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Time to Take a Stand

blog.samaltman.com

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Re: Time to Take a Stand

#631

Post by strken »

microtonal wrote: post #53
djrogers wrote: post #8

> In doing so, we should not demonize Trump voters—most of them voted for him for reasons other than the promise of a Muslim ban. We need their eventual support in resisting actions like these, and we will not get it if we further isolate them. This is very important people - calling everyone who voted for Trump a racist homophobe, a moron, and not deserving of the franchise is not going to help anything. I didn't vo…

This is very important people - calling everyone who voted for Trump a racist homophobe Maybe they are not racist homophobes, but they voted a racist homophobe and his cabal into power. They knew that his was one of the expected outcomes. Voting is powerful and you are (co-)responsible for the outcome. If you don't want racist executive orders, don't vote for a racist. Simple as that.

Who do you vote for if you're a working class parent and you really, really, really don't want your children to earn less than you did at their age, but would prefer not to vote for a leader that the media seems to think is racist and homophobic?

Because that's a tough decision to make. You might decide that the media is wrong, you might decide that your kids are the most important thing, or you might decide that principles are worth more. Either way, it's not simple, it's very complicated.

Re: Time to Take a Stand

#632

Post by gizmo »

googlryas wrote: post #621
gizmo wrote: post #496

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None of this justifies discrimination against Muslims. I'm flagging this because this kind of incendiary racism has no place on HN.

The whole point is that it isn't discrimination against Muslims. It's discrimination against nations that happen to be majority Muslim. But there are a ton of nations with even more Muslims than the nations on the list, and they aren't banned.

Countries that "happen to be" majority Muslim? Really? What a coincidence! Of course a ban on Muslims is discriminatory against Muslims. Who do you think you're fooling?

Re: Time to Take a Stand

#633

Post by enitihas »

Reading this thread, I see people saying he is implementing his campaign promises. However, going through the thread on his victory (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12909752), most people seemed to be of the opinion that he will implement none of his election promises (eg https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12911551). It is fascinating to see how people perceive things and how they might turn out to be. I wonder what more is in store.

Re: Time to Take a Stand

#634

Post by bjourne »

tlarkworthy wrote: post #198
zeteo wrote: post #169

>1. Call 2. Participate 3. Share 4. Vote This is the same kind of bullshit that's lost Hillary the election and got us here in the first place. It might have worked in the '90s to get a gold medal for Rosa Parks. It will not work in 2017 to make Trump back off his core message. The problem here is not that your side isn't loud enough and can't get political attention for an issue. The problem is that the opposing sid…

Yes. Instead of another round of finger wagging, maybe the left should figure out what they can concretely offer the local population left out from the globalization boom.

Health insurance? If all those who previously didn't have it and got it thanks to Obama had voted for Clinton, Trump wouldn't have been the president. Too many of them didn't and instead didn't vote, or voted for Trump.

Re: Time to Take a Stand

#635

Post by stale2002 »

scarmig wrote: post #382
mythrwy wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Trump is a bad person, and the people who voted for him are bad people" I voted for Trump. I support many (not all) of his policies. I don't appreciate being called a bad person. Certainly you have a right to think this but I disagree. I won't go into what I think of people who voted for Hillary because I try not be mindlessly nasty but I don't think they are all "bad people".

I think anyone who supports ethnic and religious bans and persecution is a bad person. Even if they deprioritize them in voting over other policies, thinking, well, who cares, a little bit of racism never hurt anyone, that makes them a bad person. And Trump promised voters that, and now they're getting what they voted for. The only very thin escape route a Trump-voter has is "I thought he was lying to trick the rubes…

There are no ethic or religious bans.... It was a ban on people coming from certain countries.

Re: Time to Take a Stand

#637

Post by kgwgk »

zardeh wrote: post #386
refurb wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet Christians are specifically being targeted in Syria.[1] Wouldn't you think they would be the first ones who want to leave? [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/26/magazine/is-this-the-end-... By the way, this article is from one of your reputable news sources.

But would they be more likely to be refugees? That is, I'd expect that a Christian in the middle east would be more likely to have citizenship or family in a western nation than your average Syrian. Now it could be, but 'they are being specifically targeted' doesn't immediately imply to me that 'they should be a disproportionately high number of refugees'. That story mentions Bishops and priests who are very likely t…

Christians have been living there since the times of St Peter, of course the vast majority of them are Syrian citizens.

Re: Time to Take a Stand

#639

Post by cmurf »

panic wrote: post #60
myblake wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How effective is calling local congress members if you live in an area with a strong progressive majority such as the Bay Area. Not that we shouldn't voice our option to our represented officials but I suspect in some ways it's redundant whereas things like raising money for national organizations may be more impactful.

They need to know they have the support to fight in the strongest way possible. Dianne Feinstein, for example, has voted in favor of every Trump appointee so far.

I think it's short sighted; the administration is throwing a bunch of grenades up in the air counting on distraction and wearing people out. The reality is the easiest way to have flicked off this booger was the election, and that's over. Dealing with it is much harder, much more expensive. So you have to triage which battles you're going to fight, and how. Don't count on the replacement appointees being any better, and don't count on multiple rejections in a row (it never happens, and not because they become more politically agreeable), because literally there's another important item that will be on the agenda and getting sucked into a cabinet nominee black hole is not a hill worth dying on.

Re: Time to Take a Stand

#640

Post by DanBC »

methehack wrote: post #42
_m8fo wrote: post #7

Why is that all of these posts saying to "take a stand" fail to explain the political process? I'll just quote myself here. If you want to help stop trump the most effective ways are to: 1. Call - Local congresspeople (http://www.house.gov/representatives/find/) - Senators (https://www.senate.gov/senators/contact/) - Local officials (https://www.usa.gov/elected-officials) 2. Participate - Get involved in local electi…

I think Mr. Altman is largely addressing tech CEOs here and urging them to make public statements. The actions you list are great for you and me, but he's mostly not really talking to us. Supporting quotations from the post (because evidence): "The tech community is powerful. Large tech companies in particular have enormous power and are held in high regard. We need to hear from the CEOs clearly and unequivocally" "A…

It would be useful for successful for the tech companies start by 1st or 2nd generation immigrants to speak up.

I think the list includes (but I could be wrong):

Apple

Google

Facebook

Amazon

Oracle

IBM

Uber

Yahoo

EMC

eBay

AT&T

Tesla

Reddit

And, of course, ycombinator.

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