So wait, let me get this straight. When people say "he changed his side of the story, at first in the BBC interview, he said he was serious!", they are actually wrong, because his point from day 1 was that the comment was made in irony ?

Comes back to the entire point : are we too quick to condemn people over social media outrage, before we have a chance to process the entire body of evidence ? I mean, if we now need to publically destroy people over ironic statements, might as well burn all literature from the Age of Enlightenment (looking at you Voltaire).

And right back to Ad hominems. MRA, uninformed... etc.. etc..

Every IT work place I've been in trips over themselves to hire women and minorities that do apply to the positions we have. There are no artificial boundaries. Girl wants to work in programming or IT, girl goes to school for it, girl applies to job, girl fufills dream.

You didn't even bother to list any of your perceived artificial barriers.

My girlfriend works in development and application support. She faced no artificial boundaries. No real ones either. She studied, got a degree, found work.

I don't deny the situation exists. Conversely, the same situation exists in many fields. I deny though that it is a problem. If you think it's a problem, do you also find lack of men in nursing an issue ? Lack of women in garbage collection ? Lack of men in child daycare work ?

Also, if you really feel we need to achieve Equality of Outcome, why do you feel diversity quotas are better than simply naturally letting people choose careers that interest them ? If we have 100 skilled IT workers, wouldn't it be best to have 100 of them working in IT instead of hiring the 10 women and then only 10 men to achieve a 50-50 split, while leaving 80 people unemployed ?

Do you also feel that it's better for someone to get a job because of his skin color or gender than because he's the best candidate ?

Because to me those would be creating a problem where none exists.

Your golf example is terrible. Golf is a sport. Get better, there is no reason to expect "equality" in Golf. Learn 2 play and all that jazz.

In this particular case ? Which inequality are you referring to exactly ? Last I checked, there is no inequality here. There's a lack of participants in STEM, not a barrier for women or minority groups to actually get in STEM. That women and minorities don't sign up to STEM programs doesn't mean there is inequality.

I mean, are you also going to contend that Nursing needs to be redressed by giving preferential treatment to men ?

Which is exactly how you address ALL inequalities.

I don't get your point. First for STEM, you seem to be arguing for Equality of Outcome, then for gay marriage, you accept Equality of Opportunity.

Which is it ? Because women in STEM have right now equality of opportunity, same as now gays with legalized gay marriage have equality of opportunity. And that is true equality.

Equality of Outcome, what you are apparently preaching for in STEM for women, is simply Diversity quotas, where you discriminate people based on gender/race to fill quotas so that you end up with exactly equal pie slices on your chart. That is exactly what Equality isn't and exactly what I'm saying is the wrong way to address equality issues.

You called the OP bigoted, but by pushing your Diversity quotas and your discrimination policies, can't you see how you could sound bigoted yourself ? That's why I said Ad hominem, it's simply an insult that brings nothing to the discussion. A difference of opinion is not bigotry necessarily.

The BBC interview was made over the phone while he was still at the Airport in Seoul. And he didn't double down, he admitted to making the statement, and never denied that part. The part in question is the entire context in which the statement was made, which is now being said to not have been presented initially : that the context is that it was made as a joke and that Sir Tim Hunt.

Basically, comes back to the premise of the submission : Are people reacting too quickly. Couldn't they have waited for him to get home, take in the reporting and then have him comment when people had calmed down ?

No, instead they catch him off guard while he's in a foreign country, in an uncomfortable situation.

First, I suggest reading through all the links, Connie's assertions were not fully backed, the 2 "witnesses" only confirm the joke was made (which Sir Tim Hunt doesn't deny, since he made it), and have steered clear from denying the 2nd report that frames the context.

Second, the about what I quoted : Questionning whether or not we as a society are failing to follow proper procedure and take in all evidence and try to uncover the truth before we make these decisions, and do base our decisions only on the initial emotional reaction is not us being Sexist.

Questionning emotional reactions of people is Skepticism. Not Sexism. If you're going to accuse a bunch of people of being sexist because they refuse to push your narrative and instead decide to dig deeper, you are part of the issue I'm raising. If the man truly is sexist and bigoted, give us the time to gather evidence so we can come to this conclusion based on truth rather than emotional outrage on twitter.

In this case, what was said was not properly reviewed, nor was the context properly framed and the accuser was believed and trusted 100% and only their account was considered to issue punishment.

This is the issue. Not that speech shouldn't have consequences, that the consequences to speech shouldn't be given so quickly in reaction to a social media cabal, before everything is properly assessed.

Sir Tim Hunt was not burning down houses nor was anyone's life or property in danger here. So what's your point besides shifting goalposts ?

That's exactly the wrong way, that's the way that creates more seggregation and conflict. The way to redress inequality is to remove the advantage a group has, and in order not to race to the bottom, you do it by giving that advantage to everyone, EQUALLY.

There's language in marriage law that prohibits certain types of unions ? Don't create new, preferrential unions for the exclude folks, simply remove the restriction that prevents equality!

Again : folks asking for special or preferrential treatment are Anti-equality. They are fostering a hostile society that segregates based features. I'm sure that's not your intention, but that is what you end up asking for.

And yes I do know what Ad hominem means. It's what you did to the OP. You argued his person rather than his argument.

Sexist jokes aren't inherently wrong. There's a difference in advocating sexist policies (lab seggregation, that women don't belong in STEM) and a sexist joke.

It's a good way to introduce a serious talk where he congratulates women in science in fact. "Women don't belong in science, pfwaaahh, look at all this neat stuff they have done!" is a sexist joke followed by a very serious praise. Haven't you ever used sarcasm or irony to then show how the opposite is the desired outcome ?

Sorry I didn't pollute the submission with a overly verbose description of the event. As for this quote, this is not a fact, this is in fact false. The very CORE issue here is that we do not have a broadcast of the speech. There is no video or recording of it, and thus we have to take both Ms. St-Louis and the anonymous EU Representative at face value.

If you're going to tell me to get my facts straight, at least get yours straight. Thank for providing further information about what the Lunch was about, even though that is not the topic.

As for what Tim Hunt was asked to do, if indeed that is even true (you provide no source), that's even worse. No one should be told to shut up and look good, if you do that, you should expect people to simply not show up to your talks. Let people express themselves, even if you may disagree with the result. It won't physically or mentally harm you to hear an opinion different from your own.

If it does, it would do you well to learn how to deal with those situations now rather than later anyway.

Ad hominem. While the OP was rather vulgar, it does not diminish his point that "Special treatment" is not equality and minority groups asking for and receiving preferrential treatment, is the exact opposite of equality.

People that support the idea of Special and preferrential treatment of minorities are the very problem. They are the ones creating inequalities in the world and pushing conflict at every turn, instead of supporting resolutions and equality for all.

The catch is whether to trust anything at face value. Don't take the Daily Mail article at face value, just like you don't take Ms. St-Louis' comments at face value.

Sometimes, taking a step back, letting the dust settle, and making sure to have all relevant information can lead to proper actions being taken. Time (if you use it to better understand a situation), can lead to better Accuracy.

Forced to resign. His wife got the call from HR, which was basically "either he resigns, or we remove him" while he was on the plane back from Seoul. Which makes it all the worse, the guy isn't even back from his conference, and without even meeting him, they ask for his resignation.