> it's easy to see the very real authoritarian bend of comfortable professionals who are smart but also in favor of, say, summary execution of people for protesting
There’s that rhetoric I’m talking about! Thanks for giving a perfect example.
For topics like these, the expectation is that everyone comes in here and expresses sufficient levels of outrage. After all, if you’re scrolling through all the posts showing these awful things, you should have built up the requisite level of outrage by now, so if you post anything other than “HN is obviously ok with executions”, you must be one of them and therefore further evidence that these comfortable professionals are complacent and pro-murder.
The nuanced takes are nowhere to be found, because people who might want to come into these discussions with it, see the rhetoric being tossed around, and think “nope, this is all toxic, no way I’m joining in”, flag it, and move on.
But you can look at that exact situation (people flagging the post) and conclude “yup, the person doing the flagging is okay with executions.” It’s wild.
The sad thing is that there is a nuanced discussion to be had here. In fact it’s critical to this country’s survival that we are able to navigate our way through this. But this discussion, this navigation, needs to happen in small groups, where we can actually engage face-to-face. When we can see each other’s humanity, and know that the other person isn’t a monster, and doesn’t want to see innocent people die any more than you do. Where we can dissect each other’s viewpoints carefully.
None of that is really possible in online forums, because the group think is real, and the rhetoric destroys nuance, destroys compassion, destroys the ability to find common ground. It’s sheer toxicity.
I dunno, I’m still really angry about what I'm seeing. If I had anything to say it’s probably something I’d regret later. I’m talking with my loved ones about it and trying to come to grips with what’s happening to my country. It’s not really time for an internet hot take right now.
You might consider (though perhaps not agree) that no where in my post did I insinuate that "flagging" was the same as taking a position on the subject:
my statement was about why I do, indeed, find utility these conversations you don't find useful.
That a) says nothing about my take on your understanding/ position on the issues around protest or politics and b) is a request to understand my position and not, like, a statement about the morality of your position.
And further, to me "being okay with the summary execution of people for protesting" seems like a pretty specific sentiment, and one which I have heard echoed here quite a bit. I find it super useful to see demonstrated so frequently that a person with excellent technical chops in a domain may often have massive deficiencies in their reasoning, if for no other reason that it helps me understand the weakness of my own cognition.
So, perhaps consider that it's you, in projecting a statement I didn't make in a very short and fairly clear post who is "giving a perfect example" of the level of nuance-free assumptions that do (as you correctly point out) often run rampant- and not just on this site, but in discourse in general.
To push my point a bit further, I am not here to make moral judgements or change peoples' mind on these political topics; rather, over the decade during which I've been interacting on this site, it has= has been super informative to trace the nascent fascism that breed in many of the confluences of technology and capitalism.
That may, to you, sound like hyperbolic rhetoric that is dismissive of other folks' opinions; from my position you're not understanding that this examination of (what is to me) highly disagreeable and almost sociopathic political discourse -is- the process of finding nuanced and useful understandings of our political situation.
The whole thread here started with “why do we continue to ignore this”, to which I replied “who’s ignoring this”, and the answer is “anyone who’s flagging this post.”
The conversation in this particular thread has gone off the rails, in large part because I am very angry about what’s happening, and I tend to get heated in replies. So I apologize for letting my anger get the best of me in this particular instance.
My only point was to say “I flagged this, but not because I’m ignoring it.”
I flagged it because I truly believe to my core that anonymous online discussion about emotional political topics is causing this country’s descent into fascism. Whipping people into a frenzy against one another, causes hatred to amplify past where it would be if it were just about the story itself. The discussions are where people go to out-signal each other, even if nobody’s there to argue the other point. Then if someone does end up saying something like “hmm, looks like the protester was actually carrying a gun” (or something equally not-wrong but clearly not the expected expression of ICE-hatred we all expect), they’re now the target of everyone’s anger. All that brewing hatred is now pointed at that one person, because they’re the closest thing on the site to someone who is actually pro-ICE. Then we have people like you casually saying things about this site being full of tech bros who are just fine with executions… I just feel like we need to tone everything way down. We need to be calm, to be honest. I know it’s hard. I don’t really know what else to say… it’s hard to formulate thoughts clearly in times like these.
I don’t know you but I hope wherever you are you’re safe and have a good idea of what your next steps are going to be. I’m getting increasingly distraught over what’s happening myself. It’s starting to affect my family life and I’m having a lot of trouble coping.
Venting on the internet is a way for a lot of people to come to grips with what they’re seeing. I understand. If this is what helps you cope, I won’t stop you.
Me, it’s especially difficult to see how this hatred is so self-amplifying. I see a president whose primary method of getting to where he is, is to make people hate each other to a maximum degree. I watch liberals like myself fall for it. I see how he intentionally puts armed agents in locations where he knows people will protest, then I see how those protesters are killed in the most predictable way imaginable, because they’re seen as a threat by the people with guns. Then I see the hatred get worse, the protests get larger, with more innocent people joining in, and meanwhile Trump is shipping more armed agents to the same cities.
I wish I had an answer. The answer isn’t “don’t protest”, nor is the answer “let’s all put ourselves in a position to be killed” either. I hope on some level that the images of these people getting executed is seared into enough people’s minds that Trump pays an actual political cost, but then I remember what the BLM protests turned into, and how public support tanked for what should have been an obvious issue. So whatever is going to happen, I’m not sure any of our anger is actually going to help. But I don’t really have an answer. I’m sorry.
My reasons for flagging topics like this is it just fits a pattern of “administration does something abhorrent, people get mad, social media amplifies the anger, it turns into real world deaths.” I really don’t like seeing this happen. I don’t like the hatred amplification that the internet is doing to my country. I don’t know what else to say.
> it's easy to see the very real authoritarian bend of comfortable professionals who are smart but also in favor of, say, summary execution of people for protesting
There’s that rhetoric I’m talking about! Thanks for giving a perfect example.
For topics like these, the expectation is that everyone comes in here and expresses sufficient levels of outrage. After all, if you’re scrolling through all the posts showing these awful things, you should have built up the requisite level of outrage by now, so if you post anything other than “HN is obviously ok with executions”, you must be one of them and therefore further evidence that these comfortable professionals are complacent and pro-murder.
The nuanced takes are nowhere to be found, because people who might want to come into these discussions with it, see the rhetoric being tossed around, and think “nope, this is all toxic, no way I’m joining in”, flag it, and move on.
But you can look at that exact situation (people flagging the post) and conclude “yup, the person doing the flagging is okay with executions.” It’s wild.
The sad thing is that there is a nuanced discussion to be had here. In fact it’s critical to this country’s survival that we are able to navigate our way through this. But this discussion, this navigation, needs to happen in small groups, where we can actually engage face-to-face. When we can see each other’s humanity, and know that the other person isn’t a monster, and doesn’t want to see innocent people die any more than you do. Where we can dissect each other’s viewpoints carefully.
None of that is really possible in online forums, because the group think is real, and the rhetoric destroys nuance, destroys compassion, destroys the ability to find common ground. It’s sheer toxicity.
>The sad thing is that there is a nuanced discussion to be had here.
If you say there's nuance, then out with it. Stop self censoring and speak your mind. What nuance do you see?
I dunno, I’m still really angry about what I'm seeing. If I had anything to say it’s probably something I’d regret later. I’m talking with my loved ones about it and trying to come to grips with what’s happening to my country. It’s not really time for an internet hot take right now.
1 reply →
You might consider (though perhaps not agree) that no where in my post did I insinuate that "flagging" was the same as taking a position on the subject:
my statement was about why I do, indeed, find utility these conversations you don't find useful.
That a) says nothing about my take on your understanding/ position on the issues around protest or politics and b) is a request to understand my position and not, like, a statement about the morality of your position.
And further, to me "being okay with the summary execution of people for protesting" seems like a pretty specific sentiment, and one which I have heard echoed here quite a bit. I find it super useful to see demonstrated so frequently that a person with excellent technical chops in a domain may often have massive deficiencies in their reasoning, if for no other reason that it helps me understand the weakness of my own cognition.
So, perhaps consider that it's you, in projecting a statement I didn't make in a very short and fairly clear post who is "giving a perfect example" of the level of nuance-free assumptions that do (as you correctly point out) often run rampant- and not just on this site, but in discourse in general.
To push my point a bit further, I am not here to make moral judgements or change peoples' mind on these political topics; rather, over the decade during which I've been interacting on this site, it has= has been super informative to trace the nascent fascism that breed in many of the confluences of technology and capitalism.
That may, to you, sound like hyperbolic rhetoric that is dismissive of other folks' opinions; from my position you're not understanding that this examination of (what is to me) highly disagreeable and almost sociopathic political discourse -is- the process of finding nuanced and useful understandings of our political situation.
The whole thread here started with “why do we continue to ignore this”, to which I replied “who’s ignoring this”, and the answer is “anyone who’s flagging this post.”
The conversation in this particular thread has gone off the rails, in large part because I am very angry about what’s happening, and I tend to get heated in replies. So I apologize for letting my anger get the best of me in this particular instance.
My only point was to say “I flagged this, but not because I’m ignoring it.”
I flagged it because I truly believe to my core that anonymous online discussion about emotional political topics is causing this country’s descent into fascism. Whipping people into a frenzy against one another, causes hatred to amplify past where it would be if it were just about the story itself. The discussions are where people go to out-signal each other, even if nobody’s there to argue the other point. Then if someone does end up saying something like “hmm, looks like the protester was actually carrying a gun” (or something equally not-wrong but clearly not the expected expression of ICE-hatred we all expect), they’re now the target of everyone’s anger. All that brewing hatred is now pointed at that one person, because they’re the closest thing on the site to someone who is actually pro-ICE. Then we have people like you casually saying things about this site being full of tech bros who are just fine with executions… I just feel like we need to tone everything way down. We need to be calm, to be honest. I know it’s hard. I don’t really know what else to say… it’s hard to formulate thoughts clearly in times like these.
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I don’t know you but I hope wherever you are you’re safe and have a good idea of what your next steps are going to be. I’m getting increasingly distraught over what’s happening myself. It’s starting to affect my family life and I’m having a lot of trouble coping.
Venting on the internet is a way for a lot of people to come to grips with what they’re seeing. I understand. If this is what helps you cope, I won’t stop you.
Me, it’s especially difficult to see how this hatred is so self-amplifying. I see a president whose primary method of getting to where he is, is to make people hate each other to a maximum degree. I watch liberals like myself fall for it. I see how he intentionally puts armed agents in locations where he knows people will protest, then I see how those protesters are killed in the most predictable way imaginable, because they’re seen as a threat by the people with guns. Then I see the hatred get worse, the protests get larger, with more innocent people joining in, and meanwhile Trump is shipping more armed agents to the same cities.
I wish I had an answer. The answer isn’t “don’t protest”, nor is the answer “let’s all put ourselves in a position to be killed” either. I hope on some level that the images of these people getting executed is seared into enough people’s minds that Trump pays an actual political cost, but then I remember what the BLM protests turned into, and how public support tanked for what should have been an obvious issue. So whatever is going to happen, I’m not sure any of our anger is actually going to help. But I don’t really have an answer. I’m sorry.
My reasons for flagging topics like this is it just fits a pattern of “administration does something abhorrent, people get mad, social media amplifies the anger, it turns into real world deaths.” I really don’t like seeing this happen. I don’t like the hatred amplification that the internet is doing to my country. I don’t know what else to say.
6 replies →
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