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The Death of Tony Hsieh: A Spiral of Alcohol, Drugs and Extreme Behavior

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Re: The Death of Tony Hsieh: A Spiral of Alcohol, Drugs and Extreme Behavior

#111

Post by GavinMcG »

disown wrote: post #53
GavinMcG wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Sharing hard truths" without credible backup should be flagged when it's personal information like that. Gossip and tawdry accusations don't have a place in a community devoted to responsible discourse, especially because lies spread faster than the truth. Having the same conversation now rather than right in the heat of things is fine.

> Having the same conversation now rather than right in the heat of things is fine. Why? I don't think people should arbitrarily decide when other people should have the conversation. What if some people think it's never the right time? Should we never talk about it? How about this, people should be allowed to have conversations about anything at the time of their choosing? Do we really need a moral police to tell us…

Go ahead and have conversations. Posting gossip and rumor on a public site isn't that, and should wait for credible sourcing so that it can be distinguished as true.

Re: The Death of Tony Hsieh: A Spiral of Alcohol, Drugs and Extreme Behavior

#112

Post by tempsy »

detaro wrote: post #65
breck wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hindsight is 20-20, but looking back it seems clear they were credible and correct, which is why I just wonder if dang could explain why they were flagged. Were moderators involved? Was any attempt made to verify? Or was it just lost in a sea of comments flagged daily (I don't know, not sure how the backend works here).

Flagging is a user action, not something mods do, and I don't see why mods should have overridden that here. It's obviously always possible that strong claims that are impossible to confirm quickly turn out to be true, that doesn't mean we should let them always stand as if they are true in such circumstances. EDIT: and usual hint, the most reliable way to get an answer from dang is emailing him.

something that is not immediately verifiable is not reason alone to censor something.

Re: The Death of Tony Hsieh: A Spiral of Alcohol, Drugs and Extreme Behavior

#113

Post by breck »

dang wrote: post #89
breck wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hindsight is 20-20, but looking back it seems clear they were credible and correct, which is why I just wonder if dang could explain why they were flagged. Were moderators involved? Was any attempt made to verify? Or was it just lost in a sea of comments flagged daily (I don't know, not sure how the backend works here).

Users flagged it. We can only guess why users flag things. It was flagkilled for a while and then we unkilled it but left [flagged] on. It also got a lot of upvotes, so the signals were actually mixed. I don't have any special insight, but FWIW: situations like this are inevitably messy. People want different things (e.g. the social standard about not speaking ill of the dead vs. curiosity to know the truth or share…

Thanks, really helpful the hear how you handle these sorts of situations. I don’t have any good ideas on how to handle it better, and maybe the original commenter could have provided some more corroborating info to preempt the flags. Given your information seems like it would be unreasonable on the mods to handle this one any differently.

Re: The Death of Tony Hsieh: A Spiral of Alcohol, Drugs and Extreme Behavior

#114

Post by zarkov99 »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #83
breck wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would love it if dang could weigh in on this tough issue. There were a number of people being downvoted asking questions about how this could have happened, and now to see that someone posted the true answer and it was flagged and hidden, that I think reflects poorly on HN and warrants an explanation. I'll never forget at my first friend's funeral when his mother said during the eulogy "My son was a drug addict." I…

Part of the problem is that "the truth" is generally not as simple and one dimensional as people would like it to be. I was called "lazy" for much of my life. Then I was diagnosed with a genetic disorder and people finally understood I wasn't lazy. I just didn't have the energy other people had. Everyone knows addiction is extremely hard to quit, yet being an addict remains stigmatizing and the addict is routinely tr…

All true, but sometimes bad things are indeed one's fault, or at least under one's control, and the first step towards remedy is taking responsibility.

Re: The Death of Tony Hsieh: A Spiral of Alcohol, Drugs and Extreme Behavior

#115

Post by zarkov99 »

QuadmasterXLII wrote: post #109
nxmnxm99 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This recurrent story where extremely intelligent people are battling mental health issues and cannot speak out because the stigma behind this issue is too damaging is why we need to normalize the discourse around mental health if we want to avoid this type of tragedies. Where exactly is the "stigma" of mental health in tech nowadays? We're blasted day and night to the point where apparently every other person is "b…

There is no stigma in the pretty words from HR and massive stigma in the actions of HR

What does HR have to do with anything/?

Re: The Death of Tony Hsieh: A Spiral of Alcohol, Drugs and Extreme Behavior

#116

Post by GavinMcG »

tempsy wrote: post #50
GavinMcG wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Sharing hard truths" without credible backup should be flagged when it's personal information like that. Gossip and tawdry accusations don't have a place in a community devoted to responsible discourse, especially because lies spread faster than the truth. Having the same conversation now rather than right in the heat of things is fine.

What do you mean by credible? How does anyone on here present proof of credibility about knowledge of a particular event or issue? The comment in question was from someone who created a throwaway “exzappos” username and claimed to have worked closely with Hsieh and understood the problems that have now come to light. It’s impossible for anyone on here to prove their identity or that they aren’t lying about knowledge…

An anonymous person on the internet is not credible.

That's fine when the things anonymous people are posting here can be verified elsewhere, or are philosophical arguments that can be evaluated on their own merits, for example. It's not fine when it's personal accusations and gossip that can't be verified, but which people take to be true just because it seems exciting.

Re: The Death of Tony Hsieh: A Spiral of Alcohol, Drugs and Extreme Behavior

#117

Post by okareaman »

TedShiller wrote: post #106
okareaman wrote: post #52

I am a recovering nitrous oxide addict who once set himself on fire, so I understand the terrible predicament he found himself in. Many people do nitrous recreationally as a party drug, but there's a reason they call it 'hippie crack.' Some become obsessed with it

I think one "advantage" could be that it's an invisible drug. People don't know that you're doing it, unless of course you have neurological or organ damage, but even then it could be explained away.

You start getting incoherent after heavy use, even when not currently using. People who know you notice. Jewel said she left an event early because she was upset to see Tony was acting that way. It takes 4-6 days to recover from a heavy run, including getting feeling back in your nerve endings. Taking B vitamins help.

Re: The Death of Tony Hsieh: A Spiral of Alcohol, Drugs and Extreme Behavior

#118

Post by tempsy »

GavinMcG wrote: post #116
tempsy wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean by credible? How does anyone on here present proof of credibility about knowledge of a particular event or issue? The comment in question was from someone who created a throwaway “exzappos” username and claimed to have worked closely with Hsieh and understood the problems that have now come to light. It’s impossible for anyone on here to prove their identity or that they aren’t lying about knowledge…

An anonymous person on the internet is not credible . That's fine when the things anonymous people are posting here can be verified elsewhere, or are philosophical arguments that can be evaluated on their own merits, for example. It's not fine when it's personal accusations and gossip that can't be verified, but which people take to be true just because it seems exciting.

I didn’t say it was. I challenge the need to censor comments from some random anonymous poster vs taking the comment with a grain of salt but leaving it up.

This pretty much mirrors the national debate we’re having about social media and censorship. I’m not in the group where I think something that can’t be definitively verified should be banned from a website. People should be skeptical, but that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be allowed to read something.

Re: The Death of Tony Hsieh: A Spiral of Alcohol, Drugs and Extreme Behavior

#119

Post by fairity »

paul7986 wrote: post #56
gonehome wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

She sounds like someone that actually cared about him. It’s terrible that someone who seemed like a genuinely kind person ended up surrounded by sycophants taking advantage of his wealth and encouraging his drug issues. "I am going to be blunt," she wrote in the letter, obtained by Forbes. "I need to tell you that I don’t think you are well and in your right mind. I think you are taking too many drugs that cause you…

Indeed and thus life is hard whether your poor or rich, especially for those who suddenly get mega wealthly or fame. They seem to cant handle it very well from Michael Jackson to Whitney Houston to Tony to many others. A lot of us I imagine wanted to be in Tony's position, yet would you still want to be him with how it all went down? His mega-wealth and fame of wealth seem to be his un-doing.

> A lot of us I imagine wanted to be in Tony's position, yet would you still want to be him with how it all went down?

Yes. A lot of people who don't have this type of success like to discredit the lives of those that do in order to protect their self-image. On average, wealth and status increase your quality of life.

I do think there's a lesson to be learned here about the problems that come with wealth and status. To dismiss the net benefits of wealth and status is the wrong lesson.

Re: The Death of Tony Hsieh: A Spiral of Alcohol, Drugs and Extreme Behavior

#120

Post by detaro »

tempsy wrote: post #118
GavinMcG wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An anonymous person on the internet is not credible . That's fine when the things anonymous people are posting here can be verified elsewhere, or are philosophical arguments that can be evaluated on their own merits, for example. It's not fine when it's personal accusations and gossip that can't be verified, but which people take to be true just because it seems exciting.

I didn’t say it was. I challenge the need to censor comments from some random anonymous poster vs taking the comment with a grain of salt but leaving it up. This pretty much mirrors the national debate we’re having about social media and censorship. I’m not in the group where I think something that can’t be definitively verified should be banned from a website. People should be skeptical, but that doesn’t mean they s…

You can read flagged comments, you just need to opt-in to do so. HN gives you that escape hatch if you don't want others saying that something isn't appropriate for HN get in the way of seeing it.
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