Microsoft Apologizes for Big Boobs

[Mr Pantomime]

The best part of this thread was when some posters started complaining about how people are attacking the white man (with no mention of race in the story), and then when other posters started threatening anyone who was offended.

The joke isn't offensive, its just indicative of the boys club nature of programming. Its also super lame. Like Buzz Killington, Computer Programmer lame.

Captcha: Get Over It

 

[MelasZepheos_v1legacy]

To be fair, I'd laugh just as much at

0xB16D1CK5

Or

0xB16P3N15

So I'm saying not sexist. Maybe lowbrow and childish, but it's like with a calculator. It's just easier to enter 55318008 than it is to represent boner.

 

[OuroborosChoked]

Please explain to me how this is in any way sexist.

It's sexually objectifying a portion of the female anatomy, in a context where it's completely inappropriate to do so.

As The_Critic pointed out, men can have big boobs, too. If you still assert that this is sexist, you must admit that it's based on your own assumptions, not the context. The context lacks gender references, irrespective of what you may assume the coders meant the term "big boobs" to refer to.

 

[Danzavare]

*Sigh* Where's my free speech!? The world is hypersensitive but I'm not! Having a hypersensitive reaction to other people being hypersensitive is in no way ironic.

[/sarcasm]

I think the issue (and the thread reaction) is overblown, but I can understand why Microsoft would apologise. Better to dissociate early than risk dealing with an idiotic issue longer than need be.

 

[Khazoth]

Yeah, well, when the Escapist forums foams at the mouth with white knight fervor at anyone saying or doing anything contrary to the whole 'Women are shiny, faultless, goddesses who can do no wrong' you can't really blame the news team for stuff like this.



They know their audience. Because I know /someone/ will post here offended at this.

 

[cobra_ky]

Please explain to me how this is in any way sexist.

It's sexually objectifying a portion of the female anatomy, in a context where it's completely inappropriate to do so.

As The_Critic pointed out, men can have big boobs, too. If you still assert that this is sexist, you must admit that it's based on your own assumptions, not the context. The context lacks gender references, irrespective of what you may assume the coders meant the term "big boobs" to refer to.

The context is that we live in a society in which women are sexually objectified and that objectification passes for humor. Not to mention that "boobs" is a slang term for breasts, and that men only have them in so far as they have fat deposits that resemble female mammaries.

I'm not particularly concerned with what the coder's actual intent was (although it seems pretty clear to me.) The problem here is that they should have understood how their little joke could be construed as offensive, and then realized what a bad idea it was to put it into production code.

 

[OuroborosChoked]

The context is that we live in a society in which women are sexually objectified and that objectification passes for humor. Not to mention that "boobs" is a slang term for breasts, and that men only have them in so far as they have fat deposits that resemble female mammaries.

I'm not particularly concerned with what the coder's actual intent was (although it seems pretty clear to me.)

Not quite sure what you hoped to accomplish by laying out exactly what your assumptions are... I didn't ask for them. Were you hoping I'd praise your ability to figure things out in a way that's probably correct (not that we all haven't developed probably accurate conclusions already)? Were you hoping to convince me that they're not actually assumptions by stating your assumptions?

Really, I'm baffled...

 

[cobra_ky]

The context is that we live in a society in which women are sexually objectified and that objectification passes for humor. Not to mention that "boobs" is a slang term for breasts, and that men only have them in so far as they have fat deposits that resemble female mammaries.

I'm not particularly concerned with what the coder's actual intent was (although it seems pretty clear to me.)

Not quite sure what you hoped to accomplish by laying out exactly what your assumptions are... I didn't ask for them. Were you hoping I'd praise your ability to figure things out in a way that's probably correct (not that we all haven't developed probably accurate conclusions already)? Were you hoping to convince me that they're not actually assumptions by stating your assumptions?

Really, I'm baffled...

I'm not quite sure what your point was in the first place. I was asked to explained how the joke could be construed as sexist, and i did so.

I'm saying it's a very common set of assumptions for people to make, and that the public reaction to this "joke" should have been completely foreseeable and obvious to the programmer who made it.

 

[samaugsch]

Is it bad that I snickered at the title?

 

[Twilight_guy]

Ah man, I though they were going to apologize for their executives. [a href="http://www.hiyoooo.com/"]Hiyo![/a]

I'm wondering if its in the source code or its part of the binary. If its source, then aren't comments stripped? If its binary then why the heck are people offended by it? Nobody wrote it trying to control what the hex representation would like. Maybe its something else and posted somewhere, I dunno. Honestly I think its more sexist to think that only men would be interested in the words big boobs. There are immature females too you know!

 

[Notsomuch]

I notice that many overzealous people have opinions that are wrong. This demands further inquiry.

 

[MelasZepheos_v1legacy]

0xt1n7p3ni5

To be fair, I'd laugh just as much at

0xB16D1CK5

Or

0xB16P3N15

Except these don't work because they're not hexadecimal.

Hexadecimal only allows characters 0-9 and A-F, so 16 characters in all.

That was kind of my point.

The reason I went on to say it was easier to type BOOBLESS than BONER on a calculator was to point out that you can represent BIGBOOBS in a hexadecimal system but you can't represent BIGPENIS or BIGDICKS.

Like I said 'I would laugh just as much at 0xB16D1CK5 Or 0xB16P3N15. The end of that sentence (that I didn't type is) but I can't because they can't be represented hexadecimally.

 

[Garrsus]

It's sad to see what people go to pieces over now, it just makes you think every person you meet is simply too fragile to exist.

 

[pppppppppppppppppp]

Jesus Christ, sometimes I don't know why I even bother with this site anymore.

Two whole pages of people whining about feminism and how overblown this story is.

0 actual feminists taking exception.

Well, let me be the first then. Yes, it's sexist. Yes, it reinforces a negative perception of the software development industry. Yes, Microsoft is doing the right thing by apologizing and patching it out.

Story over, situation resolved, let's move on.

Sexist
adj.

discriminatory on the basis of sex

I don't mean to start some sort of flame war or semantic back-and-forth, but how exactly is the phrase "big boobs" in itself discriminatory? Sure, it's stupid and immature, but calling it sexist would require several large inferences and leaps of logic.

A phrase in itself can't be discriminatory if it doesn't state or infer any sort of opinion. The phrase "Feminist Whore" is sexist because it implies a hatred and malice towards feminists. The phrase "Big Boobs" implies......boobs? That they're big? What?

It's like the difference between saying the n work (which connotatively recollects several centuries of hardship and oppression for African Americans) and saying "black guy". (which means there's a guy... who's black.) Could someone say the phrase black guy to make some sort of racist remark? Sure. Does that mean the phrase in itself is bad? Nope.

Immature and stupid? Yes. Made by some sexist? Possibly. Sexist in itself? No.

 

[weirdsoup]

Some may say it's a slow news day, but I like to be kept abreast of this sort of thing.
If someone's unhappy about that, they should get it off their chest...

TITS!!!!

 

[Brent DiPaolo]

Might want to proofread before submitting. "The two groups were still quite happily butting when heads when" in paragraph 6 and "occurred lat year" in the last paragraph.

 

[cobra_ky]

Jesus Christ, sometimes I don't know why I even bother with this site anymore.

Two whole pages of people whining about feminism and how overblown this story is.

0 actual feminists taking exception.

Well, let me be the first then. Yes, it's sexist. Yes, it reinforces a negative perception of the software development industry. Yes, Microsoft is doing the right thing by apologizing and patching it out.

Story over, situation resolved, let's move on.

Sexist
adj.

discriminatory on the basis of sex

I don't mean to start some sort of flame war or semantic back-and-forth, but how exactly is the phrase "big boobs" in itself discriminatory? Sure, it's stupid and immature, but calling it sexist would require several large inferences and leaps of logic.

A phrase in itself can't be discriminatory if it doesn't state or infer any sort of opinion. The phrase "Feminist Whore" is sexist because it implies a hatred and malice towards feminists. The phrase "Big Boobs" implies......boobs? That they're big? What?

It's like the difference between saying the n work (which connotatively recollects several centuries of hardship and oppression for African Americans) and saying "black guy". (which means there's a guy... who's black.) Could someone say the phrase black guy to make some sort of racist remark? Sure. Does that mean the phrase in itself is bad? Nope.

Immature and stupid? Yes. Made by some sexist? Possibly. Sexist in itself? No.

You're comparing "big boobs" to phrases that describe actual human beings. More importantly, you're completely ignoring the context that it was used in.

There was no obvious reason whatsoever to use that value, other than the programmer writing it found it amusing. "0xBI6B00B5" constituted a joke. the "humor" ostensibly derives from the fact that it's an inappropriate phrase. Why is it inappropriate? Because breasts are a sexually objectified portion of female anatomy. Sexual objectification of women is sexist.

 

[rioki]

I am totally sexist now: 2976579765