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Thanks, Marco, for drawing my attention to Sam Altman's great blog post. More people should take Sam's attitude: The way we got into a situation with Trump as

by brlewis 10y ago

Thanks, Marco, for drawing my attention to Sam Altman's great blog post. More people should take Sam's attitude: The way we got into a situation with Trump as a major party nominee in the first place was by not talking to people who are very different than we are. The polarization of the country into two parallel political realities is not good for any of us. We should talk to each other more, not less. We should all feel a duty to try to understand the roughly half of the country that thinks we are severely misguided. I don’t understand how 43% of the country supports Trump. But I’d like to find out, because we have to include everyone in our path forward. If our best ideas are to stop talking to or fire anyone who disagrees with us, we’ll be facing this whole situation again in 2020.

zerohm 10y ago
This comment deserves more attention.
- bonaldi 10y ago
  Yes, because how else are we going to hear the views of white billionaires?
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
ridgeguy 10y ago
But it's also about outcomes. As I understand it, Altman considers a Trump win a bad thing for America. There's no inconsistency between, on the one hand, repudiating Thiel's material support of Trump and, on the other hand, figuring out how to engage Trump supporters and their issues going forward. The former helps prevent an immediate bad event, the latter builds a future in which America is less likely to fragment further and leave more people on the outside. Nowhere in these does anybody stop talking to anyone. Altman talks to Thiel and publically disavows Thiel's support of Trump. Altman puts his own considerable resources and thought into talking with Trump supporters to see what's up with them, really. Everybody's talking. Granted, the conversations aren't easy, but they're talking.
RockyMcNuts 10y ago
IMHO Sam's is a pretty good post, and I also feel Sam is basically saying Peter Thiel gets a pass because he's Peter Thiel and because Trump is a major party nominee, but if anyone else were publicly supporting a basically anti-free speech, anti-immigrant, anti-women, democracy-undermining extremist organization or politician, no reasonable person would want them as an investor or adviser. Which I think Marco sums up well saying, someone who says what Trump is saying could not be associated with YC, and donating over $1m is saying you strongly support what Trump is saying. IMO saying you shouldn't fire someone over politics, shouldn't be a free pass to support ANYTHING, including things antithetical to basic human values or YC values/interests, if it happens to be from a presidential candidate.
soreal 10y ago
This thread really reinforces my respect for Altman and others like him. Of the 1,000 or so comments in this thread, hardly anyone managed to capture this simple, yet profound concept as well as Sam. If Trump is bad, he's a symptom more than a disease. Shunning Republicans isn't going to change their mind, it's going to drive them to echo chambers like /r/the_donald where they will have their beliefs reinforced, not challenged.

by brlewis 10y ago

zerohm 10y ago

This comment deserves more attention.

bonaldi 10y ago
Yes, because how else are we going to hear the views of white billionaires?
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]

ridgeguy 10y ago

But it's also about outcomes. As I understand it, Altman considers a Trump win a bad thing for America. There's no inconsistency between, on the one hand, repudiating Thiel's material support of Trump and, on the other hand, figuring out how to engage Trump supporters and their issues going forward. The former helps prevent an immediate bad event, the latter builds a future in which America is less likely to fragment further and leave more people on the outside. Nowhere in these does anybody stop talking to anyone. Altman talks to Thiel and publically disavows Thiel's support of Trump. Altman puts his own considerable resources and thought into talking with Trump supporters to see what's up with them, really. Everybody's talking. Granted, the conversations aren't easy, but they're talking.

RockyMcNuts 10y ago

IMHO Sam's is a pretty good post, and I also feel Sam is basically saying Peter Thiel gets a pass because he's Peter Thiel and because Trump is a major party nominee, but if anyone else were publicly supporting a basically anti-free speech, anti-immigrant, anti-women, democracy-undermining extremist organization or politician, no reasonable person would want them as an investor or adviser. Which I think Marco sums up well saying, someone who says what Trump is saying could not be associated with YC, and donating over $1m is saying you strongly support what Trump is saying. IMO saying you shouldn't fire someone over politics, shouldn't be a free pass to support ANYTHING, including things antithetical to basic human values or YC values/interests, if it happens to be from a presidential candidate.

soreal 10y ago

This thread really reinforces my respect for Altman and others like him. Of the 1,000 or so comments in this thread, hardly anyone managed to capture this simple, yet profound concept as well as Sam. If Trump is bad, he's a symptom more than a disease. Shunning Republicans isn't going to change their mind, it's going to drive them to echo chambers like /r/the_donald where they will have their beliefs reinforced, not challenged.