4 ms·

Thanks, that's great to read. Why an overdose should make his passing "not great" is unclear.

silisili 5y ago
Just personal opinion, no offense meant. I tend to think, perhaps unfairly, of most drug abuse as someone suffering in some way. So I guess I'm glad in that based on that and his lasts posts, he seemed genuinely happy.
- jimmyvalmer 5y ago
millzlane 5y ago
Because anything other than a natural death usually isn't great. I sincerely hope this clears it up for you.
- eyelidlessness 5y ago
  - nsxwolf 5y ago
    If he died from something that could have been prevented, that’s extra sad, because he would have been around longer.
    - eyelidlessness 5y ago
      - eyelidlessness 5y ago
        As evidenced by the great curiosity of this community, apparently people are expected to just be alive indefinitely for their personal amusement rather than those individuals’ desires. Welp.
        sillysaurusx 5y ago
        I empathize with your point of view. Try to remember that you’re here to entertain HN readers, not the other way around. It helps dull the edge — at least it did for me. Being right and being substantive are two different things. You have to drape your contrarian viewpoint in the right sort of clothing. Otherwise no one ends up happy, and no one learns anything, which is approximately the worst outcome. “Chill; it doesn’t matter as much as it feels like it matters” is an alternative viewpoint, if that helps. Though if I heard it from someone, I suppose I’d just feel upset. Let’s put it this way. If you don’t want to amuse the community, you should lurk. I was salty about that for a long time before I just accepted it and moved on. And it’s not so bad. Being an entertainer is fun, and I was surprised to have some skill in that department. But you won’t discover something like that if you let a few downvotes shake your temperament. Take solace in being right. Most people are wrong most of the time, so it’s no small thing.
        eyelidlessness 5y ago
        I walked into a comment that expressed my feelings as invalid before I even participated. I am cool with that most of the time but I’m still going to express my feelings some of the time too. I really appreciate the kindness of your response but I don’t really care about being right. I care about some expressions being welcome as part of a conversation and challenges to those being unwelcome, under the guise of “curiosity”.
        sillysaurusx 5y ago
        I hear you. All I can say is that I feel like I went through a similar struggle, and ultimately had to accept that HN now consists of millions of people. Just from a logical standpoint, it's not realistic to expect that all viewpoints will be welcomed by all people, no matter how they're expressed. If you game it out, the outcome is that either we all get along with each other, or the place burns down. You might think that's hyperbole, but HN walks a delicate tightrope -- pretty much zero social networks from 2001 stayed relevant in 2021. So it'd be very possible to blink twice and wake up a decade later and wonder "Where did HN go?" That, more than any other, is the defining struggle of the community; particularly as it continues to grow. The problem with expressing my feelings was that I pretty much always did it because it felt good, rather than because I was trying to help someone else. Eventually I came to realize that this was both selfish and unproductive, so I tried to change habits. And I still fall back into the old ways sometimes, though the last couple years have been a marked improvement. Ask yourself: What benefit is there from expressing your feelings? I hate to phrase it like that, but it was an uncomfortable truth that I was always reluctant to face. Perhaps you know of a benefit that I overlooked. If so, I'd appreciate hearing it. Ultimately I just had to stomach the fact that if I wanted to participate, I'd need to face "the community" as it is: a collection of people looking to pass the time and amuse themselves. It's nothing more and nothing less. The implications of that pretty much shattered my existing worldview, because I had to face the fact that no, the community isn't here to find some sort of enlightened viewpoint, and no, no one is going to care about me personally. Which meant that if I acted in selfish ways, no one would gain a thing -- all it would do is upset people to varying degrees. Particularly myself. I ended up happier by caring less about myself and more about the people I was talking to. I don't know if it would work for others. But you seemed sad that the community was letting you down, as I once felt, so I wanted to at least try to reframe the problem as a matter of perspective. I see you've been around HN since 2008. For what it's worth, so have I. It's really hard to let go of the old community. But we have no choice; we now live awash in an ocean of people, and those original ~5,000 commenters in 2008 may as well be tiny islands. We're still here as individuals. But if you're hoping "the community" is going to feel this way or that way, well... That path only ended with a sort of bitterness that I was happy to leave behind. Perhaps you'll find a different way out.
      - heleninboodler 5y ago
        It doesn't have to work for you. It's alright for other people to draw their own conclusions.
        eyelidlessness 5y ago
        Sorry, per the comment I was still responding to, it still doesn’t “clear it up” for me. The presumption was then that what works for them should work for me. The clarification did not clarify it for me. They had the expectation, not me.
        heleninboodler 5y ago
        I think it's a mistake to hear someone say "that's great" and infer from it that they have an expectation that you also think it's great. It's clearly a personal feeling about the situation, not an expectation of you.
HWR_14 5y ago
People usually take solace in a situation like this that there was no way to prevent it. If he had been doing a lot of drugs, the questions of "could/should someone have stoped him" would complicate people's emotions.
raunak 5y ago
I don't think it was intended in a judgement way insomuch as a "well it could have been prevented w/ Narcan or better drugs if it WAS an overdose"

Just personal opinion, no offense meant. I tend to think, perhaps unfairly, of most drug abuse as someone suffering in some way. So I guess I'm glad in that based on that and his lasts posts, he seemed genuinely happy.

jimmyvalmer 5y ago

millzlane 5y ago

Because anything other than a natural death usually isn't great. I sincerely hope this clears it up for you.

eyelidlessness 5y ago
- nsxwolf 5y ago
  If he died from something that could have been prevented, that’s extra sad, because he would have been around longer.
  - eyelidlessness 5y ago
    - eyelidlessness 5y ago
      As evidenced by the great curiosity of this community, apparently people are expected to just be alive indefinitely for their personal amusement rather than those individuals’ desires. Welp.
      - sillysaurusx 5y ago
        I empathize with your point of view. Try to remember that you’re here to entertain HN readers, not the other way around. It helps dull the edge — at least it did for me. Being right and being substantive are two different things. You have to drape your contrarian viewpoint in the right sort of clothing. Otherwise no one ends up happy, and no one learns anything, which is approximately the worst outcome. “Chill; it doesn’t matter as much as it feels like it matters” is an alternative viewpoint, if that helps. Though if I heard it from someone, I suppose I’d just feel upset. Let’s put it this way. If you don’t want to amuse the community, you should lurk. I was salty about that for a long time before I just accepted it and moved on. And it’s not so bad. Being an entertainer is fun, and I was surprised to have some skill in that department. But you won’t discover something like that if you let a few downvotes shake your temperament. Take solace in being right. Most people are wrong most of the time, so it’s no small thing.
        eyelidlessness 5y ago
        I walked into a comment that expressed my feelings as invalid before I even participated. I am cool with that most of the time but I’m still going to express my feelings some of the time too. I really appreciate the kindness of your response but I don’t really care about being right. I care about some expressions being welcome as part of a conversation and challenges to those being unwelcome, under the guise of “curiosity”.
        sillysaurusx 5y ago
        I hear you. All I can say is that I feel like I went through a similar struggle, and ultimately had to accept that HN now consists of millions of people. Just from a logical standpoint, it's not realistic to expect that all viewpoints will be welcomed by all people, no matter how they're expressed. If you game it out, the outcome is that either we all get along with each other, or the place burns down. You might think that's hyperbole, but HN walks a delicate tightrope -- pretty much zero social networks from 2001 stayed relevant in 2021. So it'd be very possible to blink twice and wake up a decade later and wonder "Where did HN go?" That, more than any other, is the defining struggle of the community; particularly as it continues to grow. The problem with expressing my feelings was that I pretty much always did it because it felt good, rather than because I was trying to help someone else. Eventually I came to realize that this was both selfish and unproductive, so I tried to change habits. And I still fall back into the old ways sometimes, though the last couple years have been a marked improvement. Ask yourself: What benefit is there from expressing your feelings? I hate to phrase it like that, but it was an uncomfortable truth that I was always reluctant to face. Perhaps you know of a benefit that I overlooked. If so, I'd appreciate hearing it. Ultimately I just had to stomach the fact that if I wanted to participate, I'd need to face "the community" as it is: a collection of people looking to pass the time and amuse themselves. It's nothing more and nothing less. The implications of that pretty much shattered my existing worldview, because I had to face the fact that no, the community isn't here to find some sort of enlightened viewpoint, and no, no one is going to care about me personally. Which meant that if I acted in selfish ways, no one would gain a thing -- all it would do is upset people to varying degrees. Particularly myself. I ended up happier by caring less about myself and more about the people I was talking to. I don't know if it would work for others. But you seemed sad that the community was letting you down, as I once felt, so I wanted to at least try to reframe the problem as a matter of perspective. I see you've been around HN since 2008. For what it's worth, so have I. It's really hard to let go of the old community. But we have no choice; we now live awash in an ocean of people, and those original ~5,000 commenters in 2008 may as well be tiny islands. We're still here as individuals. But if you're hoping "the community" is going to feel this way or that way, well... That path only ended with a sort of bitterness that I was happy to leave behind. Perhaps you'll find a different way out.
    - heleninboodler 5y ago
      It doesn't have to work for you. It's alright for other people to draw their own conclusions.
      - eyelidlessness 5y ago
        Sorry, per the comment I was still responding to, it still doesn’t “clear it up” for me. The presumption was then that what works for them should work for me. The clarification did not clarify it for me. They had the expectation, not me.
        heleninboodler 5y ago
        I think it's a mistake to hear someone say "that's great" and infer from it that they have an expectation that you also think it's great. It's clearly a personal feeling about the situation, not an expectation of you.

HWR_14 5y ago

People usually take solace in a situation like this that there was no way to prevent it. If he had been doing a lot of drugs, the questions of "could/should someone have stoped him" would complicate people's emotions.

raunak 5y ago

I don't think it was intended in a judgement way insomuch as a "well it could have been prevented w/ Narcan or better drugs if it WAS an overdose"