rustynails

Not all are created equal. Our children are unique.

One of my children showed natural talent in language at 9 months with no prompting. This was brought to our attention by childcare staff. Another of our children showed a natural talent with mathematical concepts at about a year old.

Even as they grew, our linguist struggled with math (for years) and our procedurally oriented child struggled with language (for years).

To this day, these two children maintain these core differences. It took at least 6 years for our linguist to crack basic arithmetic (even basic addition) which was at least several years behind our proceduralist.

I found out later that some leading child psychologists recognise different brain types in very young children (exactly as I found). An Internet search on brain types of children will show some high profile child psychologists who talk about this in depth, despite some strong "opinions" (ie. devoid of evidence) that oppose these studies.

Our linguist, with minimal pressure, has developed into a strong mathematician (at least grades wise) but to this day has never demonstrated anywhere near the natural ability of our proceduralist.

I have drawn the same conclusions with my own siblings and my wife's siblings. At a very young age, our own strengths become apparent without intervention. I am very glad I never pushed my kids to be equal (or even close to equal) in all skills. I consider most uses of the word "equal" worrisome (except for equal opportunity, a concept frequently downplayed in the last decade or so. Even Zuckerberg's famous open letter was unclear on such a fundamental concept).

OBS: when I asked our linguist to step through basic math, they understood the concept but could not do the work independently. Someone in this thread described a similar story for their child and attributed this to a lack of "confidence". For my child, I wholly reject that it was confidence related. When things clicked for our linguist, they clicked. If anything, our linguist's ability to crack the basics took patience on my part. I wanted my child to succeed quickly but I restrained myself (thankfully).

People need to realise that not all kids are the same. We have innate strengths. We have different learning styles, different learning rates, and different interests and motivations. I strongly reject the modern populist theory that we are all equal in ability and I believe we do significant harm because of this factoid. The motives behind this factoid concern me deeply.

If I could offer one piece of advice, your child(ren) are unique. Don't ever let anybody tell you that your child's strength or weakness comes from social conditioning. The only social conditioning cones from extreme behaviour (eg. Heavy handed forcing of "equality" under the banner of political correctness is extremely harmful, rather than focussing on potential and opportunity. This heavy handedness is also driving some extremely destructive social engineering under the banner of "equality". If you are watching academic trends you should be horrified as a patent).

I always encourage(d) play at a young age (physical activity, math games, language games). However, if you make this more than games (if you call this teaching and you start to measure), you set kids up for failure, especially when many children need patience and time.

According to PISA rankings, most western countries (especially English speaking) are not the top performers. I have hinted my beliefs of the root cause of this in this post. I predict most western countries will slip in ranking even further (especially English speaking countries). If things play as I expect, the slip will be significant in the next 10 years.

Your version is a somewhat closer reflection of the version of what is taught in school today (ie. there is no magical 1869). However, the actual conflict was sparked over Arch Duke Franz Ferdinand's assassination. You excluded some fundamental points that help understand a much broader series of issues (namely, a very late unification of Germany causing upset in many alliances, region-wide instability beyond Germany and a crumbling Austro-Hungarian empire desperate to cling to power).

As an example, read Aethelric's post here as it is important in explaining the seeds that set Germany as it was in 1869.

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1v3vk8/why_d...

The region we now know as Germany was a series of small towns with mostly independent rule. With instability (especially crumbling of the Austro-Hungarian Empire), Germany established formal alliances quickly as the political climate grew in intensity.

Franz Ferdinand was shot, the European states fought and the US (with late entry) injected fresh ideas, troops and supplies, which decisively turned the tides of a messy war.

So, 1869 was more like a traffic light that triggered the car crash. Without understanding the history, you can't really understand each participant's trajectories or motives. To limit the answer to "1869" is only slightly more informative than limiting the answer to "Arch Duke Franz Ferdinand's assassination".

If you're looking for a more insightful history to the "penny university", the Wikipedia page contains much more detail about coffee houses and some analysis of the pamphlet.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_coffeehouses_in_the_...

It's a fascinating read. Trying to capture how people lived and thought a few hundred years ago is very difficult today because much history is now overlaid with politics and filters. The Wikipedia page paints a picture that seems feasible based on my wide reading of history.

The resobscura speculates (without evidence) that the pamphlet was most probably written by a man. This view is not shared by the Wikipedia article for multiple reasons that anybody can speculate over.

As someone who is married, I truly do not understand your comment. The exact opposite seems true to me. Honesty and integrity are paramount (at least to me). Find somebody you respect. Find somebody who is compatible with you. Hope you find someone who thinks and feels the same as you do. If I struggled on my journey, it was to find a woman who did not want to dominate me or be dominated who was worthy of my respect. I consider myself very lucky. Been married for a long time to an amazing women who is an engineer in heart and soul. So, nothing about self doubt, deceit for me.

About 1/2 of my friends are female. Over the years, I've had a few of my expressions of interest rejected. However, I've had quite a few female friends "give up because I didn't get the message they were interested". I've been abused, called stupid, asked if I was gay, etc by female friends who were interested in me. I once had to ask a mutual (female) friend what happened because I couldn't get a word out of one woman. "You can't be THAT dumb, can you?".

I call bs on this one. I've had too many instances of being explicitly hit on (about 1 in 3 of good female friends at a guess) to believe the "women aren't attracted to male friends".

However, I have plenty of female friends who I just like because they are amazing people.

Have you seen InoReader? It's very Google Reader like. I don't do social media of any sort and I rely on InoResder quite a bit.

I have no affiliation beyond a regular account there.

To reference TRON Legacy, I'm rockin' the pager.

Your understanding of slavery in Ancient Rome is quite different to mine. I'd really appreciate knowing your sources as you seem to have a wealth of knowledge.

Slaves could lead very productive and meaningful lives. It was not uncommon for slaves to be freed and made a citizen. Some slaves also held high positions (eg. Dentists, accountants, etc). I also understand that the word slave was interchangeably used with the word family.

Sources: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_ancient_Rome

And Mary Beard's Meet the Romans (an exceptionally good documentary from BBC. Mary is one of my favourites).

Mary talked about a wealthy Roman woman (a business owner) who freed her slave and married him. Depending on who you ask, her slave would have been considered a sex slave before they married. The truth is always a matter of perspective!

Having said that, the Spanish and Italians used boys as young as 6 as slaves for mining silver and malachite. The boys that survived were significantly physically deformed by the time they reached adulthood. There is also significant discussion about little girls who were forced to play with dolls to be good slave housewives (the girls were described as having terrible lives).

Source: Mary Beard's other Roman documentaries and the history of Sicilian mines (can't remember the link, but easily found on Google).

Trivia: the silver was mined for coins!

"It's the same reason small towns are (I hear) less socially stressful. I am not convinced though. In larger society I end up dealing with relatively small groups anyway - friends, family, and co-workers."

There's a fundamental difference. In a small town, most of the people around you are usually known to you and friendly. In a bigger town, you tend not to know/trust more people directly around you. Kids spend much less time at the local park and more time indoors. I wrote a posting recently talking about social pressures of our modern day and part of my post was comparing the communities around us today vs 50 years ago.

I'm lucky that I live in a suburb where I know many people around me. My friends (who don't live locally) and extended family are both surprised and envious at how lucky we are being surrounded by friendly and generous people. Frequently popping in, bringing home made cakes, jams etc. I love it! As an example, I had a neighbour bring my wife some flowers recently for no particular reason.

I am fairly certain that our modern lifestyles and socialisation with neighbours is far more stressful than it used to be, judging by most people I know.

According to the release notes, you can update to Corral and roll back to 9.10 via the GUI.

The system requirements are still 8gb RAM and 8gb disk minimum.

There are no details of the performance.

Release notes are here.

https://download.freenas.org/Corral/RELEASE/ReleaseNotes.txt

Excellent point about centralisation. I can't help but feel many people either misunderstood or didn't read the article. In my view, the power Zuckerberg wields is staggering, although I've seen many postings here with contrasting views on that level of power.

The article is excellent. It's well structured and insightful. It also leads us to ask excellent questions and provides relevant content to mull over. As an example, Zuckerberg's message was fascinating in what it didn't say.

My superficial value add to truthhawk's article is as follows.

1. How much sway does Facebook actually have? Do most people seek information outside of Facebook? If they hear/see something enough, does it become truth?

2. Would Zuckerberg want to be president? I've always viewed the President as being a servant to power brokers behind the scenes. Wouldn't Zuckerberg have more influence by striking deals with potential candidates and hold leverage through Facebook profile analysis? Does Zuckerberg have the power to be more than a president?

3. Does anyone actually have the power to take on Facebook? Might that person be subjected to extra criticism (eg. during the next election) if they don't play ball?

4. Facebook exists and it is particularly powerful. If you were to decentralise the leadership (as discussed by truthhawk), would that add benefit? How? I see potential for a fragmented committee, or worse. Could Zuckerberg be like Jobs was to Apple?

5. Long term, assuming Facebook and Zuckerberg survive the test of time, who takes over? What sort of people would gravitate to that role? What might that mean for this wealth of information on many citizens of the world? Even if Zuckerberg is a benevolent dictator, the potential vacuum of power that will be created horrifies me, especially thinking about the personalities that may fight for it.

I don't believe Facebook will disappear any time soon. There are serious questions around Facebook that we desperately need to consider. This article is excellent as it helps focus us on this goal.

This is why I (mostly) love HN. It really makes me think about the world around me in so many interesting and meaningful ways. I may have given up on MSM and once-brilliant sites like Ars Technica (who now thrust biased gender and governmental politics down our throats). I hope HN can keep its secret sauce flowing.

Thanks truthhawk

There's a much bigger picture than this. It comes down to governments, media, community leaders, families and individuals. There's a huge problem with apathy toward abuse and it's all around us.

As a case on point, I am extremely disturbed by the way media and governments handle issues like domestic violence. 1800 respect (a government department in Australia) tried to shift the blame onto young boys in a series of heavily promoted TV commercials without any opposition from the community. When a female is caught abusing a family member (child/husband), the media's excuses flow readily "she lost her job", "she was under stress at work". The imagery on TV rarely reflect abused children, despite this being exactly what's happening across the spectrum of society. The Australian Bureau of Statistics says that about 25-33% of domestic violence victims are male (I haven't seen figures for children, but it is likely to be heavily under reported). That's a huge percentage of people who receive little or no representation by all media outlets and the government, let alone charity groups (ie. indigenous people are rarely represented, males are never represented, children are rarely represented - see the imagery as it speaks volumes).

Imagine being a young boy whose mother either mentally or physically abuses you. You turn on the TV and you only see fully grown white women who are (supposedly) the only victims. Politicians (eg. A prominent Queensland politician who should have been dismissed and charged long ago) are legislating for gendered criminal laws because fully grown white women are (supposedly) the only victims and never (supposedly) perpetrators. The people on the TV say how bad males are. The government (1800 respect) saturates TV with domestic violence ads saying "it's a boy thing". You open the newspaper and read the same message almost every week.

Even charity groups chime in. Most charity groups (about 95% of the ones I surveyed, using a public list of every charity that deals with domestic violence) won't even show images of male victims or house male victims. Some charities (like mission Australia) even go as far as to say that "men deny domestic violence happens". Which men? Where? This is almost certainly a ruse to justify almost all of their focus being on fully grown white women (even when Mission Australia say that indigenous women are 24 times more likely to be abused, they still mostly picture _white_ women as victims).

If you really want to talk about abuse and attitudes toward abuse, the problem starts at the top. Governments are prejudiced. The media is morally bankrupt. When somebody knows the government will turn a blind eye and the media will hand out a blank cheque and the courts will say "oh poor woman, she's oppressed/distressed/lost her job", you've got a complete system that's ripe to openly support child abuse.

I find some observations quite fascinating. For example, Steve Altman (Mr Y Combinator) expressed outrage because Muslims can't get on a plane. However, I am yet to see him voice outrage about domestic violence and the appalling attitudes in most media that are open for anyone to see.

The problem doesn't start with parents (although parents contribute to the problem). It starts with apathy.

I'm not under the illusion that this problem of violence and abuse is limited to one gender as that's patently not true. We need society to accept that truth and stop making excuses.

It appears to be deeper than that. I'll try to illustrate using a modern example.

In Australia, the media (and the overwhelming majority of feminists) refuse to acknowledge that Donestic Violence has female perpetrators or male victims. Mission Australia (a large charity organisation) even ran a smear campaign saying that men refuse to acknowlege it happens (a sleight of hand to redirect focus back on males). Some feminists even argued that domestic (of the home) violence only refers to female victims (I found that gem on ANC news). It even got worse when channel 9 and 1800 respect (a government department) took an aggressive gender based campaign that explicitly put the blame on young boys. "It's a boy thing" was one of the charming lines in the ads that saturated print time TV in 2016. Not one single feminist (not one that I could find) raised a single objection against any of this, despite it being a fundamental breach of human rights.

In case you are wondering, the Australian Bureau of Statistics identified that 1 in 3 victims of domestic violence in New South Wales (our largest state) was male. These statistics are totally ignored by government, the media and feminism.

You will see similar trends worldwide. For example, the majority of feminists in the U.K. Refuse to acknowledge many women were voting well before many men were and that women were running successful businesses long before they supposedly were according to the modern media (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-politics/9933592/Wom...).

This doesn't come down to critical discipline, it comes down to blatant pathological lying and bullying on a mass scale. Places like The Verge (among many media outlets) have embraced and driven this prejudice.

The media is extremely manipulative. The bullying of little boys today by most media outlets and many businesses blows my mind. I can't imagine any period in the last 100 years has been so committed to such extreme sexism. Even educational material like Horrible Histories has joined in on the gendered attacks.

I'm not sure what to put this down to. I usually use terms like feminism and political correctness. However, it's also the apathy of most decent people. It's a collective social issue, not just of individuals. People desperately need to take a stand against feminism and political correctness.

This goes beyond critical discipline. This is a collective social disease.

I respect your comment and the one you responded to. Being an old school nerd, only the toughest survived with a love of technology back then. I recall a stream of bullying and it either makes or breaks you. However, being a nerd is no longer the same as it was back then.

What frustrates me today is how the media (collectively) have revised the history books and promote some fairly extreme bullying (see the verge's article on Matt Taylor as an example of some extreme and unjustified bullying of Matt based on his gender).

I believe overcoming adversity is recognising you are not a victim and recognising there is something bigger than you. You are not a gender, you are not a skin colour, you are not a religion or an age group. If you can rise above these things, you are a huge step to overcoming adversity. You stop looking down on others and yourself.

I can't help but feel our society is further from this goal than I have ever seen in my lifetime. While it doesn't impact me personally, it disappoints me at how much we've regressed in even the last 10 years.

You obviously weren't around in the 70s. Here are a few corrections (there are more, obviously),

Because in the 1960/70/80s west, people ate only basic food (nothing "foreign" like Thai or Indian), #We often used to eat Chinese food, Indian food and Italian food in the early 70s. I also remember eating Lebanese fast food occasionally too. We lived close to a Chinese restaurant but preferred a takeaway in the next suburb.

very few had cable TV, and went out at most once a week to the movies. #I went out to the movies more then than I did now. I remember seeing Stat Wars, ET, Close Encounters and a host of other movies. However, this is an odd measure of happiness in my view.

They never bought an espresso, never owned a modern electronic device like a computer, # seriously? The Commodore PET and a few other home computers were around in the 70s.

never got to use the internet to settle an argument or play a computer game, unless they were extremely well off and got to play Pong circa say 1980. #Read up on BBS culture (bulletin boards). Plenty of average joes were on there (girls and guys in case you were wondering). I met many women face to face through BBS boards back then. Early nerd girls were fantastic, like my wife!

Now let me give you some examples of modern culture.

1. My local paper has only had one picture of a boy in the last few months (vs dozens of girls). In the 70s, this was always balanced in my local paper and would have been labelled as extremely sexist but no longer is labelled as sexist. Yes, I have hundreds of archived photos from the 70s to prove it. I understand this imbalance is now called "equality" when it's a significantly skewed ratio, according to the overwhelming majority of MSM (media).

2. People could be whatever they want, not this modern politically correct horse shit that encourages extreme sexism.

3. The media in the 70s would never point the finger at little boys being the root cause of domestic violence (see 1800 respect, a government Department who saturated prime time TV with aggressive ads to bully young boys in a manner that shocked most non-sexist people I have spoken to), nor would people in the 70s refuse to acknowledge male victims and female perpetrators of crimes. Yet, it's common today.

4. An average guy (eg. Matt Taylor) would never have been viciously attacked by the media (like The Verge) for wearing a shirt designed by a woman in the 70s. There are plenty of examples of similar aggressive and unfounded attacks in the last 10 years in MSM, all targeting one gender.

I could raise many more points about how screwed up and aggressively sexist we've become. Culturally, the 70s had many advantages over today that are far more important than something flippant like an espresso machine.

In the 70s: Tolerance was ahead of today (look at 70s ads on YouTube for some examples. I really like "care for kids" and "life be in it" as examples of excellent diversity and inclusiveness, despite accusations to the contrary by a very dishonest gender based group starting with F (as in F for fallacy). Social freedom was ahead of today. Open a newspaper from the 70s and you will see far more open mindedness and far less sexism than you do today. It saddens me when I look back because I realise many of the social freedoms we've lost.

No generation is perfect, but, the last 10 years have been terrible for freedom, respect and sexism. I can't think of a decade that comes even close to the lows of today. See code.org and find me an educational institution in the last 50 years that was even close to that sexist. I'm yet to find one, despite code.org toning down the sexism significantly in the last six months. It's still worse than anything from the 70s/80s/90s that I have found.

The article says very little and I'm surprised it was posted. I could not find any specific data that backed this claim. I'm not doubting it. However, the Office for National Statistics didn't make it easy to assess full time vs part time work.

It's also unclear why this data is only looking at men. Why not discuss both genders (or look at the situation collectively)?

What I agree with is automation is part of the problem. What is also obvious is that female employment rate has changed since 1971 (see ONS website), which went from about 50% to around 70-75%. This looks similar to (but inverse to) male employment which went down from 90% to about 75%. This may be a social change that nobody looks after the kids anymore and both couples work to earn an income. What's good for the goose is good for the gander.

However, I'm assuming the UK is similar to Australia where we have sexist hiring policies. For example, the police have mandated minimum quotas of 50% female police officers (regardless of number of applicants or suitability of applicants for the role. Suitability was addressed by significantly lowering physical requirements for the job and substituting it with more weapons for the officers). Naturally, these "equal opportunity" situations are a 1 way street (eg. Male teachers# are around 20% - see www.telegraph.co.uk/men/thinking-man/how-can-we-get-more-men-to-become-teachers/). Think of Emma Watson's "He for She" campaign, everything he has, she gets. Yes, a 1 way street. Such discriminatory policies would logically impact employment negatively for some people.

What also concerns me greatly is that gendered bullying by the media and governments to actively discriminate against men and boys. Keep an eye out for articles about promoting girls in STEM and an absence of talk about promoting boys in learning language#. Look at posters of kids in education or front pages of magazines - by my reckoning, it's about 80% girls (if not higher#). Sites like code.org have been extreme in their sexist campaigning against boys. I see a train wreck coming in 10-15 years.

# to illustrate part of the issue, see this web site. http://www.edchange.org/multicultural/papers/genderbias.html

You will see quotes like 'girls perform equal to or better than boys on nearly every measure of achievement' and 'standardized testing indicates that girls outperform boys at all levels of reading and writing and in Alberta testing shows that girls, "...significantly outperform boys on reading and writing tests, while almost matching them in math and science."'. Yet, the article goes on to say how the education system is stacked against girls. Having observed significant class time at a few schools, I can guarantee that the gender bias is heavily against boys that would shock any non-sexist person. Even when I picked up sexism by teachers, they ignored it. For example, a group of kids was misbehaving (about 5 boys and 5 girls). A female teacher said "why is it always the boys" quite loudly. I responded "half said them are girls". The other teachers looked away as if to say "I'm staying out of this one". I see exclusion and ignoring of boys consistently. I even saw one classroom where the boys were so despondent at the sexism in the learning materials that they switched off and didn't ask a single question. Afterward, I asked the boys about the class (passively) and they unanimously voiced the extreme sexism of the topic as isolating them. To anyone with eyes open, it's a gender war and it's extreme: it's like nothing we have ever seen (despite false claims to the contrary). Watch Horrible Histories (especially the later specials) if you want to see examples. I can't believe how much sexism they cram in these episodes targeted at young kids.

In summary, I dismiss the article as flawed (false and overly simplistic). No matter how noble (kind) your society, if the next society practices savagery and you are not prepared, your society will fail.

The level at which you pitch the concept of kindness is essential, as is the environment. To illustrate, many comments in this thread fail to hold for an example like the Mongols, or may argue that the Mongols wiping out civilisations was altruistic or kind. In a simplistic way, the Mongols survived through cooperation (as their society had some cruel rules that were definitely not kind), cruelty to outsiders and through theft. However, you could also contrast Chinggis Khan with Darius I of Persia who demonstrated far more kindness throughout his reign than Chinggis did. Both leaders in their own way were quite successful.

If you consider individuals, the dynamics can be quite different from those of nations, depending on the environment. If you limit the view to modern, first world societies, cooperation with ones peers is still essential and almost certainly more important than kindness. To illustrate, if I give everyone around me all of my money, that could be considered kind (think of a lottery winner). However, ultimately, such kindness (no matter how misguided) will usually lead to little or no benefit for the individual. Even if you compare two similarly cooperative people, the most competent cooperator will usually out perform a kinder cooperator. It will depend on the society as to whether an individual's empathy for those in need will add to the success of the individual and/or the community. For example, where a society has social welfare, an individual can point to the welfare system rather than directly contributing to the welfare of those in need.

Family dynamics are yet another level of complexity. Does a priority of kindness go to the family or the local community? What constitutes success of the family? Families that cooperate are more likely to succeed beyond those that are purely kind to each other. However, family cohesion is almost certainly dependent on both kindness and cooperation.

There are also work place environments, community group environments, local community environments, state and territory and country environments. In order to be successful, these environments require competency and cooperation. Kindness may or may not be required.

Regarding kindness. In my observations of modern society (collectively), I observe that there are some examples that complicate concepts such as kindness. For example feminism* insists that domestic violence is something that only happens to females (through ignorance of statistics or for less savoury reasons). Ultimately, what this demonstrates is that kindness can be selectively applied and still be recognised as acceptable.

In summary, I don't see kindness as essential (at least not in all circumstances). Kindness can be selective (eg. Feminism's human rights failures with respect to domestic violence by representing only one gender) and, yet, such kindness can be seen as socially acceptable. Kindness can also be handed off to community and government groups in some circumstances. However, unlike kindness, cooperation is essential for individuals and groups.

* to be clear, feminism can not and should not be interchangeably used with female. Not all feminists are female and not all females are feminist. I think of feminism more like the KKK. Not all white people support the KKK and a criticism of the KKK is not a criticism of white people collectively.

It depends on how you define winner. Does it really matter how much someone else earns as long as you're happy with your pay?

I have taken a lower paying job because of my preference for that job and workplace. Money is not my principal driver (nor is it most people's).

I also agree that an open pay system could encourage super stars to leave. I once hired a woman who earned almost 50% more than her peers because she was amazing (it's the one time I recall paying a premium for anyone). If her peers knew, it would have been a shit storm, especially her male boss (who earned well less than she did).

We are too obsessed about comparing ourselves to others. I would most probably pick a culture where there wasn't transparency because I don't think someone else's income is anyone else's business and the emphasis on money is unhealthy.

My view is anecdotal. I come from a family with adopted children. My siblings say how I talk, act and think like our parents. I am the only biological child of our parents.

Does this prove IQ? No. however, I would be astounded if there was no relationship (just looks, voice, height, thought patterns, but no IQ correlation).

At the same time, my kids are quite different from each other. However, my siblings' kids reflect their parents and have diverged significantly from my family far more so than my kids diverge from each other.

My eldest brother (as an example), earned good money but spent it all. He put very little love or effort into his kids, despite him being raised in a household of caring and sharing. He's also a drinker and drug taker. His kids all have troubles with drugs and alcohol.

This is nothing like my family. We have continued down a path of caring and sharing and support quite a few community activities.

I'm not inclined to equate IQ directly, but, I am strongly inclined to say "there is a lot more than just looks that gets passed down to children".

My eldest sister is a behavioural clone of her biological mother. They didn't know each other until their 20s. That was the moment I knew that behaviour could be inherited by children, because my eldest sister is an aggressive hedonist. No drugs, just wild partying and ladette behaviour.

The other aspect of this article that is true is that luck favours the prepared. Some people send their kids to private schools so they can Mingle with other well-to-dos.

What I do like about today's society is that there is a wealth of opportunity if you look for it, regardless of socioeconomic status. I am a huge believer in opportunity but I totally reject political correctness (and any other prejudice for that matter, PC just happens to be the most popular prejudice today).

I apologise that I only got 1/2 way through this article. It said very little to me.

The article spent a bit of time talking about decline of empires. I watched a few documentaries on the topic yesterday. A central theme that recurred was environment and conflict with other regions. This was the point where I decided that this article wasn't for me. I'm no historian, but, the analogy lost me. This and the lack of details about her theory.

I both admire and feel sorry for the author. To pour your heart and soul for so long and not achieve your outcomes can be very hurtful and devastating.

The language in this document is telling in a few ways. There is not much about collaboration with peers or superiors other than conflict. The article left me with an impression of conflict and someone who wasn't a team player. I am guessing that cultural compatibility was an issue. It may be possible that the outcome may be for the best because it may help the author grow (although, public accusations will not be seen well by future employees as it's airing many people's dirty laundry).

I'm also note that the author raises some issues that I as a boss take exception to. For example, more diversity. I am aware that in today's climate, diversity is a highly charged, politically correct topic. The author talks about diversity by hiring by gender. What diversity is the author seeking? That of genitals? Is there some magic empathy or creativity that females supposedly have? I've always built teams based on needs of skills, personality, cultural fit. As an example, I knocked back a highly qualified, well presented male candidate because he was too ambitious for a maintenance role. This was not because of his gender, but, because he was unlikely to provide a long term ROI and would expect promotion that couldn't be delivered and cause unrest by venting disappointment as a lack of growth. I would most probably be seen by the author as being sexist for not hiring by gender to fill a quota and I would view the author as sexist for hiring by gender and being unable to see that diversity is not a gender, but skills and personality.

I would encourage the author to ask themself if they are a team player. I would encourage the author to understand themselves and the sort of culture they want to work in. Maybe, it is a culture of creativity rather than talent that the author craves (as an example). Seeking feedback from peers outside of work may be very helpful and revealing too.

I can be confrontational (too many fights over too many years), but I know who I am and I know what I want. I support my organisation above myself (during working hours) and I support and respect juniors, peers and more senior staff. I negotiate my views. I listen carefully. I seek feedback from my peers. I align my views with my peers where it doesn't compromise my principals. As an example, I would never work for a company that hires (or excludes) by gender or race because I want freedom to hire the right staff, not some boxes ticked. I know myself and my employee. I turn down jobs where I don't believe in the company for my own sake and the company's.

I wish the author the best of luck and hope they have the courage to ask the tough questions. I think they need to ask some tough questions.

If someone does take these things into consideration, it will supposedly slow them down and cost them money. There's always someone else who is willing to do the job without these hindrances.

Similarly, one of my children hurt themselves climbing a tree and ended up in hospital. Our other child was taking high risks a week later. My second child said "it won't happen to me".

That creates a difficult balance. I agree with everything you said (except he instead of they). Where we are let down with that approach is if businesses, media or government don't take responsibility to manage prejudice and bullying. Imagine being Jewish in Germany just before WWII.

Now my argument may sound like political correctness, but it's not for a few reasons. You avoid prejudice by avoiding topics of gender, race, etc. You ensure people have the opportunity, which doesn't guarantee an outcome. You don't need equal numbers, just don't alienate. These 3 things encapsulate my beliefs and are the antithesis of political correctness.

So, you are right in that individuals should have the right to their views and should expect them to be challenged. Also recognise that Facebook and co will magnetise these marginalisers to each other, giving them a collective voice which can easily turn into a mob (as it often does). If you don't have responsible leadership (and we don't), these mobs become vicious and destructive. Compound this with political correctness and you have a toxic, self righteous and highly prejudiced mob of hate and bullying!

With policies of both US candidates being so openly prejudiced (eg. Trump on Mexicans, Clinton on her gender card), the future for more hate and bullying looks certain.

I don't think this article adequately captures the problem. I'll try to illustrate.

I explained to my children about the 2 US candidates. I described both of them as bullies and said they promote a culture of bullying. We discussed how they set a bad example for the broader community and how media condones this behaviour.

I was picking up my children from school when one young boy called me by my first name in a mocking tone. I approached him and asked how his day was and took a moment to ask about him. When I now see this boy, he goes out of his way to say hello.

I recently went to a computer club open day. The rules were "we will only allow the same number of boys in as girls". I looked around and saw about 20 boys and 1 girl. I went to this girl and her mother and said "good on you for giving it a go, a variety of experiences is essential to helping you find your true self". The mother went on a sexist rant about patriarchal societies (the usual politically correct thinking) and I said "why would you deny any child the opportunity? Why would you force the same numbers of girls and boys? What's gone wrong in such basic thinking?" She stopped the hardcore feminist routine and apologised. She was big enough to say "no one has ever put it like that, that really makes sense".

The problem with hate is that the Internet has given it a collective voice of monumental proportions. Our community leaders have let us down by selectively promoting prejudice (eg. Emma Watson is glorified for hypocrisy) while aggressively condemning others, especially passive people like Matt Taylor. What's worse is that most people don't recognise hate and bullying when they see it, or they are apathetic to it.

My simple rule: if someone promotes one group over another, they are as bad as someone who excludes or vilifies a group (especially politically correct people who are huge bullies). These people who marginalise are the true haters and bullies. The article really misses the breadth of hate and bullying.

Thought for the day. Do a search on breast cancer websites. How many of these sites do you think alienate men who suffer from the condition? Why do you think many of these sites quote percentages of male victims?

The media has always had a vested interest in what it tells you. Look up William Randolph Hearst as an example.

However, today, you see a lot more blatant manipulation in the media. People are conditioned to it, which is scary.

Take a subtle example, Ars Technica almost never says Chairman, it says Chairperson, but it will say Chairwoman (which also shows their ignorance of the origin of Chairman). Ars has played all sorts of games like this. It started around the time of Casey Johnson and the introduction of strong gender stereotyping. This was from a once brilliant (and well balanced) site that has never recovered.

Today, very few people will tell you how to think, they will tell you what to think, who to vote for, etc.

True of False (taken from Wikipedia): "Limited voting rights were gained by some women in Sweden, Britain, and some western U.S. states in the 1860s."

The answer of course is False. We have voting records from the UK (as one example) showing quite a few women on independent means voting in the 1830s (when FEW men had the right to vote, let alone women - which is always overlooked for the sake of propaganda). This is an example of a stream of calculated deceit that has flourished in the last 20 years, without challenge.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-politics/9933592/Wom...

There are many areas today where people don't bother to do any fact checking. What's worse are those that purposely manipulate history. They insult and disgrace our grandmothers and grandfathers. Yet, most of us would say that our grandmothers were not wallflowers and our grandfathers not anything like modern media portrays!!!

So, in short, yes. The Internet goes a long way to hiding and misrepresenting information. The signal to noise ratio is a big part of the problem, but special interest groups and political correctness have also contributed significantly.

I have recorded one year of imagery in a 1970 newspaper (as a start). Speaking from firsthand experience with comparisons from the last few years, media has taken a huge leap backwards and prejudice and nastiness has increased considerably. This is in spite of most people who haven't compared saying the opposite of what I have observed ("oh, you want to go back to how it was 50 years ago when men were all sexist?"). I could write a novel on that fallacious mindset alone!

This may not be what you meant about romanticising, but modern newspapers have deteriorated significantly.

Part of this deterioration is because of competition in journalism (click bait, a race to the bottom). Part of it is a perverse sense of and fundamental abuse of the term Equality. The abuse of the term equality has then lead to unprecedented gender bullying and some extreme revisionist history that largely remains unchallenged. If you pick up a reasonable paper from 1970, you will realise how sexist we have become! The issue today is that you won't find a reasonable (eg. non sexist) newspaper - there is no choice! Sexism and gender bullying ARE the norm.

Newspapers needed to compete with the Internet. In this respect, the article was fundamentally wrong. Failure to embrace the Internet would have allowed others to fill the void (even if you went online but charged money). More people are now used to digesting news electronically and the Internet makes the content dynamic and interactive.

People will pay good money for good news, but it needs to be good quality. That eliminates most of the market.

Think of games. You can still sell the occasional blockbuster (GTA 5 made a billion dollars worth of sales!!). However, most games on iTunes hover below a few $ and many end up free. Compare this to games 30 years ago where there was a small cheap-end market. Or, CDs. Sales have fallen through the floor, but, a 99c track sells well on iTunes. News isn't quite the same, but you can see that a paradigm shift was inevitable for newspapers with the advent of the Internet.

If there was one thing the papers got wrong, it was the increase in nastiness and prejudice. I believe society is much worse today than it has been in a long time. The caring element is what we've lost. We need a new generation of pioneers to undo the carnage.

There are so many great response postings here that I don't know which one to praise the most. Maybe the one I'm replying to.

You have a path forward. Take it, learn from it.

When I was 10, I got into computers. You REALLY needed to be thick skinned back then as nobody got any support from anyone. If you expressed interest in computers, you were ostracised as a freak. I was bullied at school for it more times than I care to remember. However, I never let myself become a victim or give up. That's where true grit comes from.

I'l be honest and say I think the whole tech industry is over-rated. There are loads of good (great) people who start out young and do some amazing things. I think it's on a downhill slide. The same happens to any saturated industry.

Stay focused. Don't be a victim. Take the opportunities that come your way.

Best of Luck!

I consider Hacker News one of the few open minded forums today. Where a comment adds value, it's sometimes up voted. Your original comment didn't add value to the discussion and I doubt its accuracy.

Take for example, during early conflicts (around 0AD), people of all social standings were known to move from city to city. The Mongols (although much later, 1200s) used this mass migration as a technique to weaken economies. So, travel is not anything like what you described.

The world's history is full of far more diversity than we give credit for.

Your comment makes a lot of sense.

A friend of mine, now over 50, still struggles with his mother's rejection throughout his childhood. He and his siblings have confirmed stories of malice (bleeding after being beaten by his mother with a whip, euthanising a much loved pet out of spite, etc).

Despite enduring years of torment, he still seeks his mother's affection. She died a long time ago and he never came to terms with the loss or the lack of love or the malice his mother frequently demonstrated.

It leaves me with a feeling of deep sadness when I see how cruel some parents are to their own children. It also leaves me even sadder when excuses are made for some of these abusers (she must have suffered depression, poor woman).

It is good to see a well researched article. However, the article gets something fundamentally wrong that I strongly disagree with. The idea of equality (of outcome) is a misnomer vs equal opportunity. 10 people don't win a race at the same time. I deeply believe that boys develop language skills slower than girls, and conversely, boys embrace science more readily than girls, unless there is extreme interference (like today).

Where we get it wrong is our extreme prejudice based on gender and a belief in equal outcomes. The last few years in Australia have been particularly brutal. Our government heavily promoted a commercial with a 10 year old boy slamming a door as domestic violence, followed by "that's a boy thing". This was a calculated attack to demoralise half of Australia's population, with no intent of stopping domestic violence. In fact, I challenge anyone to look at gender generalisations in any media in Australia (Google male/female with year by year timeframes as an example), or even listen to Australia's own minister for Sex Discrimination who brazenly supports highly sexist statements in interviews when she is on TV. She's a lawyer and lawyers consider their words carefully - it speaks volumes of how bad we are that almost no one has condemned any of this. The prejudice is unprecedented in at least 50 years. Nothing comes close to being so aggressive as media and governments are today with respect to sexism.

I promised I would build evidence about sexism and how we are far more sexist than I've ever seen. So far, I've researched what I can of 1970 and part of 1971. I found one article calling for boys to deliver newspapers, that was all I recall that was obviously sexist (from memory). I took many photos of adverts, articles, especially education, sports, advertising and politics. I will publish my findings, but as I expect to be attacked relentlessly and viciously (aka Matt Taylor), I intend to be robust in my evidence and (temporarily) remain anonymous in doing so. I've also been writing articles to support photo evidence and to cite blatant lies in this decades long gender war.

I am glad to see articles like this being discussed, however, as the sexism has recently become far more aggressive and far more prevalent and directed at younger children (code.org and Science Week in Australia as two examples), I have little faith that most people are listening and/or care. When the topic posted hits most mainstream papers, I know the gender war is stopped (at least for a time).

If you are a decent human being, I emplore you to take a hard stance against feminism or any gender based movement.

Thank you to the poster of this article and to the author.

It's a disappointing article in that it makes many narrowly focused and unfounded assumptions and one conclusion.

I've recently been doing an indepth study of sexism in Australia starting at 1970.

I've poured over archives (and I'm documenting it) to see how Australia went off the rails with its sexist attitude (eg. Domestic Violence is male only, or a revised false history of voting-who could and when).

What I have noticed is that there were plenty of ads and articles back in the early 70s (eg. One bank advertised its female branch manager with a large photo, quite proudly) that are inclusive, unlike today. TV adverts had plenty of representation in work, sport, etc. watch the "life be in it" as an example.

I know that there was an inclusive attitude back in the early 70s that we have lost. As an example, check out Science Week, aimed at kids, that has several girls only events and competitions. This sort of sexism was unprecedented from 1970-2000 (and possibly earlier). Also add that all of my female ancestors from 1900 onward held good jobs and were largely financially independent (which contradicts the article saying it didn't really happen before 1975). I've never been able to reconcile the modern story compared to my own family's history. It might be luck.

So, the article concluded that the difference is that women can now work. It ignores depression, stress (non financial), Boredom, lack of self-worth etc. if a person defines themself by a career and that career vanishes, it can turn an individual and their family upside down. I'm not surprised the authors focussed on housework and financial independence and ignored almost everything else as it seems to be the modern trend (ala domestic violence is male only).

I'm curious to see if any media outlets in Australia pick up on the blatant sexism of Science Week (targeted at kids). The last 10 years are proving to be the most sexist (by far) that I've ever seen. I'm doing some research by looking at government, education (which is largely government) and media. I will include photos, videos and loads of references - but it's a big job. It will take time when I am committed to work and family too.