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Because people like me flag them. If you want an actual explanation: I am a woman and this does not match with my lived experiences. In fact, the article seems

by novia 8y ago

Because people like me flag them. If you want an actual explanation: I am a woman and this does not match with my lived experiences. In fact, the article seems to dehumanize women in a lot of places. I'm really tired of the incel narrative and the sorts of moral arguments that come along with articles of this type in the comment section. Seeing us represented this way really stresses me out. I'm just here to learn about tech stuff, geez.

anonytrary 8y ago
I don't mean to belittle your decision to flag the article, but the flagging button is not a downvote button, and it is not there to hide things we personally disagree with. Flagging an article because it does not corroborate your personal experiences is somewhat irresponsible, especially for this community. There needs to be a better reason for flagging an article other than "my single data point says otherwise".
- novia 8y ago
  Hacker News Guidelines What to Submit On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity. Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic. -------------- To me (and many others) this topic is political in nature and controversial. See for example the 2014 Isla Vista massacre. It does not gratify my intellectual curiosity. In fact, it only briefly pretends to be a data driven piece by including a graph at the beginning and citing an informal social media poll. It might be something interesting to discuss, but in my opinion this is not the forum for it.
  - anonytrary 8y ago
    Population dynamics and sexual activity statistics is arguably something that "good hackers would find interesting". If those statistics are changing significantly, then I'd definitely consider that something "that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity". Edit: And to clarify, lots of science can be political, but that doesn't make it not-science. For example, breaking news about a new discovery in climate change projections is inherently political but it is also inherently interesting from an intellectual standpoint. Something purely political and not intellectually interesting to hackers might be news about what's happening in the White House right now. In my opinion, anything that falls under the science category is fair game for this community because plenty of people who are hackers are also very interested in science and technology.
    - novia 8y ago
      Yes climate change is political, but would the comment section to a climate change article on this site be full of the types of comments we see in here? Would it be an actually divisive topic for the users of this site? What I love about Hacker News (usually) is the lack of flame-wars. I know they exist, but they get hidden very quickly. After reading the article in full, and finding it sparse in actual data, I decided it would most likely generate the sort of discussion that does not belong on the site. Edit to add: If it is merely the "population dynamics and sexual activity statistics" that we should be interested in, why not link directly to the study instead of this meandering commentary on it?
      - anonytrary 8y ago
        This[0] and this[1] are previous discussions on HN about climate change, with plenty of trolls. Just because something gets trolls, doesn't mean the whole thing should be destroyed or censored. Look at all of the other great discussion in those threads (and this one). If you get rid of every thread that is a potential double-edged sword, then you will eventually find yourself browsing an empty forum. There is no such thing as a perfect safe-space for discussion, and places that claim to be are typically void of interesting discourse. > I decided it would most likely generate the sort of discussion that does not belong on the site. The current thread as well as the two linked threads have plenty of positive discussion. Again, every topic is a double-edged sword. You're going to get people who agree and disagree, people who are serious and others who are trolls. That doesn't mean threads should be completely destroyed. The best course of action here is to flag the offending comments, rather than the entire thread. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17698237 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17698237 [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18332012 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18332012
        novia 8y ago
        > The best course of action here is to flag the offending comments, rather than the entire thread. The best course of action for my mental well-being is to flag the whole thread and move on without reading the comments. Unfortunately I'm already in here, so I am flagging the particularly egregious comments, as well as vouching for the dead comments that I think were unjustly buried. > Just because something gets trolls, doesn't mean the whole thing should be destroyed or censored. One flag doesn't destroy an entire thread. It's a numbers game and I'm adding my vote to the pile. If the thread dies, people who think it is valuable can vouch for it.
  - freyir 8y ago
    The article isn't about politics, and controversial topics are not out of bounds. If you don't like an article, you have the option to ignore it, or even better, contribute your perspective to the conversation. The flag button isn't there to suppress any and all discussion of a topic that you don't personally care for.
    - novia 8y ago
      I flagged it AND I'm contributing to the conversation.
  - yason 8y ago
    To me (and many others) this topic is political in nature and controversial. How so? It's not about political decisions one way or another but observing a new phenomenon on the market for sex and relationships. There are tons of scientific angles available for approaching the issue. Why is this happening? What has changed? What factors can contribute? Flagging comments such as "that's good, all sex should happen in a marriage anyway" would be contributing to the discussion, flagging the entire topic would not be.
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
    - novia 8y ago
      >> To me (and many others) this topic is political in nature and controversial. > How so? It's in the very next sentence. But oh by the way, the author doesn't have a great track record on this issue. https://slate.com/business/2018/05/robin-hanson-the-sex-redistribution-professor-interviewed.html https://slate.com/business/2018/05/robin-hanson-the-sex-redi...
      - deleted 8y ago
        [deleted]
  - saagarjha 8y ago
    > Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. > Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. I feel like this is on-topic? I feel that the flag button is not there for "I found this uninteresting", because at any given time a significant portion of the articles on the front page are uninteresting to me. I don't go around flagging those because I'm sure others do find it interesting and it's possible to have a valid discussion about it without devolving into flamewars. > See for example the 2014 Isla Vista massacre. FWIW, this was not covered by Hacker News.
  - dreaded 8y ago
    You initially claimed that you flagged the article because it doesn't meet your "lived experiences". When challenged on the validity of that reasoning you abandon that claim and now justify flagging it because it's "political in nature and controversial". The truth is you simply don't like what's being said and would therefor like to suppress it, and lacking a more valid motivation will concoct whatever justification you think will be seen as valid, as you've already demonstrated. By misrepresenting your motivations you've shown that you're acting in bad faith, and because you're acting in bad faith any further justifications you offer should be disregarded.
taxicabjesus 8y ago
Men and women are wired to go about relationships differently. One problem is that people don't come with clear instruction manuals to help us understand how the relationship game works. > I'm really tired of the incel narrative Men generally play a numbers game, where their romantic overtures get rejected most of the time. It doesn't help that a lot of the time their romantic overtures are annoying [1]. Supposed "incels" just have no idea what it is that makes them so obnoxious [2]. Women have to screen candidates until they find someone they think is interesting. > Seeing us represented this way really stresses me out. Maybe the comment section on these types of articles 'stress you out' because you see a bunch of men debating their "flat earth" theories of how women go about relationships, you can tell that their theories are clearly wrong, but there's no point in even trying to expand their 'flat earth relationship' theories? Sociologists have determined that men peak sexually around 18 years old [3]. Women peak at a much later age (30's and 40's). Hopefully better understanding will help the stress you experience dissipate. > I'm just here to learn about tech stuff, geez. Interpersonal relationships can be hacked too. Women especially need constructive strategies to better deal with unwanted overtures from the other gender. I try to provide constructive comments on the topic. This comment was about how my passengers helped me figure out "attraction": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17810906 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17810906 (this one got lots of upvotes and downvotes). For the record, I never hit on my passengers, but sometimes they were intrigued by me... [1] "As a woman, is it simply 'understood' that you’ll have to contend with inappropriate male advances & suggestive language?" - https://www.quora.com/As-a-woman-is-it-simply-understood-that-you-ll-have-to-contend-with-inappropriate-male-advances-suggestive-language/answer/Molly-Carter-2 https://www.quora.com/As-a-woman-is-it-simply-understood-tha... [2] my comment ending with "Relationship coaching for men is mostly about teaching them how to be less obnoxious." - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17554503 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17554503 [3] "But around the time I turned 29 or 30 I rapidly began to lose interest in sex." - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19602351 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19602351
- novia 8y ago
  > Women have to screen candidates until they find someone they think is interesting. This is exactly the kind of harmful narrative I'm talking about. > Sociologists have determined that men peak sexually around 18 years old [3]. Women peak at a much later age (30's and 40's). Hopefully better understanding will help the stress you experience dissipate. The stress has absolutely NOTHING to do with that. BUT, since you brought it up, OkCupid had a pretty detailed analysis that showed much the opposite when it comes to the age that people are interested. Linking because you might be interested, not because it's relevant. https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/1600/0*q95i3Ma24k-hxBtK.png https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/1600/0*q95i3Ma24k-hxBtK.... https://theblog.okcupid.com/the-case-for-an-older-woman-99d8cabacdf5 https://theblog.okcupid.com/the-case-for-an-older-woman-99d8...
the-great-assyr 8y ago
As a matter of fact, your lived experience is nothing and count nothing in this contest, because the article talk about statistics and statistics don't care about your personal lived experience; so your rant is totally misplaced and your flag was just showed the snowflake you are. What about behave like a mature adult and take the figures and numbers for what they are and not as a personal attack? "incel narrative"? Really?? Are you a sjw reeeeeeing for whatever, by any chance? Go get a soy latte, some homeopathic sedative and some yoga, you oversensitive snowflake.
michaelmrose 8y ago
I am honestly still trying to figure out how the male 9s and 10s are supposed to be monopolizing all the female 1s-3s when they wont look at them. I swear everyone I have ever conversed with that believes that attractive men were monopolizing all the women was a 2 with a really negative attitude towards women. The best part is where they diss the kind of woman they actually COULD potentially date as fat or dumpy and ergo beneath them. My theory is its a perception and attitude problem not societies problem. The internet shows them an entire planet full of women that are out of their league and they fail to chase the people who actually could be their mates.
- novia 8y ago
  I like your theory about entitlement issues, but in the future could you please try to make it without resorting to reducing humans to numbers? This is the sort of rhetoric that leads to comments like this one: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19601799 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19601799 I know it's basically part of the language at this point, and I'm definitely guilty of it too, but really, it's dehumanizing and implies a static unchanging nature to attractiveness that really isn't there. Women aren't the borg. We're a collection of individuals, each with our own personal preferences, which can and do vary wildly from the personal preferences of other women.

by novia 8y ago

anonytrary 8y ago

I don't mean to belittle your decision to flag the article, but the flagging button is not a downvote button, and it is not there to hide things we personally disagree with. Flagging an article because it does not corroborate your personal experiences is somewhat irresponsible, especially for this community. There needs to be a better reason for flagging an article other than "my single data point says otherwise".

novia 8y ago
Hacker News Guidelines What to Submit On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity. Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic. -------------- To me (and many others) this topic is political in nature and controversial. See for example the 2014 Isla Vista massacre. It does not gratify my intellectual curiosity. In fact, it only briefly pretends to be a data driven piece by including a graph at the beginning and citing an informal social media poll. It might be something interesting to discuss, but in my opinion this is not the forum for it.
- anonytrary 8y ago
  Population dynamics and sexual activity statistics is arguably something that "good hackers would find interesting". If those statistics are changing significantly, then I'd definitely consider that something "that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity". Edit: And to clarify, lots of science can be political, but that doesn't make it not-science. For example, breaking news about a new discovery in climate change projections is inherently political but it is also inherently interesting from an intellectual standpoint. Something purely political and not intellectually interesting to hackers might be news about what's happening in the White House right now. In my opinion, anything that falls under the science category is fair game for this community because plenty of people who are hackers are also very interested in science and technology.
  - novia 8y ago
    Yes climate change is political, but would the comment section to a climate change article on this site be full of the types of comments we see in here? Would it be an actually divisive topic for the users of this site? What I love about Hacker News (usually) is the lack of flame-wars. I know they exist, but they get hidden very quickly. After reading the article in full, and finding it sparse in actual data, I decided it would most likely generate the sort of discussion that does not belong on the site. Edit to add: If it is merely the "population dynamics and sexual activity statistics" that we should be interested in, why not link directly to the study instead of this meandering commentary on it?
    - anonytrary 8y ago
      This[0] and this[1] are previous discussions on HN about climate change, with plenty of trolls. Just because something gets trolls, doesn't mean the whole thing should be destroyed or censored. Look at all of the other great discussion in those threads (and this one). If you get rid of every thread that is a potential double-edged sword, then you will eventually find yourself browsing an empty forum. There is no such thing as a perfect safe-space for discussion, and places that claim to be are typically void of interesting discourse. > I decided it would most likely generate the sort of discussion that does not belong on the site. The current thread as well as the two linked threads have plenty of positive discussion. Again, every topic is a double-edged sword. You're going to get people who agree and disagree, people who are serious and others who are trolls. That doesn't mean threads should be completely destroyed. The best course of action here is to flag the offending comments, rather than the entire thread. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17698237 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17698237 [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18332012 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18332012
      - novia 8y ago
        > The best course of action here is to flag the offending comments, rather than the entire thread. The best course of action for my mental well-being is to flag the whole thread and move on without reading the comments. Unfortunately I'm already in here, so I am flagging the particularly egregious comments, as well as vouching for the dead comments that I think were unjustly buried. > Just because something gets trolls, doesn't mean the whole thing should be destroyed or censored. One flag doesn't destroy an entire thread. It's a numbers game and I'm adding my vote to the pile. If the thread dies, people who think it is valuable can vouch for it.
- freyir 8y ago
  The article isn't about politics, and controversial topics are not out of bounds. If you don't like an article, you have the option to ignore it, or even better, contribute your perspective to the conversation. The flag button isn't there to suppress any and all discussion of a topic that you don't personally care for.
  - novia 8y ago
    I flagged it AND I'm contributing to the conversation.
- yason 8y ago
  To me (and many others) this topic is political in nature and controversial. How so? It's not about political decisions one way or another but observing a new phenomenon on the market for sex and relationships. There are tons of scientific angles available for approaching the issue. Why is this happening? What has changed? What factors can contribute? Flagging comments such as "that's good, all sex should happen in a marriage anyway" would be contributing to the discussion, flagging the entire topic would not be.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - novia 8y ago
    >> To me (and many others) this topic is political in nature and controversial. > How so? It's in the very next sentence. But oh by the way, the author doesn't have a great track record on this issue. https://slate.com/business/2018/05/robin-hanson-the-sex-redistribution-professor-interviewed.html https://slate.com/business/2018/05/robin-hanson-the-sex-redi...
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
- saagarjha 8y ago
  > Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. > Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. I feel like this is on-topic? I feel that the flag button is not there for "I found this uninteresting", because at any given time a significant portion of the articles on the front page are uninteresting to me. I don't go around flagging those because I'm sure others do find it interesting and it's possible to have a valid discussion about it without devolving into flamewars. > See for example the 2014 Isla Vista massacre. FWIW, this was not covered by Hacker News.
- dreaded 8y ago
  You initially claimed that you flagged the article because it doesn't meet your "lived experiences". When challenged on the validity of that reasoning you abandon that claim and now justify flagging it because it's "political in nature and controversial". The truth is you simply don't like what's being said and would therefor like to suppress it, and lacking a more valid motivation will concoct whatever justification you think will be seen as valid, as you've already demonstrated. By misrepresenting your motivations you've shown that you're acting in bad faith, and because you're acting in bad faith any further justifications you offer should be disregarded.

taxicabjesus 8y ago

Men and women are wired to go about relationships differently. One problem is that people don't come with clear instruction manuals to help us understand how the relationship game works. > I'm really tired of the incel narrative Men generally play a numbers game, where their romantic overtures get rejected most of the time. It doesn't help that a lot of the time their romantic overtures are annoying [1]. Supposed "incels" just have no idea what it is that makes them so obnoxious [2]. Women have to screen candidates until they find someone they think is interesting. > Seeing us represented this way really stresses me out. Maybe the comment section on these types of articles 'stress you out' because you see a bunch of men debating their "flat earth" theories of how women go about relationships, you can tell that their theories are clearly wrong, but there's no point in even trying to expand their 'flat earth relationship' theories? Sociologists have determined that men peak sexually around 18 years old [3]. Women peak at a much later age (30's and 40's). Hopefully better understanding will help the stress you experience dissipate. > I'm just here to learn about tech stuff, geez. Interpersonal relationships can be hacked too. Women especially need constructive strategies to better deal with unwanted overtures from the other gender. I try to provide constructive comments on the topic. This comment was about how my passengers helped me figure out "attraction": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17810906 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17810906 (this one got lots of upvotes and downvotes). For the record, I never hit on my passengers, but sometimes they were intrigued by me... [1] "As a woman, is it simply 'understood' that you’ll have to contend with inappropriate male advances & suggestive language?" - https://www.quora.com/As-a-woman-is-it-simply-understood-that-you-ll-have-to-contend-with-inappropriate-male-advances-suggestive-language/answer/Molly-Carter-2 https://www.quora.com/As-a-woman-is-it-simply-understood-tha... [2] my comment ending with "Relationship coaching for men is mostly about teaching them how to be less obnoxious." - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17554503 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17554503 [3] "But around the time I turned 29 or 30 I rapidly began to lose interest in sex." - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19602351 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19602351

novia 8y ago
> Women have to screen candidates until they find someone they think is interesting. This is exactly the kind of harmful narrative I'm talking about. > Sociologists have determined that men peak sexually around 18 years old [3]. Women peak at a much later age (30's and 40's). Hopefully better understanding will help the stress you experience dissipate. The stress has absolutely NOTHING to do with that. BUT, since you brought it up, OkCupid had a pretty detailed analysis that showed much the opposite when it comes to the age that people are interested. Linking because you might be interested, not because it's relevant. https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/1600/0*q95i3Ma24k-hxBtK.png https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/1600/0*q95i3Ma24k-hxBtK.... https://theblog.okcupid.com/the-case-for-an-older-woman-99d8cabacdf5 https://theblog.okcupid.com/the-case-for-an-older-woman-99d8...

the-great-assyr 8y ago

As a matter of fact, your lived experience is nothing and count nothing in this contest, because the article talk about statistics and statistics don't care about your personal lived experience; so your rant is totally misplaced and your flag was just showed the snowflake you are. What about behave like a mature adult and take the figures and numbers for what they are and not as a personal attack? "incel narrative"? Really?? Are you a sjw reeeeeeing for whatever, by any chance? Go get a soy latte, some homeopathic sedative and some yoga, you oversensitive snowflake.

michaelmrose 8y ago

I am honestly still trying to figure out how the male 9s and 10s are supposed to be monopolizing all the female 1s-3s when they wont look at them. I swear everyone I have ever conversed with that believes that attractive men were monopolizing all the women was a 2 with a really negative attitude towards women. The best part is where they diss the kind of woman they actually COULD potentially date as fat or dumpy and ergo beneath them. My theory is its a perception and attitude problem not societies problem. The internet shows them an entire planet full of women that are out of their league and they fail to chase the people who actually could be their mates.

novia 8y ago
I like your theory about entitlement issues, but in the future could you please try to make it without resorting to reducing humans to numbers? This is the sort of rhetoric that leads to comments like this one: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19601799 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19601799 I know it's basically part of the language at this point, and I'm definitely guilty of it too, but really, it's dehumanizing and implies a static unchanging nature to attractiveness that really isn't there. Women aren't the borg. We're a collection of individuals, each with our own personal preferences, which can and do vary wildly from the personal preferences of other women.