Heresy (2022]

Here is the discussion from the time: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30977147

It's easy (aka close to thoughtless) to just collapse everything you believe into either extreme of "Matters not at all" or "Matters infinitely much."

It's hard (aka requires lots of thought, especially to maintain) to say, "This view of mine is foundational and I can't let go of it; but this other one is one of a range of acceptable views that I could be persuaded between; and this third one is totally arbitrary, and I hold to it purely because of subjective preference."

Especially over time, there's pressure to reduce everything toward the extremes. But the effortful and right thing to do is to maintain the gradient.

Other words are used to express that something cannot be human. While I personally dont feel much when such words are used against me, others explode with emotions.

I dont see a problem with respecting others if they say a specific word hurts them, why should I use it?

My main question is when people express their opinion and emotions with specific words and we would ban them as hateful. It wouldnt change their emotions or opinions just limit their tools at the current time to express them.

Is supression of opinions and emotions even a good idea? Wouldnt it lead to the search of new tools someone could use?

Our world would be better if we could respect people and their boundaries more.

I think the trend line has reversed a bit since 2022. Whether it be simply because public events have overwhelmed public attention, or there’s been a genuine retreat, it certainly feels as though (in private institutions at least, setting aside the federal government for a moment which has fumblingly attempted to enforce norms against criticizing the president) the Overton window on what can be said has never been wider in my memory. And not entirely for the good. People are out in public endorsing wild conspiracy theories, supporting political ideologies from Stalinism to Juche to Fascism, and outright criminality often while publishing under their own names. Maybe some of these people are getting fired, but for the most part there seems to be a tolerance for just spouting off on almost any topic in a way there wasn’t in 2020 or even before.