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Comment Re:Remove fear labeling to start objective discuss (Score 1) 704

We don't call it "race-phobia" or "men-phobia" or "women-phobia", the labelling of disagreeing with an accusation of fear (homo-phobia) does not allow the conversation to begin on a level of mutual respect, where people merely have disagreements on personal behavior.

I'm not going to discourage you to create new words but I think it's important to note think about how people react when someone tells them that something they said was racist. I've called plenty of people out on racist, sexist, transphobic, and homophobic things that they have said both in university classroom settings, workshop settings (were people were there to learn about things like transphobia or racism in LGBTQ communities), and day to day life when I'm hanging out with people. When do people act the most defensive or offended that they were called out, or even just that made aware that something they said wasn't ok? When it has to do with racism. I think this has to do with the imprint that historical racism and organizations that are blatantly overtly racist have made on most people that grew up in the US compared to the imprint that feminists one or many of a variety of feminist schools of thought have made. So yes you can say that homophobia and transphobia have a suffix that means "fear". However if your going to say that -phobia makes those words imply a sense of fearing people who are gay or trans and thus that means that people react less favorably to those words than racism or sexism then I suggest you take a look at your examples and also look at examples of how people react to people pointing out that something they said or did was homophobic or transphobic vs. racist.

Comment Re:Teaching programmer? (Score 1) 381

Sorry to pop your bubble, but the only documented bias that exist these days is against male students, and in every field of knowledge, not only in CS, and it is a bias reinforced by initiatives like this.

Who knew it was so terribly hard to be a [cisgendered] male in the US? Oh wait, that's right it's not. Check your privilege at the door and read some sociology texts. After that I suggest you look at the reasonings for things like Title IX. Do I think that cutting pay to teachers (who don't get paid enough as it is) who don't have X amount of females in their classes is a good thing? No - that isn't a logical way to start going about fixing this issue. But I'm not ignorant and culturally blind enough to not realize that there is a major gender gap in things like STEM subjects/fields and wages.

Comment Re:What about texting apps? (Score 1) 100

Facebook, foursquare, and just plain old texting, all impact people's safety because of their improper use, mainly by drivers. Are we going to go after texting app developers when people get hurt while using such software?

None of the apps and websites that you mentioned make claims that they can save your life via enabling others to locate you under snow based on wifi, gps, and/or bluetooth connections. Yes texting and browsing Facebook while driving impact people's safety but, as you said, doing such is improper use. The apps brought up in the documents created by the Canadian Avalanche Centre are, unsurprisingly, likely to not enable you to be found when using the device correctly while being stuck in an Avalanche.

Comment Re:What is the problem? (Score 1) 89

Presumably people are paying for it out of pocket. It should also be noted that a lot of people in the US pay for mental health treatment out of pocket as it isn't uncommon for health insurance companies to say, cover 12 outpatient visits a year. Yes I realize that inpatient treatment is more expensive than outpatient, but if you figure that plenty of people are paying for 40+ outpatient mental health visits a year out of pocket it ends up being comparable.

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