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Paul said you don't have to be rich. Matthew responded as if he'd said that it's not beneficial to have a safety net. That's putting a statement in to his mouth

Paul said you don't have to be rich. Matthew responded as if he'd said that it's not beneficial to have a safety net. That's putting a statement in to his mouth that he did not make. Anything more than a "fuck off" from PG was charitable.

casion 7y ago
The problem is that it gets read as a false dilemma. Talking about rich people and saying "you don't have to be rich to..." is like walking into a room of black people and saying "You don't have to be white to...". Nobody there is going to think that you're talking about asians. The statement doesn't really say anything except that 'being rich' is something that can come from some other non-rich state. It doesn't specify at what level you can be to reach that state. He could be implying that poverty is sufficient, or "middle-class" or that upper class CT is sufficient (and we don't even know if he thinks that means " rich"). It's just a complete non-statement that attempts to pander to an audience that has little choice but to misinterpret it or assume that he's stating the blindingly obvious.
- Consultant32452 7y ago
  I don't think it matters what we're defining as rich. We can be honest without being destructive. I feel like our culture is constantly telling people they can't do anything with their life if they don't have every box of privilege checked. It's terribly psychologically destructive. Life is a constant struggle,a real river of shit sometimes, but it's one in which our own actions are still the biggest determining factor in our long term outcomes.
  - zepto 7y ago
    Except not. Life is obviously not an equally constant struggle for everyone. Social mobility has been declining for years. For any individual you can create a counterfactual to suggest that their choices are what created their outcome. However it’s also unarguable that we are not all facing the same risk/reward choices. And of course people who take on more risk are going to fail more often. And those without a safety net will end up worse off than where they started. It wouldn’t be risk otherwise.
    - Consultant32452 7y ago
      Yep, some things are a little bit harder than they might have been in the very recent past for some people, but overall life is better than it has ever been in the history of the world. Telling kids to stay in their lane because it's hard to do otherwise it's terrible leadership in my opinion.
      - zepto 7y ago
        Nobody is telling kids to stay in their lane, so that’s a straw man. However some people are proving that they don’t understand the risks other people face, and recommending that they take them anyway. Advising someone to take a risk that you don’t understand is not leadership.
        Consultant32452 7y ago
        Is high achievement possible for poor people or not? That's the only thing in question here. Arguing that it's harder for people who start off disadvantaged in some way is a tautology, and in context does nothing but discourage people. People don't need you to tell them about their risks, they live them every day. What they need is for people to shine a light on their opportunities. Because that's the part that's harder to see if they aren't in an environment where other people are succeeding.
        zepto 7y ago
        You’re making a false distinction between risks and opportunities. A startup is both a risk, and an opportunity. If you incorrectly judge that risk, you have the potential to end up with fewer opportunities than before. The poorer you are the worse the impact of this will be. Therefore it is important for anyone, rich or poor, to have a good assessment of the risk of trying to launch a startup. How are people who aren’t in an environment where people are succeeding supposed to accurately judge the risk of a startup when that information is not in their environment? They clearly do need accurate information about the risks associated with startups. It’s clearly true that it is harder for some people than others. Arguing against this may be ‘encouraging’, but it’s also arguing against accurate risk assessment which is foolhardy in business. If Paul Graham want to help poor people take risks, using this binary argument is not the way to go about it. He should use some of his resources to produce some realistic risk assessments so that people know what they are taking on.
JangoSteve 7y ago
I think the response was reading more into the meaning behind what pg said than the actual words he used. This makes sense to a degree, since what pg actually said makes little sense unless you read more into it. When people say startups are for rich kids, they probably don't mean you _have_ to be rich to succeed in startups, since there are plenty of examples to the contrary. What they mean is that your chances of success are significantly higher when you already have means. So pg arguing that startups aren't for rich kids probably isn't just a claim that you don't need to be rich to start a startup, because that would be a response to a claim no one is making. I think this is why it's reasonable (maybe incorrect, but reasonable) for some people to infer that pg is trying to discredit the underlying notion actually meant by such claims as he referenced, which is that building a successful startup is often less of a meritocracy than we'd like to believe. Of course we could argue all day about the nuances of each argument, and what was said versus what was meant. But we all know this is the problem with any claim made on Twitter; it invites inference, since abbreviated excerpts don't allow for proper context or dialogue.
idlewords 7y ago
Graham said you don't have to have a certain class background, and then cited the example of three people with that background. Read the entire exchange. He's talking specifically about upper middle class kids—his words.
noelsusman 7y ago
Having a safety net is what people mean when they say you have to be rich to found a startup. If you have a place you can always go if things go south, then you are "rich", even if you personally struggle to pay rent on a regular basis. I was poor in college like a lot of people, but I had a stable family I could rely on. I knew people who didn't have that, and they had to make very different decisions than I did. I didn't have much money in my bank account, but I was rich compared to many of my peers. No matter how badly things went for me, there was no scenario that would have left me homeless or hungry. If PG's only point is "you don't literally need a six-figure salary to found a startup" then he's arguing against a strawman.

casion 7y ago

The problem is that it gets read as a false dilemma. Talking about rich people and saying "you don't have to be rich to..." is like walking into a room of black people and saying "You don't have to be white to...". Nobody there is going to think that you're talking about asians. The statement doesn't really say anything except that 'being rich' is something that can come from some other non-rich state. It doesn't specify at what level you can be to reach that state. He could be implying that poverty is sufficient, or "middle-class" or that upper class CT is sufficient (and we don't even know if he thinks that means " rich"). It's just a complete non-statement that attempts to pander to an audience that has little choice but to misinterpret it or assume that he's stating the blindingly obvious.

Consultant32452 7y ago
I don't think it matters what we're defining as rich. We can be honest without being destructive. I feel like our culture is constantly telling people they can't do anything with their life if they don't have every box of privilege checked. It's terribly psychologically destructive. Life is a constant struggle,a real river of shit sometimes, but it's one in which our own actions are still the biggest determining factor in our long term outcomes.
- zepto 7y ago
  Except not. Life is obviously not an equally constant struggle for everyone. Social mobility has been declining for years. For any individual you can create a counterfactual to suggest that their choices are what created their outcome. However it’s also unarguable that we are not all facing the same risk/reward choices. And of course people who take on more risk are going to fail more often. And those without a safety net will end up worse off than where they started. It wouldn’t be risk otherwise.
  - Consultant32452 7y ago
    Yep, some things are a little bit harder than they might have been in the very recent past for some people, but overall life is better than it has ever been in the history of the world. Telling kids to stay in their lane because it's hard to do otherwise it's terrible leadership in my opinion.
    - zepto 7y ago
      Nobody is telling kids to stay in their lane, so that’s a straw man. However some people are proving that they don’t understand the risks other people face, and recommending that they take them anyway. Advising someone to take a risk that you don’t understand is not leadership.
      - Consultant32452 7y ago
        Is high achievement possible for poor people or not? That's the only thing in question here. Arguing that it's harder for people who start off disadvantaged in some way is a tautology, and in context does nothing but discourage people. People don't need you to tell them about their risks, they live them every day. What they need is for people to shine a light on their opportunities. Because that's the part that's harder to see if they aren't in an environment where other people are succeeding.
        zepto 7y ago
        You’re making a false distinction between risks and opportunities. A startup is both a risk, and an opportunity. If you incorrectly judge that risk, you have the potential to end up with fewer opportunities than before. The poorer you are the worse the impact of this will be. Therefore it is important for anyone, rich or poor, to have a good assessment of the risk of trying to launch a startup. How are people who aren’t in an environment where people are succeeding supposed to accurately judge the risk of a startup when that information is not in their environment? They clearly do need accurate information about the risks associated with startups. It’s clearly true that it is harder for some people than others. Arguing against this may be ‘encouraging’, but it’s also arguing against accurate risk assessment which is foolhardy in business. If Paul Graham want to help poor people take risks, using this binary argument is not the way to go about it. He should use some of his resources to produce some realistic risk assessments so that people know what they are taking on.

JangoSteve 7y ago

I think the response was reading more into the meaning behind what pg said than the actual words he used. This makes sense to a degree, since what pg actually said makes little sense unless you read more into it. When people say startups are for rich kids, they probably don't mean you _have_ to be rich to succeed in startups, since there are plenty of examples to the contrary. What they mean is that your chances of success are significantly higher when you already have means. So pg arguing that startups aren't for rich kids probably isn't just a claim that you don't need to be rich to start a startup, because that would be a response to a claim no one is making. I think this is why it's reasonable (maybe incorrect, but reasonable) for some people to infer that pg is trying to discredit the underlying notion actually meant by such claims as he referenced, which is that building a successful startup is often less of a meritocracy than we'd like to believe. Of course we could argue all day about the nuances of each argument, and what was said versus what was meant. But we all know this is the problem with any claim made on Twitter; it invites inference, since abbreviated excerpts don't allow for proper context or dialogue.

idlewords 7y ago

Graham said you don't have to have a certain class background, and then cited the example of three people with that background. Read the entire exchange. He's talking specifically about upper middle class kids—his words.

noelsusman 7y ago

Having a safety net is what people mean when they say you have to be rich to found a startup. If you have a place you can always go if things go south, then you are "rich", even if you personally struggle to pay rent on a regular basis. I was poor in college like a lot of people, but I had a stable family I could rely on. I knew people who didn't have that, and they had to make very different decisions than I did. I didn't have much money in my bank account, but I was rich compared to many of my peers. No matter how badly things went for me, there was no scenario that would have left me homeless or hungry. If PG's only point is "you don't literally need a six-figure salary to found a startup" then he's arguing against a strawman.