Wider issues in society always affect what we do in our work lives, for a number of reasons.
Very few of us work purely in the technology industry. That is, our customers or market are not technical in nature, technology is usually used in support of other goals.
More pertinent to this case, Alan Turing’s life and death shows us how issues such as sexuality affect technical work. Who knows what Alan may have done had he lived longer, or what he would have achieved if he wasn't side-lined when he was alive.
In particular terms of why it is newsworthy on HN, as per the guidelines "Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity."
For me as a hacker, it falls right within this definition.
One of the most notable chemists of the 20th century, Percy Julian, was black and had to expend significant effort working around resulting prejudice. [1]
If you don't think prejudice influences technical progress, look also at motivations influencing various development efforts throughout that century as well as any other historically documented century.
As for Turing, the question remains: If his death was suicide, or homicide, what additional contributions were thereby lost? (I realize the current dialog is exploring the possibility of accident. The ongoing dialog about his death -- including by notable technologists -- is what is making these potential discoveries possible.)
And there is the different, perhaps somewhat opposing view. If Julian hadn't had to work so hard to overcome opposition? If Turing's personal life hadn't made him so aware of the importance of secrets and privacy? Would they have developed in the same direction?
I think it is relevant because it is human beings who are developing these technologies. And consider, here on HN and in the press, we tend to celebrate those very human beings who don't separate their work and personal lives -- for whom it isn't simply "a job".
"The position and actions of various U.S. “churches” who actively promote harm to homosexuals both in the United States and in other countries. Their use of my tax dollars to sustain these churches in their fight to deny me rights particularly infuriates me."
Whaaaaaat? I don't think it's supposed to work that way.
Edit: a bit further down, it seems that he considers his tax dollars to be supporting Fred Phelps' church because if somebody tries to burn it down, the fire department will put it out. That's... certainly an interesting position, especially coming from someone who does not live in Topeka or even in Kansas.
I don't want to go church bashing and I don't know how it is in the US but in Australia church run enterprises pick up a lot of government contracts for job placement, school chaplaincy and delivery of social services. Also church run schools receive a lot of public funding (sometimes in excess or poor public schools) while still pocketing large fees. And they do this without having to pay taxes. I am mainly concerned about this in Aus because of the denial of qualified counselling services to kids in favour of evangelism and the Internet and games censorship lobby. But there is no doubt the anti-gay lobby here is primarily driven by religious organisations and I don't doubt they benefit from the lobbying capabilities and funding that comes from being close with government.
Be careful about the funding claims. Australian public schools receive their funds from both state and federal governments. Private schools receive funds only from the federal government. Generally (always?) public schools receive more government funding than private schools, but splitting of their income source may mean that they receive less from a single government source than a private school.
In the US, one could argue some churches do the same. They get a lot of breaks for government outreach contracts and are generally non-profit entities.
I'm a non-mormon living in Salt Lake City, Utah, so I might be biased against churches though.
It makes sense when you realize that churches are tax-exempt, i.e. the reap all the benefits without paying any of the costs, and that this is made possible by the payments of taxpayers.
Jon: welcome to the Out world. Wonderful essay.
And thanks, Maddog, for all you've done for Linux and FOSS (and various techish bits before then) all these years.