Blog by Sumana Harihareswara, Changeset founder
On Nóirín Trouble Plunkett's Death
Hi, reader. I wrote this in 2015 and it's now more than five years old. So it may be very out of date; the world, and I, have changed a lot since I wrote it! I'm keeping this up for historical archive purposes, but the me of today may 100% disagree with what I said then. I rarely edit posts after publishing them, but if I do, I usually leave a note in italics to mark the edit and the reason. If this post is particularly offensive or breaches someone's privacy, please contact me.
I was devastated today to learn of the death of my friend Nóirín Plunkett.
This is a terrible thing and I am still shocked and saddened to learn of their death. (Per their profile, please follow their pronoun preferences and use "they".)
Some things to know about them:
Their bold honesty about being sexually assaulted at an open source software event moved us to action; it helped spark the creation of the Ada Initiative.
As Geek Feminism's wiki documents, they were facing tremendous legal bills because of a legal conflict with an ex.
They had just started a new role at Simply Secure, one that combined their open tech expertise with their writing and coordinating skills and their judgment and perspective.
When I was volunteering on the search for the Ada Initiative's new Executive Director, I worked closely with Nóirín and could always count on their wisdom, compassion, and diligence. I am so grateful, now, that I had a chance to collaborate with them -- I had hoped to work with them again, someday, in some organization or other.
One of the last times I saw them, they were crying with happiness over the passage of the Irish same-sex marriage referendum.
I don't want to end this entry because there is no ending that can do justice to them.
