Live data from Hacker News

Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

wsj.com

181–190 of 901 posts

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#181
post #78

> they feel people there are resistant to different social values and political ideologies This is just bizarre to to me. I moved here from the Midwest, which I found stifling. There's a far greater variety of social values and political ideologies (not to mention backgrounds and interests) here than pretty much any place I've lived. The main hostility I see is to intolerance, but that's hardly surprising given SF's…

> This is just bizarre to to me. I moved here from the Midwest, which I found stifling. There's a far greater variety of social values and political ideologies Really? Because the only values I've heard expressed have been standard democratic talking points and once in a while far left ideologies.

Do we include libertarian techno-utopianism as left leaning or democratic talking points?

Because there's a ton of libertarian techno-utopianism.

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#182

I find the recent uptick in progressivism in SV refreshing, and sorely needed. Then again, I've lived my entire life in liberal enclaves and do not personally identify with conservative / "family values" viewpoints.

So you self-identify as liberal and never actually been exposed to people in an area that is predominantly conservative?

Isn't that the definition of insular and close-minded?

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#183
post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember always getting annoyed at colleagues and Hacker News generally for being technolibertarian fanboys. And now I'm constantly annoyed at the sanctimony and self-indulgence of the "Left," even though I hate granting them that label. Maybe I'm just getting old.

Old saying If you're young and you don't have left wing views, you have no heart. If you're old and you still have left wing views, you have no brain.

... but the terms left and right have lost all meaning so this saying is kinda meaningless too.

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#184
post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The takeover by the proscriptive far-left Americans have a very weird conception of what "far-left" means. Liberal feel good minority appeasement by billion dollar multinational corporations is as far from "far-left" as you can get.

Just people arguing in bad faith, I think.

I hope that I demonstrate through my polite and hopefully-constructive replies that I am in fact arguing in good faith.

Once we abandon that assumption then all hope is lost.

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#185

What is it that Peter Thiel said previously about women voting? What did he do to Gawker?

Just a friendly reminder, Gawker did not out Thiel. He had a public profile on Friendster that clearly described him as interested in men. Gawker's editor at the time remarked that people like him thought the web was this super ultra secret bat cave, and that if you posted something there it wasn't really public.

You see no difference between someone sharing something on a social platform versus having that information plastered across the nation?

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#186

None of the three people profiled in this article are tech workers. They are investors, or whatever it is that Tim Ferriss is. To the extent tech workers are leaving Silicon Valley, I'm willing to bet the dominant factor is the cost of housing.

"thoughtleaders"

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I have no idea what SF is like, so in these discussions I never can tell if there really is an influx of insane, insufferable far left crazies I'm not a Trump supporter by any means but I remember clearly the morning after the election and seeing people walking through the street in SF on their way to work in tears. If that doesn't point to a presence of insane, insufferable far left (or at least leftist) crazies I…

>If that doesn't point to a presence of insane, insufferable far left (or at least leftist) crazies I don't know what does. I think you're mistaking how extreme their political beliefs are with how extremely devoted to their political beliefs they are. Most of these people aren't 'far left' they're just very, very committed to their center/center-left politics.

Let me tell you, if you shed tears because Trump won the election you are mentally unstable.

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#188
There is a linguistic sleight of hand at work here: 'libertarian' and 'left' is not what is happening in SV. These terms have been hijacked by the identity politics cartel.

The SV political and ideological climate is all about pidgeonholing you into 0.01-0.3% segment ('left-handed bisexual javascript expert'), then maintaining these segments and manipulating the fractured society into neoliberal directions.

It is obvious that there is nothing that can be named as a common interest in SV: there is no such discourse. The commonality is restricted to your 0.01-0.3% segment.

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nashville as you know is actually pretty liberal, but the biggest difference is that people here live their lives, are friendly to others, and that southern charm is a real thing. People in San Francisco are always so outraged and angry (mainly since Trump took office) and the media constantly feeds them things to be outraged about that they are perpetually angry. People in Nashville for the most part don't let polit…

We do not live in the same Nashville. Not only is it not “pretty liberal” by any definition, people here aren’t any less political than people on the coasts, and they don’t “live their lives” any more, whatever that even means. However, people here are less angry about Trump and the Republicans because they’re much more likely to have voted for him and support what he’s doing. They were plenty angry when Obama was in…

> Not only is it not “pretty liberal” by any definition

Any definition? I'm not from there, but if you use votes for liberal candidates as a basis, they are pretty liberal [0]. That's at least one definition, whether or not it's yours. I could understand arguing nuance, but to say it isn't pretty liberal by any definition appears incorrect.

0 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nashville,_Tennessee#Politics

Re: Like Peter Thiel, Tech Workers Feel Alienated by Silicon Valley ‘Echo Chamber’

#190
post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never can tell if there really is an influx of insane, insufferable far left crazies, or if people who insist on remaining racist and keeping gays in the closet are mad that nobody is having that anymore. That's because it's entirely a matter of individual perspective and experience. Everyone takes their own tiny viewport onto a region of millions of diverse people and attempts to claim "oh yeah SF/bay area is like…

There may be millions of diverse people and opinions but there is definitely a dominant ideology, it is definitely far-left, and it suppresses all other political viewpoints. This is absolutely blindingly self-evident in SF and if you disagree I wonder if you have actually been there.

It's relatively left but not far-left, and it hasn't really moved much in decades, though the rapid movement of the right end of the Overton Window over the past couple decades (and particularly the past few years) may make it seemed to have moved left to those whose perceptions are driven by distance from the center of their own identity group, and identify with a right-leaning (either conservative or right-libertarian) faction.
Post reply on HN