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Political discourse is off-limits on Hacker News * *Except when Sam Altman feels like talking about it

by pvnick 9y ago

aaron-lebo 9y ago
That's not really fair. There's lots of political discourse on HN.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- artursapek 9y ago
  In my experience political posts get [Dead]ed pretty fast, but this guy's articles always stay at the top for hours because of his association with HN/YC.
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    In my ecperience, lots of political posts stay up for quite a long time without getting [Dead]; articles that are on classic flamewar topics or which are fairly shallow posts on the partisan controversy of the day tend not to.
- jrs95 9y ago
  I see mods getting after people about it when they're not expressing the generally accepted view around here too, though.
  - dang 9y ago
    We don't moderate HN that way. Nor is there a 'generally accepted' view in the community about any divisive topic, for the simple reason that the community is too large. The views here reflect the divisions in society as a whole, just as any sufficiently large sample would. (Edit: really I should say 'societies', because there are deep divisions across geographical and cultural lines as well. Those are largely invisible and have a stronger influence than most people realize.) What does commonly happen is that people with strongly opposing views imagine that the HN community and/or mods are stacked against them. This perception is in the eye of the beholder (a.k.a. a cognitive bias), because all sides make the same claim and in both intensity and direction it always corresponds to the perceiver's own political commitment. I've written about this a bunch if anyone wants to read more about this dynamic: https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix&page=0&query=by:dang%20beholder https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme....
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
dang 9y ago
That's completely untrue—actually it's a combo pack of false statements. I've been doing the moderation thing for years now yet still wince when I see such things delivered with such snark.

Political discourse is off-limits on Hacker News * *Except when Sam Altman feels like talking about it

by pvnick 9y ago

Political discourse is off-limits on Hacker News * *Except when Sam Altman feels like talking about it

aaron-lebo 9y ago

That's not really fair. There's lots of political discourse on HN.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
artursapek 9y ago
In my experience political posts get [Dead]ed pretty fast, but this guy's articles always stay at the top for hours because of his association with HN/YC.
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  In my ecperience, lots of political posts stay up for quite a long time without getting [Dead]; articles that are on classic flamewar topics or which are fairly shallow posts on the partisan controversy of the day tend not to.
jrs95 9y ago
I see mods getting after people about it when they're not expressing the generally accepted view around here too, though.
- dang 9y ago
  We don't moderate HN that way. Nor is there a 'generally accepted' view in the community about any divisive topic, for the simple reason that the community is too large. The views here reflect the divisions in society as a whole, just as any sufficiently large sample would. (Edit: really I should say 'societies', because there are deep divisions across geographical and cultural lines as well. Those are largely invisible and have a stronger influence than most people realize.) What does commonly happen is that people with strongly opposing views imagine that the HN community and/or mods are stacked against them. This perception is in the eye of the beholder (a.k.a. a cognitive bias), because all sides make the same claim and in both intensity and direction it always corresponds to the perceiver's own political commitment. I've written about this a bunch if anyone wants to read more about this dynamic: https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix&page=0&query=by:dang%20beholder https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme....

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

dang 9y ago

That's completely untrue—actually it's a combo pack of false statements. I've been doing the moderation thing for years now yet still wince when I see such things delivered with such snark.