I really had to have a think on how to respond here as I do want to try and look past the article and just look at our interactions. This is the best I could do though as the language used in your responses doesn't read in a positive way, but I am only human so there is a chance I am still misreading it:

Firstly, I am really trying to believe that you don't have massive biases yourself.

But yet again, some of the sentences here are very presumptuous, I am not sure why you cannot see it.

"Unfortunately you simply misunderstand what I'm communicating here, and I'm sure that is likely due both to different experiences and levels of education and introspection on systemic bias."

Let's start with you believing I misunderstand you, not because of the language you use, but because of differing (by which I can only infer you mean "my lack of" due to your phrasing) education and how much time I spend on introspection?

A little bit of a background on me:

I work in accessibility and inclusion and have for over 5 years now, I advocate for accessibility, I spend my days working on educating people on bias, society and perception.

I have spent 18 months (and still have at least 6 months before launch) building a product all to do with inclusion, my company is called "Inclusivity Hub".

I spend several hours a day examining and being surprised by my biases and correcting them, assuming people can't do X because of a disability and then learning that I am an idiot, yes even now, after years in the industry.

The space I work in overlaps an awful lot with gender issues and race issues, as well as sexuality issues and gender identity issues, mainly because people with disabilities are more likely to be homosexual, they are more likely to be transgender, they are far more likely to face discrimination and bias than someone who is black or female but not disabled ever will (and obviously if you are black, female and disabled...you have an uphill struggle to say the least!).

Oh, and before the pandemic I was on a steering group examining how to get more women into tech.

So I am pretty confident I have a rounded education on the subject and spend a decent amount of time on introspection.

The only thing you have an advantage on is personal experience, and personal experience, whilst valuable, is just that.

Personal experience is where biases come from.

So at this point, I have to ask what your education on the subject is and whether you believe that we are similarly educated on the subject and whether I have spent enough time on introspection to justify us being able to have a conversation as equals and without the condescending tone?

Leading on from that - the personal experience of others is invaluable for me. That way I can understand where the problem is.

But just because I do not have the experience you share doesn't mean I can't listen to that experience, and that of hundreds of others and empathise and act on it. I mean that is the key point, I may not experience it, so I listen to many people's experience to see patterns. Yet again, who is more likely to have bias, one person's view or someone who has listened to many views?

So given all of that, I think the only misunderstanding we have here is in the language you choose and the way we approach inclusion.

I believe in "personal responsibility and identity", you believe in "group identity" (that is my understanding based on our brief conversation so far). You use words like "incite" and then say it is not a personal attack, I still cannot reconcile that due to the meaning of the word. "incite" is a deliberate act. Perhaps some of this is down to semantics, but I would argue that is as much your fault for your choice of words as mine for taking the word at its meaning.

I mean, yet again, look at your choice of words here:

"You're saying that you will absolutely sit down and be educated about unconscious bias, but this is the type of toxic behavior that these biases give a pathway to."

"sit down and be educated" - who says that? I mean seriously, who has the audacity to say that, and how am I meant to take that without believing there is an undertone of "shut up and listen"?

As for biases and looking at our own biases - I will admit that given your article and our interaction I have a bias towards you that I am having to try and be mindful of, I believe you have a disdain for white men and "we are all the same".

I am trying very hard to work against that bias but so far you have given me no evidence to the contrary. I am hoping I am wrong.

You want to educate me (I really am trying to put that down to arrogance not bias, but it does smell of bias I must say), judge me because I am white, judge me because I am male, you believe in group identity....all the things I cannot reconcile with as they are abhorrent behaviours and detrimental to achieving understanding and better relations.

As for the toxic behaviour part - what toxic behaviour have I exhibited. My sarcasm was indeed unprofessional, perhaps even a little bit of an attack, but I am sure you will agree not toxic? I have already said I believed it was not the right way to approach this so I am not sure what other behaviour I could have exhibited that made you use the word "toxic". In fact I have no idea what "this type of behaviour" means in this context? perhaps you could elaborate for me?

My question is would you be happy to sit down and be educated on the dangers of group identity? (if that is how we are now talking to each other)

If so then I am more than happy to sit down and have a discussion so we can educate each other on our differing points of view.

"If you want to see something quite telling - look at the folks who are framing this as character assassination and think it's unfair, and who is grateful I said this."

Some of that will indeed be down to prejudice and bias. Yet again a point we could have a discussion on, but that isn't the entirety of it, there is a lot more to the story. Look deeper.

Why are white people and men outraged by this? Because you are projecting your own narrative onto an entire group. You are attacking them.

Who agrees with you? People in your group?

You are also writing on a site dedicated to an industry that is dominated by a narrative of "white man bad".

All stemming from a narrative pushed by education and Universities and the main stream media, it is an industry filled with highly educated individuals who are exposed to this narrative far more often. We are in an echo chamber of group identity politics, a narrative nobody is willing to challenge for fear of being ousted or attacked.

I am pretty sure if you wrote this same post in a more balanced industry there would be a much different reaction.

A final point with regards to trying to work out where the support or criticism comes from...with no downvote button we only have the comments, and as most of them were deleted how can we possibly see who said what and what race and gender they are? Or indeed what ratio of people disagreed with you?

As for male dominated industries and minorities enduring the jabs, remarks and other behaviour that is not welcoming - oh I really think we could be on the same ground on a lot of points here, but we are still too far apart on the fundamentals at the moment to make that work productively.

Mainly because I want to dig into more than just the surface crap you hear on social and main stream media, I want to look at genetics, culture etc. I want to look at how minor differences in temperament between men and women (across a standard distribution looking at the mean and the extremes as the extremes are where lessons can be learned) can add up to big problems and inequality. I want to look at how much of women's choice to abandon STEM subjects is driven by society, how much by genetic predisposition (women who are good at maths, on average are better than men who are equally good at maths, at other subject such as English, giving them more options), media influence, parent's opinions or the existing status quo in an industry.

I want to understand "how much of inequality is driven by X, how much by Y....right well X is where we should focus our efforts as we can't change Y easily". I want to ask the hard questions, without a narrative getting forced over it.

This is very dangerous ground to cover for friends, impossibly dangerous ground when we start from a position of opposition rather than understanding.

I will consider your framing, yet again I think that we could have common ground here, but I still cannot see how you believe that this Twitter conversation was the hill to stand your ground on, or that you cannot see how the language you used is not conducive to an inclusive and productive discussion.

Are you at least willing to concede that the fault, perhaps, is not all mine and start talking to me assuming that I may actually be able to hold my own in a conversation on these matters (or if this is just a phrasing issue, consider your phrasing in a way that I cannot misconstrue?)?

I will, in exchange, respond in good faith also and stop assuming you are trying to incite outrage (see what I did there 😋🤣🤣).

Hell, on paper we should be friends, we work in a similar space, we want inclusion and equality....surely we should be able to get to a point where we can tackle some of these issues together?