Joan Didion has died • Hacker News Board

Re: Joan Didion has died

#51

Post by clairity » Sun, Dec 26, 2021, 7:02 PM UTC

dredmorbius wrote: post #50

clairity wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

MLK keenly understood that olive branches need backing by a sharp tongue to cut through comfortable stupor, otherwise minds don't change and bodies don't make way. issues of intrinsic identity--race, gender, sexuality, etc.--are contentious, not because of those characteristics themselves, but because of the perceived threat to the status of marginally-statused individuals in otherwise higher status groups. that's wh…

Martin needed and acknowledged Malcolm. Status-quoism is inherently repressive in any culture in which existing descrimination exists. And yes, cognitive dissonance, especially aimed at cultural or tribal identity, hurts. Most people reject it. I agree with all of those points. I'm not arguing for status-quoism. I am suggesting what I've found to work reasonably well in promiting my own set of heterodox views, which…

maybe it's inadvertent, but by hammering on your perspective for how you think change can happen (which i can appreciate but don't agree with), you come off as normative, that we should all think and act the same way. it's brushing aside malcolm for martin, and only martin. but confrontation has a place in the constellation of approaches needed to move groups beyond shallow backwaters. confrontation is an exertion of power; it shifts fault lines. it creates the discomfort required to unlock stupor, the ossification of perceived hierarchy.

that said, i'm not really a revolutionary. i'll drop in a provocation from time to time to keep the sheep vigilant, but i generally nope out of most hn discussions around issues like race and gender. the ignorance, self-serving naïveté, and shallowness of those discussions are as gallingly juvenile as they are unrewarding. this isn't just an hn problem, it's a tech industry problem.

Re: Joan Didion has died

#52

Post by dredmorbius » Tue, Dec 28, 2021, 4:50 AM UTC

clairity wrote: post #51

dredmorbius wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Martin needed and acknowledged Malcolm. Status-quoism is inherently repressive in any culture in which existing descrimination exists. And yes, cognitive dissonance, especially aimed at cultural or tribal identity, hurts. Most people reject it. I agree with all of those points. I'm not arguing for status-quoism. I am suggesting what I've found to work reasonably well in promiting my own set of heterodox views, which…

maybe it's inadvertent, but by hammering on your perspective for how you think change can happen (which i can appreciate but don't agree with), you come off as normative, that we should all think and act the same way. it's brushing aside malcolm for martin, and only martin. but confrontation has a place in the constellation of approaches needed to move groups beyond shallow backwaters. confrontation is an exertion of…

That reading is certainly not what I'm intending.

It's more a strategic reading of the landscape. Direct confrontation plays poorly in HN comments, and attempts to do so will be futile.

There's a subtext to the moderator response in the thread linked above: if you do want to engage in direct political discourse, doing so within an article submitted to HN is far more likely to be successful. The submission queue is a more powerful instrument than the discussion thread. Focus efforts there principally. That doesn't mean "don't play the comments". But recognise the limitations, ground rules, and limitations in doing so.

(Review of my own comment history should show the types of confrontation I'm finding generally useful. I usually aim less at changing minds directly than at exposing hypocrisy and/or motivated reasoning, or similar faults.)

Your submission history suggests you haven't been utilising that approach. You might give it a shot.

The submissions queue also affords the option at encouraging others' efforts in the direction you'd like to see. It's also possible to contact HN mods directly (again: hn@ycombinator.com) and recommend posts for the 2nd chance or invited submissions queues. I've found mods quite receptive to this. My practice is to not recommend my own pieces, though that's apparently permitted.

Re: Joan Didion has died

#53

Post by clairity » Tue, Dec 28, 2021, 10:09 PM UTC

dredmorbius wrote: post #52

clairity wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

maybe it's inadvertent, but by hammering on your perspective for how you think change can happen (which i can appreciate but don't agree with), you come off as normative, that we should all think and act the same way. it's brushing aside malcolm for martin, and only martin. but confrontation has a place in the constellation of approaches needed to move groups beyond shallow backwaters. confrontation is an exertion of…

That reading is certainly not what I'm intending. It's more a strategic reading of the landscape. Direct confrontation plays poorly in HN comments, and attempts to do so will be futile. There's a subtext to the moderator response in the thread linked above: if you do want to engage in direct political discourse, doing so within an article submitted to HN is far more likely to be successful. The submission queue is a…

> "Direct confrontation plays poorly in HN comments, and attempts to do so will be futile."

i'd be remiss not to point out how repeating this, the heart of your position, 3 times now comes across as dogmatic, and condescendingly so[0]. observe: there's no one true way. (say that 3 times, even)

note that i'm generally quite intentional about the message and tone of my posts, and they more-or-less land as intended, contrary to unsupported claims otherwise[1]. the path to changing hearts and minds has no single roadmap, and it really is ok if some people get butt-hurt and recoil a bit, even to (what you seem to perceive as) entrenchment.

[0]: e.g., you start with an assumption that i don't understand how hn and discursive mechanisms at large work, and need to be schooled here. but if you want to support transgressive discourse, step aside and support it, openmindedly. not doing so indicates a different underlying objective. this is exactly how the democratic party goes so badly astray on social-progressive issues by the way.

[1]: note also that i don't see downvotes as always bad or even always negative, as you seem to assume.

Re: Joan Didion has died

#54

Post by bsanr » Mon, Jan 03, 2022, 2:44 AM UTC

clairity wrote: post #53

dredmorbius wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That reading is certainly not what I'm intending. It's more a strategic reading of the landscape. Direct confrontation plays poorly in HN comments, and attempts to do so will be futile. There's a subtext to the moderator response in the thread linked above: if you do want to engage in direct political discourse, doing so within an article submitted to HN is far more likely to be successful. The submission queue is a…

> "Direct confrontation plays poorly in HN comments, and attempts to do so will be futile." i'd be remiss not to point out how repeating this, the heart of your position, 3 times now comes across as dogmatic, and condescendingly so[0]. observe: there's no one true way. (say that 3 times, even) note that i'm generally quite intentional about the message and tone of my posts, and they more-or-less land as intended, con…

You're the only person in this conversation who seems to get it, and I just want you to know how thankful I am that you haven't been afraid to express these thoughts. I think that you're right, that the person you've been replying to is wrong, and it's incredibly frustrating that this conversation has to happen. But thank you for being that voice.