3 ms·

Thanks. By the way, your explanation of that persecution complex was good. The challenge is people (like me) looking at and thinking “yeah, sounds correct exce

Thanks. By the way, your explanation of that persecution complex was good. The challenge is people (like me) looking at and thinking “yeah, sounds correct except in my case, where I know for a fact I’m a persecuted minority on HN” But maybe it’s enough to convince people in general that there’s no such persecution going on, even if there is. That way comments like mine that imply it’s existence end up with -10 instead of +23 or whatever. So fewer tedious comments, but maybe easier for the downvoting/flaming/flagging cabals (should they exist) to take control of the narrative on HN. You’ve been doing this a long time. So you’ll probably make a good decision, whatever you decide.

dang 5y ago
> “yeah, sounds correct except in my case, where I know for a fact I’m a persecuted minority on HN” Exactly! that's how we all do it. The weird thing is that even when you become aware of it, it doesn't stop. You simply become aware that you think this way, just as everyone thinks this way, and that despite knowing this, you still feel that you are the noble exception to the universal rule—a human among worms, as it were. It is like an optical illusion that persists even after you know that it is an illusion. However, the awareness seems to have the effect of modulating one's behavior, which is the important thing. I suppose it's still an open question what really has a chance of shifting this at a community level. Asking people to go against human nature is a tall order. One thing I've tried is pointing people to similar-but-opposite generalizations being made by the other side; or showing them long lists of contradictory generalizations, like here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26148870 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26148870. I'm not sure it really helps, though.

dang 5y ago

> “yeah, sounds correct except in my case, where I know for a fact I’m a persecuted minority on HN” Exactly! that's how we all do it. The weird thing is that even when you become aware of it, it doesn't stop. You simply become aware that you think this way, just as everyone thinks this way, and that despite knowing this, you still feel that you are the noble exception to the universal rule—a human among worms, as it were. It is like an optical illusion that persists even after you know that it is an illusion. However, the awareness seems to have the effect of modulating one's behavior, which is the important thing. I suppose it's still an open question what really has a chance of shifting this at a community level. Asking people to go against human nature is a tall order. One thing I've tried is pointing people to similar-but-opposite generalizations being made by the other side; or showing them long lists of contradictory generalizations, like here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26148870 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26148870. I'm not sure it really helps, though.