A robot programmed to eliminate "unpure" food based on the standards set by a bunch of critics. In their arrogance the critics will have provided standards of purity that no food can match, and the robot will go wild, destroying all food everywhere.

Of course given that the end is inevitable, i for one welcome our new robotic food tasting overlords.

Power companies hate Apple for this one weird trick!ï

If you don't care about what kind of job you get, just how much money you make, then:

a) You will make more money than someone who considers other factors in their choice of career.
b) You will take any courses which you're told will enhance your marketability, no matter how disgusting. Like COBOL.

Hence it's unsurprising that people who take COBOL make more money... but is it *because* they took COBOL? That's less clear. Correlation is not causation.

Despite Microsoft supposedly saying that won't be the case, i'm more concerned that this will mean the end of Minecraft on PS3 and PS4. Either directly or through neglect. Microsoft may be behind in this console generation but they're definitely not out yet, and a "the only place where you can play the latest version of Minecraft" tagline might sell 100,000 or more extra consoles.

Well even if we still haven't cleared up the mystery of the reason for the abbreviation, and despite the fact we clearly differ in opinion on the social issues involved, i thank and congratulate you for being the only person to respond to the original question in a reasonable manner with an attempt at an actual explanation (albeit with some confusion and fumbling around on both our parts before arriving at that point.)

Although it's a little sad that in this case an AC is setting the standard that so many of the pseudonym users ought to be aspiring to.

See my above response. It's not the name i disagree with. (I disagree with the assumptions behind it, and it seems a bit over the top, but it's a reasonably adequate name for its purposes.) It's the choice to consistently use the acronym instead that seems bizarre to me.

Saying "I don't like people who are enthusiastic about rape threats" doesn't sound paranoid. However if a bunch of people started going on about the "RTEs" and questioning what the RTEs were responsible for and if the RTEs had submitted this slashdot article, etc. Well, that would sound both stupid and a little paranoid.

Though i disagree with your interpretations, that's a perfectly adequate description of how the name might have come about, however it does nothing to explain the choice at acronym-ize it.

I have heard people complain about the War on Drugs many times (and i often agree with those criticisms.) However i can't ever recall anyone complaining about the "WoD". Certainly not for the first reference to the name in any case. In contrast i've seen "SJW" used dozens or scores of times, but can't recall "Social Justice Warrior" being used at all except on the rare occasion to explain what SJW actually stands for. (Notably in your explanation above you just assumed everyone already knew what SJW stood for when you explained the derivation.)

So to get back to the original comment that prompted the question in this thread, why is it:
"Who are possibly outnumbered by professional victims and SJWs."

instead of:
"Who are possibly outnumbered by professional victims and social justice warriors."?

or to use your own definition, why not just:
"Who are possibly outnumbered by professional victims and militant misandric idiots."?

To me, #1 sounds stupid, #2 sounds a little hokey but okay, and #3 sounds perfectly reasonable (given the viewpoint of the person supposedly saying it.) I would certainly have gone with "militant misandric idiots" myself but would be boggled by the idea if anyone suggested abbreviating it to "MMI".

(I was originally going to suggest "militant misandric assholes" as an alternative, but then realized that if you tried to abbreviate that everyone would think you were talking about martial arts. Although perhaps choosing a term that can't be acronym-ized without confusion would be a good way to help prevent that from happening.)

You're right, that was a mistake on my part and i apologize. What i should have said was "Question, why do you (generally speaking) feel the need to lump many or all of the people who disagree with you together into one group [...]"

The "or all" part is because it's possible that the set of people that are, in general, included in the group "professional victims" is actually a subset of the group "SJWs". If that were the case my original question would still be correct, however since i don't know if that is the case or not the rewording is justified. Carry on.

Hmm,

#1: I never said that i've seen anyone on /. or any other forum say that rape or death threats are cool. I have seen people make such threats elsewhere, and perhaps it is a bit of jump to assume that the people who made those threats think that they are cool, but i think it's reasonable to believe so until proven otherwise. If you wish to debate the point however for the moment i will settle for "i mentally categorize everyone who makes rape or death threats into the same group."

#2: You specifically left out the bit immediately following the part you quoted, in which i clarified that i was not accusing anyone here "(and just to be clear, as far as i know that is not the exact same group as the people who like to use the term "SJW")".

#3: The part where you say that you do not take conversations on slashdot seriously (or at least that's my interpretation of your statement) and post here "only for fun": http://slashdot.org/comments.p...

So nice job troll, thanks for playing?

No, i have no problem with that. If you wanted to take everyone you currently lump under the label "SJW" and call them "misandrists" instead i would disagree with your definition, but i wouldn't think it sounded stupid. It's not that you disagree with those people and have a less than complimentary name for them, it's that the name you (collectively) chose sounds like it came out of a paranoid conspiracy. Why construct stupid sounding acronyms to make it sound like there's some organized group out to get you when there are so many other perfectly normal words you could use?

It's interesting that so far there have been over a half-dozen replies in this thread and there's been a lot of dodging the question (sometimes with insults thrown in, free of charge) but no actual attempt to explain why "SJW" seemed like a good idea at the time.

No, i got it all from three letters written by you, and the context of all the other people who have used those same three letters. I realize the definition is a bit redundant, but the group of people who use "SJW" to refer to people in a serious context just end up sounding well... to put it politely, "strange." My faith in humanity, battered though it may be, insists that they're not all just crazy and there must be some reason why they choose to do that, so what is it?

As for your knee, it sounds like you hurt it. I can say that in just six words because in this case i can say the first thing that comes to mind without sounding like i'm trying to insult you outright.

Well as i said, my initial presumption would be that people who always resort to blaming things on groups with three letter acronym names are just crazy. However i am trying not to fall prey to the simple "well those people are just crazy" impulse, so i'm trying to understand instead. Why do you feel that's appropriate? Do you not realize it sounds... strange to people who aren't versed in your sub-culture? Or do you not care? Do you believe you're trying to educate the rest of us about what "those people" are really like?

Even though i do mentally categorize everyone who thinks rape and death threats are cool into the same group (and just to be clear, as far as i know that is not the exact same group as the people who like to use the term "SJW") i don't feel the need to give them a name any more specific than "misogynist assholes." I don't understand the appeal of coming up with some fancy name with a three letter acronym and bandying it about all over the place. Honestly i'd think that anyone who felt compelled to do so would sound... well, a little crazy. So what's the appeal? (I'd think the people who keep going on about "MRA"s are crazy, except i had the impression the "MRA"s gave that name/acronym to themselves, which again, i don't understand the appeal.)

Question, why do you (generally speaking) feel the need to lump all the people who disagree with you together into one group, give that group a sarcastic name, and then abbreviate that name into an acronym which you can then use as a accusatory label whenever the subject comes up for discussion?

It sounds like the kind of thing my old paranoid-schizophrenic girlfriend would do when talking about "them", but i presume you are not mentally ill, so there must be some other reason for it. Is it some kind of bonding thing between people who feel threatened by others? Or do you believe that by creating the appearance of some kind of organized opposition that you will sway "neutral" parties toward your side? It just sounds dumb to me, but maybe i'm not the intended audience?

Well if California was actually betrayed by anyone, the first blame would have to fall at the feet of the state legislature, which failed to vote on the incentive package before the latest session ended. When the California governor promised Tesla the incentives the company responded with interest, and a few days after those incentives disappeared in puff of legislative smoke Tesla announced their decision to go with Nevada.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/...

When the topic first came up on Slashdot a number of people seemed to think offering such incentives was a bad idea. Maybe the California legislature agreed with that reasoning, but if they've made any statements about why they did what they did i haven't heard about it.

"A dowser is less effective than a geologist and bears, at the minimum, a higher opportunity cost over the average (of instances of people searching for water with a dowser instead of a geologist)."

Wait, a dowser is less effective than bears, at the minimum? What kind of low bar do bears set? Where does one go to hire a bear to find water and how do they go about it?