4 ms·

I was interested in genuine responses, not in starting a flamewar.

dang 8y ago
I believe you, but intention isn't enough. How you frame such a question has the largest impact on what responses emerge. The combo of a low-information comment, a pejorative, and a divisive topic is going to be a flamebait cocktail regardless of anything else.
- tomcam 8y ago
  Sorry to bother you, but this is frustrating. I think I may be a little on the spectrum, so please take my statement literally. The comment by the parent was undeniably true. It really is an authoritarian dictatorship (Source: obvious common sense and also my extended family is all Chinese). Source: obvious common sense and also my beloved extended family is mostly Chinese). I feel like the question was framed properly and I can’t attribute any of those traits to it – pejorative, divisive, flame bait. Your thoughts?
  - dang 8y ago
    You're not bothering me! But I only saw this reply by accident. If you want to be sure to get an answer you should email us instead (hn@ycombinator.com). Just keep in mind that we can't always reply right away. There are two problems. First, the term "authoritarian dictatorship" is not as well-defined as you seem to suggest, and carries a pejorative meaning which is separate from any factual information it does contain. Second, the comment was too short to convey much information in its own right. When people post pejorative, low-information comments about inflammatory topics, that's flamebait, whether or not they intended it that way. I'm sure that driverdan had no malicious intent, but intent doesn't protect a dry forest from dropped matches. I can understand why you would be frustrated by this response if you look at the comment as an atomic, standalone thing. But comments on internet forums aren't standalone. They're prefixes of the subthreads that follow from them, and commenters are partly responsible for what follows from their comments. Certainly they are responsible for following the site guidelines, which distill much of what we've learned over the years about how to comment in ways that don't lead to degenerate subthreads.
    - tomcam 8y ago
      Thanks very much for the answer. I need to rethink things.

dang 8y ago

I believe you, but intention isn't enough. How you frame such a question has the largest impact on what responses emerge. The combo of a low-information comment, a pejorative, and a divisive topic is going to be a flamebait cocktail regardless of anything else.

tomcam 8y ago
Sorry to bother you, but this is frustrating. I think I may be a little on the spectrum, so please take my statement literally. The comment by the parent was undeniably true. It really is an authoritarian dictatorship (Source: obvious common sense and also my extended family is all Chinese). Source: obvious common sense and also my beloved extended family is mostly Chinese). I feel like the question was framed properly and I can’t attribute any of those traits to it – pejorative, divisive, flame bait. Your thoughts?
- dang 8y ago
  You're not bothering me! But I only saw this reply by accident. If you want to be sure to get an answer you should email us instead (hn@ycombinator.com). Just keep in mind that we can't always reply right away. There are two problems. First, the term "authoritarian dictatorship" is not as well-defined as you seem to suggest, and carries a pejorative meaning which is separate from any factual information it does contain. Second, the comment was too short to convey much information in its own right. When people post pejorative, low-information comments about inflammatory topics, that's flamebait, whether or not they intended it that way. I'm sure that driverdan had no malicious intent, but intent doesn't protect a dry forest from dropped matches. I can understand why you would be frustrated by this response if you look at the comment as an atomic, standalone thing. But comments on internet forums aren't standalone. They're prefixes of the subthreads that follow from them, and commenters are partly responsible for what follows from their comments. Certainly they are responsible for following the site guidelines, which distill much of what we've learned over the years about how to comment in ways that don't lead to degenerate subthreads.
  - tomcam 8y ago
    Thanks very much for the answer. I need to rethink things.