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Peter Thiel, YC, and hard decisions

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Re: Peter Thiel, YC, and hard decisions

#141

Post by burkaman »

mootothemax wrote: post #75

Hang on - Thiel thinks women shouldn't have the right to vote, and has written unambiguously as much? How on earth is that not the argument for dropping him? From another angle, how on earth can you trust someone's advice if they truly and honestly think like that? I'm honestly shocked YC can champion women founders while having someone like this involved as a partner. Just shocking. And so, so disappointing.

Thiel would tell you that's not what he meant, it was simply a factual observation that women tend to vote against his preferences, according to polling data. And I do think he is slightly redeemed by the fact that his conclusion was not "let's roll back women's suffrage", it was "let's get rid of voting altogether".

So I don't think it's quite unambiguous, although I wouldn't buy this explanation. I would love to ask him why he thinks women voters differ from men on these issues.

Re: Peter Thiel, YC, and hard decisions

#142

Post by dsacco »

dfabulich wrote: post #9

There is clear precedent for YC taking a political stand by uninviting investors. Only five years ago, Paul Graham was willing to uninvite investors from Demo Day based on their support for the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). https://techcrunch.com/2011/12/22/paul-graham-sopa-supportin... Paul asked, "If these companies are so clueless about technology that they think SOPA is a good idea, how could they be good invest…

I agree with the thrust of your point - that organizations like YC should be allowed to uninvite or refuse to collaborate with people they are diametrically opposed to for political reasons.

However, I do not agree that it's fair to call an investor's competency into question due to their political views. I agree organizations have every right to not affiliate themselves with those investors, but in the real world there are plenty of examples of investors who hold controversial political views.

Logically, there is no a priori reason why "Thiel is a good investor." and "Thiel strongly endorses Trump." cannot both be true. To go further, I don't see an a priori reason why an investor with political views that are antagonistic to the industry he focuses on cannot be a very good investor. It might not be likely, but on its own I do not agree with using politics as a criterion for investing performance. That's silly - just look at investing performance directly.

To go even further, I think it would be disingenuous for groups like YC to announce they will distance themselves from investors they disagree with because "How could they be qualified investors if they hold this opinion?" That's masking the real reason for not affiliating with them, and in my opinion they shouldn't have to mask that anyway.

I also think using that sort of language establishes a precedent that makes the industry less inclusive to people with opposing political views. Much of the tech industry is progressive and liberal, but it would be ridiculous if this was applied to potential founders. Should founders who support SOPA or Trump not be admitted to YC if they are well into a startup that will most likely become the next Google?

Put another way, if you read Zero to One and you found it to be very insightful and full of legitimately good ideas, would you call it into question after learning that Thiel supports Trump? Doesn't that strike you as an ad hominem? Sure, Thiel's political views might be relevant or worth noting as an investor, but they certainly do not define his investment performance.

Re: Peter Thiel, YC, and hard decisions

#143

Post by dragonwriter »

sulam wrote: post #116
natrius wrote: post #16

Cleaving off 40% of America is not a recipe for progress. When Trump shows his people how they're getting blacklisted from the economy, that isn't going to make them want to riot less . Our culture of progress has become entirely about excluding dissenters until they submit, and it's not working anymore . We've given up on convincing the people who have all the weapons, and now we're going to start hurting them econo…

There are two larges groups of people who are voting for Trump regardless of anything he does (as he said: he could shoot people down on 5th avenue and these people would still vote for him). The largest group of them are Republicans who will always vote Republican. My beef with these people is that I wish they were a little more loyal to our country's values than they were to their party, but fundamentally I've got…

Those two groups overlap substantially (making the latter group a subset of the former was rather the point of Republican strategy beginning with Nixon's Southern Strategy, which exploited Johnson's support for civil rights legislation to try to peel that group off from the Democrats, who'd they'd supported since "White Nationalism" made a real go at having an actual nation; the Democrats have certainly lost them, but the Republicans haven't reliably captured all of them, though they've done a fair job of it.)

Re: Peter Thiel, YC, and hard decisions

#144

Post by [deleted] »

sulam wrote: post #116
natrius wrote: post #16

Cleaving off 40% of America is not a recipe for progress. When Trump shows his people how they're getting blacklisted from the economy, that isn't going to make them want to riot less . Our culture of progress has become entirely about excluding dissenters until they submit, and it's not working anymore . We've given up on convincing the people who have all the weapons, and now we're going to start hurting them econo…

There are two larges groups of people who are voting for Trump regardless of anything he does (as he said: he could shoot people down on 5th avenue and these people would still vote for him). The largest group of them are Republicans who will always vote Republican. My beef with these people is that I wish they were a little more loyal to our country's values than they were to their party, but fundamentally I've got…

[deleted]

Re: Peter Thiel, YC, and hard decisions

#145

Post by jowiar »

maratd wrote: post #48
archagon wrote: post #26

Based on the awful things Trump has said and (apparently) done, it should be blatantly clear to anyone remotely following the election that isn't your usual political rivalry. Pao is right: "this isn’t a disagreement on tax policy, this is advocating hatred and violence." Quite literally at times! (I might give a pass to the people following the party line or acting on incomplete information, but Thiel knows exactly…

> To them, supporting Trump and Clinton are equally bad No, to us destroying a person for their political views is disgusting, even if we disagree with them. A person should not lose their job, their status on a board, their inclusion in an event, etc. based on who they decide to support politically. That's disgusting and people who support that sort of witch hunt should be ashamed of themselves. I vehemently disagre…

> No, to us destroying a person for their political views is disgusting, even if we disagree with them.

And this is some seriously oppressing bullshit that has (wittingly or not) prolonged white/male supremacy. People creating a space that makes it very clear that non-white, non-males aren't welcome, then well-meaning "moderates" going along with it because, well, I'm not going to judge him for his politics. It's how the US even came to be, founded on a compromise that was fundamentally designed to promise that slavery would never be repealed.

Here's the deal. Having a don't-ask, don't tell policy regarding your votes in a voting booth is fine. But the minute you write a big fucking check to a big fucking fascist (or anyone else), you forfeit any right to not suffer consequences for your actions. Sure, the government can't (and shouldn't) impose penalties. But I'm damn sure going to judge you, and judge those who continue to associate with you (because they are saying that maintaining your friendship is worth alienating others).

Re: Peter Thiel, YC, and hard decisions

#146

Post by InclinedPlane »

HaloZero wrote: post #90
blfr wrote: post #62

At Project Include, our mission is to give everyone a fair chance to succeed in the workplace. “Everyone” means all groups to us, but we draw a line at individuals who fund violence and hate. And you denounce... Thiel? Hillary Clinton made material contributions to starting two seemingly random wars in Libya and Syria with hundreds of thousands of victims. That doesn't count as funding violence? What about her suppor…

Most sitting presidents and secretary of states in the past 50 years have had to call for violence against other nations. It's part of the role and maybe she's made mistakes. But there's a difference between Secretary of State allowing an airstrike and being a owner of a company inciting others to violence.

Or, you know, explicitly calling for the commission of war crimes, for the use of torture, for the reintroduction of carpet bombing, and for the directed assassination of the family members of terrorists.

Re: Peter Thiel, YC, and hard decisions

#147

Post by danso »

whistlerbrk wrote: post #21
dfabulich wrote: post #9

There is clear precedent for YC taking a political stand by uninviting investors. Only five years ago, Paul Graham was willing to uninvite investors from Demo Day based on their support for the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). https://techcrunch.com/2011/12/22/paul-graham-sopa-supportin... Paul asked, "If these companies are so clueless about technology that they think SOPA is a good idea, how could they be good invest…

I disagree that opposing SOPA is just political, supporting SOPA threatens innovation which threatens the startup community which in turns threatens YC's bottom line. Therefore opposing SOPA and denying investors access based on their support is a business decision.

But politics is business, which is why lobbying is such a huge part of democracy. There are die-hards like you who would argue the same when it comes to environmental and energy, or justice and privacy issues. Few partisans think of their core cause as being mere "politics".

Re: Peter Thiel, YC, and hard decisions

#148

Post by M_Grey »

mason240 wrote: post #37
sigmar wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>When Trump shows his people how they're getting blacklisted from the economy, that isn't going to make them want to riot less. How are they getting blacklisted by the economy? Project Include has the right to choose who they associate with.

>Project Include has the right to choose who they associate with. As does anyone else who blacklists.

That's just nonsensical, and you've defined anything with membership as a "blacklist". What makes a blacklist a blacklist, is the list of "undesirables"; you don't just get to point to any body with membership and define all non-members as "blacklisted".

Re: Peter Thiel, YC, and hard decisions

#149

Post by dubrocks »

Delmania wrote: post #70
ikeboy wrote: post #22

Tl;dr >We agree that people shouldn’t be fired for their political views, but

The problem is that this election is not about a difference of opinions over the fundamental issues. It's become a spite-driven, rage-fueled, all out fear mongering and hate breeding spectacle. Trump's supporters have, in some cases, started talking open revolt if he doesn't win. On Twitter, there was a hashtag of #RepealThe19th, which essentially said they wanted to disenfranchise women in efforts to ensure Trump is…

Yet neither Trump nor his worst supporters represent Peter Thiel. Are Democrat voters represented by Hillary's worst supporters?

Re: Peter Thiel, YC, and hard decisions

#150

Post by supergeek133 »

untog wrote: post #65
supergeek133 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to mention "single issue voting" has become a huge trend in this country. Do you know any friends who are LGBT who will vote democrat just because of gay rights, but on any other day of the week are fiscally conservative? I'm sure there are more than one of those people voting for Trump because of some issue they disagree with Hillary on, or some single issue they disagree with Trump on.

What you're describing seems only natural to me. Very few people sit entirely within the spectrum of one of the two parties - they have to evaluate both and see which has the most pluses. If you're gay, the Republican party is threatening your ability to get married and live without discrimination, so I can believe that might seem more important than relatively minor shifts in economic policy.

Well, take a different issue then, one that's larger and either drives people to or away from a party.

Say I really side with an issue that is on the Republican platform, gun rights for example. We've come to the point lately where that just means I must also be a racist, homophobe, bigot. Guilt by association. Even to the point of people losing their job or life over it.

Really? We think that's OK? Then in this case she's doing it simply because he has money and gave it to said candidate?

On the reverse I've seen some people with the "pot should be legal" argument get completely put down by some on the more conservative side saying they must also be for free everything!! Which isn't always the case.

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