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The death of the private citizen?

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Re: The death of the private citizen?

#91

Post by throwaway4666 »

I still have no idea why people are making this whole thing about a political point or 'controversial opinions'. The facts are:

-The NYT wanted to write about SSC notably because SA warned about covid ahead of time, wrote a nice piece about the effectiveness of masks, etc.

-The NYT did not care enough about Scott's pseudonymity to keep it intact

-Scott, fearing that his relationship with his patients might be jeopardized if they got linked to his personal blog, deleted it.

Where do 'the mob' or 'controversial opinions' or 'ideological differences' factor in this at all? It is not 'the mob' that triggered this, in fact Scott upset a lot of people over the years with some of his articles and that hasn't deterred him from keeping them up blogging further. The NYT isn't reporting on the SSC commentariat's curious obsession with the IQ of black people either. So why do 90% of posts on here are making it about politics? If I were not charitable beyond reason I would start to believe HN's love of neutral, level-headed and impassionate discussion might be an act.

Re: The death of the private citizen?

#92

Post by BraveSnoo1028 »

throwaway4666 wrote: post #91

I still have no idea why people are making this whole thing about a political point or 'controversial opinions'. The facts are: -The NYT wanted to write about SSC notably because SA warned about covid ahead of time, wrote a nice piece about the effectiveness of masks, etc. -The NYT did not care enough about Scott's pseudonymity to keep it intact -Scott, fearing that his relationship with his patients might be jeopard…

Scott didn't take down his blog just because of his relationship with his patients. It's one of his core arguments, yes, but it's tied with modern cancel culture, where speaking your mind if it deviates from accepted norms and ideas can result in significant personal and professional consequences, even if your intent isn't to oppress, spread hate speech, promote racism, etc. and even if the ideas you express are valuable in some way. It's dangerous nowadays to toe the line of what's "acceptable", where what's acceptable is decided by what people happen to feel on any particular day and how something can be spun into something it's not. Any number of character assassinations we've seen (such as the attempt on Stallmann) show that there are risks to being visible if some people suddenly decide they don't like you. Which connects with his other concern, that he may become too much of a liability for the place he works if some group or other finds something he's said controversial and tries to punish him or his employers for it.

Re: The death of the private citizen?

#93

Post by masonic »

Spooky23 wrote: post #53
wahern wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how that would work any better than it has previously. For example, the American South has generally been the more laissez-faire region in the U.S. but the North has remained the industrial powerhouse, despite itself according to mainstream intuition. I think people misunderstand and chaff under many of the very same policies that make them wealthy. We want contradictory things. Anyhow, mobility is lower…

The south isn’t laissez-faire, its cheap due to the legacy of lesser working rights for workers, etc and government organization. There’s downsides though. Toyota put a plant in Ontario because it would take too long to turn assembly instructions into LEGO like instructions. Literacy was too low in Mississippi or wherever.

No, it's because the UAW union opposed plants in right-to-work states. Other manufacturers like Hyundai have done well with new plants throughout the South.

Re: The death of the private citizen?

#94

Post by throwaway4666 »

BraveSnoo1028 wrote: post #92
throwaway4666 wrote: post #91

I still have no idea why people are making this whole thing about a political point or 'controversial opinions'. The facts are: -The NYT wanted to write about SSC notably because SA warned about covid ahead of time, wrote a nice piece about the effectiveness of masks, etc. -The NYT did not care enough about Scott's pseudonymity to keep it intact -Scott, fearing that his relationship with his patients might be jeopard…

Scott didn't take down his blog just because of his relationship with his patients. It's one of his core arguments, yes, but it's tied with modern cancel culture, where speaking your mind if it deviates from accepted norms and ideas can result in significant personal and professional consequences, even if your intent isn't to oppress, spread hate speech, promote racism, etc. and even if the ideas you express are valu…

At no point did he mention cancel culture or 'the norm'. In fact, his argument entirely revolved around his relationship with his patients and that has little bearing on what he believes about the IQ of black people, since, as he says, his patients run the full gamut of the political spectrum (so any opinion would be controversial to some of them). It's more about the fact that psychiatrists are apparently supposed to act as blank slates to their patients and his blog contains a lot of deeply personal stuff. Even without the politics stuff it'd be a problem.

Re: The death of the private citizen?

#95

Post by BraveSnoo1028 »

throwaway4666 wrote: post #94
BraveSnoo1028 wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Scott didn't take down his blog just because of his relationship with his patients. It's one of his core arguments, yes, but it's tied with modern cancel culture, where speaking your mind if it deviates from accepted norms and ideas can result in significant personal and professional consequences, even if your intent isn't to oppress, spread hate speech, promote racism, etc. and even if the ideas you express are valu…

At no point did he mention cancel culture or 'the norm'. In fact, his argument entirely revolved around his relationship with his patients and that has little bearing on what he believes about the IQ of black people, since, as he says, his patients run the full gamut of the political spectrum (so any opinion would be controversial to some of them). It's more about the fact that psychiatrists are apparently supposed t…

Are you sure you read his blog entry?

> The second reason is more prosaic: some people want to kill me or ruin my life, and I would prefer not to make it too easy. I’ve received various death threats. I had someone on an anti-psychiatry subreddit put out a bounty for any information that could take me down (the mods deleted the post quickly, which I am grateful for). I’ve had dissatisfied blog readers call my work pretending to be dissatisfied patients in order to get me fired. And I recently learned that someone on SSC got SWATted in a way that they link to using their real name on the blog. I live with ten housemates including a three-year-old and an infant, and I would prefer this not happen to me or to them. Although I realize I accept some risk of this just by writing a blog with imperfect anonymity, getting doxxed on national news would take it to another level.

He doesn't name cancel culture, but it's obvious it's a part of what he's worried about.

Re: The death of the private citizen?

#96

Post by throwaway4666 »

BraveSnoo1028 wrote: post #95
throwaway4666 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At no point did he mention cancel culture or 'the norm'. In fact, his argument entirely revolved around his relationship with his patients and that has little bearing on what he believes about the IQ of black people, since, as he says, his patients run the full gamut of the political spectrum (so any opinion would be controversial to some of them). It's more about the fact that psychiatrists are apparently supposed t…

Are you sure you read his blog entry? > The second reason is more prosaic: some people want to kill me or ruin my life, and I would prefer not to make it too easy. I’ve received various death threats. I had someone on an anti-psychiatry subreddit put out a bounty for any information that could take me down (the mods deleted the post quickly, which I am grateful for). I’ve had dissatisfied blog readers call my work pr…

There's no evidence all of this comes from cancel culture. As I said in a previous thread, the main doxxing comes from an alt-right dude who angrily posted Scott's personal info and clinic because he believed to be shadowbanned.

Seriously, look at Scott's post where he quotes disparaging opinions about him. You'd be surprised at how much of the vitriol comes from the alt-right, calling him limp-wristed, a beta cuck, as well as any number of Jewish slurs. And the alt-right does have a far more prominent record in actually killing people than blue-haired people on twitter.

Re: The death of the private citizen?

#97

Post by mc32 »

nybble41 wrote: post #82
mc32 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is never “no ruler”. Someone always emerges who sets the pace, etc. True anarchy can only exist in very low density situations where population is very low and very sparsely settled. Let’s say fewer than 5 people per square mile actual (not average) on good land. One or fewer would be better. Rural Siberia -Yakutiya, Rural Mongolia. Colonial era trappers and such when they were not in town.

You seem to be confusing "leaders" with "rulers". It's fine to have someone around who "sets the pace" so long as they are willing to leave other people alone who aren't interested in doing things their way. Anarchy is about the absence of power relationships, not maximizing uniformity of roles or social disorder.

I think you’re starting to get into semantics. But I agree that basically the only way to achieve it is is very low density situations where power relationships can’t be manifested.

It’d be an idealized primitive culture -technology will produce power relationships. So will density (water rights, hunting rights, fishing rights, etc)

Re: The death of the private citizen?

#98

Post by noir_lord »

wahern wrote: post #72
perl4ever wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article [on curbed.com] you link to doesn't seem to focus on people who move for work. In fact the chart titled "The reasons people move" doesn't even include "for work"! I don't see what you think is the "it" that "doesn't seem that large". I mean, yes, the fall in the number of people moving for work, but what is the source? [Edit] It seems to say the proportion of people moving for work has increased, while th…

My opinion comes from the literature I read studying political science and international affairs in college during the late 1990s, the literature I read studying law a decade later (I so miss free journal access), and generally following the academic discourse for the past 20 years. In any particular year people tend to mine the longer trends for evidence related to whatever is most interesting at the time, thus the…

Journal access, Google 'libgen' or 'library genesis'

Re: The death of the private citizen?

#99

Post by Forgeties79 »

bsder wrote: post #13
Forgeties79 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is kind of crazy how many people can’t - or won’t - connect the dots about this. If you have an online presence you cannot be anonymous. Some of our parents, whether they know it or not, were actually pretty wise to tell millennials “everything you post online is forever.” The corollary being it will be linked back to you eventually.

> If you have an online presence you cannot be anonymous. So "The Dead Past" (by Isaac Asimov) is our only option? I reject that. The problem is that our laws have not caught up to the fact that the Internet makes some things too accessible. We have too many things which link our personal identities exposed online because of the government which assumed that it was too much work to go to the county courthouse and loo…

I guess I should have been more clear. I’m not saying that literally anyone can easily grab anything about you, though that isn’t entirely untrue in the current moment. What I am saying is that once you put it out there, once you link accounts or make a comment or really do anything online, someone determined can find you.

Re: The death of the private citizen?

#100

Post by evgen »

MattGaiser wrote: post #43
julianeon wrote: post #34

I saw a comment on Twitter that what you're really seeing here is dueling philosophies, and I agree. Ever heard the expression, Sunshine is the best disinfectant? I think you're seeing it's logical endpoint with the SSC story. And while it seems to have fallen out of fashion, for the most part, I agree. It seems to me that no matter where you turn, when it comes to 'the truth and nothing but the truth' about someone…

>but it prevents worse problems. Like you, I also comment on the internet under my real name, so pulling back the curtain on everything else is an exciting prospect. But for that not to ever bite us, that requires that we never offend too many people, even for a brief second. I naturally stay within bounds, so that is fine for me, but I suspect many opinions would need to remain hidden if a war were waged on anonymit…

> Why can't ideas be allowed to exist on their own, detached from any known person?

Perhaps because their formation was coloured by someone else's experiences and prejudices. Why is it wrong to want those who propose these ideas to take credit and responsibility so that we can examine the idea and the nature of the person who conceived the idea. These ideas exist to persuade; they should be examined as the rhetorical sophistry that they truly are and not in some pretend world of spherical cows and platonic ideals.

If you temper the ideas you propose to the public it could be because you are afraid of offending someone, or it could be that you are simply someone who is capable of feeling empathy. Given the similar result does it matter which reason is the source of such self-regulation, and are we worse off for it?

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