Before starting this experience, please go through all of the “Foundations” readings and experiences.
For this experience, begin by familiarizing yourself with two current examples of online harrassment: Gamergate and the “Serial Swatter”:
Now read this roundtable discussion on diversity, harrassment, and their connection:
Imagine that a new situation similar to Gamegate were to arise. What (ethical) actions might you as a software engineer take to address it?
In the Serial Swatter, “obnoxious” exploited Twitch to find female gamers to harrass. If you were a software engineer at Twitch, what would your ethical obligations be? Justify your answer by reference to either the ACM Code of Ethics or the Software Engineering Code of Ethics and Professional Practice.
In the Silicon Valley roundtable article, notice the lack of discussion surrounding the ethical obligations of software engineers (other than the claim that ethics is not covered in the software engineering curriculum). Now that you have an understanding of ethical principles, how might you apply them to address the issues of sexism raised in this article?