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I really don't think using rhetoric like "whataboutism" as a distraction when someone points out some sort of hypocrisy promotes conversation in any useful way.

by dnh44 9y ago

mercer 9y ago
I'd agree in general, but I have noticed that particular topics have a way of provoking a lot of comments that do seem 'suspicious'. I've found that while in practice these comments are often by otherwise somewhat acceptable HN commenters and not shills, they are often noticeably more partisan/controversial/low-quality than their other comments. Specifically, this seems to happen with discussions that involve particular nation states (India, Turkey, Russia, Serbia, China are at the top of my list), as well as particular topics (gender, Trump, socialism/capitalism, etc.). While I do agree that pointing this out violates the principle of charity and possibly hurts the conversation, it's still a 'dynamic' that kind of stands out. EDIT: this is more of a general 'observation', not necessarily applicable to this particular thread.
- dnh44 9y ago
  But those are all potentially controversial topics and people can get a bit passionate about things especially if they hold an opinion contrary to whatever is considered mainstream. Especially on topics that have massive media focus. But that's healthy isn't it? Especially in a place like this that has a higher than average level of discussion. And really so what if someone is actually a paid shill? If they can hold a reasonable discussion to get their point across and perhaps even enlighten me to something I was ignorant of then I welcome them. In reality I imagine a paid shill would work off of some sort of set of talking points that gets pushed to an entire team but even in this case civil discussion should be able to tear apart what are likely to be fairly weak arguments.
- avar 9y ago
  It's curious that you leave the US out of your list of nation states that tend to attract particularly low-effort comments around here. In my experience this is way more pronounced with the US than any other country that's discussed on HN. Of course any country that's discussed here is likely to attract people from that country who feel they have something to explain or defend, but due to the userbase being predominantly American the bias is very much towards the US, not India, Russia, China or whatever.

I really don't think using rhetoric like "whataboutism" as a distraction when someone points out some sort of hypocrisy promotes conversation in any useful way.

by dnh44 9y ago

I really don't think using rhetoric like "whataboutism" as a distraction when someone points out some sort of hypocrisy promotes conversation in any useful way.

mercer 9y ago

I'd agree in general, but I have noticed that particular topics have a way of provoking a lot of comments that do seem 'suspicious'. I've found that while in practice these comments are often by otherwise somewhat acceptable HN commenters and not shills, they are often noticeably more partisan/controversial/low-quality than their other comments. Specifically, this seems to happen with discussions that involve particular nation states (India, Turkey, Russia, Serbia, China are at the top of my list), as well as particular topics (gender, Trump, socialism/capitalism, etc.). While I do agree that pointing this out violates the principle of charity and possibly hurts the conversation, it's still a 'dynamic' that kind of stands out. EDIT: this is more of a general 'observation', not necessarily applicable to this particular thread.

dnh44 9y ago
But those are all potentially controversial topics and people can get a bit passionate about things especially if they hold an opinion contrary to whatever is considered mainstream. Especially on topics that have massive media focus. But that's healthy isn't it? Especially in a place like this that has a higher than average level of discussion. And really so what if someone is actually a paid shill? If they can hold a reasonable discussion to get their point across and perhaps even enlighten me to something I was ignorant of then I welcome them. In reality I imagine a paid shill would work off of some sort of set of talking points that gets pushed to an entire team but even in this case civil discussion should be able to tear apart what are likely to be fairly weak arguments.
avar 9y ago
It's curious that you leave the US out of your list of nation states that tend to attract particularly low-effort comments around here. In my experience this is way more pronounced with the US than any other country that's discussed on HN. Of course any country that's discussed here is likely to attract people from that country who feel they have something to explain or defend, but due to the userbase being predominantly American the bias is very much towards the US, not India, Russia, China or whatever.