactly the same behavior.
- bduerst 7y ago
  You missed this part: > Generally, the best scenario is to talk with the involved parties, to cooperate and to seek a solution that doesn’t make the problem bigger. This isn’t always possible. In this case they went public and accused me and I had to explain what happened. One of the parties involved wasn't interested in civilized collaboration, but making false accusations instead.
  - enriquto 7y ago
    He does not explain the whole story, so it is difficult to know. It does not really seem that he tried to talk to the person whose talk was cancelled (and who had probably already bought plane tickets, etc). I agree that, in the end, it is true that this person was a troublemaker that should not have been invited in the first place. However, it seems from the text that the organizers decided to cancel the invitation before receiving any input whatsoever from the concerned person. I cannot see how this is ok. Imagine that this person has been bullied in such a way out of a dozen conferences by a concerted effort of a few colleagues that hate her. And for this last conference, she exploded with great and not completely unjustified ire. Whatever, it is a bit absurd to have an opinion on this question without information from both sides.
    - bduerst 7y ago
      Why are you trying to create a scenario that justifies the speaker's false accusations and harassment of the organizer?
wolco 7y ago
Many thoughts. Change communication channel immediately. Don't invite someone and when they arrive tell them they are not welcome to speak. Post a list of speakers before, get your feedback and live with your decisions. This is the best thing that could happen to your event. Use this time wisely to boost your event. Is it just me or is there a group of people who seem to go to every conference?
- igaray 7y ago
  The industry is really small, more so in other parts of the world such as Buenos Aires. The 'scene', people who actually leave their keyboards or don't engage outside of 9-to-5 is even smaller. Many things were learned. More research was probably warranted. Also, it's not the same to organize a conference for an existing community organized around some technology, e.g. Ruby, Python, NodeJS, etc and organizing an event that tries to span industry topics, it's much harder to know everyone or get references.
- revvx 7y ago
  > Don't invite someone and when they arrive tell them they are not welcome to speak. Post a list of speakers before, get your feedback and live with your decisions. The speaker was notified in April 25. The conference will happen in mid-June. She was given fair warning.
  - oidmortales 7y ago
    You don't invite somebody and then just uninvite her with no provocation. No without some kind of compensation.
kazinator 7y ago
Would some disconnected third party be able to kindly doxx this douchebag couple for the benefit of everyone else? Thanks.
- MrBuddyCasino 7y ago
  There is no need to, its already out in the open: https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:2oL_vhVEIuoJ:https://twitter.com/unbalancedparen/status/1122307053610065922+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:2oL_vh...
- neilv 7y ago
  Please do not do doxx, nor take up pitchforks -- not in this case, nor in any other. We can hear someone's report of a terrible experience, and think about the problem, and provide support to that person. However, judgment and sentencing of some other person has very different standards of proof and process.
  - deleted 7y ago
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  - kazinator 7y ago
    > judgment and sentencing of some other person has very different standards of proof and process. If this other party is known to many unrelated people over numerous past events for that pattern of behavior, it seems like fair game to me. People out there already know; it's just "connecting the doxx" for the rest.
    - neilv 7y ago
      That might make sense, for where you, or the writer, are located. I'm in the US, and we have ideals (not always respected) about due process, and systems to support that. You might want to consider: how much proof did you actually have when you called for doxxing, and how easy would it be for an adversary to manufacture that amount of proof? Also, it seems that doxxing tends to result in people with the worst judgment taking vigilante action first, so the standard for doxxing must consider that.
throw1231234 7y ago
This is a serious question that I had to make a throwaway to ask: How does someone determine what the 'right' balance is of gender, race, etc, for their given event? It seems like people often pick 50% female and 50% male, but why? What if their field is 90% male to begin with? What if their field is 90% female to begin with? It doesn't make sense for me to hire programmers and ensure they are 50% female just as it doesn't make sense for me to hire psychologists and ensure they're 50% male. If you want more females to be interested in software, why don't you encourage it when they're young, rather than trying to force your conference to over-represent them over the baseline.
goodrubyist 7y ago
I hope the guy who wrote this post didn't choose to disinvite those two just because they had unfashionable views on social justice. Morality /=/ fashion.
- somebodyelse1 7y ago
  It looks like it was exactly because of this.
- unethical_ban 7y ago
  Reading the rest of the story, and presuming the statements are true, I doubt the decision was made based solely on abstract political opinion.
  - goodrubyist 7y ago
    I hope that's the case!
somebodyelse1 7y ago
I know about this case. I can say the following: Most of the facts stated on this post are lies, or lies by omissions. This guy has an harassment lawsuit against him and hes trying to protect himself. He harassed the girl in front of many witnesses in another conference IN WHICH HE WAS NOT INVITED AND THE GIRL WAS A SPEAKER, and was promptly removed from said conference because of that. She filed a police report against him for this. The conference is FLISOL CABA 2019, ask the organizers about what happened there to Federico Carrone (unabalancedparens) the organizer of buzzconf. Here people are doxing and attacking a couple, dont you realize he's posting this all over internet to cause harm, to smear them, while the couple is silent? Doesn't that ring a bell? He might be the harasser! Many things in his story don't match. This is a he-said she-said situation. The only thing sure is this: He really believe somebody is attacking him using a Signal messenger cyber-attack that is worth maybe millions on the black market? that detail alone can show you that we are talking about a highly paranoid guy.
- bootloop 7y ago
  Not sure if its worth to comment but both statements (blog post or your comment too) could be lies because neither provided any proove. So at the end the outcome of the lawsuit will give some closure and until then any comment on this matter is without value.
- sophiedeziel 7y ago
  No sure if I am willing to trust a comment from an account created 40 minutes ago.
- deleted 7y ago
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gwbas1c 7y ago
I wish I knew why so many conference attendees requested that such a person be removed from the conference. Why? Part of diversity means being able to cooperate with people who have different viewpoints and ideologies. Further reading about this person's aggressive and retaliatory behavior implies that this person has issues that should keep her out of conferences. But, I still think it's important to understand why attendees ask that she be removed.
- stronglikedan 7y ago
  Sometimes, people who have different viewpoints and ideologies are, themselves, not able to cooperate with a diverse group. This seems like one of those times, and I wouldn't be surprised if her reputation preceded her within the community.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
markvdb 7y ago
Organising a conference is hard. Creating value is hard. Farting on social media is easy. As a conference organiser, handling social media fires is especially hard, because you're at peak load already. You're organising a conference!
- wysifnwyg 7y ago
  Farting on social media isn't easy at all! The security guards at Facebook won't let me in after the last time.
lgleason 7y ago
The problem with conferences is that they have become watered down with political agendas instead of focusing on learning and quality content. With this person's comments, the "troublemaker" might indeed be a problematic person, but, given what I've seen, usually when a group of women target another women it has very little to do with actual harassment and more to do with differences in political ideology.
- NewTexasKubern 7y ago
  > when a group of women target another women it has very little to do with actual harassment and more to do with differences in political ideology. BINGO!
mathgenius 7y ago
I'm very sorry this person is having to suffer all this crap, but > conferences tend to net to a loss. If you put out a lot of energy, for "free", then you often get shit in return. If you don't take responsibility for what you are getting back for all your hard effort, things can easily go pear-shaped. This seems to be one of those mystical laws of the universe. I'm not saying you should be selfish, or charge big bucks for your time. There are plenty of ways for people to give something back, and you need to make sure that is happening too.
hkai 7y ago
I couldn't understand anything. What sort of woman was disinvited and why others were uncomfortable with her?
- commandlinefan 7y ago
  He danced around that so much I feel like something is being hidden (besides somebody’s identity).
  - somebodyelse1 7y ago
    Its obvious that he is doing incredible mental gymnastics to try and workaround the problem that this stupid internet drama was created by group of women hating on a girl because they dont like her (or want to 'cancel' her for some reason), and are using this poor bastard money and credibility as their weapon against her and everybody around her.
  - village-idiot 7y ago
    Assuming that the story is true as written, one of the first reactions the subject had to a negative experience was to have her boyfriend harass the conference organizer’s girlfriend. I think that would probably make women feel unsafe.
lawnchair_larry 7y ago
“We also talked with the organizers of other conferences and with dev that are part of gender groups focalized in technology and all of them recommended us to take distance from them.” Experience tells me author is probably in the wrong here based on this sentence alone. This screams of those extreme lefties that want to police everybody else with their safe spaces and trigger warnings, then deplatform and unperson anyone who doesn’t agree with their agenda or worldview. Author should have disinvited those people instead. ”It was a difficult decision in which we prioritized the participation of the public that had reached out to us while also knowing that many people, especially women, wouldn’t come to the conference if we did nothing about this situation.” This reeks of BS to me. We are supposed to believe that the presence of this particular woman at a conference will discourage women from attending? What the hell? The reason for the extreme reaction was likely because it pissed them off that these extremists got their way, and successfully censored and unpersoned another victim. Admit it, you’d be pissed too. If you don’t like one of the speakers, and you’re an adult, you skip that talk. Stop creating drama and find a real purpose in life other than being a professional victim.
- BonesJustice 7y ago
  One can be justifiably angry without becoming completely unhinged. I have no idea who was actually in the wrong here, but I would tend to side with the person making the calm, measured response. All things being equal, if someone acts nuts, they probably are.
- village-idiot 7y ago
  > The reason for the extreme reaction was likely because it pissed them off that these extremists got their way, and successfully censored and unpersoned another victim. Admit it, you’d be pissed too. Sure, I’d be pissed. I’d also not harass the organizer, their friends, and their employers as revenge. I’d also consider doxxing and false accusations to be beyond the pale even if I felt angry about losing a conference spot. In fact, the act of doing that would prove that the organizer was completely correct in kicking this person out, and that the extremist was the speaker and not the organizer.
qbaqbaqba 7y ago
The unnamed person could probably describe her experience in the same words as the author did here. Author made her uncomfortable, organizers may have consulted some gender or wherever oriented groups. We don't know the other side of the story.
valtism 7y ago
I can't believe how many people are attacking the author here. He has had to deal with things that nobody should have to, and the couple he uninvited are clearly unhinged and he made a good decision uninviting them. My sympathies go out to him, and I hope he get support in this, and it doesn't suck up their will to do good things for the community like organise conferences.
ncmncm 7y ago
I understand why the writer is not warning us who these people are. But if you know, please spill.

Sorry to hear about the harassment, thats never fun to deal with. On the plus side, sounds like OP made the right call to disinvite the person from the conference. You can tell an awful lot about a person by how they handle rejection.

londons_explore 7y ago
As long as that speaker was one of many, I wouldnt have uninvited them. If the audience has an issue with one speaker out of 10, they can take a lunch break then. If it's one out of 2, I can see why they might not want to attend. Using inclusion or exclusion to punish someone for past actions I would try to avoid at all costs. If someone has broken the law, the legal system is there to do punishment. It isn't your role as conference organiser/colleague/etc. to punish. You are not qualified to make decisions as to the veracity of the claim. Perhaps the furthest I'd go is saying to them "you (rightly or wrongly) have a reputation for X. Please make sure none of that happens during the conference."
- village-idiot 7y ago
  I feel that such policies fall apart when faced with truly toxic people. If the claims of the above article are true, I would consider the people being mentioned to be truly toxic.
- lawnchair_larry 7y ago
  This is how adults should behave. And if people have a personal problem with the person existing at the conference (as in, this isn’t actually a violent person, and it’s an issue of discomfort as opposed to safety) that cannot be solved by avoiding them, then it’s probably those people who shouldn’t be there. Or anywhere else really.

commandlinefan 7y ago

It sounds like you compromised on your principles and are now paying the price. Lesson learned?

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
danharaj 7y ago
Could you elaborate?
mrec 7y ago
Which principles do you think they compromised on?
- hitekker 7y ago
  The GP saw a victim and a chance to hurt them. Pure sadism, that's all.

leereeves 7y ago

How can we know if your side of the story is the truth? Either way, this is an excellent example of why the Twitter Justice System is a bad idea.

duxup 7y ago
One thing is this person didn't mention the other people. Telling this story this way isn't likely to be seen as attacking someone else / not a huge benefit to them / perhaps LESS of an incentive to lie..
- wccrawford 7y ago
  From the article, it sounds like the only reason they didn't name the people was that their lawyer told them not to.
  - duxup 7y ago
    Maybe, but that doesn't change that there's not a lot of value here as far as any given he said he said type situation. I can belive the writer, it really changes nothing as far as who they're describing as I've still no idea who they are / the author isn't really changing my opinion about anything.
  - unbalancedparen 7y ago
    That is not correct. I have no interest in damaging anybody. That is why I did not write names and other things that happened in the article. He has already been banned from other conferences. I am trying to protect myself based on what happened and other people told me, I assure you the last few weeks have been a hell for me. My only objective is to be able to run my conference as I want and not to be harrassed.
    - leereeves 7y ago
      But you did identify the woman on Twitter. I won't link to it because I don't think we should share it further, but someone posted it in this discussion. I sympathize but I think the court of public opinion is unlikely to do anything other than further escalate things.

duxup 7y ago

>Nevertheless, we didn’t expect a threatening reaction followed by several emails, Twitter DMs, persistent phone calls and Whatsapp messages. She even texted my girlfriend, one of the organizers of the conference, whose telephone number is not public and wasn’t given to her at any moment. At the same time, she started contacting other speakers of the conference. At that point you know you made the right choice... the rest is mind boggling.

igaray 7y ago
Exactly this, you want to make the right choice and not be judgemental or act out of fear, but once the other party becomes needlessly belligerent one knows what to do.
bduerst 7y ago
Right? If you're asked not to speak at a conference, why would you go on to consistently prove it was the right decision to remove you?
- somebodyelse1 7y ago
  She was not asked. She was invited, and then kicked out of buzzconf (said conference), and the motives are not clear. Then he said there was some kind of harassment of which we don't have any proof except what he say. Then the guy justifies the ban saying it is because of commercial reasons, but before that he said it was because of some mysterious people were not comfortable WITH THE BOYFRIEND (are we in china were we ban people because of their associations?). He changed the narrative. Ok, so which people? can he name them? are they anonymous? are they the guy's angry ex-girlfriend? (VERY likely) Do we have to believe him in this too? That's many things to believe.
  - unbalancedparen 7y ago
    Hello somebodyelse1. We had our commercial reasons to change the lineup. After living this, I think their reaction speaks for itself.
  - 7y ago

jawns 7y ago

> There is no way of making a technical conference if some people feel insecure or uncomfortable. I'm surprised to hear a conference organizer say this, because I think it's an unrealistic goal. There's a difference between people feeling as if their safety is being directly threatened by someone at a conference and someone feeling uncomfortable with a speaker because of, for instance, some of their personal views that they strongly disagree with. (Edit: In the original version of OP's blog post, it did not say why people were uncomfortable with the speaker. It said, "My team and I were contacted by different people to warn us that they were uncomfortable with the participation of a speaker and her partner in our conference. They told the organization of the conference that we would have problems with the speaker and his partner. his communication took us by surprise since we had performed a basic background check on the chosen speakers to avoid these kinds of issues." The blog post was later updated to clarify, "They told the organization of the conference that this couple had caused problems to women in the community," which is still pretty vague.) Obviously, conference organizers should be taking attendees' safety seriously and making sure they're not being subjected to harassment or unjust discrimination. But if you take a "comfort is priority #1" mindset, it gives a lot of ammunition to people who dislike a speaker's political views or choices they might make in their personal life. HN has had a bunch of previous threads about how welcoming conferences should be to speakers who hold unorthodox or unpopular opinions -- stuff that potential attendees might object to. I think the general consensus has been: If there is real evidence (e.g. past conduct at similar events) that they are likely to engage in conduct that directly threatens the safety of other attendees or otherwise violate the conference's code of conduct, it's a no-brainer. Disinvite. If they hold unorthodox, potentially objectionable opinions, but there's no evidence that they're going to violate the code of conduct, and the issue is that people merely feel uncomfortable being around someone who holds such views (or they feel as if the conference is implicitly endorsing such views by having the person as a speaker) then you take one of several paths: If the opinion is unquestionably beyond the pale, like something that 9 out of 10 attendees would say, "Yeah, that's truly awful," then it's a pretty easy decision. Disinvite. If the opinion is about an issue that is merely controversial -- meaning that in mainstream society, there is a wide range of opinions (e.g. any strong opinion about abortion or guns) -- then you have to do some weighing of principles vs. practical considerations. If maintaining the person as a speaker is going to tank your conference, then even if you don't support disinviting them as a matter of principle, you might decide it's necessary on a practical level. But if it's not going to tank your conference, then you might be able to lean more heavily on principles.

NewTexasKubern 7y ago

I read the whole thing. Sorry there are several things that do not match. First, you kicked out a female speaker because some people contacted you saying that they weren't 'comfortable with her and her partner. What the partner has to do in all of this? I think she was right in taking it badly, don't you think? Second, you saw her in another conference just a day after that. How is that possible? that cannot be a coincidence. Do you realize that if she finds you in another conference, you would look like a stalker to her. What she was doing in this conference? What were you doing? you don't specify that. Third, and most important. Who were those persons that contacted you at first? are they trustworthy? are they anonymous persons? because this smells too much like a smear campaign by a bunch of women and you are being played like a pawn. EDIT: Fourth: you seem to imply that you are being attacked by someone with knowledge of the Signal messenger. Do you really think that someone would use an attack like that on you? those attacks are very valuable. Sorry but it all points to you being very paranoid.

opportune 7y ago

Perhaps I missed it but is it known specifically why that person was uninvited to begin with?

gregmac 7y ago
> My team and I were contacted by different people to warn us that they were uncomfortable with the participation of a speaker and her boyfriend in our conference. They told the organization of the conference that this couple had caused problems to women in the community. > Several people who knew both of them confirmed that they had had problems with them in the past. We also talked with the organizers of other conferences and with dev that are part of gender groups focalized in technology and all of them recommended us to take distance from them.
- opportune 7y ago
  I was hoping for something more specific i.e. concrete actions
  - emilfihlman 7y ago
    Probably controversial views on the internet, ie. nothing actually bad.
    - AgentME 7y ago
      I'm going to make a wild guess that it was more than that, given that they were the type of person to harass the conference organizer after the fact.
      - lawnchair_larry 7y ago
        To be fair, most of the harassment allegations were vague and not even alleged to be perpetrated by the woman who was disinvited (like “a famous hacker knows her, and my Signal started doing weird things”).
  - 7y ago

gumby 7y ago

I am glad this was written without naming the people involved. Although I see nothing wrong with naming names in situations like this (see below) the lack of specific names meant I could focus on the experiences (as related by the poster) rather than having the specific people colour my opinion. The reason I think specifying people by name would have been OK is that 1 - they were presumably an issue for a number of attendees due to (prior) publicly stated positions and 2 - they apparently made subsequent statements via "broadcast" media such as Twitter, for anyone to peruse. This would be quite different if the people were more private, and if all discussions had been private and/or via non-broadcast tools like SMS or WhatsApp. Plus naming names could cause me to read what they had said and even disagree with the OP, at least on the baseline of non-inviting them. However the anonymity made the post much more interesting.

electricslpnsld 7y ago
> I see nothing wrong with naming names As he is pursuing legal options, I’m guessing his counsel told him not to.
- baud147258 7y ago
  He named people (and showed pictures of messages) on Twitter in this convo [1], FWIW. At this point, I think it's more to avoid further escalation, as said in the article. [1]https://twitter.com/unbalancedparen/status/1122307059154870273 https://twitter.com/unbalancedparen/status/11223070591548702...
  - revvx 7y ago
    I watched this unfold on twitter, and in the organizer's defense, he only addressed the situation and the culprits after those people started a public discussion regarding the ban. The organizer was defending himself. It's a difficult situation to be in.
    - ambicapter 7y ago
      Moral of the story: Strike first, strike hard, no mercy? More reasonably but still on the aggressive side, does this mean that now we have to publicly announce when speaker invitations are rescinded to get ahead of the story?

Mirioron 7y ago

I was with the author until the diversity and equity part. Why does everything have to boil down to skin color and gender? I don't see why you need to offer this for a tech conference. It should be about ability and topics. Edit: I already regret making this post.

wccrawford 7y ago
Because there's a well-known imbalance, and not everything balances itself. Sometimes fairness requires stepping in and lending a helping hand to right an imbalance.
- gameswithgo 7y ago
  should we be aggressively encouraging men to take up nursing?
  - lostdog 7y ago
    We are aggressively encouraging men to take up nursing.
    - donthate 7y ago
      I don't think I've ever seen a "Black Men Nurse"
    - CydeWeys 7y ago
      And for good reason. Nursing is physically demanding, especially seeing as how the majority of American adults are now obese. It's common for nurses to physically injure themselves trying to move a patient that they're simply not strong enough to handle. So yes, nursing needs more men, as the job shares a lot of the same physical requirements of other strength-requiring occupations such as construction.
  - MattGrommes 7y ago
    Sure, go for it. But I know a male nurse and he's never experienced anything remotely like what a lot of women I know in tech experience so it's not the equal thought you might think it is.

alexanderlabrie 7y ago

Small potatoes. I can't imagine legal action helping much. Move on from the unpleasant experience and help others who face greater injustices.

duxup 7y ago
>I can't imagine legal action helping much. If they're continuing to harass them as described, it seems like a prudent choice.
- NewTexasKubern 7y ago
  Do you realize he is harassing them back, writing this post and posting all around internet?
- alexanderlabrie 7y ago
  What's outlined in the article doesn't meet the burden of proof. There was a conflict and OP solipsistically experienced it as a big deal. Meanwhile, there's plenty of oppression and destitution in the world, but let's all focus on some low-level drama because it's more entertaining.
  - duxup 7y ago
    >doesn't meet the burden of proof. What burden of proof?
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
  - bradenb 7y ago
    It may be low-level drama to you, but clearly the author felt threatened by the couple. The spam messages, the threats to release personal information, etc. I would have no qualms with seeking legal action.
    - 7y ago

srpguy 7y ago

Insanity. If only her name could be published. People like that deserve to face consequences for their actions.

NewTexasKubern 7y ago
Dude, you created your account 12 hours ago and only posted in this thread. Who do you think you are fooling?
baud147258 7y ago
The name can be found by searching for 5 min on twitter, starting with the name of the conference and going down until you reach posts that are not announcements.
- village-idiot 7y ago
  Let’s not encourage an internet mob.
  - baud147258 7y ago
    That's why I did not post any name. I just said that it was easy enough to be found (right now since tweets had been deleted it might be more complicated)

MagicPropmaker 7y ago

I'm a big fan of "unbalancedparen". He's a great guy; smart and considerate. I think the Industry has invited this sort of bad behavior by rewarding Cry Bullies at conferences. People act enititled and they're not willing to put up with speakers who they may have political or philosophical problems with. Similarly, speakers are expecting privileged treatment too, like the spurned speaker in this blog posting. When there is a real problem, we're unsure who or what to believe. People will complain with the same force whether the problem is big or small. And everyone tries for a "gotcha" and then to have a Trial by Twitter.

duxup 7y ago
In the example ... there appear to be no "Cry Bullies" or similar action.
- 0815test 7y ago
  > ..."At that precise moment I saw the former speaker. She was calling the security of the event and using her cellphone to record me. She yelling that I was at the conference to stalk her, and that I was harassing her and following her. I never thought something like this could ever happen. It is worth noting that, at this point, I had only talked over the phone with her once, met her in person also once and, as I stated before, I had received several persistent communications on her." Sure sounds like a "cry bully" to me. Despicable behavior for sure, and it does validate his decision to not have her at the conference (after he was made aware that her participation at the conference would be highly problematic to others - particularly women, in fact). Edit: Also a representative example from the twitter threads that were linked elsewhere in this comment thread: `"uh these people are like that, be careful. they take it out on someone, they see em as the enemy and they start to fuck legally, and you also start getting anonymous complaints". I feel like a fool, many knew and I did not. That's why these things have to be SPOKEN about, they shouldn't be hidden`
  - duxup 7y ago
    I'm not sure what you mean by "cry bully" at this point.

jacquesm 7y ago

Sounds like he made the right decision not to have her present. Any rejection that generates such a wave of hatred and downright threatening activity was certainly on good grounds, regardless of the situation before what happened afterwards validates it.

bquinlan 7y ago

I've been a co-convener for two Python conferences in Vancouver. The conferences were small (<200 people) but I don't remember the organization being as stressful as the article describes. For me, the key sources of stress were: 1. hoping that tickets and sponsorship would cover our costs (at some point you have to pay for your venue, flights for your keynotes, etc. and this happens before ticket sales open). I think that we lost a few hundred dollars on the first conference and donated a few hundred dollars to the Python Software Foundation on the second one. 2. the BBQ. For both years, I arranged a beach BBQ but didn't have enough budget to deal with contingencies in the event of rain (remember this is Vancouver so the chance definitely exists). My plan was to refund attendees if we canceled the BBQ but that would have been thousands of dollars out of my pocket and lots of disappointed people. Fortunately, it didn't rain in either years. I would say that convening a conference in a city where you have lots of connections really helps. For example, I was able to buy salmon direct from the docks for the BBQ because I knew someone who was willing to help me. I also used my family as the chefs (https://photos.app.goo.gl/C6yNzqMnBG98GxE36 https://photos.app.goo.gl/C6yNzqMnBG98GxE36). What I do remember being hard was not the planning but going without sleep during the conference itself. As a convener, I had to be at the venue before any attendees arrived, had to leave after the last attendee left and then still had to deal with issues, etc. for the next day. Still it was tonnes of fun!

unbalancedparen 7y ago
Some simple things (logistics, catering, etc) in countries like Argentina are more difficult. However, your are right. We had a LOT of fun last year. I think I am pessimistic because of everything that happened these last few weeks.
- juliusmusseau 7y ago
  Good luck in the courts. Unfortunately that route is very slow. (You're probably looking at 1.5 to 3 years before you obtain any final orders - and then there's the issue of enforcing any orders you might obtain!)
Ragnarork 7y ago

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

myself248 7y ago

Sounds like the same reason the Derbycon organizers aren't doing it again: https://www.derbycon.com/blog/derbycon-9-0-every-beginning-has-an-end/ https://www.derbycon.com/blog/derbycon-9-0-every-beginning-h...

duxup 7y ago
>This year, we had to handle issues that honestly, as an adult, we would never expect to have to handle from other adults. I had a similar experience in a class recently. I couldn't help but keep thinking "my 9 year old knows better than to behave like this" (and my 9 year old has his own developmental challenges). The behavior was really shocking considering everyone in the room was an adult. Unfortunately there wasn't much I felt I could do. It was a short class, and I had the impression that this person was well versed in pulling the appropriate levers to protect themselves from any negative reaction to their behavior whatever they didn't like by claiming privilege, race, sex etc whenever possible (this person made lots of conspicuous references the very first day and the second .. .and so on before trouble started). They were also always just some terrible victim of something or other ... but as time went on it was pretty clear that it was all just a system that allowed them to behave poorly, make outbursts and bully others. I specifically asked not to be in any groups with this person and my request was honored thankfully. To be clear I mentioned privilege, race, and sex, any consideration of those things was NOT the source of the problem, had there been none of that I'm certain that the person in question would have found other ways to manipulate the situation, their behavior was the real issue.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
xvector 7y ago
> To put it in perspective, we had to deal with an individual that was verbally and mentally abusive to a number of our volunteer staff and security to the point where they were in tears. It sounds like the proper response to this is to tell the individual to "fuck off and never come back", but looks like popularity mattered too much to the Derbycon organizers: > Admittedly, we had no idea how to handle this person, and in fear of repercussion of removing this person, allowed them to stay at the conference in order to “not upset the masses”. Guys, the response to adults acting like children is to completely ignore them and kick them out of your discussions. They do not deserve to be a part of your forum. Perhaps tell them why you're doing so, so they can improve themselves, but there is no need to deal with their shit.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

deleted 7y ago
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emilfihlman 7y ago

https://twitter.com/unbalancedparen/status/1122307059154870273 https://twitter.com/unbalancedparen/status/11223070591548702... >Apart from this, @joycftw is related to people that doesn’t follow our code of conduct. Seems like Google's "by associating with these people we ban you" or China's social credit system. OP is hardly any better than the idiot harassing him.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

draw_down 7y ago

The conference scene feels like such a hostile environment. I have my own reasons for not being interested in speaking, but even absent that, my desire to avoid anything resembling the above is much stronger than whatever desire to have people listen to me talk about computers. And that's just speaking; organizing is something I would never do, and really can't imagine how people put up with it. There is a conference I've gone to twice now and really enjoyed, so I'm going again this year. But I expect as this conference grows, eventually this stuff will come along with it and I'll stop attending. It's a shame, but I don't really pin this hostility on any particular group (ie, I'm not mad about "SJWs" or whatever). A lot of people acted in bad faith for a lot of years for us to reach this point. There is another poster in this thread talking about how "cry bullies" caused the problem. That kind of shit is not helping.

0815test 7y ago
> The conference scene feels like such a hostile environment. It's a hostile environment either way - even the male speaker in this whole drama was widely known as "a male chauvinist who persecutes and intimidates women at sector conferences" - which is why he was so unwelcome in the first place! But sunlight is the best disinfectant - throw out with prejudice ANYONE who is publicly known to engage in intimidating behavior, whether they're of the "male chauvinist" or the "SJW" sort. Let the pox fall on both houses. (edit for the avoidance of doubt: I mean the dude who was disinvited by OP, of course.)
- draw_down 7y ago
  I don't understand how that's supposed to solve the problem that the conference scene feels hostile. To the extent that there are "two sides", sure, condemn bad people on both sides. But that's just making sure the shittiness is distributed evenly. In other contexts, cancel culture is making everything terrible. This just sounds like more of that. (By the way, I'm not allowed to post more than twice in 2 hour spans so I can't respond further)
- somebodyelse1 7y ago
  Dude, you are just repeating what he said in the post. He is not 'widely known as' nothing. Its all what he say. We dont know the other side.

enriquto 7y ago

The reaction of the organizer is very sad. Civilization is based on the peaceful collaboration of people who may hate each other. Disallowing such collaboration is, by definition, uncivilized. Being able to deal with people that make you very uncomfortable without creating a fuss is a fundamental requirement of adulthood. Regardless of the callous reaction of the un-invited person, it was not OK to un-invite them, at least for the reasons exposed in this article. The organizer says: > Being accused like that caused me harm. of course it did. Just like the harm you did by cancelling invitations on behalf of a hypothetical discomfort of other people. It is exactly the same behavior.

bduerst 7y ago
You missed this part: > Generally, the best scenario is to talk with the involved parties, to cooperate and to seek a solution that doesn’t make the problem bigger. This isn’t always possible. In this case they went public and accused me and I had to explain what happened. One of the parties involved wasn't interested in civilized collaboration, but making false accusations instead.
- enriquto 7y ago
  He does not explain the whole story, so it is difficult to know. It does not really seem that he tried to talk to the person whose talk was cancelled (and who had probably already bought plane tickets, etc). I agree that, in the end, it is true that this person was a troublemaker that should not have been invited in the first place. However, it seems from the text that the organizers decided to cancel the invitation before receiving any input whatsoever from the concerned person. I cannot see how this is ok. Imagine that this person has been bullied in such a way out of a dozen conferences by a concerted effort of a few colleagues that hate her. And for this last conference, she exploded with great and not completely unjustified ire. Whatever, it is a bit absurd to have an opinion on this question without information from both sides.
  - bduerst 7y ago
    Why are you trying to create a scenario that justifies the speaker's false accusations and harassment of the organizer?

wolco 7y ago

Many thoughts. Change communication channel immediately. Don't invite someone and when they arrive tell them they are not welcome to speak. Post a list of speakers before, get your feedback and live with your decisions. This is the best thing that could happen to your event. Use this time wisely to boost your event. Is it just me or is there a group of people who seem to go to every conference?

igaray 7y ago
The industry is really small, more so in other parts of the world such as Buenos Aires. The 'scene', people who actually leave their keyboards or don't engage outside of 9-to-5 is even smaller. Many things were learned. More research was probably warranted. Also, it's not the same to organize a conference for an existing community organized around some technology, e.g. Ruby, Python, NodeJS, etc and organizing an event that tries to span industry topics, it's much harder to know everyone or get references.
revvx 7y ago
> Don't invite someone and when they arrive tell them they are not welcome to speak. Post a list of speakers before, get your feedback and live with your decisions. The speaker was notified in April 25. The conference will happen in mid-June. She was given fair warning.
- oidmortales 7y ago
  You don't invite somebody and then just uninvite her with no provocation. No without some kind of compensation.

kazinator 7y ago

Would some disconnected third party be able to kindly doxx this douchebag couple for the benefit of everyone else? Thanks.

MrBuddyCasino 7y ago
There is no need to, its already out in the open: https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:2oL_vhVEIuoJ:https://twitter.com/unbalancedparen/status/1122307053610065922+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:2oL_vh...
neilv 7y ago
Please do not do doxx, nor take up pitchforks -- not in this case, nor in any other. We can hear someone's report of a terrible experience, and think about the problem, and provide support to that person. However, judgment and sentencing of some other person has very different standards of proof and process.
- deleted 7y ago
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- kazinator 7y ago
  > judgment and sentencing of some other person has very different standards of proof and process. If this other party is known to many unrelated people over numerous past events for that pattern of behavior, it seems like fair game to me. People out there already know; it's just "connecting the doxx" for the rest.
  - neilv 7y ago
    That might make sense, for where you, or the writer, are located. I'm in the US, and we have ideals (not always respected) about due process, and systems to support that. You might want to consider: how much proof did you actually have when you called for doxxing, and how easy would it be for an adversary to manufacture that amount of proof? Also, it seems that doxxing tends to result in people with the worst judgment taking vigilante action first, so the standard for doxxing must consider that.

throw1231234 7y ago

This is a serious question that I had to make a throwaway to ask: How does someone determine what the 'right' balance is of gender, race, etc, for their given event? It seems like people often pick 50% female and 50% male, but why? What if their field is 90% male to begin with? What if their field is 90% female to begin with? It doesn't make sense for me to hire programmers and ensure they are 50% female just as it doesn't make sense for me to hire psychologists and ensure they're 50% male. If you want more females to be interested in software, why don't you encourage it when they're young, rather than trying to force your conference to over-represent them over the baseline.

goodrubyist 7y ago

I hope the guy who wrote this post didn't choose to disinvite those two just because they had unfashionable views on social justice. Morality /=/ fashion.

somebodyelse1 7y ago
It looks like it was exactly because of this.
unethical_ban 7y ago
Reading the rest of the story, and presuming the statements are true, I doubt the decision was made based solely on abstract political opinion.
- goodrubyist 7y ago
  I hope that's the case!

somebodyelse1 7y ago

I know about this case. I can say the following: Most of the facts stated on this post are lies, or lies by omissions. This guy has an harassment lawsuit against him and hes trying to protect himself. He harassed the girl in front of many witnesses in another conference IN WHICH HE WAS NOT INVITED AND THE GIRL WAS A SPEAKER, and was promptly removed from said conference because of that. She filed a police report against him for this. The conference is FLISOL CABA 2019, ask the organizers about what happened there to Federico Carrone (unabalancedparens) the organizer of buzzconf. Here people are doxing and attacking a couple, dont you realize he's posting this all over internet to cause harm, to smear them, while the couple is silent? Doesn't that ring a bell? He might be the harasser! Many things in his story don't match. This is a he-said she-said situation. The only thing sure is this: He really believe somebody is attacking him using a Signal messenger cyber-attack that is worth maybe millions on the black market? that detail alone can show you that we are talking about a highly paranoid guy.

bootloop 7y ago
Not sure if its worth to comment but both statements (blog post or your comment too) could be lies because neither provided any proove. So at the end the outcome of the lawsuit will give some closure and until then any comment on this matter is without value.
sophiedeziel 7y ago
No sure if I am willing to trust a comment from an account created 40 minutes ago.
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gwbas1c 7y ago

I wish I knew why so many conference attendees requested that such a person be removed from the conference. Why? Part of diversity means being able to cooperate with people who have different viewpoints and ideologies. Further reading about this person's aggressive and retaliatory behavior implies that this person has issues that should keep her out of conferences. But, I still think it's important to understand why attendees ask that she be removed.

stronglikedan 7y ago
Sometimes, people who have different viewpoints and ideologies are, themselves, not able to cooperate with a diverse group. This seems like one of those times, and I wouldn't be surprised if her reputation preceded her within the community.
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markvdb 7y ago

Organising a conference is hard. Creating value is hard. Farting on social media is easy. As a conference organiser, handling social media fires is especially hard, because you're at peak load already. You're organising a conference!

wysifnwyg 7y ago
Farting on social media isn't easy at all! The security guards at Facebook won't let me in after the last time.

lgleason 7y ago

The problem with conferences is that they have become watered down with political agendas instead of focusing on learning and quality content. With this person's comments, the "troublemaker" might indeed be a problematic person, but, given what I've seen, usually when a group of women target another women it has very little to do with actual harassment and more to do with differences in political ideology.

NewTexasKubern 7y ago
> when a group of women target another women it has very little to do with actual harassment and more to do with differences in political ideology. BINGO!

mathgenius 7y ago

I'm very sorry this person is having to suffer all this crap, but > conferences tend to net to a loss. If you put out a lot of energy, for "free", then you often get shit in return. If you don't take responsibility for what you are getting back for all your hard effort, things can easily go pear-shaped. This seems to be one of those mystical laws of the universe. I'm not saying you should be selfish, or charge big bucks for your time. There are plenty of ways for people to give something back, and you need to make sure that is happening too.

hkai 7y ago

I couldn't understand anything. What sort of woman was disinvited and why others were uncomfortable with her?

commandlinefan 7y ago
He danced around that so much I feel like something is being hidden (besides somebody’s identity).
- somebodyelse1 7y ago
  Its obvious that he is doing incredible mental gymnastics to try and workaround the problem that this stupid internet drama was created by group of women hating on a girl because they dont like her (or want to 'cancel' her for some reason), and are using this poor bastard money and credibility as their weapon against her and everybody around her.
- village-idiot 7y ago
  Assuming that the story is true as written, one of the first reactions the subject had to a negative experience was to have her boyfriend harass the conference organizer’s girlfriend. I think that would probably make women feel unsafe.

lawnchair_larry 7y ago

“We also talked with the organizers of other conferences and with dev that are part of gender groups focalized in technology and all of them recommended us to take distance from them.” Experience tells me author is probably in the wrong here based on this sentence alone. This screams of those extreme lefties that want to police everybody else with their safe spaces and trigger warnings, then deplatform and unperson anyone who doesn’t agree with their agenda or worldview. Author should have disinvited those people instead. ”It was a difficult decision in which we prioritized the participation of the public that had reached out to us while also knowing that many people, especially women, wouldn’t come to the conference if we did nothing about this situation.” This reeks of BS to me. We are supposed to believe that the presence of this particular woman at a conference will discourage women from attending? What the hell? The reason for the extreme reaction was likely because it pissed them off that these extremists got their way, and successfully censored and unpersoned another victim. Admit it, you’d be pissed too. If you don’t like one of the speakers, and you’re an adult, you skip that talk. Stop creating drama and find a real purpose in life other than being a professional victim.

BonesJustice 7y ago
One can be justifiably angry without becoming completely unhinged. I have no idea who was actually in the wrong here, but I would tend to side with the person making the calm, measured response. All things being equal, if someone acts nuts, they probably are.
village-idiot 7y ago
> The reason for the extreme reaction was likely because it pissed them off that these extremists got their way, and successfully censored and unpersoned another victim. Admit it, you’d be pissed too. Sure, I’d be pissed. I’d also not harass the organizer, their friends, and their employers as revenge. I’d also consider doxxing and false accusations to be beyond the pale even if I felt angry about losing a conference spot. In fact, the act of doing that would prove that the organizer was completely correct in kicking this person out, and that the extremist was the speaker and not the organizer.

qbaqbaqba 7y ago

The unnamed person could probably describe her experience in the same words as the author did here. Author made her uncomfortable, organizers may have consulted some gender or wherever oriented groups. We don't know the other side of the story.

valtism 7y ago

I can't believe how many people are attacking the author here. He has had to deal with things that nobody should have to, and the couple he uninvited are clearly unhinged and he made a good decision uninviting them. My sympathies go out to him, and I hope he get support in this, and it doesn't suck up their will to do good things for the community like organise conferences.

ncmncm 7y ago

I understand why the writer is not warning us who these people are. But if you know, please spill.