Mardy (Articoli su societate)

Will the internet forget russophobia?

Alberto Mardegan — Sun, 04 Jun 2023 07:41:02 GMT

I've often wondering what will happen when this horrific war in Europe will finally be over. I won't be discussing politics here, but what is mostly interesting to me is how (and if) all the companies who made high proclaims about not doing business with Russia will justify their getting back into the Russian market. They will probably count on the fact that the war will be long, and that people will forget what these companies' stance was. After all, the world has forget about all the companies who collaborated with the Nazi regime, so we can expect the same to happen with this war.

But I don't think that's right: if you made a mistake, you should be held accountable for it. You might be wondering what is the “mistake” I'm talking about: that's russophobia, indeed. To put it simply, and make a concrete example: if The Qt Company stops doing business with Russian companies and blocks its downloads page to Russian IP addresses because of the war, without being forced by the government to do so, but does not take similar measures against other countries who wage wars which have caused way more deaths and displacement of individuals, well, that's what I call “russophobia”. Of course, I'm aware that there's way more than that, and that the hatred for all what is Russian (including culture and sport competitions) is an even bigger issue, but in this blog post I'm especially focused on the IT world, so please forgive my semi-intentional narrow-mindness on this topic.

Now, I'm fully aware that we live in a mediatic bubble that directs our decisions in a way that is almost automatic, and I'm sure that most people working for companies who took russophobic decisions are not themselves russophobic at all (and I'm not dismissing the possibility that even the very same people who took these decisions might not be russophobic) and that these decisions were taken on impulse, because “everyone else is doing the same” and due to the media pressure that if you don't do that, you might get accused of supporting the “wrong” side of the war.

But that's not an excuse, especially for “smart” people like IT engineers (and I put the adjective between quotes for a reason), and especially after the initial heat has passed and when, after more than one year of war, we should have been exposed to different point of views and be able to evaluate the situation more rationally. It has been therefore especially stunning for me to learn that the Linux Kernel community, and hence The Linux Foundation, has recently given room to russophobic behaviours, refusing a patch coming from the Russian company Baikal (a CPU maker). For the record, the incriminated patch was not related to supporting hardware produced by this company (not that this would make the deed less serious, but at least one could have argued that there could be some spot of logic in it):

From: Jakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org>
To: Serge Semin <Sergey.Semin@baikalelectronics.ru>
[...]

On Tue, 14 Mar 2023 01:42:24 +0300 Serge Semin wrote:
> From: Serge Semin <Sergey.Semin@baikalelectronics.ru>

We don't feel comfortable accepting patches from or relating 
to hardware produced by your organization.

Please withhold networking contributions until further notice.

(here the link to the original discussion). One week later, someone denounced this as a violation to the Code of Conduct committee (unfortunately the only link I could find to this is coming from a Russian IT forum, and any other references seem to have been removed from DuckDuckGo and Google), only to receive a reply that it was all fine.

To me this is not fine. The war will end, sooner or later, but it bothers me that we never learn from the past and repeat the same mistakes over and over. We apparently know a lot about propaganda, yet we fail to recognize it when it influences our own mind and actions. My humble contribution is the creation of a page where I list the companies who have taken russophobic actions, and, on the opposite side, companies (like Flickr and Zorin OS) who have stood out for positive messages and helpful actions. My hope is that some of the listed companies will find the courage to review their actions, and either correct their stance, or at least clarify their reasons. So, I hereby present

Denouncing russophobia

where you'll find some of the good and some of the bad companies. I'm sure I'm missing plenty of them: I just started recollecting my memories and searching online a couple of days ago. I created this as a GitHub project, because indeed I'm looking forward for contributions, to help me make the lists more complete. I need to stress that the fact that a company has announced the suspension of its business in Russia does not automatically make it russophobic: what we need to look at is the reason for that decision: companies like LEGO and Nintendo, for example, have suspended their operations citing logistic and financial reasons; no judgement involved.

Let me repeat it once more, just to make sure there are no misunderstandings: it's perfectly fine for businesses to take a stance on politics, and sometimes it might be even praiseworthy; but if a company is international, and does not apply the same reasoning to other armed conflicts, or seem to care only about certain human rights violations and not others, then it's a case of double standards which we need to be aware of, and make the company think twice about it. And that's also the reason why you won't find any Ukrainian company among the “bad” ones, because in their case the reaction is perfectly understandable and they can hardly be accused of adopting double standards (well, technically speaking, they are adopting double standards, but when you are so directly impacted I think it does not deserve a blame): if it's your house which burns, you should definitely scream about it, even if you previously have been silent about your neighbour house's burning.

I'm especially looking forward for more “good” companies, who have shown empathy towards the people affected by the war (and maybe even collected money to help them) while refraining from taking the judging role and forgetting about all the injustice and suffering that other wars have caused (including on that very same piece of land that suddenly appeared on all newspapers' front pages on February 24th, 2022). I hope that these companies can serve as an example of positive action, humanity, and love.

Leaving Canonical, again

Alberto Mardegan — Sat, 03 Dec 2022 07:03:58 GMT

For the second time, I'm being shown the door at Canonical. Well, technically, this time it was me who handed over my resignation, but that was only after I was told in very clear terms that I would eventually be fired. No timeframe was given, but since I don't particularly enjoy the feeling of checking my e-mail every morning to find out whether this is the day when I'm being fired, I decided to take the initiative and leave myself.

The reason? Those who know me well might suspect that it's related to some complications with that fact that I'm living in Russia, or maybe with some remarks I might have made about the war in Ukraine or about other current events, since I tent to be quite outspoken and provocative. Nothing of all that: it's about my refusal to get vaccinated against COVID-19; unfortunately, it has now become apparent that I'm not the only one leaving, and other employees who have refused either to get vaccinated or to disclose their vaccination status are also being shown the door (including people who have been in the company for more than 10 years). This has sparked some internal discussions in the company, and several different point of views have been voiced: from those who welcome this policy and would like to see it extended to flu vaccinations (which makes a lot of sense, since once you've accepted to renounce your freedom in order to protect the weak, you should accept it for all transmissible diseases), to those who voiced concerns about the legality of this move, or would have found this reasonable one year ago but not in the current situation as restrictions are getting lifted and the current variants are less scary than the previous ones; those who pointed out that being vaccinated has little impact on transmissibility of the virus; that we are mostly a remote company and we could instead have exceptions to allow unvaccinated people (or people with a weak immune system) to remotely attend the few in-person meetings we have; that as long as there are no vaccination mandates for plane flights and other guests attending the same hotel premises where we meet, mandating employees to get vaccinated might not help a lot; and whether this is a decision that a company should make, or shouldn't it rather lobby the politics to have it mandated at state level. I think there's merit to all these arguments, but I'm personally not particularly interested in discussing any of them, since my point is another.

Before talking about that, though, let me clearly set one thing straight: I hate lies, and Canonical's management is lying about this matter. The vaccination mandate measure is being justified on the grounds that it allows employees to travel (something that I've been able to do as unvaccinated throughout the last two years, even when restrictions were at their peak) and, most importantly, to protect our weaker colleagues. This is what I find most disgusting: using genuine feelings like love and compassion to justify repressive measures. No, dear Canonical, this has nothing to do with protecting the weak; not only because a vaccinated person can still spread the virus (and our employees know this from first-hand experience), but also because, if this was the real reason, then you'd accept people who have recently recovered from COVID-19, since immunisation after recovery is not worse than that of vaccination; but you don't, as I was explicitly told by HR that any previous infection is irrelevant. It's also significant that you didn't establish clear rules about how often one needs to get vaccinated, since all recent scientific literature on vaccine efficacy shows that this is not a minor detail. Why not just be honest with ourselves, and admit it's just for business? Being open about the fact that having a fully vaccinated workforce can grant us access to more business deals would not change a lot in the practical life of the (ex-)employees, but at least we won't feel that the company is treating us as fools while embellishing its image with fake care and compassion. Or, if there are other reasons, state them, because these ones don't stand up to logic scrutiny.

Another thing that doesn't match (though maybe this is a timing issue, so I cannot for sure call it out as a lie) is the fact that HR claims to have an exemption process through which one could opt-out of the vaccination for religious beliefs. Well, I was explicitly told in very clear terms by HR that no exceptions would be made on either moral or religious grounds. But maybe this has changed since the time I was told this (mid October) and now?

Here, finally, let me state why I believe that such a mandate is wrong. The first thing I want to put on the table is that even though I see very little reason for this mandate (given all what we know about the virus mutability and infectiousness, the shortcomings of the vaccines, etc. — by the way, if you are into science I suggest reading this article which raises some questions you won't hear in mainstream media and has a comprehensive bibliography for further study), I recognize that in principle there are very solid reasons for vaccination mandates, for example in the case where a virus is extremely lethal, its symptoms otherwise uncurable and the vaccine is 100% safe and highly effective. But even in that case, while getting vaccinated myself, I would still oppose a mandate. Why? Because of freedom, which trumps everything. The choice is never between a healthy life and freedom: if there's no freedom, there's no life worth living. Even if some decision has very solid reasons behind it, this doesn't automatically make it a good decision.

Let me make a few examples: if a company (I'm talking about companies here, but the reasoning could be extended to states as well) decided that smokers will be fired, or that those who drink alcoholics will be fired, or that you cannot eat meat, or that you must take a pill whenever your head aches, or that transgender people must undergo gender reassignment surgery, or that everyone should wear a black band on their arm whenever a relative of a colleague dies, or that employees' households must use the product made by the employer, or that they have to excercise sports for at least two hours per week, etc.; I would be categorically opposed to every single of these impositions, despite recognising that there are reasons behind each of them, and that I even dream of a world in which some of their goals are attained (could we just all be fit and healthy?!). Because I think that personal freedom is more important. You can always find good reasons to justify this or that action; surely, if we think back at the fascist and totalitarian regimes of the first half of last century, we must acknowledge that they were supported by the (overwhelming?) majority of the population. An effective propaganda machine could convince the population on this and that matter, but ultimately it's the population who reasoned and accepted that storytelling. Nowadays the situation is different, but the mechanisms are the same, except that propaganda has become way more effective (or have we become dumber?) and aligned over the same direction, thanks to the globalisation process.

I'm well aware that societies are made of rules and therefore inevitably restrict personal freedom: Western societies, for example, forbid nudity in public places, and that's something I accept because it's part of my culture; it's a rule deeply entrenched in our history, and I don't feel it as a burden. I'm convinced, however, that the evolution of human society should be that, as we become more conscious, we should be moving towards more free societies, with fewer rules and more tolerant for diversity.

The “idiotism” of software developers

Alberto Mardegan — Tue, 08 Nov 2022 17:11:55 GMT

Before you get angry at me for this title, please let me state that I count myself in the number of the “idiots” and, secondly, that what I mean by “idiotism” here is not to be intended as an offence, but as some traits of mindset which are typical of very logical brains.

Some months ago I finished reading Dostoevskiy's “The Idiot”, a book about an exceedingly good-hearted man, prince Lev Mishkin, whose behaviour was puzzling the people around him so much that they thought of him as an idiot. Sure, the fact that he was suffering from epilepsy didn't help, but it was far from being the primary reason for their thinking, since his epileptic seizures were very rare (if I remember correctly, only two occurred during the time of the story) and everybody's opinion had already formed well ahead of witnessing him in such a state.

He was an idiot because he was open, trustful, and especially because he could not “read between the lines” of what was been said to him: his social conduct was straight, and although he was following at his best the customs that he had been taught, he was supposedly awkward and unable to perceive and parse all the messages that are implicitly conveyed by social behaviours and human interactions. I added the word “supposedly” because, as a matter of fact, his behaviours were all perfectly normal for me: I only noticed their awkwardness when it was pointed out by the other characters, at which point I couldn't help smiling and acknowledging that, indeed, that thing he did was weird.

However, he was a good and caring person, and not without talents: he had an interest in calligraphy, and everybody liked to listen to him, as his speech was insightful and his thoughts were original. I wonder how many of my readers can identify themselves in such a character?

I definitely can. I won't get into the details, but I've felt many times on me the amused or puzzled glance of people (like that time in high school when I could not open a door in front of dozens of people, and I heard them say “So, that guy is the genius of mathematics?” — I'll never forget that!), often without understanding the reason for their reactions. Still, generally people seem to like my company and be genuinely interested in talking to me.

So, what's wrong with prince Lev Mishkin, me, and maybe with you too? Well, a few things, I would say. I'm not going to claim any scientific truth on what I'm going to say, these are just my own impressions and deductions, which seem to be shared by other people in the interwebs too, judging from a quick search I did; take them for what they are.

The first thing I notice is some common traits between us and autistic people: we tend to work better with things, rather than with people; we can focus on a certain thing (work, a mathematical problem, a game) and forget about the world around us; we have our unique hobbies, like solving puzzles, arguing about a specific and very narrow topic, learning artificial (both human and programming) languages; it's as if we needed to build a small, better world where we would feel safe and at ease.

The other thing, which I actually consider harmful and which I put efforts to change in my own life, is the fact that it's extremely easy to get us interested into a specific aspect of a problem, and make us forget (or just not notice) the big picture. That small part that we are looking at is stimulating and challenging, and we are led to think that it's core of the issue, and maybe of all the issues that affect our world. What is often missing is the ability to take one step back and try to look at the issue from a different angle, and especially the ability to listen for counter arguments; I mean, we do listen to them, but since we have, in a way, “gamified” the issue, even when we think that we are open to listen to the other side, we are in reality trying to win the counter-arguments, rather than genuinely trying to understand them.

Another thing which we have, is faith. Yes, you read it right: even though the IT world is probably the one with the highest percentage of atheists, men always need something to believe in. We just don't realize it, but we do hold a blind trust in certain persons and authorities. This does not mean that this trust lives forever and cannot be broken, but this generally does not occur because of a conscious realization of ours. Much more often than we'd like to admit, the reason why we lose faith in a certain person or authority is because the rest of the persons and authorities that we trust has told us so. In other words, even if there's undoubtedly a reasoning of our own, the full realisation and conviction occurs after having collected and compared the opinions (or statements) of those we trust. The net result is that the IT population is the one most trustful of the mainstream media, because it's the mainstream media who has more “voice”: that's where the most reputable journalists, scientists, activists are (and “reputable” is the key word here, since this reputation is recursively created by the mainstream media themselves or by their sponsors).

I might be biased by my own experience here, but it seems to me that there isn't a group of people more homogenous in their political (and generally, world) views than that of IT workers. When, in 2018, I saw the leaked video of Google's co-founder Sergei Brin and other executives' reaction at Trump's presidential victory, what I found most surprising was not the contents of the speech, as they were mostly mainstream opinions, but rather the fact that all this could be said in a company meeting. Something like this, I though, could never happen in an European company, as political matters are a conventional tabu in the work environment. But the point is that Brin and others could say those words only because they knew that the overwhelming majority of the audience shared the same opinion. I don't think you could find the same homogeneity of thought among shop assistants or philosophy professors.

Assuming that you have followed me this far into my rambling, and that you recognize that there might be some truth in what I wrote, you might now be wondering if there's a way to counterbalance our “idiotic” traits. Unfortunately I don't have a full answer, as myself am only halfway there (but maybe I'm too optimistic here? and does this road even ever end?), but there are a few things that I think are absolutely worth trying:

Talk with people. Better if face to face, or at least in a video call; just 1-on-1, avoid groups, or you'll get on the defensive and try to defend your position for the sake of not losing the argument in front of an audience. But it's not a fight. Your goal when talking should not be that of convincing or getting convinced, but rather just to understand the other points of view.
Read both sides of the narrative. Try to see the other party's argument as they themselves present it, and not how it is presented in the media you usually read. Media often use this trick, to either invite “clown representatives” of the other point of view just to ridicule it, or they give them too little time, or extrapolate their answer out of context, just to make them appear unsensible.
Always assume that other people are smart, and that no one is bad.
Whatever the argument, try to answer the key question: “Cui bono?” (who profits?) to be at least aware of all the hidden interests behind this and that. They don't necessarily invalidate a position, but they must be considered.
Lose faith. The only faith you are allowed to keep is the faith in God (or Gods), if you have it: but men, theories, institutions, authorities (including religious ones!), these must always be assumed to be imperfect and not blindly trusted. People serve their interests or can be manipulated. Try always to start from a clean table and an empty mind, and see if they have enough arguments to convince you.
Do never assume “They can not all be wrong” or “If this were wrong, at least some media would report it”. It just doesn't work this way, this is again a matter of having faith in the majority. Think of how many times in (recent) history you were presented an unambiguous truth, which later came out to be a scam (Iraq war being a famous one).
Defocus. You might be spending a lot of energy into something that's not worth it. I mean, feel free to pursue whatever hobbies you like, as long as they make you feel better. But if you think you have a mission, think twice about it. Think about the world you'd like to live in, and whether/how this mission contributes to it.¹
Ask questions. Be curious. Be challenging. For any topic, there are questions that have not been answered in mainstream media². Find the answer, then find explanations, never stopping at the first satisfactory one, but always get at least two competing answers. From here, ask more questions, rinse and repeat. And at every step ask yourself this: why didn't I know about this? Is someone trying to hide the truth from me?
Aim at improving. Whenever you read something or talk to people, keep a humble attitude and try to be challenged. Your goal should be that every reading and every dialog should make you wiser, even if what you initially read and heard sounded like garbage. There are always reasons for all these thoughts you disagree with.
Reach out to the people nearby. Try not just to be sympathetic to the needs of some population living far away from you, which the media has singled out as being those needing your compassion, and try instead (or in addition to that) to be sympathetic and helpful to the people around you. To your neighbours, to those you see in the public transport and, first and foremost, to your relatives.

Summing up, what I want you to realize is that we IT workers are easily exploitable. All those thought manipulation techniques represent a problem to everyone, but it's particularly with us that they tend to be especially effective; as a matter of fact, I've found that awareness of how the power controls us is higher among uneducated people, because they are more distrustful of the media and just tend to consume less of it. We, on the other hand, are not only well educated to respect the authority (see Noam Chomsky on education), but our logical, detail-focused mind can be easily externally controlled by continuously stimulating it to focus on specific things and not others.

How would Dostoevskiy call us?

I was recently surprised when I read people in a forum who were discussing avoiding doing business with Saudi Arabia because of their human rights record. Seriously? We are talking about a government who has indirectly caused the death of more than 300 thousands people in Yemen, and your main reason to criticize them is human rights? It's like asking the police to arrest a killer because before the assassination he misgendered his victim! Yet the elephant in the room continues to go unseen. ↩
My favourite one is: which country hosts more refugees from Ukraine? ↩

The Media

Alberto Mardegan — Thu, 15 Sep 2022 20:29:28 GMT

Ah, the media. No words from me are necessary here: just read these two articles, then read their titles again, then wonder.

Just wow.

L'acqua santa non ritornerà

Alberto Mardegan — Thu, 03 Feb 2022 15:30:13 GMT

Forse ciò che mi ha colpito di più la scorsa estate, quando sono ritornato in Italia in tempo di pandemenza, è stato trovare le acquesantiere vuote. La sensazione provata in quel gesto abituale, stavolta culminato col tocco della pietra asciutta con le mie dita, mi ritorna periodicamente alla memoria e mi infonde un certo senso di incompletezza, decadenza, se non proprio di sgradevolezza.

Sono tornato a rifletterci più di una volta, e — forse per il fatto di vivere all'estero e di non aver ascoltato o letto le motivazioni ufficiali della sua rimozione — la domanda più martellante che il ricordo dell'acqua santa mi suggerisce è questa: abbiamo tutti perso la fede?

Già, perché se da un punto di vista scientifico sappiamo benissimo che la benedizione del sacerdote non cambia la composizione chimica dell'acqua e non le conferisce alcuna proprietà antivirale, sappiamo anche, da fedeli, che l'acqua in cui intingiamo le dita è acqua santa. E ciò che è santo, per definizione, ci avvicina a Dio, e non va temuto. L'acqua benedetta non si beve a tavola, non si getta nel lavandino; al contrario, ci eleva: viene usata nei battesimi, e negli esorcismi per scacciare i demoni. Nella cerimonia dell'aspersione si prega con queste parole:

Signore Dio onnipotente, fonte e origine della vita, benedici quest’acqua con la quale saremo aspersi, fiduciosi di ottenere il perdono dei peccati, la difesa da ogni malattia e dalle insidie del maligno, e la grazia della tua protezione. Nella tua misericordia donaci, o Signore, una sorgente di acqua viva che zampilli per la vita eterna, perché, liberi da ogni pericolo dell’anima e del corpo, possiamo venire a te con cuore puro. Per Cristo nostro Signore.¹

Altrettanto esplicito è il testo della benedizione in latino, laddove recita “ut creatura tua, mysteriis tuis serviens, ad abigendos dæmones morbosque pellendos divinæ gratiæ sumat effectum” (“affinché la tua creatura [l'acqua], diventi un agente di grazia divina al servizio dei tuoi misteri, per scacciare gli spiriti maligni e allontanare le malattie”). Fermo restando che va condannato l'uso superstizioso dell'acqua benedetta così come di tutti gli altri oggetti santificati e dei rituali, la fede ci impone di riconoscere che il fedele autenticamente credente nel Signore non potrà corrompersi venendo a contatto con l'acqua santa, indipendentemente da quanti virus e batteri ne siano stati versati dentro.

Chi ha un minimo di fede sa benissimo che il Signore non permetterà che chi lo cerca venga attaccato da una malattia trasmessa proprio da un oggetto santificato; sa pure che, se una propria futura malattia fosse contemplata nel disegno divino, questa si abbatterebbe su di lui nonostante vaccinazioni, mascherine, distanziamenti sociali e aquesantiere vuote. Il che, si badi bene, non significa non essere artefici della propria vita: significa riconoscere il ruolo del sacro e il potere del Signore di operare nel nostro quotidiano. Quindi non rassegnazione, ma ricerca attiva del divino.

È per questo che provo un certo rammarico e un profondo senso di delusione, soprattutto rivolto alle autorità ecclesiastiche che, obbedendo ciecamente e convintamente ai diktat del potere politico, vuoi con chiusure dei luoghi di culto nei periodi del lockdown, vuoi con distanziamenti, mascherine e rimozione dell'acqua benedetta, hanno dimostrato, nella mia percezione, di riporre maggior fede nell'Organizzazione Mondiale della Sanità che nella Provvidenza.

Temo che non sia stata colta appieno la pericolosità di questi cambiamenti per quanto riguarda gli effetti a lungo termine sulla fede delle comunità. Comunità che un tempo si meravigliavano per l'avventatezza dei religiosi che prestavano le loro cure ai lebbrosi e ai malati di peste, incuranti della propria incolumità e desiderosi soltanto di servire Dio e le sue creature. Non solo oggi mancano esempi simili, ma anche la sola menzione del concetto di "Provvidenza" non viene accettata, se non nei contesti più astratti.

La rimozione dell'acqua benedetta o, forse peggio ancora, il suo ritorno in forma di un pratico dispenser, relega Dio nei piani più alti dell'iperuranio, dove vivono le belle idee che mai, tuttavia, potranno influenzare la vita terrena.

Io, senza vergognarmene, continuerò a credere che l'acqua santa non possa contagiare il fedele.

Dal Messale Romano, edizione 2020, pagina 990. ↩

La premiazione di Maria Shukshina al Cremlino

Alberto Mardegan — Tue, 07 Sep 2021 08:42:03 GMT

Il 31 agosto di quest'anno all'attrice russa Maria Shukshina è stata conferita una medaglia per “servizio alla Patria” nell'ambito della cultura. A consegnarle la medaglia è stato il primo ministro russo Michail Mishustin, che probabilmente però non si aspettava dall'attrice un discorso di questa portata:

L'ho sottotitolato per voi con tanto amore, e spero con pochi errori. Cercate di non farvi troppo distrarre dal volto impassibile del primo ministro, anche se effettivamente questo da solo varrebbe la visione del video.

La domanda per voi, chiaramente, è questa: vi sono stati episodi analoghi in Italia, in cui un personaggio dello spettacolo si sia rivolto così a Draghi, davanti alle telecamere nazionali?

Cammino quindi penso - 2021-04-16 - Tramite conoscenti

Alberto Mardegan — Fri, 16 Apr 2021 19:53:58 GMT

Sull'importanza di una rete di conoscenze, e di come la didattica a distanza sia un ostacolo alla sua formazione.