Slate Star Codex and Silicon Valley’s War Against the Media

I agree that deleting the blog makes it less likely that NYT readers would investigate and find something objectionable, both because the blog becomes less accessible (but not inaccessible) and because if the story doesn't run (as it seems not to have) then there's no readers in the first place. The New Yorker claim was about the NYT reporter, though, not the readers. If I had an embarrassing secret out in public and a reporter was sniffing around, then conspicuously deleting some but not all copies of it seems like the stupidest possible thing I could do, just encouraging them to dig further for it. That's the reason I doubt that could be Alexander's motivation in deleting the blog.

As to the Streisand effect, we're talking about this now at least, and you're aware that he "likes" eugenics[1]--indeed, if anyone's still reading this thread then perhaps they learned that Alexander likes eugenics specifically because of this article, which appeared specifically because he deleted the blog. I can't imagine the NYT reporter doesn't know too. So as a tactic to conceal his writing, I think deleting the blog has empirically failed.

Though I agree that he probably did fear that an NYT story that said "[Scott Alexander's full name] likes eugenics" would harm his ability to practice as a psychiatrist, and reasonably so. Eugenics obviously has an abhorrent history in its purported application, and he treats the subject casually enough to creep me out too. I didn't read his blog extensively, but the creepier stuff always felt to me more like autistic-style disregard for social context than a desire to revive those horrors. I think the remedy to that should be for someone to point that out to him (as they have, of course), rather than for a journalist to quote his worst phrasing out of context and thus end his career.

1. Literally with the word "like", too, https://web.archive.org/web/20200109033206/http://slatestarc...

> You think the outfit that took down Weinstein cares about some SV tantrums?

Metz cares about access to SV sources, probably. I'll quote Nostalgebraist[0]:

> The journalist also written a soon-to-be-published book about AI work at “Google, Microsoft, Facebook and OpenAI,” whose blurb makes it sound impressed with its subjects, and also touts his “exclusive access to each of these companies.” So, this is someone whose career depends on being in the good graces of the big-name Silicon Valley crowd, and presumably cares a lot whether e.g. Paul Graham is mad at him.

I don't think you can do the sort of work Cade Metz wants to do if the first thing anyone from OpenAI thinks of when you write to them is "oh, it's that asshole that doxed Scott Alexander".

[0]: https://nostalgebraist.tumblr.com/post/621772274317623296/my...

Where was I "un"-civil by your definition and conception of civility? Again, you [mst] are making vague provocations and insinuations and continuing to carry the conversation into a direction that is unproductive and trying to paint me in a poor light. By turning this into a meta-argument you have derailed the original conversation.

I used to just walk away from such conversation but realized I'm letting the bullies win when I do that. By walking away I'm letting sophistry become a viable strategy. We will continue this as long as you want. I am not backing down and will continue to argue my position and provide reasons for what I believe and why.

You have consistently used bad faith and misleading tactics to derail the entire conversation. Every time I have assumed good faith you have thwarted it. Every time I have extended an explanatory provision you have used it against me by quoting me out of context, and then tried to put words in my mouth and pretended to not have done so. Whereas I have taken no such actions and have always quoted you in context.

My actions have been civilized. Yours have been otherwise.

This was Scott's message to the readers:

> There is no comments section for this post. The appropriate comments section is the feedback page of the New York Times. You may also want to email the New York Times technology editor Pui-Wing Tam at pui-wing.tam@nytimes.com, contact her on Twitter at @puiwingtam, or phone the New York Times at 844-NYTNEWS.

> (please be polite – I don’t know if Ms. Tam was personally involved in this decision, and whoever is stuck answering feedback forms definitely wasn’t. Remember that you are representing me and the SSC community, and I will be very sad if you are a jerk to anybody. Please just explain the situation and ask them to stop doxxing random bloggers for clicks. If you are some sort of important tech person who the New York Times technology section might want to maintain good relations with, mention that.)

Can you elaborate on what was un-civil about this? How is directly the users towards the feedback page of the New York Times and the editor in charge of the NYT technology section (the sub-group that Carl Metz belongs to), accompanied with explicit calls to be civil uncivil?

The notion that this is a harassment campaign is nothing less than laughable.

Even if the author's real name were used:

> Community message, pls share around as you like

> If you have spoken with Cade Metz, or if he has reached out to you, since the day that Scott took down Slate Star Codex: there may be something you can do to help

> Please feel free to reach out to me by DM and I can fill you in

How would this be considered harassment? This user is asking for people who have spoken to Cade Metz to get into contact. How is this evidence of harassment?

You seem to be inserting your own imagination that this tweet author is planning to release private contact information or something similar. When in reality this could easily be people sharing their experiences with Cade and whether similar situations of doxxing or de-anonymoization by the NYT authoer have occurred in the past.

Why is it laughable? I have already said several times what was uncivil about it. If I was a psychologist who read the comments of my posts I would have realize that subtle suggestions can be blown out of proportions and I would be very careful with what words I was using to express my intent.

A civil phrasing would have been, "I'm making this decision of my own volition but I personally plan to work out a peaceful solution for all parties involved". That would have been civil. Asking anyone to act on your behalf by giving feedback to a 3rd party when it's obvious the intent is negative is not civil. It is sinister.

It's also becoming clear to me these conversations are no longer productive and I have started to re-iterate points I made in other posts. If you want to argue further make sure you understand what point I'm making and why and then make a good faith and pertinent point. Otherwise I will no longer engage with anyone responding to posts in this thread.

You can also email me if you want and make your points in a longer format. I will consider them and respond if you have well researched rebuttals.