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Being apolitical is fine. I try to be that way publicly and in my work. I fail sometimes, but I try. But when I look at huge messed up things in society, and I

Being apolitical is fine. I try to be that way publicly and in my work. I fail sometimes, but I try. But when I look at huge messed up things in society, and I know there are people on HN who had a big role in making them that way? At some point you gotta cut the crap. Not taking a stand is taking a stand. Nobody gets a free ride. There's no special "get out of difficult conversations for free" card that we tech folks get that others don't have. I do not think HN needs to be reddit. But yes, I do think a second room for the intersection of tech and politics (and only that topic) is way overdue. We are better than this.

jacquesm 9y ago
> We are better than this. We could be, but we're not. This is what we are right now, a bunch of people that can't even have a rational discussion on a subject such as this.
- DanielBMarkham 9y ago
  I spent my entire youth reading sci-fi stories about mankind making new technology that eventually wipes out the species: giant robots, viruses, nuclear bombs, and so on. And this it what we got? Tweeting and liking posts? This is the scary tech that's destroyed mainstream media and now threatens to lay waste to civil discourse in general? Typing little comments into boxes? Really? Nobody can say the universe doesn't have a sense of humor.
  - true_religion 9y ago
    Some of us have spent our entire adult lives working to prevent technology that "wipes out species". It's not an accident that these things did not occur.
- adrienne 9y ago
  It might help if 2/3 of HN commenters weren't giant misogynists and racists.
dismantlethesun 9y ago
There are places for cutting the crap, and taking a stand... that doesn't necessarily have to be here. To call upon the topic of "safe spaces", I think HN ought to be a safe space for people involved in technology to simply... be... without having to constantly add disclaimers to their comments referencing their employer, or watching out for attacks due to their involvement in something that's suddenly politically volatile. There are many different forums in the world, and the only way they stay different is by drawing a line as to what topics and discussion patterns they won't except. The line drawn on HN is hardly a "hard line". Political topics are acceptable, but only one at a time and only if participants remain somewhat aloof. In conclusion, I think HN is nice simply because it has only one room. Adding other rooms isn't something I'd like to consider, whilst the existence of other multi-room sites exist with the same population. I am on Reddit, but I use pseudonyms there ... merely because I am afraid.
- jacquesm 9y ago
  > Adding other rooms isn't something I'd like to consider, whilst the existence of other multi-room sites exist with the same population. That doesn't parse, but even if it did I disagree with it, i don't think that those other sites exist with the same population.
  - DanielBMarkham 9y ago
    And the thing is, by being a startup board, we support exactly the kind of actions, movements, and organizations that have greatest new impact on fellow humans It might be okay to turn away if that "new impact" is something like faster pizza delivery. It's another thing entirely when we're instrumenting every action that every cell phone user does and then selling the data off to the highest bidder. There might be plenty of other places for this discussion. There are no other places with these people who are responsible for doing these things. And this is exactly what the social media companies want: everybody to find some other place besides their forum to talk about difficult things, because difficult conversations turn away eyeballs. It's us. The founders, inventors, and senior executives and engineers at these companies that are most in need of these discussions. And we not only have created a world where these things don't happen, we revel in the fact that we've separated all these concerns into different compartments It is a vile and corrupt system. I refuse to believe that people who give some time to think about it would continue supporting it the way it is.

jacquesm 9y ago

> We are better than this. We could be, but we're not. This is what we are right now, a bunch of people that can't even have a rational discussion on a subject such as this.

DanielBMarkham 9y ago
I spent my entire youth reading sci-fi stories about mankind making new technology that eventually wipes out the species: giant robots, viruses, nuclear bombs, and so on. And this it what we got? Tweeting and liking posts? This is the scary tech that's destroyed mainstream media and now threatens to lay waste to civil discourse in general? Typing little comments into boxes? Really? Nobody can say the universe doesn't have a sense of humor.
- true_religion 9y ago
  Some of us have spent our entire adult lives working to prevent technology that "wipes out species". It's not an accident that these things did not occur.
adrienne 9y ago
It might help if 2/3 of HN commenters weren't giant misogynists and racists.

dismantlethesun 9y ago

There are places for cutting the crap, and taking a stand... that doesn't necessarily have to be here. To call upon the topic of "safe spaces", I think HN ought to be a safe space for people involved in technology to simply... be... without having to constantly add disclaimers to their comments referencing their employer, or watching out for attacks due to their involvement in something that's suddenly politically volatile. There are many different forums in the world, and the only way they stay different is by drawing a line as to what topics and discussion patterns they won't except. The line drawn on HN is hardly a "hard line". Political topics are acceptable, but only one at a time and only if participants remain somewhat aloof. In conclusion, I think HN is nice simply because it has only one room. Adding other rooms isn't something I'd like to consider, whilst the existence of other multi-room sites exist with the same population. I am on Reddit, but I use pseudonyms there ... merely because I am afraid.

jacquesm 9y ago
> Adding other rooms isn't something I'd like to consider, whilst the existence of other multi-room sites exist with the same population. That doesn't parse, but even if it did I disagree with it, i don't think that those other sites exist with the same population.
- DanielBMarkham 9y ago
  And the thing is, by being a startup board, we support exactly the kind of actions, movements, and organizations that have greatest new impact on fellow humans It might be okay to turn away if that "new impact" is something like faster pizza delivery. It's another thing entirely when we're instrumenting every action that every cell phone user does and then selling the data off to the highest bidder. There might be plenty of other places for this discussion. There are no other places with these people who are responsible for doing these things. And this is exactly what the social media companies want: everybody to find some other place besides their forum to talk about difficult things, because difficult conversations turn away eyeballs. It's us. The founders, inventors, and senior executives and engineers at these companies that are most in need of these discussions. And we not only have created a world where these things don't happen, we revel in the fact that we've separated all these concerns into different compartments It is a vile and corrupt system. I refuse to believe that people who give some time to think about it would continue supporting it the way it is.