[Dailydave] Miltonic Shitweasels

[Ben Nagy]

[given that I got drunk and blabbed this on twitter, I may as well blog it
 on my preferred microblogging platform
              ]


I recently gave a talk at Kiwicon, in New Zealand, with an old friend. At
least one person was genuinely and deeply distressed by one slide, and a
number of other people complained about the talk's "tone". After a
discussion with the organisers, we were asked to leave, and banned from the
rest of the conference and official events. The charge, per the Code of
Conduct, was "shitweaselry".

What follows is not a defence of my actions, nor is it an appeal for sympathy,
and it is not, most emphatically, a call for action of any kind. I'd be happiest
if you read it, react in whatever way it causes you to react and then take no
further action.

Firstly, the incident. Most of our talk used the "metaphorical images"
technique. Concepts and tools were represented by images that were intended to
be some combination of thought-provoking, amusing and beautiful, while we
filled in the blanks with banter. And, no bones about it, this talk was
deliberately intended to be at least half stand-up. Cryptocat was a person on
a motor-scooter comprehensively failing to leap 5 cars. Skype was the shady
"Free Hugs" bunker meme.

To illustrate Tor, the image we chose was a transgender Mongolian woman
starkly contrasted against a featureless desert, which we cribbed from a
photo-journalistic piece we'd read here:
http://www.slate.com/blogs/behold/2014/03/03/ _lvaro_laiz_photographs_the_tran
sgender_community_in_mongolia_in_his_series.html. The accurate quote of the
controversial line we ad-libbed is "[Tor] makes you stick out as much as a
transgender Mongolian in a desert" ( I say accurate only because some people
reported it as "transvestite" ).

The St James Theatre in Wellington is a magnificent stage. Three banks of
seating, a titanic curtain arch and a thousand-odd expectant hackers in the
gloom. If you've been on stage, you'll know what it's like to give a good
performance. Lines are working. Banter flows, cueing from one to the other
happens as if rehearsed, and the audience are THERE. A vast animal, breathing in
time, laughing in time. You are a falcon; coasting on an endless updraft.

I mention this only to help you understand what it's like to walk to the wings
and be told that it was terrible. That people walked out. It was offensive.
There's an organiser going on stage right now to apologise, and come with us,
please.

I'll gloss over the process of the ejection. Many of the Kiwicon crüe are old
friends. It was done well, nobody got mad.

It's still quite difficult to set out my emotional reactions without
revisiting them, and they're not really germane to my point, so I'll keep it
brief. This was not simply an ambush by the professional complainers brigade.
A real human was really upset, and I'll have no part in opining on whether
they had ( or need ) some sort of right to that feeling. Since I am not,
actually, a psychopath I feel awful for them. I was bitterly disappointed that
what I thought was a great talk provoked such a negative reaction - nobody
likes a bad review. Finally, there was a large measure of crushing guilt that
I'd made life difficult for my friends running the con. It's a hard job,
incredibly stressful, and they didn't need the extra weight of an incident
management.

So, the last of the facts. We apologised as soon as we could get ourselves
together. It was brief, it was genuine, we didn't defend our actions or lash
out. We stayed off twitter completely during the hot reaction phase and kept a
low profile for the next few days. We supported the organisers. As a result of
excellent handling by the organisers and our role in not actively instigating
drama, it died fairly quickly and the rest of the con was ( I'm told ) not
ruined.

Unless you like poetry and controversy, stop reading.

Seriously. Now would be a good time.

I'd like to say I've always loved Paradise Lost, but while I'm being honest..
it's pretty long. The good bits, however, are great. For those that don't know
it, it's a dramatic retelling of the War in Heaven. It's particularly loved by
scholars because of the complexity with which Milton treats Satan. I've always
felt that it resonates with "hacking"; both our perception by "normal" society
and in our darker moods. In Book nine, Satan speaks of his alienation, his
obsession:

"[...] sweet interchange
Of hill and valley, rivers, woods, and plains,
Now land, now sea, and shores with forest crowned,
Rocks, dens, and caves! But I in none of these
Find place or refuge
[...]
For only in destroying I find ease
To my relentless thoughts;"

I'm certainly not casting myself as Satan here - I'm just a run-of-the-mill
shitweasel. To leap ahead a few hundred years to "The Love Song of J. Alfred
Prufrock" and borrow Eliot:

"No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;
Am an attendant lord, one that will do
To swell a progress, start a scene or two"

but, let's be realistic, I'm not on the side of the Angels. In the final phases
of Paradise Lost, Eden is created and the War recedes to Heaven and Hell while
Earth is set aside for humans. As time drags on, wonder ebbs - yet surely a
small price to pay for the banishment of Satan and his forces.

Most of my friends in this community are ... unskilled ... at correct
behaviour. They are, frankly, downright offensive some of the time. Some hold
deeply troubling views. I'm sure that many of them could change if they really
tried, but by the same token many of them have pretty genuine problems - and
yet, despite their flaws, I'm bound to these people by a community of spirit.
Of course we can't tolerate individual harassment or physical attack, and we
should apply those standards impartially to attendees, speakers and staff. I
recognise that the act of congregation can make us bolder in our worst traits.
I agree that the culture as it stands needs surgery. I only fear, as part of
the wrong end of the spectrum, that perhaps the scalpel is too blunt.

I suppose it's for the best. The bell curve normalises. Numbers swell, the
community grows, events multiply. "Real Professionals" are showing up.
Thoughts are being suitably led and People Are Getting Along. A true Eden.

Yet where will we go, we devils, the offensive, the shocking, the stealers of
illicit laughter? It's nigh impossible to create a joke without a butt, but
what "rating" shall we aim for onstage? MA15+? PG? G? Will we need trigger
warnings for pictures of scissors? Frequent Duck References or furniture with
alluringly smooth corners? Was that last joke duck-phobic? Should we read
aloud our two-column papers, approved in advance, and exit to genteel
applause? Oh, poor Prufrock!

"
In the room the CISSPs come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.

If one, settling a pillow by her head,
  Should say: "That is not what I meant at all;
  That is not it, at all."
"

Do I dare to eat another peach?

This is the Titanomachia. We cede to newer, gentled gods.


( Or, in the words of the immortal sage Bender, "Start our OWN theme park.
With blackjack. And hookers." )

Ben "shitweasel" Nagy