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US man finds lost mother in an isolated Amazon tribe

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Re: US man finds lost mother in an isolated Amazon tribe

#41

Post by dang »

deadslow wrote: post #23
dang wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please re-read the site guidelines. This story is appropriate for HN. It's not a close call. Let's not fall for a superficial definition of "intellectually interesting". The story is also brutal, dismaying, and provocative. Hopefully that won't render substantive discussion impossible, but if it does, we'll do what we usually do and weight the thread.

> Let's not fall for a superficial definition of "intellectually interesting". Sure. Can you provide some examples of what's allowed and not allowed then? Because "anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity" actually covers each and every topic in the world. When you exclude one topic, you're actually demeaning people who find that topic interesting.

> "anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity" actually covers each and every topic in the world.

Not every story gratifies intellectual curiosity. Some (like celebrity gossip) gratify social curiosity. Others (like many political articles) gratify a desire for agitation, or victory. Others (like promotional pieces) are meant to gratify the author's desire for attention, or business.

It's true that people disagree about what meets the HN standard based on what they themselves find interesting, and it's impossible to give these terms a precise definition. On the other hand, they're not just arbitrary, either, the site has evolved some informal but pretty coherent standards over the years, and there are editors whose job it is to make judgment calls and who try hard to strike the right balance for the community.

What I hope is crystal-clear, though, is that HN is not just for articles about startups and technology. The curiosity we value here is polymathic.

Re: US man finds lost mother in an isolated Amazon tribe

#43

Post by DanielBMarkham »

This is a fascinating story, because there's obviously a hidden narrative that the reader is supposed to play along with: rich, sophisticated asshole of a grad student takes advantage of a terribly young girl. Heartache ensues. One child suffers alcoholism. A ton of emoting going on.

As I take this apart, however, I'm at a loss to where the story is. Is it wrong to study other cultures? No. Is it wrong to take a wife of 13? Perhaps in the western world, but not there, so I gotta go with "no" on that one. Should the kids have stayed in the Amazon? Once again, I think both parents made the safest choice for the children in the long term. I also think it's great the writer is getting re-connected with his mom.

If anything, I'm disturbed by the idea that the mother is just another cookie-cutter ignorant primitive. I see no indication that she was forced into a marriage. It appears she wanted things to happen as they did. She decided to move to the states and she decided to move back. In fact, the father's explanation that it was a divorce looks to me like a clearcut explanation of what happened. Older man marries younger woman, kids arrive, much heartache, story ends with grown man finding his mother. It's a great story, no doubt, but not a very unusual one. I'm not sure what the "Isolated Amazon Tribe" brings to the table that isn't already there. Just a gimmick to attract more readers?

I hope this guy continues reconnecting with his mother's side of the family. As he says, his story is just beginning. I bet it's going to be an interesting one. It's the interaction of cultures that's the interesting thing here, not the all-too-common tragedy of marriages gone bad.

Re: US man finds lost mother in an isolated Amazon tribe

#44

Post by dang »

All: The coincidence of an HN user being personally close to this story is so remarkable that we have put James' comment [1] at the top of the thread, using the same method we occasionally use for moderation announcements. This is very rare—I don't think we've ever done it before.

It does occasionally happen that one commenter is uniquely close to a story, or knowledgeable about it, in an HN thread. I've thought for some time that the HN software should support this somehow, because those moments (e.g. when Peter Norvig shows up to comment on his own work) are among the most valuable here. If we had that feature today, we'd certainly have applied it to James' comment.

1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7797013

Re: US man finds lost mother in an isolated Amazon tribe

#46

Post by rayiner »

mherkender wrote: post #10

Wow, his father sounds like a piece of work. He decides that culture is the only real reason he shouldn't marry someone who was "about 9 to 12" when he's 36. Then his long absences put her at risk of being brutally gang-raped, which happens. She ends up in the US, and eventually goes back without her kids. He tells his kids nothing about her, why she left, who she is, but still has his son beg her to come back in fro…

I couldn't get through this article this guy made me so mad. He's like the worst sort of intellectual, the one that loses his own morality and culture to abstract ideas.

Re: US man finds lost mother in an isolated Amazon tribe

#47

Post by jacquesm »

phpnode wrote: post #30
jameswburke wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which aspects are you questioning? It's not my favorite piece I've seen published — I don't think it covers some areas in enough detail and leaves room for insinuation (e.g. Yarima was young when they met, but it wasn't until years had gone by that a relationship occurred. They (David's parents) have spoken as recently as ~7 months ago on a satellite phone, and Yarima has expressed interested on returning to America…

thanks for your reply! I wasn't questioning anything in particular, but wow this article makes his dad sound like a terrible person.

Is this the right place to divulge information about a third party? I realize there is an article about him posted here and that it already contains lots of details that would normally be considered private, however I feel that somehow if you have questions about this it might be better to take it off-line. Especially parts about his father and mother's relationship in the present, it has absolutely no business being in a public forum like this. We're not exactly discussing people that have been dead for 50 years.

Re: US man finds lost mother in an isolated Amazon tribe

#48

Post by phpnode »

jacquesm wrote: post #47
phpnode wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

thanks for your reply! I wasn't questioning anything in particular, but wow this article makes his dad sound like a terrible person.

Is this the right place to divulge information about a third party? I realize there is an article about him posted here and that it already contains lots of details that would normally be considered private, however I feel that somehow if you have questions about this it might be better to take it off-line. Especially parts about his father and mother's relationship in the present, it has absolutely no business being…

Hmm on reflection I agree with you, and now it's too late to delete or edit my post.

Re: US man finds lost mother in an isolated Amazon tribe

#49

Post by ars »

Natsu wrote: post #17
mherkender wrote: post #10

Wow, his father sounds like a piece of work. He decides that culture is the only real reason he shouldn't marry someone who was "about 9 to 12" when he's 36. Then his long absences put her at risk of being brutally gang-raped, which happens. She ends up in the US, and eventually goes back without her kids. He tells his kids nothing about her, why she left, who she is, but still has his son beg her to come back in fro…

I thought that the US had laws against "sex tourism" so I wonder if it's possible, at least in theory, that he could get prosecuted for this?

> sex tourism

He married her. It's really not the same thing.

Re: US man finds lost mother in an isolated Amazon tribe

#50

Post by davidw »

dang wrote: post #41
deadslow wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Let's not fall for a superficial definition of "intellectually interesting". Sure. Can you provide some examples of what's allowed and not allowed then? Because "anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity" actually covers each and every topic in the world. When you exclude one topic, you're actually demeaning people who find that topic interesting.

> "anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity" actually covers each and every topic in the world. Not every story gratifies intellectual curiosity. Some (like celebrity gossip) gratify social curiosity. Others (like many political articles) gratify a desire for agitation, or victory. Others (like promotional pieces) are meant to gratify the author's desire for attention, or business. It's true that people d…

I don't think it's an unfair question: clarifying what's intended by "intellectually gratifying" would help a lot of people. Left so vague, some portion of people seem to find, say, political hit pieces to be absolutely fascinating.

To me it's about learning something new that I didn't know and maybe hadn't even thought about before. If it's about politics or economics or by Reason.org or Krugman, it's probably part of an argument, and not written for the sake of conveying an interesting fact.

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