I think this sort of thing taken to the limit will cut every which way until eventually we run out of subjects and the overton window shrinks into an overton dot.
The risk that the quality of discourse on HN falls to Reddit leveles of shitposting seems a greater one to me. Having high volume of popular highly polarized discussions seems a great way to have an Eternal September[2] event, and there is no way to recover what makes a forum unique after that.
HN is a single place on the internet with clear moderation guidelines[1]. It doesn't have to cater to every form of speech. In fact, actively not doing so is probably the reason why HN's level of discourse is comparatively high.
People who want Reddit should go to Reddit, not drag HN with them through the mud.
Empirically they are not. What you mean is that you don't like to be faced with the reality revealed by these stories and the comments.
But this attitude explains a lot of the abusive flagging that goes on here. Stories get flagged because they make people feel ick, and they feel ick because they previously took positions that were wrong. So they flag. And when asked, why do you flag, they say "I don't know, I just don't like it", forgetting that the site exists supposedly to help drive intellectual curiousity. You may not like these stories, but other people do find them useful and you should not interfere with them.
This isn't actually COVID specific. It's a nasty and frequent tactic on this forum, where someone makes strong assertions about one side of an argument whilst simultaneously claiming that the other side can't be allowed to speak because it would be "fighting", a "flamewar", a "trash fire", "not curious", "tedious" or whatever. It's an attempt to manipulate the site rules to suppress debate and is itself anti-curious.
"Given the weak sourcing, it feels like this article, in particular, flunks the "divisive subjects require more thought and substance" test."
(on a Bari Weiss article arguing that health authorities weren't really driven by science, something they now admit themselves was true).
In other comments you asserted that COVID vaccines can't possibly be dangerous but also said, "Convincing suspicious vaccine-skeptics of the value of vaccines is not the goal here. We're not a public health service; we're a forum for curious conversation. Tedious rehashes of antivax arguments aren't curious; they're just tedious."
If you don't like such discussions, ignore them! Nobody forces you to click through to the comments section. But this tactic of trying to define disagreement with your very strong opinions as not "curious" enough is tiresome. Other people do in fact want curious conversation, which will sometimes mean conversations about topics that you don't like. I'll say it again: leave those discussions alone. Stay away by all means, but don't interfere with other people's curiousity.
I think this sort of thing taken to the limit will cut every which way until eventually we run out of subjects and the overton window shrinks into an overton dot.
The risk that the quality of discourse on HN falls to Reddit leveles of shitposting seems a greater one to me. Having high volume of popular highly polarized discussions seems a great way to have an Eternal September[2] event, and there is no way to recover what makes a forum unique after that.
HN is a single place on the internet with clear moderation guidelines[1]. It doesn't have to cater to every form of speech. In fact, actively not doing so is probably the reason why HN's level of discourse is comparatively high.
People who want Reddit should go to Reddit, not drag HN with them through the mud.
[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September
We've been running this system for something like a decade now, I think we know how it's going to converge.
I don't. I'd like to know however! Do tell!
1 reply →
Empirically they are not. What you mean is that you don't like to be faced with the reality revealed by these stories and the comments.
But this attitude explains a lot of the abusive flagging that goes on here. Stories get flagged because they make people feel ick, and they feel ick because they previously took positions that were wrong. So they flag. And when asked, why do you flag, they say "I don't know, I just don't like it", forgetting that the site exists supposedly to help drive intellectual curiousity. You may not like these stories, but other people do find them useful and you should not interfere with them.
Comments like this really make me feel viscerally what we're missing out on by not having COVID fights on the front page more often. Thanks.
This isn't actually COVID specific. It's a nasty and frequent tactic on this forum, where someone makes strong assertions about one side of an argument whilst simultaneously claiming that the other side can't be allowed to speak because it would be "fighting", a "flamewar", a "trash fire", "not curious", "tedious" or whatever. It's an attempt to manipulate the site rules to suppress debate and is itself anti-curious.
Concrete examples from your comment history: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32104731
"Given the weak sourcing, it feels like this article, in particular, flunks the "divisive subjects require more thought and substance" test."
(on a Bari Weiss article arguing that health authorities weren't really driven by science, something they now admit themselves was true).
In other comments you asserted that COVID vaccines can't possibly be dangerous but also said, "Convincing suspicious vaccine-skeptics of the value of vaccines is not the goal here. We're not a public health service; we're a forum for curious conversation. Tedious rehashes of antivax arguments aren't curious; they're just tedious."
If you don't like such discussions, ignore them! Nobody forces you to click through to the comments section. But this tactic of trying to define disagreement with your very strong opinions as not "curious" enough is tiresome. Other people do in fact want curious conversation, which will sometimes mean conversations about topics that you don't like. I'll say it again: leave those discussions alone. Stay away by all means, but don't interfere with other people's curiousity.
8 replies →