101–110 of 164 posts
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>Today, virtually everyone is anti-woke. I have yet to hear a coherent description of what "woke" even fucking means that doesn't ultimately dissolve into a pot-pourri of personal grievances.
Exactly - that's the entire point of a dogwhistle.
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> Complaining about wokeness doesn't make you right-wing, much less reactionary. Honestly given the impact, I'd say complaining about "wokeness" pretty much defines "reactionary". Pronouns and flopsy straws never hurt nobody, and kids have been calling their elders racists and rapists and whatnot for generations. Something happened to convince tech folks that "wokeness" was somehow a threat, when it clearly wasn't an…
That's not all wokeness is. There's also the anti-merit stuff, which seeks to e.g. get rid of standardized tests or even remove algebra from school curricula. Then there's racial discrimination in hiring and admissions, which is often so cartoonishly stupid you can't make it up (e.g. https://www.tracingwoodgrains.com/p/the-faas-hiring-scandal-...).
> Something happened to convince tech folks that "wokeness" was somehow a threat, when it clearly wasn't and never will be
People hated wokeness so much they became single-issue voters. That was short-sighted, but it doesn't mean they were wrong to oppose wokeness.
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The disinvitation data is so incredibly small that there's no way on earth we can call this "rabid." In Haidt and Fukuyama's "The Coddling of the American Mind" they present data on disinvitations attempts . And it is in the tens of attempts nationwide. They even have to present the data with Milo Yiannopoulos removed since he made up a considerable portion of all disinvitation attempts. You can think that students a…
The FIRE Campus Deplatforming Database claims to collect 769 successful deplatforming attempts.
The data above is since 1998. So in the last 27 years we've seen an average of 28 successful deplatforming attempts annually. The website cites 172 attempts (not necessarily successful) in 2024.
There are thousands of colleges in the US. Surely hundreds of thousands of invited talks annually. I just cannot imagine thinking that this is a substantial social problem that should justify changing one's voting behavior.
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> Complaining about wokeness doesn't make you right-wing, much less reactionary. Honestly given the impact, I'd say complaining about "wokeness" pretty much defines "reactionary". Pronouns and flopsy straws never hurt nobody, and kids have been calling their elders racists and rapists and whatnot for generations. Something happened to convince tech folks that "wokeness" was somehow a threat, when it clearly wasn't an…
> Pronouns and flopsy straws never hurt nobody That's not all wokeness is. There's also the anti-merit stuff, which seeks to e.g. get rid of standardized tests or even remove algebra from school curricula. Then there's racial discrimination in hiring and admissions, which is often so cartoonishly stupid you can't make it up (e.g. https://www.tracingwoodgrains.com/p/the-faas-hiring-scandal-... ). > Something happened…
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> Complaining about wokeness doesn't make you right-wing, much less reactionary. Honestly given the impact, I'd say complaining about "wokeness" pretty much defines "reactionary". Pronouns and flopsy straws never hurt nobody, and kids have been calling their elders racists and rapists and whatnot for generations. Something happened to convince tech folks that "wokeness" was somehow a threat, when it clearly wasn't an…
> Pronouns and flopsy straws never hurt nobody That's not all wokeness is. There's also the anti-merit stuff, which seeks to e.g. get rid of standardized tests or even remove algebra from school curricula. Then there's racial discrimination in hiring and admissions, which is often so cartoonishly stupid you can't make it up (e.g. https://www.tracingwoodgrains.com/p/the-faas-hiring-scandal-... ). > Something happened…
People can be wrong and not "woke" (which you're clearly using to connote "evil" or "enemy"). The slide from reasoned discussion into hyperbolic nonsense is precisely what the article is about. And specifically that the same thing happens to billionaire brains too.
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Looking it at again the next morning, I think I just misread your opening sentence. Sorry! (see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43823347 ) On the other hand, other people would probably have misread it in the same way, so the point still applies, just not as much, and probably not enough to justify my mod response. This may be a little embarrassing, but I don't read people's comments very closely. There isn't ti…
Well, thank you for looking again! I'm curious how you interpreted it? I thought about swapping around the two parts of the sentence to put the familiar context first, but thought it landed better the way I said it. On the original topic, because I will acknowledge that my comment did have several bits of dry tinder in it - the sin of my lead in sentence was that it was irreverant. It would have been inappropriate if…
At first I read it as a gratuitous Holocaust reference (i.e. some sort of throwaway flamebait). Later I realized you were probably referring to ongoing current events. One can agree or disagree but that at least wasn't gratuitous.
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> Pronouns and flopsy straws never hurt nobody That's not all wokeness is. There's also the anti-merit stuff, which seeks to e.g. get rid of standardized tests or even remove algebra from school curricula. Then there's racial discrimination in hiring and admissions, which is often so cartoonishly stupid you can't make it up (e.g. https://www.tracingwoodgrains.com/p/the-faas-hiring-scandal-... ). > Something happened…
Characterizing those issues the way you do, instead of as considered and real efforts to do good stuff in the real world, is precisely the result of the echo chamber in question. It really doesn't occur to you to at least nod to the fact that some of us see things differently? People can be wrong and not "woke" (which you're clearly using to connote "evil" or "enemy"). The slide from reasoned discussion into hyperbol…
> People can be wrong and not "woke" (which you're clearly using to connote "evil" or "enemy").
Of course they can. The Trump administration is wrong and unwoke. I did not use "woke" to connote "evil" or "enemy". Where are you getting that? I mentioned specific cases where "wokeness" has led to bad policy.
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Like all other forums, public and private, HN has an ideological filter. I'm as surprised as the next person that the HN ideological filter turned out not to be permissive enough to discuss the downfall of the free society that fostered its creation. The oligarchs will not lose their freedom or power and they won't fight (or even inconvenience themselves) to preserve yours. Next time you're reading a blog or a biogra…
> Like all other forums, public and private, HN has an ideological filter. I'm as surprised as the next person that the HN ideological filter turned out not to be permissive enough to discuss the downfall of the free society that fostered its creation. Is it that surprising? As a longtime member, this seems perfectly consistent with the general bent of the website. Collectively, HN has long been extremely comfortable…
HN also does the same for far left authoritarian ideologies, those are also here and upvoted. I don't see how this pushes out anyone.
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> Pronouns and flopsy straws never hurt nobody That's not all wokeness is. There's also the anti-merit stuff, which seeks to e.g. get rid of standardized tests or even remove algebra from school curricula. Then there's racial discrimination in hiring and admissions, which is often so cartoonishly stupid you can't make it up (e.g. https://www.tracingwoodgrains.com/p/the-faas-hiring-scandal-... ). > Something happened…
"Remove algebra from the school curricula" is a lie. The decision that made noise was about eliminating accelerated algebra classes where people take algebra ahead of the normal schedule. Whether you think that is dumb or not, it is not "removing algebra from the school curricula."
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> Like all other forums, public and private, HN has an ideological filter. I'm as surprised as the next person that the HN ideological filter turned out not to be permissive enough to discuss the downfall of the free society that fostered its creation. Is it that surprising? As a longtime member, this seems perfectly consistent with the general bent of the website. Collectively, HN has long been extremely comfortable…
> Collectively, HN has long been extremely comfortable with authoritarianism and far right ideologies, as long as those opinions are expressed in a framing that conveys intellectualism and "civility". HN also does the same for far left authoritarian ideologies, those are also here and upvoted. I don't see how this pushes out anyone.
Appropriately, this reply (which is exactly what I was expecting) is itself an example of the effect I'm describing: the false presumption that two point which can be distinguished are inherently equivalent and comparable.
> I don't see how this pushes out anyone.
Given your other extensive other comments about these topics, I can understand why you don't think this dynamic would push anyone out, and I also don't think we're going to see eye to eye on any of this.