[Noisebridge-discuss] It has come to my attention that...

Danny O'Brien danny at spesh.com
Fri Jun 21 00:55:34 UTC 2013


On Fri, Jun 21, 2013 at 6:47 AM, Bill Gag <billgag11 at yahoo.com> wrote:

> The fact that this discussion has gone from Dru's behavior to more people
> bitching about their stupid science lab being used as a resource by
> homeless people is disgusting, Dru's behavior is terrible even if the space
> was a fucking office.
>
> The fact that every discussion has to be used to define the space is
> irritating enough but this discussion is no place for that shit, get the
> fuck out of here and be safe at home.
>

Hey Kim,

You're right that it's important to make the stupid science lab safe for
everyone. But, speaking personally, I can't do that *and* make it as a
resource for homeless people or people who are just generally hanging out.
It's too much. It takes a lot of time and energy to deal with the normal
traumatastic drama that emerges from dealing with all the problems that
hacker culture has, *and* deal with people who are trying to deal with a
bunch of other societal issues, like poverty, homelessness and mental
illness, *plus* the people who prey on open spaces and open communities in
general.

It's a stupid science lab, but that's all it is meant to be. We had a
science lab experiment trying to make it welcoming by just being open all
the time so that anyone could come in at any time, but in the end that just
end up excluding whole classes of people (including a lot of whiteboy
hackers, but also hackers of every other kind), and constructing an
atmosphere of entitlement with a bunch of people who aren't doing the stuff
that the place is designed to encourage.

I'm burned out, because the place needs smart, enthusiastic, vaguely sane
people to help things run smoothly, and a great deal of my time is
dominated by the consequences of people who clutch hold of it for other
reasons than it was designed for, and need to, frankly, sort their shit out
somewhere else.

You've only just subscribe to nb-discuss, Kim, but you know that I've
invested a lot of time social sysadminning trying to sort out problems
among people and mediate solutions. I don't really often go off on one like
this. But really, I have to draw the line somewhere.

So here's one the new lines I'm drawing for myself. If you think that this
is a "stupid science lab", please leave.  Anyone who seriously says that
for a moment is not welcome by me, anymore. You should go. There are other
places you can go, less full of horrible science geeks. There are other
places you can build yourself, that might be more welcoming.

We have a lot of problems, and we can't solve them all, and right now, we
can't solve yours, particularly when you're actively scorning the very
reason we wanted to share our space with you.

I'm sorry. Please go.

d.



>
> The fact is, that making the space exclusive or anything of that sort
> would NOT solve this problem, the presence of predatory men and people
> there to defend them is, and no matter how you view the space, this needs
> to be dealt with, because as long as humans use noisebridge there will be
> this sorta shit.
>
> Because its not a safe space. Its a hostile one, only safe for white men
> with houses or jobs. Until that changes, this shit will continue. The
> argument over the use of the space is merely an extension of this shit
> behavior.
>
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>
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