Reactgate Recap

aryanjnyc

•

May 1, 2024

Series of Events A take on Vue developers vs. React developers is tweeted....

Series of Events

A take on Vue developers vs. React developers is tweeted. {% twitter 1164506235518910464 %}
A number of the deleted posts in the thread above is from Dan Abramov (defending the React community).
A subtweet (thread) directed at Ken Wheeler describes how his behavior is viewed as toxic by marginalized people. {% twitter 1165111494062641152 %}
heydonworks described how Ken Wheeler played "the circle game" at a React conference. The circle game gesture is very similar to the "Okay Hand Gesture" that has become a symbol amongst white supremacists. This tweet has since been deleted.
Tatiana Mac calls out React developers for trying to protect React's integrity rather than listen to its users. {% twitter 1164912554876891137 %}
Ken Wheeler, in this tweet, tries to clear up the misunderstanding. {% twitter 1164934308366340096 %}
Dan Abramov deactivates his Twitter. {% twitter 1165431134378975232 %}
heydonworks tries to fix the damage done in the above tweet with this tweet. {% twitter 1165439718512824320 %}
Tatiana Mac quits the industry due to all this. {% twitter 1165456607729180673 %}
Dan Abramov explains that he's fine on Reddit.
Dan Abramov rejoins Twitter. {% twitter 1166333416272486400 %}
Tatiana Mac posts a factual account on, what is now termed as, #Reactgate. {% twitter 1166348406840864773 %}
#Reactgate becomes a topic on Twitter.

Comments section

fotoapostol

This is stupid!!!

0 Replies

theodesp

Remind me again, why do we use Twitter? If it hosts emetic comments that ruin your day when you read them, then it's time to take a break from this nonsense.

8vius

You americans really need to calm down. Take a step back and stop reacting emotionally to everything. The whole white power ok hand sign was a prank that was played on you by 4chan, and you just took it hook line and sinker because you've lost the ability to view anything in the political realm under any objective (or even sane) light. You just keep feeding this tribalism over inane things, just calm down.

marcinpiekarski

Thanks for the summary Aryan.

barfyismydogsn1

Code Hipsters always end up devouring their own.

-signed

A Humble COBOL programmer

pedrsntana

I hate the thought that just because a hate group does one thing, that thing immediately becomes a symbol of hate. That and the fact that the "Okay hand gesture" has the "white power" symbol is a troll by 4Chan, and most idiots fell for it (including the supremacists, who are so stupid they don't know their own shit).

White Supremacist: *Breathes*

BREATHING IS NOW A HATE SYMBOL!

1 Replies

ashleemboyer

There are so many ways to communicate things. It's not going to hurt us to stop using the OK hand gesture. Stopping the usage will prevent harm, however, and that should be worth it.

rj_bloomfield

It should also be pointed out the Tatiana Mac is quitting the industry because of this mess: twitter.com/TatianaTMac/status/116...

erica

Thank you for the summary. I saw some of the fall out but it was hard to piece together exactly what happened.

eli

Update: You can read Tatiana's factual account of what went down and draw your own conclusions.

I think number 0. was a hand sign at a conference that is sometimes meant to mean "white power." The Southern Poverty Law Center has a pretty in-depth explanation of the symbol:

... what it’s about most of the time is a deliberate attempt to “trigger liberals” into overreacting to a gesture so widely used that virtually anyone has plausible deniability built into their use of it in the first place.

The problem, of course, is that there are white nationalists, neo-Nazis and Klansmen who have increasingly begun using the use of the symbol both to signal their presence to the like-minded, as well as to identify potentially sympathetic recruits among young trolling artists flashing it. To them, the configuration means WP, for “white power.”

This use of the signal preceded the 4chan hoax that made it go viral. A number of alt-right figures, notably white-nationalist guru Richard Spencer, published photographs of themselves using the symbol as early as 2016. Milo Yiannopoulos adopted the symbol on social media as early as 2015.

Using white power symbols or other forms of hate speech should have no place in the tech community. Unfortunately many people are comfortable with these hate symbols because they don't understand the destructive impact they can have on people. Even if the intent of this symbol was just a joke about the "circle game" like Ken said in his talk, it is still a symbol of hate and it is psychologically damaging to people regardless of what his intent was.

One impact in this case is an incredibly talented designer and speaker (Tatiana) leaving the tech community. I encourage you to read Radhika's perspective on the saga. I think she summed it up perfectly: "This isn't about Ken. This is about supposed allies, folks taking the neutral route, the infinite amount of gaslighting."

Another gem from Radhika's thread:

You can't claim that we brought politics into your pure world of React.

My life is political.

My tech career almost ended because my life is political.

Your life & tech career are political, too. You just don't see it.

This. Is. Technical.

cseeman

Thank you for adding this, I am not sure if this article is the full story and can be misleading. This is a pretty narrow scope of the full issue that was going on. aryanjnyc, please think about updating this post with further information.

victorjperez

Man I really wish I could escape this twitter drama, didn't want to see it on dev.to

3 Replies

v6

The Twitter Twattle metastasizes.

ozzyaaron

Could not agree more.

It's a problem of spending too much time online and not in real life - you tend to see things where they aren't. You become hyper aware of niche concerns that may not even exist.

Leaving a community (or at least declaring they will) is how immature people deal with issues - especially a community as large and actually very accepting as the tech community. Immature people tend to have more than one issue going on.

I read the "factual account" it's just a cherry-picked list of references to bolster a made up accusation.

Sure there are issues in any community but honestly rage quitting says more about you than anything else.

Please don't minimize this to drama.

edalusicarus

Drama queens

dalmo

Sounds like two good frameworks to work with...

nikoheikkila

Typical Twitter. Not regretting the decision to leave the service a month ago. Relying on Mastodon, DEV, and RSS feeds for keeping myself in the tech loop has done amazing things on my mental health and cut my staring at phone to less than half.

Can only recommend the same for Dan and the rest of the community.

ben

I think it's pretty clear that Twitter is terrible for the mental health of its users, and the collective mental health of the software community.

It's addictive and enables limited-context arguments, like this one.

biscuitech

I can't be the only one thinking this whole situation got out of hand REAL quick. People need to chill tf down.

2 Replies

mburszley

What is the situation? Even following the "breakdown", I have no idea what happened or who these people are.

jaffparker

It was just a very successful trolling campaign from some possibly jealous assholes that was picked up by everyone because they pretended to touch the issue of diversity

This has been a frustrating situation in a few ways with many people shouting past one another. I hope we can come together as a community.

There were valid concerns at play here, as well as some unhealthy tribalism. Our industry needs to get better at making minoritized groups feel safe and heard, while also improving constructive communication as a whole.

dance2die

Thanks for following up.

jsmanifest

The most important part is #7

aryanjnyc Author

I've updated the list. Just for reference, #7 in OP refers to "Dan Abramov explains that he's fine on Reddit."

I was genuinely sad for Dan. He's such a sweetheart in the community.

I am afraid his insights are going to be far in between from now on on social media.

Reactgate Recap

aryanjnyc

Series of Events

Comments section

fotoapostol

theodesp

8vius

marcinpiekarski

barfyismydogsn1

pedrsntana

ashleemboyer

rj_bloomfield

erica

eli

cseeman

victorjperez

v6

ozzyaaron

ashleemboyer

edalusicarus

ashleemboyer

dalmo

nikoheikkila

ben

biscuitech

mburszley

jaffparker

ben

dance2die

jsmanifest

aryanjnyc Author

biscuitech

Aryan J

28 Followers