Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Scott Adams has died

youtube.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 1001 posts

Re: Scott Adams has died

#141

Post by cthalupa »

robert_foss wrote: post #99
shin_lao wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

He treated his cancer with the anti-threadworm medication Ivermectin.

As much as I dislike Adams and disagree with a lot of the attempts to paper over a lot of reprehensible stuff, he gave it a try, abandoned it, and publicly denounced it after it didn't work, and even spoke out against the pressuring campaigns done by ivermectin/etc. quacks to push people to waste time, money, and hope on quack treatments.

There's much better examples of areas where he was off the rails than him spending a month on a relatively safe treatment trying to stay alive before giving up when faced with reality.

Re: Scott Adams has died

#142

Post by hamburglar »

concinds wrote: post #105
ravenstine wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes it cautionary? From what I can tell, he hardly suffered from what you described. I'm not saying that I agree with everything that came out of Scott's mouth, but I never saw a sign of regret in him in regards to politics.

I don't recall where (Vic Berger?), but someone made a compilation of "regret" clips from Trump influencers (Alex Jones and others, and Scott Adams). This was in the circa January 6 days, where humiliation reigned, and they all felt betrayed because "RINOs" dominated Trump's term, "the deep state" was still standing, and he accomplished nothing of note. It's been memory-holed since then but that was the dominant mood…

I’d be interested in seeing this. Not to doubt you, but I suspect a more accurate characterization is not “my life was ruined by my support for Trump” but rather “look what being right about everything gets you in a world of trump haters.”

Re: Scott Adams has died

#143

Post by TheAceOfHearts »

I disagreed with him politically, especially during the last few years, but I'm very appreciative of Dilbert and in particular the Dilbert cartoon. The Knack is one of those clips that I keep coming back to and sharing with friends whenever someone shows signs.

Re: Scott Adams has died

#144

Post by Waterluvian »

I got to interact with Scott just once on Twitter. I shared one of his strips in response to a tweet he made. My intent was tongue-in-cheek and very inline with the themes of his work, but he reacted very aggressively and then blocked me.

It was a bit of a crushing moment because inside my head I was thinking, "I know and love this guy's work. Surely if I just engage him at his level without being a jackass, we can add some levity to the comments section." My instinct was that maybe he really was just a jackass and I should label him as such in my brain and move on.

But then my cat got sick last year and went from being a cuddly little guy to an absolute viscious bastard right up to the day he died. It was crushing. One day I realized it felt similar to my experience with Scott. I wondered if maybe Scott was just suffering really badly, too. I have no idea what the truth of the matter is, and I don't think that people who suffer have a free pass for their behaviour. But I think I want to hold on to this optimism.

Re: Scott Adams has died

#145

Post by officeplant »

Cuuugi wrote: post #48
ryandvm wrote: post #33

The entire arc of Scott Adams is a cautionary tale. To go from a brilliant satirist to becoming terminally online and just completely falling off the far right cliffs of insanity is incredibly sad. And unfortunately, this is plight is not uncommon. It is incredibly dangerous to make politics part of your identity and then just absolutely bathe yourself in a political media echo chamber.

The online world breeds extremism. It wasn't too long ago criticizing someone on their obituary was considered classless. This is the world we have made.

> It wasn't too long ago criticizing someone on their obituary was considered classless.

It's very easy to avoid getting criticized in your obituary, don't be an asshole.

If you devote your life to being an asshole, the civilized response gloves will come off and maybe more people should learn this lesson.

Re: Scott Adams has died

#147

Post by legitster »

I loved Dilbert back in the day, and even the books were witty and poignant.

I would like to point out that the quality of his satire really feel of as time went on. He came from an office life in the late 90s and had a lot of insight into it's dysfunctions. But after decades of being out of that world, he had clearly lost touch. The comics often do little to speak to the current corporate world, outside of squeezed in references.

As I see it, decline in quality and the political radicalization go hand in hand. You cannot be a good satirist and be so long removed from the world you are satirizing.

Re: Scott Adams has died

#148

Post by caminante »

hamburglar wrote: post #136
erezsh wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Not having a dog in this fight, what it really looks like to me is the “haters” started as people who respectfully acknowledged his greatness while also recognizing that there were aspects of him they didn’t like. The real hatred came out when people couldn’t handle this due to sharing a political identity with him.

> while also recognizing that there were aspects of him they didn’t like

Except you're not being objective.

Accusing anyone of "falling off the far right cliffs of insanity" is a subjective and negative portrayal.

e.g., I could say and get away with the former, but not the latter when critiquing a co-worker's idea.

Re: Scott Adams has died

#149

Post by ghaff »

TYPE_FASTER wrote: post #28

There was a super weird alignment at a previous job where the appearances, personalities, and seniority/rank of some of my co-workers matched characters in Dilbert to the T. It was really funny and almost eerie, like Scott Adams was hiding in a cube taking notes.

The VP who "raises issues" reminded me perfectly of someone at a prior workplace.
Post reply on HN