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Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for one week

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for one week

#331

Post by tptacek »

mjg59 wrote: post #288
dang wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, it's not possible to define "politics" precisely, and it would be a mistake to try. But there's nothing new in that; the HN guidelines have always mentioned politics without defining the term, and we get by. We can clarify, though. The main concern here is pure politics: the conflicts around party, ideology, nation, race, gender, class, and religion that get people hot and turn into flamewars on the internet.…

Hi dang, Quick question for clarification - would http://www.wsj.com/articles/tech-companies-delay-diversity-r... fall into the kind of race and gender issues that you'd block this week?

I can't answer for 'dang but I would definitely flag that post during a "political detox week".

Also: HN threads on that particular topic (statistical evidence for diversity in the industry and its impact) are invariably a shitshow here. I am guessing your political leanings w/r/t/ industry diversity are identical to mine, and I do not see what HN generally gains from the trolling and nastiness that occurs on "diversity as a phenomenon" threads.

Re: Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for one week

#332

Post by lsy »

The idea that you can somehow separate "political" from "non-political" stories seems poorly-thought-out and censorious. Who will make these decisions? It seems clear that many posts that are nominally "about tech and only tech" are pushing some political viewpoint, whether it be the benefits of mass computerization, workaholic tips and tricks, or protection from civil rights violations using encryption.

HN pretends to be largely apolitical, but the quick disappearance of certain threads or topics seems to show that it has a heavy slant towards a sort of techno-utopian quasi-libertarianism that wants to work its way out of challenges to its ideas by sort of putting its fingers in its ears. Instead of attempting to "depoliticize" itself, maybe HN should spend time developing a better understanding and clarification of the extremely political stance it takes every day?

Re: Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for one week

#333

Post by acbabis »

reflexive wrote: post #243

Based on Agnolia, these are the most popular stories from the past week on HN that might be construed as "political": #17 Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for a week https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13108404 #23 Canadian journalist's detention at US border raises press freedom alarms https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13092330 #29 Help Us Keep the Archive Free, Accessible, and Private https://n…

> #17 Tell HN: Political Detox Week

I see what you did there

Re: Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for one week

#337

Post by reflexive »

anonbanker wrote: post #212
sean_patel wrote: post #19

I really welcome this move. I couldn't get out of bed on Nov 9th and a few hours of introspection later, I realized I have no control over any of the Political changes and that I shouldn't be causing myself so much stress. So I stopped watching the news -- both online and on TV -- since Nov 9th. It's been an incredible month for me since then. I've made significant progress on my languishing side-projects ( a Show HN…

Thank you for taking advantage of that introspection. it must feel weird when you first realize that approximately half the population disagrees with you. I believe that, if more people in the United States felt the way you did, we could have world peace in a generation.

Actually, the entire population disagrees with you, about something. The "realization" is that a lot of the things we disagree about, are actually kind of boring.

Re: Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for one week

#339

Post by [deleted] »

s_q_b wrote: post #255

I live in Northwest Washington, D.C. I am a technologist, a government contractor, and an HN member for many years under various accounts since 2008. I respectfully disagree. Yesterday someone motivated by the "Pizzagate" story, spread and enabled by the social media systems we designed , fired multiple shots from a semi-automatic weapon into a crowded restaurant near my home. My partner and I passed the crime scene…

[deleted]

Re: Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for one week

#340

Post by lintiness »

Frondo wrote: post #184
djsumdog wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually haven't seen very many political stories on here. I've personally avoided most of the political crap too, so maybe I just didn't click on a lot of it (and therefore selectively un-memoryed it). I don't feel this need to be an explicit policy. I mean it gets into the entire "what is politics debate." Hackernews is about hacking (software, hardware, life), and I still see tons of that on here -- well that an…

The problem I see is that everything is politics, because politics is the air we breathe as a society. It's asking the question of how we live in community. I think what dang is after getting of is tribalism, where people show group membership with displays of insults, meme-dropping, etc. Different things, but if any group can separate tribalism from politics, through thoughtful community-making, I'd say HN can.

good lord. peter thiel's satan on earth for backing trump, not because he agrees with him, but because he views him as disruptive to a broken system. can't you see how "political" and unthoughful all that is?
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