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Ask HN: What is a HN unpopular opinion that you hold?

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Re: Ask HN: What is a HN unpopular opinion that you hold?

#11
post #10

All of its? Read my comments, because I practice what I preach ;)

You only have fourteen comments, and four of them are dead or flagged. That’s not indicative of “unpopular opinions”, the dead ones get tasteless and dehumanising.

[flagged]

Re: Ask HN: What is a HN unpopular opinion that you hold?

#14

Everyone really should be using Linux. It's not that hard.

Im generally with you, but then seeing how a large number of people build software system, Im pretty sure they would end up messing their systems up without all the guardrails that Microsoft and Apple puts into place.

Re: Ask HN: What is a HN unpopular opinion that you hold?

#17

The biggie, of course, is that US exceptionalism is pushing the US down the wrong track. That will be the economic and probably military downfall of the US and will likely occur within the next 5-10 years. (You may call me 'Cassandra'.)

Timothy Snyder, author of On Tyranny, likes to restate the idea of US exceptionalism as both the politics of inevitability and democracy is not something you are, it is something you do.

Many people wrongly think that democracy is an inevitable result of capitalism, but if that's true then there is nothing extra you have to do to remain democratic other than participate in capitalism. If freedom is an inevitable result of being an American, then there is nothing you have to do to be free as long as you are American. If peace between two countries is an inevitable result of both countries "having a McDonalds", there is nothing extra you need to do to achieve peace except trade.

If you want freedom, peace, or governance that represents you, you can't just be something, you actually have to hold beliefs and conduct yourself in a way conducive to those outcomes.

You will love this video (12m): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eghl19elKk8

(edited to make some statements more correct)

Re: Ask HN: What is a HN unpopular opinion that you hold?

#18

The biggie, of course, is that US exceptionalism is pushing the US down the wrong track. That will be the economic and probably military downfall of the US and will likely occur within the next 5-10 years. (You may call me 'Cassandra'.)

Timothy Snyder, author of On Tyranny , likes to restate the idea of US exceptionalism as both the politics of inevitability and democracy is not something you are, it is something you do . Many people wrongly think that democracy is an inevitable result of capitalism, but if that's true then there is nothing extra you have to do to remain democratic other than participate in capitalism. If freedom is an inevitable re…

> Many people wrongly think that if democracy is an inevitable result of capitalism, then there is nothing extra you have to do to remain democratic other than participate in capitalism.

It is not wrong to think this, it is true by definition.

OTOH, it is very wrong to think “democracy is an inevitable result of capitalism”. Democracy is in fundamental conflict with capitalism; their co-existence is fundamentally unstable.

Re: Ask HN: What is a HN unpopular opinion that you hold?

#19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Timothy Snyder, author of On Tyranny , likes to restate the idea of US exceptionalism as both the politics of inevitability and democracy is not something you are, it is something you do . Many people wrongly think that democracy is an inevitable result of capitalism, but if that's true then there is nothing extra you have to do to remain democratic other than participate in capitalism. If freedom is an inevitable re…

> Many people wrongly think that if democracy is an inevitable result of capitalism, then there is nothing extra you have to do to remain democratic other than participate in capitalism. It is not wrong to think this, it is true by definition. OTOH, it is very wrong to think “democracy is an inevitable result of capitalism”. Democracy is in fundamental conflict with capitalism; their co-existence is fundamentally uns…

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: What is a HN unpopular opinion that you hold?

#20

Everyone really should be using Linux. It's not that hard.

Linux... kind of sucks though. It's way better than being locked into unfree-on-many-level MS products, but there are many other OSes that I would rather use in other contexts. Out of 7 machines I'm currently running at home, only two run linux, and I definitely wouldn't be any happier if the ratio tilted away from *BSD.
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