4 ms·

This gets close but misses the obvious reason for any recent spike: “ It’s easy to speculate about the reasons for this increase: a financial crisis that awake

This gets close but misses the obvious reason for any recent spike: “ It’s easy to speculate about the reasons for this increase: a financial crisis that awakened Americans to the widening gaps between rich and poor; an opioid epidemic caused by corporate greed; entrenched racism and sexism; bitterly divided partisan politics; and, of course, technological change” It’s not “partisan politics,” we feel alienated because we are witnessing the attempted dismantling of modern democracy by a transnational network of would-be fascists. We feel alienated because a man who admitted on tape to being a serial rapist was subsequently elect4d president. We feel alienated because the police are murdering innocent civilizations with shocking regularity, as are Private individuals with guns. Non of this is “partisan”... the government and its allies around the world are openly hostile to the interests of the public. That is, well, alienating,

dang 7y ago
Please don't take HN threads into flamewar. This is going the wrong way down a one way street. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- ForrestN 7y ago
  So funny to return to this after reading through the fact-free chaos of the ‘socialist website” Assange disinformation and the attending praise of Wikileaks. Hopefully one day we can go through a collective process of settling on what’s true and what isn’t, and prioritizing true stuff! I heard this happened at a grand scale, the enlightenment, I think it was called?
- ForrestN 7y ago
  That anyone here would disagree with the above facts, let alone see the possibility for them to be widely controversial, is a searing indictment of our situation as a community. Why talk about collective stress if it’s a faux pas to mention the actual real source of it for non-rich non-Californians? Ah well I guess it’s delusional to imagine a more realistic and engaged grappling with political reality to venture here. There’s too much money to be made I guess. Don’t want distractions like using our massive power to help save our democracy to free in.

dang 7y ago

Please don't take HN threads into flamewar. This is going the wrong way down a one way street. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

ForrestN 7y ago
So funny to return to this after reading through the fact-free chaos of the ‘socialist website” Assange disinformation and the attending praise of Wikileaks. Hopefully one day we can go through a collective process of settling on what’s true and what isn’t, and prioritizing true stuff! I heard this happened at a grand scale, the enlightenment, I think it was called?
ForrestN 7y ago
That anyone here would disagree with the above facts, let alone see the possibility for them to be widely controversial, is a searing indictment of our situation as a community. Why talk about collective stress if it’s a faux pas to mention the actual real source of it for non-rich non-Californians? Ah well I guess it’s delusional to imagine a more realistic and engaged grappling with political reality to venture here. There’s too much money to be made I guess. Don’t want distractions like using our massive power to help save our democracy to free in.