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Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for one week

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Re: Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for one week

#911

Post by imafish »

ForrestN wrote: post #796

I flagged this post because supressing political speech systematically, and even ignoring it, is actually active political discourse. Politics is not and never will be a separated topic, it is inextricable from everything we care about. This Tell HN is arguing for a specific political position about the nature of public discourse (that it is best stewarded from the top down by extremely rich people who overwhelmingly…

Agreed. We live in scary times for a lot of people. Smart people agreeing not to talk about it, cannot be the right solution.

Re: Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for one week

#912

Post by grzm »

nkurz wrote: post #909
grzm wrote: post #784

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If this is a topic you're interested in, I think you'll find Jonathan Haidt's book "The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion" particularly useful. I've read it through twice and it's helped me better understand the nature of the issue.

I'm halfway through it now as a result of your recommendation of it a week ago. Thanks, I'm finding it great!

Very glad to hear it :)

Re: Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for one week

#913

Post by cabalamat »

reflexive wrote: post #515
cloverich wrote: post #501

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The topic doesn't matter Technically true. But practically speaking, I'd wager political topics lead to emotionally charged, intellectually devoid arguments (much) more commonly than others. If that's true, then this moderation should boost the general quality of HN comments and topics, which is why most of us come here in the first place. As a comparison, I was initially annoyed that simple jokes / witty remarks t…

I'd wager political topics lead to emotionally charged, intellectually devoid arguments (much) more commonly than others. This may be partly because so many thoughtless people feel qualified to enter a political discussion (e.g., about basic income, or immigration), whereas they couldn't even pretend to understand real-time operating systems or functional programming enough to have an opinion. Part of the beauty of H…

> This may be partly because so many thoughtless people feel qualified to enter a political discussion (e.g., about basic income, or immigration), whereas they couldn't even pretend to understand real-time operating systems or functional programming enough to have an opinion.

This is true, but I suspect the biggest reason is that politics is more prone to Crony Beliefs ( http://www.meltingasphalt.com/crony-beliefs/ ) than almost any other field of discussion.

Re: Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for one week

#914

Post by dang »

chris_wot wrote: post #910
dang wrote: post #530

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We effectively have that already, because if users continue to post good comments after being banned, other users will vouch for those and we review vouched comments. When someone who was banned reforms their ways and starts abiding by the site rules, we unban them. Of course that can be a slow process, but anyone who doesn't want to be banned is invited to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that…

You don't do that anymore. Your correspondence has increasingly turned into approbation and you show an unwillingness to explain why someone is even rate limited.

I realize the rate limit is upsetting you, but we've given you a ton of explanation and detailed information about what you need to do in order to have it lifted. Instead you've been doing the opposite. I'm not sure why that is, but it would be good if you'd stop.

Re: Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for one week

#916

Post by datashovel »

After seeing this, I just had to post this (btw I think it's probably a good idea). This clip is kind of a funny metaphor for what I tend to see in comment threads about many topics, but politics especially:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oj_ghGKy1PY

Re: Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for one week

#917

Post by jkimmel »

jdietrich wrote: post #857
minimuffins wrote: post #264

The idea that we can carve out a space that exists outside of politics and ideology is delusional. Ideology is present everywhere. It's built in to the ways we relate to each other, to our employers, to the public and private institutions and technologies we interact with all the time, and especially the way we work and conceive of work. Ideology is often tacit, baked into our assumptions even in "non-political" area…

If you stood up in the middle of a geology lecture and tried to start an argument about Roe v. Wade, you'd rightfully be thrown out of the room. We're all affected by politics, but that doesn't mean that political discussion is necessary, useful or welcome in every context. This is Hacker News. It's not the front page of Reddit, it's a niche site with a clear remit. I'm absolutely fine with any general political disc…

> If you stood up in the middle of a geology lecture and tried to start an argument about Roe v. Wade

This is a false premise. I've spent my week at a large scientific conference.

We have continually had panels re: our role and responsibility as scientists in the current political environment. Talks on hard technical issues have often included comments alluding to these roles and responsibilities.

Technologists are so deeply involved in the way that modern society perceives the world outside their immediate community that it's absurd to believe they can be apolitical.

Technologists need to discuss their roles and responsibilities as well.

So no -- you would not be thrown out of a room for bringing up politics in a Geology lecture.

HN isn't a Geology lecture at all. It's more like a quad at an engineering school. We're here because we're curious, we like to build things, we want to help create a better world. We cannot do that while insulating ourselves from the reality of our world's most powerful organizations and their leaders.

Re: Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for one week

#918

Post by nkurz »

opsiprogram wrote: post #802

While I see the point, and I can agree with the points made that HN shouldn't be a "battlefield" for person opinion, I cannot accept that we will concede politics to be a topic to be too difficult for discussion, difficult conversations are the most important ones to have. In the view you've put forward, you say that politics is the problem, a topic that when discussed causes fights and it can damage the culture of H…

See where we go, go forth and be critical thinkers and talk about the hardest topics facing human civ right now. Lets see what happens.

Perhaps that should be next weeks experiment!

(Yes, I'm serious.)

Re: Tell HN: Political Detox Week – No politics on HN for one week

#920

Post by daptaq »

olalonde wrote: post #675
daptaq wrote: post #518

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One could argue, that when you live in a democracy, politics are a necessary duty for every citizen. For a democracy to flourish, no place, no topic, no time should be unfit for discussion, because if you forbid politics, you just manifest the status quo, which doesn't have to be a-political!

> For a democracy to flourish, no place should be unfit for discussion This is obviously false. For example, plenty of democracies have flourished despite having libraries where silence is golden. > One could argue, that when you live in a democracy, politics are a necessary duty for every citizen. HN is international and if I recall correctly, more than half of users are not from the USA. Some users don't live in a…

>For example, plenty of democracies have flourished despite having libraries where silence is golden.

There is a difference between "not allowed to speak" and "not allowed to speak about politics". You can't speak under water, but a pond isn't the proof that democracy can't exist.

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