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I have never seen anyone on HN questioning another person's humanity. That's pretty messed up if it has happened. I understand why you wouldn't want to provid

I have never seen anyone on HN questioning another person's humanity. That's pretty messed up if it has happened. I understand why you wouldn't want to provide any additional details, but it's also hard to take your claims at face value given my own experience. Perhaps you could share examples which do not compromise your own identity?

briefcomment 6y ago
If you bring up Trump in any positive capacity, you are downvoted, and sometimes your values are called into question, as if there is literally only way way to think about Trump.
- Jordrok 6y ago
  Of course, downvotes and disagreement are hardly an attack on a person's humanity. After all, what's more human than having stupid opinions?
  - briefcomment 6y ago
    What’s more dehumanizing than reducing a person to an inanimate nuisance that should be swept aside? A caring human tries to change other people’s minds, instead of signaling that someone else should just go away. Heathy disagreements and downvotes are hardly equivalent.
    - srean 6y ago
      One can lead a horse to the water but not make it drink it. After many a 'leading' it can become tiresome and a times pointless to have a discussion where the participants have strongly held incompatible beliefs.
      - briefcomment 6y ago
        So then it makes sense to disappear comments? Downvoting wouldn’t be bad if comments remained, but only a few downvotes net will bury a comment point. Make it 50 downvoted net at least.
- pcstl 6y ago
  Aaaand you've already been downvoted.
- pmiller2 6y ago
  You also get downvotes if you dare to question capitalism or the "free market." This isn't just an issue for right wingers.
- CivBase 6y ago
  Downvotes are not moderation, a censorship speech, or a statement anout the user's humanity. Votes are just a measure of popularity within a community.
  - briefcomment 6y ago
    If downvotes grey out and eventually disappear comments, they are moderation.
    - dang 6y ago
      Anyone can click on the timestamp link of a downvoted comment and get taken to a page where the text is fully readable. Yes it's an extra hop, but that's a small price to pay for an immune system.
      - briefcomment 6y ago
        I don't know. Seeing a greyed out post undeniably biases me against it, regardless of what the content actually is. It takes mental effort to give it fair consideration. Not sure if you've done this analysis yet, but I wouldn't be surprised if downvoted posts are mostly unpopular opinions, and not necessarily incorrect facts or egregiously bad takes.
        dang 6y ago
        That's far from the case.
        briefcomment 6y ago
        Ah ok. Any reason not to start greying comments out at a lower threshold of net downvotes?
        dang 6y ago
        I'm not sure I understand, but it seems like you mean greying out fewer comments, i.e. restricting it only to those which are more heavily downvoted? Unless we added some other visual indicator, that would be the same as ignoring the first 1 or more downvotes. I'm not sure that's a good idea because there's a lot of signal in comments being at 0 points, -1, etc., given that they start out at 1. Two things are true: (1) not all downvoted comments deserve that status; (2) most downvoted comments do deserve that status. #1 sucks, but #2 is really important. The benefit of displaying #2 outweighs the cost of #1, which is not to deny that cost. Of course it would be vastly better to only have the #2 comments displaying as downvoted, but with a community mechanism like downvoting, there's unfortunately no way to have only the benefit and not the cost. Moderation can help, though (we'll often restore comments that are unfairly downvoted) and maybe there's a place for something like vouching to return a comment to a neutral state.
minikites 6y ago
>I have never seen anyone on HN questioning another person's humanity. It's subtle and masked by the "politeness", that's the trick.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
belval 6y ago
Not the OP you were responding too, but a lot of the threads on immigration will have those types of personal attacks I don't have a specific one but they usually devolves in people against immigration being called sociopaths.
walkedaway 6y ago
Take a simple browse through a thread about Trump or his supporters for one example. There are many, many other examples as well.

briefcomment 6y ago

If you bring up Trump in any positive capacity, you are downvoted, and sometimes your values are called into question, as if there is literally only way way to think about Trump.

Jordrok 6y ago
Of course, downvotes and disagreement are hardly an attack on a person's humanity. After all, what's more human than having stupid opinions?
- briefcomment 6y ago
  What’s more dehumanizing than reducing a person to an inanimate nuisance that should be swept aside? A caring human tries to change other people’s minds, instead of signaling that someone else should just go away. Heathy disagreements and downvotes are hardly equivalent.
  - srean 6y ago
    One can lead a horse to the water but not make it drink it. After many a 'leading' it can become tiresome and a times pointless to have a discussion where the participants have strongly held incompatible beliefs.
    - briefcomment 6y ago
      So then it makes sense to disappear comments? Downvoting wouldn’t be bad if comments remained, but only a few downvotes net will bury a comment point. Make it 50 downvoted net at least.
pcstl 6y ago
Aaaand you've already been downvoted.
pmiller2 6y ago
You also get downvotes if you dare to question capitalism or the "free market." This isn't just an issue for right wingers.
CivBase 6y ago
Downvotes are not moderation, a censorship speech, or a statement anout the user's humanity. Votes are just a measure of popularity within a community.
- briefcomment 6y ago
  If downvotes grey out and eventually disappear comments, they are moderation.
  - dang 6y ago
    Anyone can click on the timestamp link of a downvoted comment and get taken to a page where the text is fully readable. Yes it's an extra hop, but that's a small price to pay for an immune system.
    - briefcomment 6y ago
      I don't know. Seeing a greyed out post undeniably biases me against it, regardless of what the content actually is. It takes mental effort to give it fair consideration. Not sure if you've done this analysis yet, but I wouldn't be surprised if downvoted posts are mostly unpopular opinions, and not necessarily incorrect facts or egregiously bad takes.
      - dang 6y ago
        That's far from the case.
        briefcomment 6y ago
        Ah ok. Any reason not to start greying comments out at a lower threshold of net downvotes?
        dang 6y ago
        I'm not sure I understand, but it seems like you mean greying out fewer comments, i.e. restricting it only to those which are more heavily downvoted? Unless we added some other visual indicator, that would be the same as ignoring the first 1 or more downvotes. I'm not sure that's a good idea because there's a lot of signal in comments being at 0 points, -1, etc., given that they start out at 1. Two things are true: (1) not all downvoted comments deserve that status; (2) most downvoted comments do deserve that status. #1 sucks, but #2 is really important. The benefit of displaying #2 outweighs the cost of #1, which is not to deny that cost. Of course it would be vastly better to only have the #2 comments displaying as downvoted, but with a community mechanism like downvoting, there's unfortunately no way to have only the benefit and not the cost. Moderation can help, though (we'll often restore comments that are unfairly downvoted) and maybe there's a place for something like vouching to return a comment to a neutral state.

minikites 6y ago

>I have never seen anyone on HN questioning another person's humanity. It's subtle and masked by the "politeness", that's the trick.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

belval 6y ago

Not the OP you were responding too, but a lot of the threads on immigration will have those types of personal attacks I don't have a specific one but they usually devolves in people against immigration being called sociopaths.

walkedaway 6y ago

Take a simple browse through a thread about Trump or his supporters for one example. There are many, many other examples as well.