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Update on My Situation

slatestarcodex.com

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Re: Update on My Situation

#91

Post by stevenwliao »

pas wrote: post #86
stevenwliao wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The optimal strategy would probably have been radio silence, and then the blog disappearing without an explanation after a few weeks.

Optimal for what? Sure that might thwart this problematic piece but would it guarantee anything for the future? At least this way Scott was able to size up his readership and work on solving this problem for good (for himself), plus the cat is out of the bag regarding how fickle the NYT is.

Optimal for maximizing the chance of the publicity going away and him continuing his job status quo. Most people aren't going to write about a dead blog.

This solution is fine now that there's no chance.

Re: Update on My Situation

#92

Post by searchableguy »

Barrin92 wrote: post #48
sillysaurusx wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah. Thank you! That’s an entirely reasonable theory that fits the data. I didn’t realize he blogged about his patients. Do you happen to know of any examples of articles he published along those lines? Now I’m curious what he said...

https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/07/12/34/ here's one, I don't know if he put that preface on all of them, apparently he fictionalises them and mixes them up.

> I know that if I don’t change the medication, he will probably be a zombie like this until such time as somebody else does change it, which may be never. But if I do change the medication…well, there must be some reason somebody put him on that, and the idea of somebody who needed that much medication not being on it is too horrible to imagine. Also, I’m only seeing him once, and then he gets transferred to someone else. What do I do?

> The maxim is “do what lets you sleep at night”, so I punted. I kept him on his medications and turned him over to the next guy. I just hope the next guy gets my documentation instead of thinking “Dr. Alexander kept him on all this medication…I wonder what he knows that I don’t.”

Oh man, I have noticed this same behaviour with doctors.

I think how we portray doctors and hospitals as isn't aligned with practice. People really lack the skills to express their issues succinctly to doctors and expect them to figure out everything when they couldn't in months or years. The idea that a 30 min conversation is enough for doctors to know your entire life and medical history to prescribe you relevant medicine and diagnosis is flawed. Many people omit details out of fear and shame. Not that doctors are better at communicating that as a message. It's really like an interview.

Re: Update on My Situation

#93

Post by mafuy »

iron0013 wrote: post #83

A tempest in a teapot. Nothing has happened to this man, yet he plays the victim card over and over again.

Way to get personal without backing anything up...

He got death threats, and I'm sure you have no idea what his employer and patients told him. So don't make such assumptions without any evidence. What he described as problems is entirely reasonable and adheres to a professional standard of care.

Re: Update on My Situation

#94

Post by pas »

stevenwliao wrote: post #91
pas wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Optimal for what? Sure that might thwart this problematic piece but would it guarantee anything for the future? At least this way Scott was able to size up his readership and work on solving this problem for good (for himself), plus the cat is out of the bag regarding how fickle the NYT is.

Optimal for maximizing the chance of the publicity going away and him continuing his job status quo. Most people aren't going to write about a dead blog. This solution is fine now that there's no chance.

But the blog is very important for him, just as psychiatry.

Re: Update on My Situation

#95

Post by unityByFreedom »

pas wrote: post #88
unityByFreedom wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Haha IMO we are all equally capable of thinking for ourselves, and therefore it is not necessary to have the patient recline in order to subjugate them and/or induce openness.

Isn't that done also to break eye contact? In (some) analytical therapy face-to-face discussion is discouraged as far as I know.

Therapists usually try to encourage social skills that increase eye contact.

Re: Update on My Situation

#96

Post by awerawerawrjhui »

KKKKkkkk1 wrote: post #67
brundolf wrote: post #6

> And now that I’ve publicly admitted privacy is important to me – something I tried to avoid coming on too strong about before, for exactly this reason – some people have taken it upon themselves to post my real name all over Twitter in order to harass and threaten me. Has anybody applied the Dark Forest metaphor to internet publicity? It's fascinating (horrifying) how simply catching the attention of too big a piec…

What caustic attention? A popular blogger whose name is publicly available but not mentioned on the blog had his name posted on Twitter? Why does he perceive this as harassment and persecution?

Have you even read his original post about why he didn't want his real name to be publicised?

Re: Update on My Situation

#97

Post by edbob »

pas wrote: post #87
frank2 wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All we know is that Substack is willing to make a lot of promises to Scott. Scott probably lacks (as I do) the expertise to negotiate a contract that would actually hold Substack to those promises. But maybe I am being too cynical.

It's not the promises that are problematic. The long term plans and interests of Substack are not so well aligned with Scott's. Every future development has to either treat him as a special snowflake (so they have to implement a VIP tier) or eventually bulldoze every perk of his blog back into uniformity. I don't understand why doesn't he goes full patreon.

If cancel culture is causing him problems, then Patreon is the last place he wants to be.

Re: Update on My Situation

#98

Post by dredmorbius »

peteretep wrote: post #81
shajznnckfke wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the more modern version of this arrangement would be for Alexander to work at/start a think tank, which has the advantage of being tax-exempt for the patron. Or for a less formal, more distributed solution, there is of course Patreon.

That’s interesting, although my understanding of Think Tanks is that they’re meant to be following an editorial line

The philosopher Diogenes was eating bread and lentils for supper. He was seen by the philosopher Aristippus, who lived comfortably by flattering the king. Said Aristippus, "If you would learn to be subservient to the king you would not have to live on lentils."

Diogenes replied, "Learn to live on lentils and you will not have to be subservient to the king".

Re: Update on My Situation

#99

Post by dredmorbius »

brundolf wrote: post #6

> And now that I’ve publicly admitted privacy is important to me – something I tried to avoid coming on too strong about before, for exactly this reason – some people have taken it upon themselves to post my real name all over Twitter in order to harass and threaten me. Has anybody applied the Dark Forest metaphor to internet publicity? It's fascinating (horrifying) how simply catching the attention of too big a piec…

What's the Dark Forest metaphor in this context? Liu Cixin?

https://onezero.medium.com/the-dark-forest-theory-of-the-int...

Re: Update on My Situation

#100

Post by gdevenyi »

edbob wrote: post #97
pas wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not the promises that are problematic. The long term plans and interests of Substack are not so well aligned with Scott's. Every future development has to either treat him as a special snowflake (so they have to implement a VIP tier) or eventually bulldoze every perk of his blog back into uniformity. I don't understand why doesn't he goes full patreon.

If cancel culture is causing him problems, then Patreon is the last place he wants to be.

There is SubscribeStar instead.
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