I have used harsher words towards males
Wow, you must be a riot to work with.
And you must be a cry-baby nobody would want in his team. See how ad-hominen cuts both ways?
Now, if we are to discuss seriously as adults, what he says sounds correct to my experience to. In teams I've worked with (in over 5 companies), people have said way harsher words than "you're being too emotionally attached to my code".
Not only the project lead -- you can hear such things between team members, even from team member to project lead. And 99% of the time it's not even taken personally -- a little later the crisis is resolved, a decision is made, and people are working together just fine, including having fun together with Nerf guns or what have you, again.
The very words "sexist" and "racist" are really just smear words. They convey no meaningful information and really only serve to attack a person or institution. As soon as I hear either word I assume the user is merely axe grinding and has no interest in conversation.
If I say "Bill is sexist", What precisely does that mean? That Bill hates all women? That Bill generally assumes female engineers are less skilled? That Bill will try to sleep with women he works with? As a statement it conveys nothing. It is nothing more than an attack on Bill.
Well, the same applies to me too -- not sure why you commented that to my response.
Although I still believe there are some legitimate cases for the use of such words -- a KKK member is racist. A guy believing that blacks are lazy is racist. Someone like Zimmerman is racist. A guy hiting his wife is sexist. Somebody denying a promotion to a programmer because she's a woman, is sexist.
When these terms are used by privileged people they are, more often than not, misapplied and/or exagerrated to death. They are used as token examples of tolerance, as a show off to how progressive they are.
A man can hit a woman (whether or not he is married to her) for reasons other than her gender. So, no, I'd say this is an invalid statement (unlike your other examples, which seem to be more valid.)
And follows up with:
> I’ve struggled with this for over a decade now, coming to terms with the humanity of those I believe oppress me.
And the title is: "Sexism and Tech and Love"
> Wow, you must be a riot to work with.
I'm not a diplomat, nor a politician, nor a kindergarden teacher, I'm a programmer, I don't get paid to talk nice to people, I get paid to get stuff done to best of my abilities, and forgive me if I dare use harsh words towards people who deserve it.
There are ways to criticize people constructively, and sometimes that requires being nice to others.
However if you for some reason will insist on doing it the wrong way despite the fact that you can't back up your claims, I will call you names, and I won't care a shit about your skin colour/gender/nationality/whatever.
Yes it is a collaborative field, that's why I will do everything I can to make you do your best for the product, however if it's a lost cause, I will call you names.
Yes, there were pressures and yes, she was new to the project so didn't have some of the background insight, but I felt compelled to call the developers privately and apologize as a human that they had to endure the chew.
Point is, bosses under pressure can be se-holes.