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Sinead O’Connor has died

irishtimes.com

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Re: Sinead O’Connor has died

#141

Post by synetic »

dang wrote: post #134
synetic wrote: post #30

I remember being outraged at her tearing up John Paul II’s picture. The media in the U.S. did a great job of hiding why she did it. I was not outraged at her when I found out her justified reasons for doing so. That was the first time I became consciously aware that news is a business and that that business thrives when it generates outrage. I no longer fall victim to this. She’s far more the saint than that bastard…

You started a religious flamewar and then poured fuel into it in multiple places. That's why your comment is flagged. Please don't post like that here. Your comment was just fine in the first paragraph and broke the site guidelines with the second paragraph—not because we care what you think about popes, but because such swipes predictably lead to internet dreckfests and we're simply trying to have a forum that doesn…

I’ve been on this site since the beginning. I change usernames periodically. I understand the desire to avoid flame wars.

Here’s a sincere question. If I called Charles Manson a bastard would that be flamebait? Are we at the point that calling out the objectively verified despicable acts of a person is flamebait?

It wasn’t a swipe at the man. Sinead suffered a lot for ripping his image apart. She has died now. It is appropriate to point out she did not deserve the reaction and that the protector of her abusers did deserve to have his image shredded.

It’s always ok to call out those who abuse or protect abusers. I care not that my post got flagged. I’m glad of it. I feel a tiny bit like Sinead. Even after all that is known about John Paul 2 people still can’t face reality about the man.

We obviously don’t agree. I’ll stop posting about this and just read all responses.

Re: Sinead O’Connor has died

#142

Post by dang »

synetic wrote: post #141
dang wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You started a religious flamewar and then poured fuel into it in multiple places. That's why your comment is flagged. Please don't post like that here. Your comment was just fine in the first paragraph and broke the site guidelines with the second paragraph—not because we care what you think about popes, but because such swipes predictably lead to internet dreckfests and we're simply trying to have a forum that doesn…

I’ve been on this site since the beginning. I change usernames periodically. I understand the desire to avoid flame wars. Here’s a sincere question. If I called Charles Manson a bastard would that be flamebait? Are we at the point that calling out the objectively verified despicable acts of a person is flamebait? It wasn’t a swipe at the man. Sinead suffered a lot for ripping his image apart. She has died now. It is…

"That bastard John Paul II" was obvious flamebait—of course it was a swipe. You're broadcasting to thousands of people when you post here. Did you really think some people wouldn't react? Is it a high-quality conversation about Sinead O'Connor to have people yell at each other about popes?

> It’s always ok to call out those who abuse or protect abusers. I care not that my post got flagged. I’m glad of it. I feel a tiny bit like Sinead

We're trying to avoid online callout/shaming culture on this site. It reliably leads to poor-quality discussion. https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&type=comment&dateRange=a... Generally, the state of high indignation (and its correlate, high moral justification) isn't congruent with the intended spirit of conversation here.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Sinead O’Connor has died

#143

Post by nailer »

basisword wrote: post #103
hprotagonist wrote: post #96

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzxTDHMQza8 To stand in the full blast of a crowd that hates you with that amount of poise, and have a voice that is still capable of song or even coherent speech, just beggars my imagination. i hope you have found peace. you were a voice crying out in the wilderness and we did to you what we always do to that.

Wow! The thing that surprised me most about this was it’s a Bob Dylan tribute concert? I’m shocked religion still had such a hold on the kind of people attending that type of concert at that point in time. The volume is insane. Incredible strength to be able to stand and take such abuse and continue to perform.

The audience are terrible, but as a child I would have taken part in that. We identified as a group, with a set of beliefs our parents had chosen for us, and thought anyone that attacked our leader was attacking us.

Years later I grew up and apologised to Sinead O Connor on Twitter for thinking this way. But a lot of people never did grow up, not just Catholics but also people from other conservative religions. People still feel religious ideas are somehow innate, and therefore the criticising religious ideas is wrong. But no idea is innate, people can and do leave and join every religion and every set of spiritual beliefs all the time, so no idea is beyond criticism. A crowd of people booing Sinead O Connor 30 years ago is very similar to people attacking Charlie Hebdo in 2015 and sadly people still make excuses for both.

Re: Sinead O’Connor has died

#144

Post by synetic »

synetic wrote: post #141
dang wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You started a religious flamewar and then poured fuel into it in multiple places. That's why your comment is flagged. Please don't post like that here. Your comment was just fine in the first paragraph and broke the site guidelines with the second paragraph—not because we care what you think about popes, but because such swipes predictably lead to internet dreckfests and we're simply trying to have a forum that doesn…

I’ve been on this site since the beginning. I change usernames periodically. I understand the desire to avoid flame wars. Here’s a sincere question. If I called Charles Manson a bastard would that be flamebait? Are we at the point that calling out the objectively verified despicable acts of a person is flamebait? It wasn’t a swipe at the man. Sinead suffered a lot for ripping his image apart. She has died now. It is…

[flagged]

Re: Sinead O’Connor has died

#146

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

What a legend. It's hard to overstate how much pushback and shit was thrown at her when she ripped up a picture of the Pope on SNL in 1992 to protest church child abuse. It's also hard to overstate how incredibly prescient and correct she was in her outrage. Catholic church child sex abuse didn't really enter the national debate until a decade later.

Re: Sinead O’Connor has died

#148

Post by belfalas »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #127

I always had immense respect for her decision to shave her head when told by music execs to "sex it up." She was gorgeous but she was a singer. She wanted to be hired for her singing. Being a pretty young woman shouldn't be such a ridiculous hardship. And I kind of wonder how much that radicalized her and how that factors into her conversion to Islam.

Wow, I always liked Sinead and her music but didn't realize that was the reason for her haircut. Big up to her.

Re: Sinead O’Connor has died

#149

Post by dang »

unethical_ban wrote: post #119

There are a number of flagged comments which don't deserve it. And as long as there is no outlet for objecting to poor flagging decisions, I'll use the comments section to call attention to it. If we are going to have a discussion about a performer unafraid of controversy and who struggled with mental and spiritual concerns publicly, a robust conversation should be allowed.

The flagged comments I'm aware of are either taking the thread into flamewar, and/or on generic tangents. Those are correct uses of flags. If there's something I've missed about this, I'm happy to take a look, but I'd need a specific link.

"Robust" can mean a lot of things. HN's intended purpose is curious conversation. If we allow the predictably-outraged type of thread here, it will quickly take over discussion of most stories. If that happens, it will quickly destroy the forum. This is not a small risk—it's the biggest one. It would be foolish not to take it seriously, and we work hard to prevent it.

Ironically, that sometimes leads to the perception that the forum is fine, so why not allow a few robust fires to burn here and there? The answer is that the forum is not fine. It's at constant risk of burning to a crisp [1], and our primary responsibility is to stave that off [2], to the extent that we can.

That said, if there's truly high-quality conversation going on in any of these flagged subthreads, I'd like to see it. My experience in general is that flamewar doesn't go along with high-quality conversation at all. It's extremely exciting, of course—but from an intellectual-curiosity point of view, inert and boring, as anything predictable is [3].

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

[1] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...

[2] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...

[3] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...

Re: Sinead O’Connor has died

#150

Post by jgwil2 »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #139
basisword wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow! The thing that surprised me most about this was it’s a Bob Dylan tribute concert? I’m shocked religion still had such a hold on the kind of people attending that type of concert at that point in time. The volume is insane. Incredible strength to be able to stand and take such abuse and continue to perform.

I think it speaks less to people's religious feelings and more towards the rather apolitical and apathetic alternative music culture at the time. If I recall the atmosphere at the time it was less "how dare she say that about the Pope?!" and more "how dare she co-opt the public stage for controversial/'political' speech?!" I also don't recall the outrage at her SNL performance even being particularly or especially by…

> Maybe getting a billboard #1 single and becoming a sensation was the worst thing that could have happened for her.

She said as much herself in her recent memoir: “I feel that having a No. 1 record derailed my career, and my tearing the photo put me back on the right track.”

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