I'm quite skeptical of this. It's not like her gender is immediately obvious from the GitHub repo, and it seems obvious that if these guys recognized the screen name they wouldn't have been foolish enough to make these comments about an engineer at Mozilla.

Accusing everybody criticizing a woman of sexism is certainly not helping. They almost certainly didn't know she is a woman. Moreover Steve Klabnik at least is a widely known ally (http://confreaks.com/videos/1089-madisonruby2012-anti-opress...)

"Accusing everybody criticizing a woman of sexism is certainly not helping."

It's not that they're criticizing a woman, it's ~how~ they go about it.

It is fundamentally impossible to provide enough evidence or preemptive apologies to find redemption once someone starts playing the Identity Victim card. Don't even bother.

It's the reverse - a lack of civility among those alpha-nerd types leads to the general acceptance of misogyny (and racism, for that matter) among them.

They both feed into each other.

I don't want to be the one to say it, but it hasn't yet been mentioned in this thread.

If the author was named Henry instead of Heather, this wouldn't make front page or have a comment thread full of white knights.

That doesn't make the critics right in their aggressiveness, and people overall should be nicer.

You have absolutely no way of knowing that this post would not make the front page if the 'H' was for Henry.

That sentiment is a huge pet peeve of mine. Forget the gender of harthur, and look at what's left: someone writes a tool that's useful for them, and thought it would be useful for others (and, based on other comments, clearly it's agreed that it is for some). At least three people publicly take a shit all over said tool because, you know, lolol. Those three people have now been called out, and rightly so.

I don't think those three have been called out because Heather is a woman. I think they've been called out because others can see themselves in Heather's place. I know if I published something I wrote, just a small convenient script I had lying around, I wouldn't feel too good to see it attacked in public. Genuine sympathy can be extended to anyone.

"If the author was named Henry instead of Heather"

I'm going to have to strongly disagree, I honestly didn't know the author was a girl until I saw the name, well after I had read comments and was intrigued overall with the topic. I think the jump to misogyny or gender bias is a bit premature, but I can't really offer up much evidence other then my own perceptions and interpretations of what I've read.

Simply put, the topic is really interesting in itself and hasn't really been discussed much on HN in this specific way, unless I've missed some previous threads. I think add the fact that the negative comments were from some decently well known people, which all responded to it as well, and I think you have all the explanation you need for it being a popular post outside of any sort of need to resort to guys going to to a girls defence explanation.

"have a comment thread full of white knights"

You're seriously suggesting that anyone here who decries the rude behaviour described in the blog post, is doing so just to impress the protagonist of this drama with their chivalry? What an absurd notion.

Using the phrase "white knights" as a gender-based insult for people sticking up to bully-behavior is pretty unnecessary and reflects poorly on you. There's no need to bully the bullied further because you feel some sort of nonexistent imbalance.

If the author was named Henry, the probability that this post would have been written would be far lower. For better or for worse.

Perhaps you are correct. While I completely agree that what happened to her was completely uncalled for regardless of her gender. I find that sometimes myself I am slightly harsher in criticism of my male colleagues and friends. Perhaps dcramer and steveklabnik didn't realize they were addressing the project of a female programmer? Nonetheless, their rudeness is still wrong especially in the public sphere.

I seriously doubt it was misogyny as much as it's just online disinhibition. Twitter is especially notorious because the very format forces you to be curt.

The majority of HN readers seem to have assumed that the author is male. I assumed the same thing for most of it, before getting suspicious at the non-joking use of "sobbing". I wouldn't be surprised if these Twitter posters made the same assumption.

The thing that bothers me is that some people changed their tone after they found out she was a woman and after they read her post. This speaks volumes more than the original comments. If anything it seems there's an implication that somehow women are unable to cope with jackasses as well as men.

Would it have even made HN at all if she was a man and wrote the same way? I doubt it, but if it did, and she was a he, he would have been pounded to the ground in the comments.

Of course, all of this could have been avoided if people act the way they're expected face-to-face. None of these people considered the "person" who wrote the code. And none of them considered "not useful for me" != "not useful". If it was, why are there so many tools out there besides UNIX?

BTW... Twitter's short form is a lame cop out IMO. You can be curt and still not be condescending. Allegedly "smart" people could have been cogent without being asses.

I just wanted to point out that (hopefully) these Twitter guys were posting because they truly disliked the project, rather than out of misogyny as the GP speculates.

It bothers me too when people here and elsewhere assume every single negative comment or piece of criticism directed at a woman is due to misogyny, and that somehow women should be "no criticism zones" or something. I really like when people maintain gender anonymity online, because it keeps comments and feedback at a gender-blind level.