Well just watch the whole thing, from nomination to winning, to award acceptance to Mr Fry taking the stage again and tell me that his comment sounds like a joke. I'm sure he intended it to be a joke and to not be taken seriously, and I'm sure he was sincere when he was calling her the best costume designer in Britain, but the joke didn't work. The comment came across as crass and harsh and mocking of a woman who's just won an award just because she's dressed unconventionally for an awards ceremony.
I think he missed the mark with his 'joke', and as I've said before I'm not personally offended and I'm not going to tell him off publicly on social media but I can't help how his comment felt mean spirited to me and still does despite context of their familiarity.
Well I'm actually curious now what the twitter response was, because as I've expressed here, I think his 'joke' missed the mark and came off harsh, which I found hurtful by proxy I suppose. I wouldn't like to be called that live on television. So I'm assuming most of the response was 'that wasn't very nice I think you should apologise for that remark' and Mr Fry's response is to get annoyed that anyone would get offended by his comment and eventually close his twitter account. I'm sure there were much more extreme remarks but this is twitter, you're going to get chaff with the wheat.
I personally think he was out of line and even with the context of they were friends I think it was a mis-judged joke. I'm not going to go on social media to tell him about it but my opinion of him has certainly changed based on this behaviour.
I'd like to be clear that I'm not advocating anyone on twitter or anything that was said, I have not read any of the twitter response to this.
I just wanted to say that I could understand why people saw it the way they did, because to me it came across as really mean. It really stood out and made Mr Fry seem rather mean even compared to some of his other jokes. I'm not personally offended and I'm not going to twitter about it but I can see why people felt it was harsh because it felt harsh to me.
I mean, I watched the show, I heard what he said, it's whole tone was off compared to the rest of the night. It really stood out and sounded awfully harsh.
Now I'm not going to go to twitter about it, it didn't offend me but it did come across rather mean and crass.
Without clarifying it it looks like he stood on stage in front of a bunch of rich celebrities and slagged off the winner of an award for not wearing conventional dress to an award show.
I'm all for offensive comedy, but this wasn't a joke, he was basically slagging her off in public, live on television to a room full of people. Without context of their relationship it really looks like bullying. That's completely different to an offensive stand up comedy joke, especially when its so personally targeted. Some context to clarify that it wasn't mean and they're friends would have taken the edge off the 'joke' and nobody would have cared, but it was so off the cuff and mean it just looks like he is bullying her, which is probably what touched a chord with so many people. I'm sure Mr Fry is the last person who would want to be seen as bullying anyone.
I watched the BAFTAs with my girlfriend last night and I have to say, when Stephen made that comment we both said 'woah that's a bit mean' out loud. Of course, being the general public we're not aware of Mr Fry's relationship with the lady who won the award but from an outside perspective it came across as a bit bullying.
I only found out today about the twitter backlash and I don't think it should be lumped in with so called SJW movements, or the anti-anti-offensive movement, it really sounded like a hurtful unnecessary comment that he shouldn't have made without context or clarifying their relationship. It really seemed un-characteristically mean for Mr Fry.
Wow, the comments on this post really do sum up his points in this article. The whole article isn't about goto at all, but about programming myths and how they perpetuate and how HN is just allowing us to be more lazy by only reading the titles to posts. Why is nobody discussing the actual intent behind this article, which is how myths and, slightly related, programming myths begin and propagate throughout our education and culture.
Instead, ITT, gotos are bad and here's why, gotos are ok and here's why, gotos are good and here's why.
Not everyone can multi-task that well. I know at least 2 people, girlfriend included, that can't do anything when on their phone. They'll literally stop in their tracks when walking on the sidewalk or completely drop out of a conversation when reading / writing a text message. Let alone playing a game. I also think its a bit rude to play a game when in the company of someone else trying to have a conversation.
I've observed a work colleague play this game. It looks incredibly boring, and its not much fun to hang out with someone who is glued to their phone the whole time, changing routes just so they can get more portals.