Earlier quoted context omitted.
If this is one of the most toxic forums you've come across, you must be very fortunate almost to the point of being sheltered. Not saying this is the best ever, but it's nowhere near the worst. The worst traits on HN seem to be an abundance of nitpicking with some disagreements on a few pet topics. Many other sites have active anti-social posters that abuse users for fun, start flamewars for the "lulz" and will argue…
you're right and wrong. :-) (which is the best kind of right/wrong? haha) what I mean is... I tried to make a subtle point, but it didn't come across. what I was trying to say was this is one of the most toxic sites I've seen for a certain mix of toxic behaviors: mostly passive-aggressive, hyper-nerdy/autism-spectrum types of comments, humblebragging, etc. I agree with you wholeheartedly, from my own experience that…
>>a weird mix of passive aggressiveness, disagree-based-downvoting, "cite paper!"-ness, minutial edge case-oriented pedantry
You are basically describing software developers.
They are passive aggressive because they don't like direct confrontation.
They downvote when they disagree because if they disagree that means you are wrong.
They nitpick on edge cases because edge cases are what they deal with everyday in their code, so they can't help it.
So really, it's not HN you have an issue with, but the developer crowd. ;)