Policing tone is far more prevalent when the speaker is a woman. Perhaps (I'm doubtful) this feedback would be given to a very well known male speaker, but it would not have been the top comment here.
Criticism is a staple of any human discussion/forum. It's not even feedback, it's just complaining about TFA. Sometimes the top comment on HN is someone complaining about the font-color of the blog post. Let's not lose our minds here.
Seems weird to get worked up over spotting a complaint on HN just because a woman wrote TFA. And btw, most complaints on HN are leveled at men simply because men populate this forum and tech more than women. Does that mean this forum hate men? Why is it assumed men can handle it but women can't?
I have to wonder how many women are turned off by the idea that they need to be babied like this and can't take generic online criticism. Or the suggestion that criticism was only leveled at them because they are women. It sure reeks, to me.
Having different standards for different speakers is exactly what you're doing.
Criticizing how a message is delivered is standard HN criticism. Especially the sort of "everyone is smart except for me" tone of TFA. I myself criticize commenters here for that as it's something I can't stand, either.
Why would you think it's something we only see leveled at women here? And, according to what? And, yes, you're then infantilizing women when OP does receive that criticism. I think your heart is in the right place, but you're doing exactly what you think you're condemning.
I don't think this type of criticism is only leveled at women. I think it is
a) much more likely to happen for much softer offenses
b) much more likely to become the primary conversation rather than an aside buried three levels deep in the comments
Perhaps in this instance Rachel's rhetoric was so off-putting that it really deserved top billing for conversation/criticism here. But that doesn't ring true for me, and I sincerely doubt the conversation/top post would be the same if instead written by e.g. Carmack
It's a good rant, but it's still a rant. Don't make it to something it's not, plenty of rants get harsher critiques and or don't receive that much up-votes.
There are few blog posts that make it to the front page of hacker news that don't draw sharp criticism in the comments and that criticism is quite often the top comment.
> “When a woman says it, it doesn’t sound as crazy,” said Maria Guadalupe, a professor at France’s INSEAD Business school and a co-creator with Joe Salvatore, clinical associate professor of educational theatre at New York University’s Steinhardt School, of the play.
Hmmm.
Is your conclusion based on actors reading off lines, or real life tone policing?
Maybe if it's a "natural experiment" it could be that women know they'll be held to a more tolerant standard (by most people) so they can get away with being a bit ruder. Or maybe they don't know the standard is more tolerant for women (they might even think they're being oppressed) but know where the line is where a crowd will turn against them (like most people do), and that line happens to allow them to be a little ruder.
Interesting experiment! I wasn't aware of it. I think it's difficult to extrapolate results, but I definitely have different takeaways than you.
1) The smiling aspect is explained (for me) by society pushing women to constantly smile, but not men. The amount we expect men and women to smile is different and when they violate those norms they're either a bitch (women for too little) or fake (men for too much).
I'm not sure how to interpret the tone aspect, and it's super interesting! It definitely flies in the face of multitudes of studies showing the reverse. I'm inclined to believe the studies which are really quite simple e.g. have people grade a short essay where the only difference between groups is the essay author's name.
