Richard “Lowtax” Kyanka, creator of Somethingawful, has died • Hacker News Board

Re: Richard “Lowtax” Kyanka, creator of Somethingawful, has died

#81

Post by AmericanChopper » Thu, Nov 11, 2021, 10:27 AM UTC

hacksnewer wrote: post #68

javajosh wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>credible allegations I truly wish that allegations of any and every sort were considered not credible by the general public. Domestic abuse is a real problem, but false allegation of domestic abuse is a real problem, too. Indeed, if a person wants to harm another without lifting a finger, the simplest thing to do is claim "He hurt me" or "I'm afraid of him" and you'll get every cop, judge, attorney, a legion of your…

This comes off as naive. I saw the domestic abuse allegations again him and decided to read up. He had multiple allegations from both exes. He lightly joked about rape, domestic abuse etc. Yeah, they're jokes, but when I stopped being a child that stopped being funny, you can still see him making these jokes int interviews about his situation. You've got people on HN today that believe that metoo is just made up. Tho…

The problem with metoo is that the solution it envisioned for the problem, was to attempt to undermine the justice portion of the justice system as much as it could, and to create as many avenues for extrajudicial punishment as it possibly could. The entirely inevitable outcome of this is that these new systems were put to use by people to enact personal agendas, in any venue where interpersonal politics was relevant. Which is why we have a growing cohort of people who now reactivity think that any accusation is more likely to be false than true.

Sure, these accusations can be very hard to prove. But an accusation of a false accusation is even harder to prove. Yet most people will be inclined to reactively put their faith in one of those accusations, but not the other. The idea we’ve come up with to resolve this tension is the presumption of innocence, and that accusations must be proven for justice to be carried out. This is one of the foundational moral and legal principles of all liberal democracies. While people might end up frustrated by the unavoidable outcome that sometimes, some conflicts can’t be satisfactorily resolved, throwing out the core principles of justice seems like a bad solution to some people.

Re: Richard “Lowtax” Kyanka, creator of Somethingawful, has died

#82

Post by XorNot » Thu, Nov 11, 2021, 10:28 AM UTC

havkd wrote: post #71

hacksnewer wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comes off as naive. I saw the domestic abuse allegations again him and decided to read up. He had multiple allegations from both exes. He lightly joked about rape, domestic abuse etc. Yeah, they're jokes, but when I stopped being a child that stopped being funny, you can still see him making these jokes int interviews about his situation. You've got people on HN today that believe that metoo is just made up. Tho…

It’s like you’re saying that someone who makes rape jokes is more likely to be a rapist.

Welcome to the world of Bayesian priors, and our star witness, the OJ Simpson murder trial.

There was a comment which didn't get enough attention during that trial: the defense claimed that fewer then 1 in 1000 women who suffer domestic abuse are killed by their domestic partners and therefore allegations of spousal abuse by OJ Simpson did not constitute supporting evidence.

But: this is wrong. Because once a woman has been killed, if her domestic partner was an abuser then almost 80% of the time the abuser did it (given reasonable other factual assumptions - i.e. pretty obviously if they weren't in the same state at the time then we can exclude it etc..)

The key part of the issue is that once an event has occurred, the Bayesian prior has changed: we are no longer evaluating the same initial probability.

[1] https://math.temple.edu/~paulos/oldsite/oj.html

Re: Richard “Lowtax” Kyanka, creator of Somethingawful, has died

#83

Post by Jensson » Thu, Nov 11, 2021, 10:28 AM UTC

content_sesh wrote: post #78

jokethrowaway wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I make the worst joke and I hope you wouldn't consider me a domestic abuser. Given how our judicial system works, if I had an public known history for jokes about rape, it would be even easier to mount a case of domestic abuse on me. If a divorce will grant me unique custody of my children or money and get rid of my ex, I would be ready to lie my way out. Unless there is proof, these are just allegations. And if I we…

Every one of my ex-wives is a crazy bitch. Every judge has it out for me. It's not my fault my kids don't like me; their mom keeps poisoning them against me with lies and my visitation schedule makes it impossible for me to be in their lives. No one ever believes me, they all just want to think I'm the bad guy. You don't need to construct hypotheticals here because we're talking about a specific person. He pretty muc…

My dad says all of those things, but he never abused anyone. My mother told people a lot of lies about him, said he abused us etc. He was just naive, socially unaware and had money, and that somehow attracts horrible women like a lantern attracts flies.

Now I wouldn't say that my dad was a good dad, but he wasn't an abuser.

Re: Richard “Lowtax” Kyanka, creator of Somethingawful, has died

#84

Post by javajosh » Thu, Nov 11, 2021, 10:28 AM UTC

IanCal wrote: post #74

javajosh wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>credible allegations I truly wish that allegations of any and every sort were considered not credible by the general public. Domestic abuse is a real problem, but false allegation of domestic abuse is a real problem, too. Indeed, if a person wants to harm another without lifting a finger, the simplest thing to do is claim "He hurt me" or "I'm afraid of him" and you'll get every cop, judge, attorney, a legion of your…

This is an odd take. > I truly wish that allegations of any and every sort were considered not credible by the general public. If someone steals my phone at the bar and everyone at the table sees them do it, then tells you exactly what happened with the same story - would you say "no, this is _not credible_. It is not something I am able to believe could happen and it is not plausible". Surely not. It would be a cred…

But yours is not an odd take, I'm afraid. You present strawman (seeing it makes it credible), an ad hominem (not projecting, but thanks for the baseless speculation), and another strawman (I did not and do not confuse meaning with definition). All in quick succession, all in seeming defense of the principle: we can and should considered guilty until proven innocent.

There's no argument to be made since you didn't make one. But I'd suggest stepping back and considering the overall point you're trying to make. You might start with a scenario which is, by construction unfair: a couple fights, she takes the kids, he shouts, she calls the police and claims abuse, he is beaten and arrested; during the divorce she uses the arrest as evidence of the abuse, and frames the beating as evidence of her husbands violent tendencies; the court accepts this argument and he loses the children, getting supervised visitation only 90 minutes once a week.

Does that sound right, or fair to you? Do you think this scenario is physically impossible? Because this is what I'm arguing against, and I can't understand how or why anyone would want this to be how things work.

Re: Richard “Lowtax” Kyanka, creator of Somethingawful, has died

#85

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Nov 11, 2021, 10:32 AM UTC

dash2 wrote: post #75

loriverkutya wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Even if you despise the person, their death has caused real human suffering and pain among those around and associated to them. Generally the victims of a serial abuser are usually experienced the suffering and the pain while the abuser was alive and their death is a relief. (firsthand experience) I really don't understand of this speak ill if the dead thing, where is the limit, am I allowed to speak ill of Stalin o…

Most humans are imperfect. Some guy once said something about casting the first stone. A more recent guy pointed out that analogies with Stalin and Hitler are usually not illuminating.

[deleted]

Re: Richard “Lowtax” Kyanka, creator of Somethingawful, has died

#86

Post by romwell » Thu, Nov 11, 2021, 10:34 AM UTC

Jensson wrote: post #76

hacksnewer wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comes off as naive. I saw the domestic abuse allegations again him and decided to read up. He had multiple allegations from both exes. He lightly joked about rape, domestic abuse etc. Yeah, they're jokes, but when I stopped being a child that stopped being funny, you can still see him making these jokes int interviews about his situation. You've got people on HN today that believe that metoo is just made up. Tho…

> Yeah, they're jokes, but when I stopped being a child that stopped being funny Autists often don't pick up on that and continues to make unfunny or cringe jokes year after year. That makes them prime targets for false accusations, since the world is full of people like you who will assume they are guilty just because they are socially unaware.

As an autistic: no.

Lack of social awareness isn't an excuse for rape and abuse jokes. You don't need any social awareness to figure out that you shouldn't do that. The concept of "jokes at someone else's expense = bad" isn't hard to grasp for an analytical mind.

Autism is not stupidity. You are not doing "autists" any favor by trying to excuse this behavior.

(Also, for some reason, autistic women aren't seen joking about rape and domestic abuse. Perhaps autism isn't the reason why someone may feel comfortable making these jokes, huh.)

Re: Richard “Lowtax” Kyanka, creator of Somethingawful, has died

#87

Post by javajosh » Thu, Nov 11, 2021, 10:34 AM UTC

kortilla wrote: post #80

hacksnewer wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comes off as naive. I saw the domestic abuse allegations again him and decided to read up. He had multiple allegations from both exes. He lightly joked about rape, domestic abuse etc. Yeah, they're jokes, but when I stopped being a child that stopped being funny, you can still see him making these jokes int interviews about his situation. You've got people on HN today that believe that metoo is just made up. Tho…

> This comes off as naive. I saw the domestic abuse allegations again him and decided to read up. Indeed, reading allegations and treating that as research does come off as naive. > Yeah, they're jokes, but when I stopped being a child that stopped being funny, you can still see him making these jokes int interviews about his situation. It’s cool that your sense of humor about that changed during adolescence. That’s…

Society is really confused about right and wrong. Wendy Williams (a talk show host) asked her audience if one of her guests, who wanted a baby, should trick her boyfriend into fathering a child. The audience laughed and said yes -- Wendy laughed too, and agreed.

This is called paternity fraud, because once pregnant the father will have no say in the disposition of the child, AND will be on the hook for child support. That's 18 years of free money for the mom! To quote Lynch's Dune, "And for the father, nothing."

Re: Richard “Lowtax” Kyanka, creator of Somethingawful, has died

#88

Post by claudiawerner » Thu, Nov 11, 2021, 10:38 AM UTC

javajosh wrote: post #65

extortionist wrote: post #12

He leaves behind a complicated legacy. It's important to note that credible allegations of domestic abuse lead him to sell SA in the past year, and this can't be set aside. At the same time, SA's influence on the modern internet can't be understated. The 'image macro' of early SA (maybe created by Lowtax himself, from what Fragmaster says in his video in the link) is the direct ancestor of today's common meme image--…

>credible allegations I truly wish that allegations of any and every sort were considered not credible by the general public. Domestic abuse is a real problem, but false allegation of domestic abuse is a real problem, too. Indeed, if a person wants to harm another without lifting a finger, the simplest thing to do is claim "He hurt me" or "I'm afraid of him" and you'll get every cop, judge, attorney, a legion of your…

>This isn't against women.

>"Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned," and yet here we are

The fact that these same two statements are in the same paragraph seems sarcastic, if not ironic.

Re: Richard “Lowtax” Kyanka, creator of Somethingawful, has died

#89

Post by Jensson » Thu, Nov 11, 2021, 10:40 AM UTC

romwell wrote: post #86

Jensson wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yeah, they're jokes, but when I stopped being a child that stopped being funny Autists often don't pick up on that and continues to make unfunny or cringe jokes year after year. That makes them prime targets for false accusations, since the world is full of people like you who will assume they are guilty just because they are socially unaware.

As an autistic: no. Lack of social awareness isn't an excuse for rape and abuse jokes. You don't need any social awareness to figure out that you shouldn't do that. The concept of "jokes at someone else's expense = bad" isn't hard to grasp for an analytical mind. Autism is not stupidity. You are not doing "autists" any favor by trying to excuse this behavior. (Also, for some reason , autistic women aren't seen joking…

> The concept of "jokes at someone else's expense = bad" isn't hard to grasp for an analytical mind.

Rape jokes aren't at anyone's expense. A joke at someone's expense would be making fun of someone, a rape joke is just something like "9 out of 10 enjoys gang rape" etc, that isn't what people mean when they say "joke at someone else's expense".

So to me your post just shows that you lack the social awareness to understand these things, and if you grew up in a different environment you would have happily made rape jokes.

Re: Richard “Lowtax” Kyanka, creator of Somethingawful, has died

#90

Post by javajosh » Thu, Nov 11, 2021, 10:41 AM UTC

content_sesh wrote: post #78

jokethrowaway wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I make the worst joke and I hope you wouldn't consider me a domestic abuser. Given how our judicial system works, if I had an public known history for jokes about rape, it would be even easier to mount a case of domestic abuse on me. If a divorce will grant me unique custody of my children or money and get rid of my ex, I would be ready to lie my way out. Unless there is proof, these are just allegations. And if I we…

Every one of my ex-wives is a crazy bitch. Every judge has it out for me. It's not my fault my kids don't like me; their mom keeps poisoning them against me with lies and my visitation schedule makes it impossible for me to be in their lives. No one ever believes me, they all just want to think I'm the bad guy. You don't need to construct hypotheticals here because we're talking about a specific person. He pretty muc…

Sometimes participants in a discussion can't get a particular scenario out of their head to the point they literally can't accept even a hypothetical scenario that differs.

You seem stuck on the scenario where, by construction, an actually guilty person is accused, and then claims the allegations are false.

But you haven't really engaged, it seems to me, with another scenario where, by construction, an actually innocent person is falsely accused, and then claims the allegations are false. Is your position that this just never happens, and never could happen? Or it happens so infrequently it can be ignored?