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While I agree with the idea of the article, this sort of writing style always makes me feel like the author should be discussing this with a therapist instead o
by palijer 5y ago
While I agree with the idea of the article, this sort of writing style always makes me feel like the author should be discussing this with a therapist instead of focusing and working on it.
Not that they aren't correct here, but the "let me put a list of wrong opinions I disagree with that people could hold and get mad about it" theme never felt mentally healthy to me. I catch myself doing this all the time however.
- coldtea 5y agoI feel like we didn't learn a lot about the TFA author in this comment, but more about a pet concern of yours? The author critiques the cliches, misinformation, wrong ideas, and romantization journalists use when writing about Africa. These are not merely some "opinions they disagree with", these are wrong and lazy writing, and it's a bad public service (they are getting millions of people the wrong ideas about a place). It surely deserves to be critiqued.
- palijer 5y agoYou are absolutely correct that it does deserve to be critiqued, and it is important to do so. What makes me feel weird about the style however is there aren't any example of this, so if a reader does not know the field well of the common tropes, it feels like the author is just throwing together opinions people could possess (let's say opinions on how to write an Article about Africa), and then promote anger over how such people could exist.
- bsanr2 5y agohttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26383977 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26383977 Declaring mental illness in the face of exposed bigotry is a classic tactic, meant to discredit legitimate and reasoned grievance.
- workaccount21 5y agoHe's talking about the writing style, and I tend to agree.
- bsanr2 5y agoYou both are dangerously close to accusing him of being inarticulate. I would ask you to rethink your agreement, for your own sake.
- throwaway894345 5y agoNormally I'm put off by cynical writing styles like this, but this time I enjoyed it. I think it was well done. I also liked that the viewpoint wasn't predictable or at least one with which I'm already very familiar--for example, I'm very familiar with the anti-Western tropes and I'm familiar with pro-Western tropes but this article was refreshingly critical of anti-West Westerners who purport to care about Africa--that's novel to me, anyway.