4 ms·

This has a real "I've read Rand and I'm using cocaine" vibe.

redisman 5y ago
This article seems to be mostly very mediocre social commentary. Reminds me of an angsty high schooler (who’s somehow rich and defending their position) describing their view of society
- jlawson 5y ago
  Naval grew up poor in India.
  - lotsofpulp 5y ago
    I feel like a lot of the immigrants I meet from India are landowners there and not exactly the lower class. They all talk about having people to clean their houses and do their laundry. Not rich per American standards, but definitely people that have an option if their gambles don’t work out.
  - redisman 5y ago
    I mean he's defending his current status as a rich person.
  - bradlys 5y ago
    > Ravikant was born in New Delhi, India in 1974. He moved to New York with his mother and his brother, Kamal, when he was 9. He graduated from Stuyvesant High School in 1991.[6] He didn’t grow up poor in India. He went to Stuyvesant in NYC - one of the most prestigious high schools in the world. In another article: > His father was a pharmacist in India, but his pharmacist credentials were not acceptable to practice pharmacy in the United States. Both of Ravikants parents did clerical work in New York City after their move to New York City. Shortly after moving to New York City, Ravikant's parents split up, leaving his mother responsible for raising him and his brother for the majority of their childhoods. They weren’t poor. Never were poor. I don’t know if maybe a pharmacist in India is a worthless job that is comparable to a subsistence farmer but in the US, it pays pretty well. We all have different versions of poor but I think subsistence farmer when I hear poor - not the version I’ve heard from many people in India where if you clean your own house, you must be poor.
- xyzelement 5y ago
  I am going to venture a guess that both you and the parent you are replying to belong to exactly the same economic strata as your parents. You haven't had to build yourself up. For someone who has built their life from 0 dollars broke ass immigrant to being in the 1%, Naval's narrative resonates as exactly the right advice.
  - redisman 5y ago
    I make more money than both my parents combined and I'm an immigrant if that's somehow relevant.
  - vincent-toups 5y ago
    It is neither his ideology nor his advice that I'm taking exception to. What strikes me as the issue is that he identifies literally anyone who may level any criticism at him as acting in bad faith: purely participating in a game of status and an inferior one at that. Not only is it really unlikely that literally everyone who might have a different set of priorities than him is a crass social climber, but his need to describe them as such is immature, even if it were the case.
    - xyzelement 5y ago
      >What strikes me as the issue is that he identifies literally anyone who may level any criticism at him as acting in bad faith: purely participating in a game of status and an inferior one at that. Where did you get that? I read this part of the article as describing a mental model the author believes in. Thinking about it, the model matches up to my experience of the world. A thinker needs to be able to express their best thinking. If this is what he believes and can argue for, that's an intellectual service. We can use our own intellect to agree or not.
ProjectArcturis 5y ago
Yeah, he's correct you'll never make it to the top 0.01% working a job, but the jabs at socialists and the "makers vs. takers" are some Level 1 right-wing talking points. There certainly are makers and takers in our society, and the biggest takers are not the single parents getting $200 a month in food stamps, it's the capitalists whose businesses depend on cheating their workers out of wages, polluting the environment, and/or getting sweetheart government deals.
cushychicken 5y ago
It's been a long time since an HN comment made me laugh out loud. Thanks a bunch for breaking the drought.

This article seems to be mostly very mediocre social commentary. Reminds me of an angsty high schooler (who’s somehow rich and defending their position) describing their view of society

jlawson 5y ago
Naval grew up poor in India.
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  I feel like a lot of the immigrants I meet from India are landowners there and not exactly the lower class. They all talk about having people to clean their houses and do their laundry. Not rich per American standards, but definitely people that have an option if their gambles don’t work out.
- redisman 5y ago
  I mean he's defending his current status as a rich person.
- bradlys 5y ago
  > Ravikant was born in New Delhi, India in 1974. He moved to New York with his mother and his brother, Kamal, when he was 9. He graduated from Stuyvesant High School in 1991.[6] He didn’t grow up poor in India. He went to Stuyvesant in NYC - one of the most prestigious high schools in the world. In another article: > His father was a pharmacist in India, but his pharmacist credentials were not acceptable to practice pharmacy in the United States. Both of Ravikants parents did clerical work in New York City after their move to New York City. Shortly after moving to New York City, Ravikant's parents split up, leaving his mother responsible for raising him and his brother for the majority of their childhoods. They weren’t poor. Never were poor. I don’t know if maybe a pharmacist in India is a worthless job that is comparable to a subsistence farmer but in the US, it pays pretty well. We all have different versions of poor but I think subsistence farmer when I hear poor - not the version I’ve heard from many people in India where if you clean your own house, you must be poor.
xyzelement 5y ago
I am going to venture a guess that both you and the parent you are replying to belong to exactly the same economic strata as your parents. You haven't had to build yourself up. For someone who has built their life from 0 dollars broke ass immigrant to being in the 1%, Naval's narrative resonates as exactly the right advice.
- redisman 5y ago
  I make more money than both my parents combined and I'm an immigrant if that's somehow relevant.
- vincent-toups 5y ago
  It is neither his ideology nor his advice that I'm taking exception to. What strikes me as the issue is that he identifies literally anyone who may level any criticism at him as acting in bad faith: purely participating in a game of status and an inferior one at that. Not only is it really unlikely that literally everyone who might have a different set of priorities than him is a crass social climber, but his need to describe them as such is immature, even if it were the case.
  - xyzelement 5y ago
    >What strikes me as the issue is that he identifies literally anyone who may level any criticism at him as acting in bad faith: purely participating in a game of status and an inferior one at that. Where did you get that? I read this part of the article as describing a mental model the author believes in. Thinking about it, the model matches up to my experience of the world. A thinker needs to be able to express their best thinking. If this is what he believes and can argue for, that's an intellectual service. We can use our own intellect to agree or not.

ProjectArcturis 5y ago

Yeah, he's correct you'll never make it to the top 0.01% working a job, but the jabs at socialists and the "makers vs. takers" are some Level 1 right-wing talking points. There certainly are makers and takers in our society, and the biggest takers are not the single parents getting $200 a month in food stamps, it's the capitalists whose businesses depend on cheating their workers out of wages, polluting the environment, and/or getting sweetheart government deals.

cushychicken 5y ago

It's been a long time since an HN comment made me laugh out loud. Thanks a bunch for breaking the drought.