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

Boeing whistleblower found dead in US

bbc.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

361–370 of 618 posts

Re: Boeing whistleblower found dead in US

#361

Post by hayst4ck »

lutoma wrote: post #308
dang wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not a technical article. It's a lurid media topic* about a suspicious-looking alleged suicide with zero information for a substantive discussion, and tons of fuel for sinister speculation. That's not what HN is supposed to be for. However, we can give this one a pass because the ongoing Boeing saga is of interest and there's clearly a community appetite to discuss this development. Edit: even though the thread i…

[flagged]

I am a deeply liberal American. MSM is not a far right dog whistle in the US.

Words are indirect references to ideas and don't have any meaning without a receiver. All of these words have to be contextualized based on the speaker and receiver.

The right are known for lying with the truth which makes a good amount of their rhetoric stick.

Washington is a swamp, almost any American will agree no matter which side, that's why the statement is powerful and effective.

The MSM in the US is irresponsible. Again regardless of which side you are on, you generally understand that US Media is owned by billionaires and corporations or at the very least people who don't have your interest at heart and want to manipulate you rather than inform you. It is not a far right dog whistle at all so much as a statement towards the general non-quality and lack of journalistic integrity in American's most prominent media. The left acknowledges the existence of "MSM" and blames them for giving the previous president attention and therefore power. The real difference is what MSM is actually referring to. One side generally means "all cable news but fox news" and the other generally means "all chiefly advertisement supported news you could find a newspaper of or see on cable."

Woke is a word that around the times of George Floyd meant something to the effect of "waking up to the idea of systemic racism and acknowledgement of it's generational consequences." Now it is largely a word used to describe "politically correct" policies or social policies that are contradictory to radical fundamentalist Christianity.

I think you are probably thinking about the previous president's fake news and lying press rhetoric which I don't think is a dog whistle because I don't think most conservative Americans are educated enough to tie that to its Nazi "Lügenpresse" heritage. You generally won't hear someone on the left say "fake news" or "lying press" unless it's in a mocking way.

Contextually all these things can be shibboleths based on context, which is probably more accurate for what you mean than dog whistle: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shibboleth

Re: Boeing whistleblower found dead in US

#363

Post by ceejayoz »

worewood wrote: post #310
sparrowInHand wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And companys would never bring the full instruments to force on a single person. PIs etc, psycho-terror and so on and so forth..

The Ebay stalking case comes up to mind

Which only came to light because they were shockingly inept about it.

That case absolutely made me wonder about how many big corporations have successfully executed more subtle versions of the tactic.

Re: Boeing whistleblower found dead in US

#364

Post by notorandit »

torstenvl wrote: post #4

"Self-inflicted wound"? Obviously the story is still developing but I'm immediately skeptical. EDIT: Also weird that BBC is already memory-holing that it was a gunshot wound. archive.is has the original. https://archive.is/wj0LE

I am not going to be skeptical until they tell me exactly how hey got to the "self-inflicted" wound. How can you tell it was self-inflicted? Any witness? Recording? C'mon!

Re: Boeing whistleblower found dead in US

#365

Post by taf2 »

rmbyrro wrote: post #355
yifanl wrote: post #61

I'm just going to take this story at face value, there's an infinite number of alternate explanations that I'd be powerless to talk about. I've had my own (thankfully brief) moments where I've thought about suicide just from the perception that my coworkers, my bosses, the entire world, just does not care about doing the right thing. Mr Barnett worked for the same company for over three decades and physically watched…

> there's an infinite number of alternate explanations I see only one reasonably acceptable alternate explanation. He either committed suicide or was suicided by someone at Boeing terrified about what would happen to them in jail.

Or killed by a nation state that thrives on creating conflict by amplifying two sided situations that lead to increased polarization and more instability… the problem with speculation is it’s just that speculation… I’m going to wait and see

Re: Boeing whistleblower found dead in US

#366

Post by arrowsmith »

krapp wrote: post #341
willis936 wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Jon Stewart has a crusade against MSM for their role in the US-Iraq War. Is he dogwhistling to the far right when he uses the term?

[flagged]

Please provide evidence that the term "mainstream media" has its origins in far right politics.

Re: Boeing whistleblower found dead in US

#367

Post by leetcodesucks »

bruce511 wrote: post #206
jj999 wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one care about your constitution outside your borders while the concept of Free Speech is universal and isn't defined by a geographicaly limited piece of paper. I'll never let your regressive law colonize my thoughts.

Can you please elaborate on what you consider the Universal definition of Free Speech to be? Are you suggesting that people have the right to say anything they like, in any forum, without consequence?

[dead]

Re: Boeing whistleblower found dead in US

#368

Post by hnbad »

sokoloff wrote: post #332
mcv wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, your skepticism is warranted. Democracy tries to select for people doing the right thing, but of course people interested in power will try to game the system by pretending to do the right thing.

I think that’s right. It’s hard to know from a distance “they are definitely doing the right thing” so the appearance of doing the right thing is valued. Then, as a politician, appearing to do the right thing is sufficient and then pretending to do the right thing is often cheaper/higher output per unit of input, so pretending is rewarded.

The problem is not democracy (everyone getting an equal vote) but representative democracy (everyone getting a vote on a person once every N years who then gets the power to do what they want which they hopefully did not lie about in order to get those votes).

Delegation (everyone getting an equal vote on all issues but being able to designate someone else to vote on their behalf on any given issue without forfeiting the right to vote directly on other issues) does not suffer this problem and is arguably more democratic.

Additionally certain forms of representative democracy make this problem worse like first-past-the-post voting resulting in strategic voting, i.e. voting not for the person you think best represents your interests but most likely to win while still representing some of your interests, encouraging politicians to do the bare minimum and avoid taking strong stances on divisive issues to remain "electable".

The problem is that representative democracy centralizes power in a ruling class (sometimes literally, due to nepotism and dynastic reputations) whereas delegation maintains decentralized power while allowing for that power to be temporarily centralized (e.g. many people delegating to the same individual) but always with the understanding that everyone is free to reclaim their power by withdrawing it from their delegate on a case by case basis. In Germany a variant of this was promoted by the Pirate Party under the label "liquid democracy" - although they of course heavily focused on a possible technological implementation of it rather than promoting the idea itself first.

Re: Boeing whistleblower found dead in US

#369

Post by mdekkers »

camgunz wrote: post #348
mdekkers wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I've had my own (thankfully brief) moments where I've thought about suicide just from the perception that my coworkers, my bosses, the entire world, just does not care about doing the right thing. Please share how you managed with this. I’ve been here for a few years - since I lost my wife - and some days I can barely hang on.

I have some experience with this. My advice is that these episodes come in waves and thus a simple yet vital rule has literally kept me alive: don't do it; this will pass. That plus therapy and a brief stint on antidepressants swung me from suicidal ideation to optimism. I do think you have to watch your environment too. Just like alcoholics don't typically hang out in bars, we shouldn't hang out in places/jobs that…

Thank you. I am unable to find a therapist, and I was unable to manage with antidepressants. My mechanism right now is "see if you still feel this way a week from now" which - so far - helps. It isn't so much that I changed my mind, but more that I understand that there are people that depend on me being around.

Job is indeed a major factor. I don't currently work in a great place - it is generally a rather toxic place - and age-discrimination is, like most of the industry, rife. Pushing 54 it is hard to find a new gig, especially in this market, which doesn't help at all. After 30 years working at the forefront of this industry solving some of the hardest problems around, my skills, experience, and insights are just no longer required.

Life circumstances have left me without any kind of options for retirement, early or otherwise, so this is me for the rest of my life; I'm likely to die behind my keyboard. I'd rather go out on my own terms, watching the sun set behind the sea.

Re: Boeing whistleblower found dead in US

#370

Post by redeeman »

bandyaboot wrote: post #102
redeeman wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

some people kill others because they run out of nutella, some kill others to rob $10 from their pockets, some kill them for fun, but its difficult to believe a giant corporation with A LOT to hide would kill a whistleblower?

Those are examples of irrational people doing things without regard to consequences. That’s not particularly relevant to what conditions would likely need to exist for a giant corporation to decide to do something like that. It would not be difficult to believe if this person had unique knowledge that likely would not come to light otherwise. Then I could see a rational (and terrible) person deciding that the benefit…

could be he had information that would be devastating to some specific higher-up individual
Post reply on HN