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Significantly more moderation. Unfortunately the consensus here in the past is that they'd prefer the majority of the "moderation" to come from the community,

by zorpner 11y ago

Significantly more moderation. Unfortunately the consensus here in the past is that they'd prefer the majority of the "moderation" to come from the community, which only serves to amplify the already echo-chamber-like qualities of the discourse here. But make no mistake -- that those who moderate and administrate choose not to act does not absolve them of responsibility for the bigoted, status-quo-loving noise that dominates here and more than justifies the reputation HN has across the web.

vinceguidry 11y ago
Moderation isn't the problem. Moderation won't make contentious issues non-contentious. The problem is us. HN readers need to step up and provide a counterbalance to idiocy.
- sarahnadav 11y ago
  I think HN readers should do some soul searching, because this isn't contentious out there in the real world. The post has been picked up on a few different news sites, and nobody (even in the comments) is nearly as threatened by what I have to say as the folks who are on this thread.
  - vinceguidry 11y ago
    I think you are right. Sexism stories always bring out the trolls here, and they tend to bring out ugliness in otherwise normal people. I'll do some soul searching in this space since it's clear that few others will. It took a long time for me to get to the root of sexism in myself and others. Gender is very core to identity and it's perceived as an attack on one's masculinity to be accused of sexism. To rise past this deep urge is very difficult. To see females as people instead of objects is easy to do intellectually, very hard to internalize to the point to where you can look at a female programmer and actually see a programmer instead of a woman. I think there is a certain level of ingrained social awkwardness in the tech community that exacerbates this. In other milieus, you'd never see things like codes of conduct becoming actual bones of contention. Everywhere else, guys might have their beliefs about the necessity of codes of conduct or otherwise, but know better than to actually express them. In tech, every idiot with an opinion thinks it's important enough to mouth off about.

by zorpner 11y ago

vinceguidry 11y ago

Moderation isn't the problem. Moderation won't make contentious issues non-contentious. The problem is us. HN readers need to step up and provide a counterbalance to idiocy.

sarahnadav 11y ago
I think HN readers should do some soul searching, because this isn't contentious out there in the real world. The post has been picked up on a few different news sites, and nobody (even in the comments) is nearly as threatened by what I have to say as the folks who are on this thread.
- vinceguidry 11y ago
  I think you are right. Sexism stories always bring out the trolls here, and they tend to bring out ugliness in otherwise normal people. I'll do some soul searching in this space since it's clear that few others will. It took a long time for me to get to the root of sexism in myself and others. Gender is very core to identity and it's perceived as an attack on one's masculinity to be accused of sexism. To rise past this deep urge is very difficult. To see females as people instead of objects is easy to do intellectually, very hard to internalize to the point to where you can look at a female programmer and actually see a programmer instead of a woman. I think there is a certain level of ingrained social awkwardness in the tech community that exacerbates this. In other milieus, you'd never see things like codes of conduct becoming actual bones of contention. Everywhere else, guys might have their beliefs about the necessity of codes of conduct or otherwise, but know better than to actually express them. In tech, every idiot with an opinion thinks it's important enough to mouth off about.