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I Can't Sleep

blog.paulbiggar.com

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Re: I Can't Sleep

#81

Post by giraffe_lady »

dang wrote: post #74
giraffe_lady wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think there are any cases where expressions of anger are necessary or correct? Or are you only able to see things in terms of "quality discussion" and "meaningful communication." Do you measure that only in terms of apparently calmness of the participants. Do you see how this favors the party doing harm over the one being harmed? After all it's much easier to remain calm while you're transgressing than while y…

Of course expressions of anger can be necessary and correct. (I don't think I'd use the word "correct" for this—I don't think of feelings as correct or incorrect, because if a feeling exists, it's always for a good reason—but I suppose that's a tangent.) It's not clear to me why you'd ask this, since the answer is obvious and I don't think I implied otherwise. Perhaps it is the frequency with which I ask people not t…

It really just seems like your position here, on this specific issue, is that we already talked about this. We just had a discussion about it the other day, and people were worked up about it, and so we don't need to and in fact should not have a discussion about it today.

The thing is it is still happening, and so people should be worked up about it every day until it stops. And our industry is specifically involved implicated and complicit at the very core of the matter, and so action is necessary from us. From you, even.

Like do you understand that you're not going to be judged on the "tiny blobs of text online" you're going to be judged by the consequences of our collective actions and your role in influencing them? And that your role, specifically dan, is one of power and influence? People are going to write books about the relationship between the american tech industry and the genocide of palestinians and you are going to be in them. I'm not cross examining you but you should reckon with the fact that people will.

Re: I Can't Sleep

#82

Post by dang »

giraffe_lady wrote: post #81
dang wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course expressions of anger can be necessary and correct. (I don't think I'd use the word "correct" for this—I don't think of feelings as correct or incorrect, because if a feeling exists, it's always for a good reason—but I suppose that's a tangent.) It's not clear to me why you'd ask this, since the answer is obvious and I don't think I implied otherwise. Perhaps it is the frequency with which I ask people not t…

It really just seems like your position here, on this specific issue, is that we already talked about this. We just had a discussion about it the other day, and people were worked up about it, and so we don't need to and in fact should not have a discussion about it today. The thing is it is still happening, and so people should be worked up about it every day until it stops. And our industry is specifically involved…

By that logic, HN should be a current affairs site, dedicated to talking about the most important things in the world—of which this war certainly is one.

But that's not the kind of site HN is or ever has been, so the question becomes: does a site like HN, with its particular mandate, have a right to exist? or should it be replaced by something more important? This question has been around for a good 15 years. Our answer is: we're trying to have a specific kind of website, and it's ok for it to exist, even though it's not the most important.

People with strong views (perhaps entirely justified) on a topic don't like it when that topic doesn't get as much coverage as they think it should. Often they think it should dominate HN's front page completely and anything less than that is a deplorable failure on the part of the admins, who obviously lack any morals or humanity. If I answer that yes, this topic is important, deserves discussion, and has indeed been receiving it—more than any other topic of its kind—well, one quickly learns that such demands can never be satisfied, short of replacing the site with an entirely different one, and even then probably not. Moreover such demands come in from multiple angles about multiple topics and the people making the demands not only disagree amongst themselves but are even at war with each other.

This dynamic has been playing out for many years, and if we had done as you say, HN would have ceased to exist a long time ago. I think it's a good thing that HN still exists, even though many of the things on its front page are trivial and of so much less importance than the suffering, violence, and cruelty going on in the world that it's grotesque to even compare them.

Re: I Can't Sleep

#83

Post by giraffe_lady »

dang wrote: post #82
giraffe_lady wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really just seems like your position here, on this specific issue, is that we already talked about this. We just had a discussion about it the other day, and people were worked up about it, and so we don't need to and in fact should not have a discussion about it today. The thing is it is still happening, and so people should be worked up about it every day until it stops. And our industry is specifically involved…

By that logic, HN should be a current affairs site, dedicated to talking about the most important things in the world—of which this war certainly is one. But that's not the kind of site HN is or ever has been, so the question becomes: does a site like HN, with its particular mandate, have a right to exist? or should it be replaced by something more important? This question has been around for a good 15 years. Our ans…

I'm not arguing for it to be a general current affairs site. But it should certainly be able to address current affairs that emerge from or have a strong influence on technology. Especially the technology that is made and shaped by a significant portion of its userbase, the shaping of which it has a significant influence on.

It's not just that the palestinian genocide is impactful to the world, it is that american tech companies are impactful to the palestinian genocide. This article was specifically a discussion about our role in this atrocity and a call to action to us as creators and users of technology to end it.

Within that context your editorial decision to shut down this conversation, and your invoking your mandate to keep HN functioning in this specific way, is explicitly coming out on the side of order vs justice. I am not exaggerating when I say you are going to be in history books for this one. We are all going to regret this.

Re: I Can't Sleep

#84

Post by [deleted] »

borski wrote: post #78
pbiggar wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not an expert on terrorism, obviously. I just believe that it's immoral to drop bombs on civilians. Like any other conflict, for a positive end result there has to be a meeting of the minds on both sides, committed to peace. So this is going to seem very one sided, but if you look prior to Oct 7, you can't have peace where one side controls everything, has all the resources, and uses them to keep the other popula…

> So this is going to seem very one sided, but if you look prior to Oct 7, you can't have peace where one side controls everything, has all the resources, and uses them to keep the other population "occupied". That is always going to breed resistance. Except that that's not quite true. Gaza could have continued maintenance of the existing water treatment plant (for example) that was working when Israel pulled out in…

[deleted]

Re: I Can't Sleep

#87

Post by Strs2FillMyDrms »

borski wrote: post #78
pbiggar wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not an expert on terrorism, obviously. I just believe that it's immoral to drop bombs on civilians. Like any other conflict, for a positive end result there has to be a meeting of the minds on both sides, committed to peace. So this is going to seem very one sided, but if you look prior to Oct 7, you can't have peace where one side controls everything, has all the resources, and uses them to keep the other popula…

> So this is going to seem very one sided, but if you look prior to Oct 7, you can't have peace where one side controls everything, has all the resources, and uses them to keep the other population "occupied". That is always going to breed resistance. Except that that's not quite true. Gaza could have continued maintenance of the existing water treatment plant (for example) that was working when Israel pulled out in…

You can give the Israeli part any moral excuse for their barbarity in Gaza. We will just turn on the screen on any live Israeli TV channel and any propagandist excuse you gave here will be deemed completely irrelevant, overriden by the sick society that arrogance and impunity have fostered.
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