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Dang is great most of the time but effectively ends up pushing a "centrist" semi liberal view point. I do not envy what dang does. It's a hard job. But at the

Dang is great most of the time but effectively ends up pushing a "centrist" semi liberal view point. I do not envy what dang does. It's a hard job. But at the end of the day these positions end up effectively enforcing the middle ground logical fallacy.

chillacy 5y ago
From what I've seen and noticed myself, exposure and engaging with different arguments in good faith (e.g. able to switch sides and argue for the other side in as convincing a way, as one might do in a debate club) tends to either move people towards the center or makes them agnostic to any solution. At least in political questions, or questions of "ought" as opposed to "is".
dvt 5y ago
> I do not envy what dang does. It's a hard job. But at the end of the day these positions end up effectively enforcing the middle ground logical fallacy. Dang has personally dinged me a few times -- maybe I'd disagree with a few, but the guy seems alright. Sometimes I troll and don't get caught, sometimes I'm being honest but dang dings me. I dunno', but this is by far the best forum on the modern web. Of all fallacies, the "middle ground fallacy" seems to me to be the best.
dotnet00 5y ago
The middle ground "fallacy" as used by most people in reference to social media moderation is usually a strawman. Often pushed by the exact types of people responsible for social media being the divisive cesspool that it is. dang's job sucks, but him pushing for moderation (as in moderate behavior regardless of opinion being expressed) is exactly what makes HN enjoyable even in threads where I don't necessarily agree with the consensus.
- aaomidi 5y ago
  Liking moderate behavior is because you're a moderate. Which is basically my point. You didn't explain how it's a fallacy rather than just state it is. The middle ground might be right in some stuff, it might also be extremely damaging in others. I'm sure you can think of examples for that.
  - dotnet00 5y ago
    In my experience, when people cite the middle ground fallacy, it's because they're so radicalized that they believe that to a self-described centrist, the ideal compromise between genocide and no genocide is half a genocide, which is obviously a complete strawman. I've only ever seen it used in bad faith arguments of that sort, thus my previous comment. In my opinion that sort of ever more absurd "if you're not with us you're against us" type thinking is what has turned social media into such a cesspool, and by enforcing a sort of moderate state, that sort of person gets pushed away, making the space more tolerable for healthier minds. Eg. with abortion it's almost impossible to have a civil, nuanced debate on social media because the extremes of both sides have cemented themselves into (fairly hypocritical) positions that paint everyone who isn't fully with them as an enemy, even though there's a lot of room for reasonable compromise and healthy debate on the effects and tradeoffs of specifics of related policy.
    - aaomidi 5y ago
      I mean the example you give is actually great. The idea that everything should be a debate is kinda how things get pushed to really weird areas. Most Americans would argue (and there's data to back this up) that abortion shouldn't even be something that we need to have a nuanced discussion about. The idea of nuanced discussion for everything is how stuff get pushed into harmful and extremist views. The idea of "nuanced discussion" doesn't really work when the outcome of one side of the nuanced discussion is the subjugation of a whole class of people. America went through "nuanced discussion" about the "Japanese problem". It went through "nuanced discussion" about civil rights. Most of this ended up either literally fucking over a group of innocent people, or delaying action that should've been taken decades prior. The idea that a "nuanced discussion" is the way to go is exactly what that fallacy is talking about. Basically you can't have people's rights and lives talked about as if one side of the discussion has the right to take that away from them. Think about how long it took us to legalize gay marriage. The only thing that got the ball really rolling was stonewall. Or think about the Vietnam War. Extremists helped end it. How about climate change? Do we have a nuanced discussion between the older population who is going to be dead by the time this becomes a problem, or do we listen to the climate extemists who are generally younger and the ones who are going to get fucked by this? Anyway, middle ground politics is a dead area and not something that always works. The people who like it are generally the people who are fine with the status quo. So of course you're going to see angry view points (who most of the time have all the right to be angry) as a cesspool.
baisq 5y ago
I agree with you. In the interest of cohesion and to avoid conflict, every new user who posts their point of view and isn't a centrist-leaning-to-the-left progressive ends up banned in the end. Even if the new user is polite and well-meaning, after so many years the community is completely full of centrist progressives and every post that goes against that is a trigger for a flame war - in the interest of avoiding conflict it's easier to ban the new guy than it is to warn everybody involved.
- MrMan 5y ago
  There is nothing progressive about HN - it was created to push a libertarian agenda.
  - baisq 5y ago
    Back in the day, yes. Today, not at all. Everything you read here is regulation, regulation, regulation.
hoseja 5y ago
Vast majority of people are semi-liberal centrists.
- aaomidi 5y ago
  That's not necessarily a reason to push conversations to the middle.

chillacy 5y ago

From what I've seen and noticed myself, exposure and engaging with different arguments in good faith (e.g. able to switch sides and argue for the other side in as convincing a way, as one might do in a debate club) tends to either move people towards the center or makes them agnostic to any solution. At least in political questions, or questions of "ought" as opposed to "is".

dvt 5y ago

> I do not envy what dang does. It's a hard job. But at the end of the day these positions end up effectively enforcing the middle ground logical fallacy. Dang has personally dinged me a few times -- maybe I'd disagree with a few, but the guy seems alright. Sometimes I troll and don't get caught, sometimes I'm being honest but dang dings me. I dunno', but this is by far the best forum on the modern web. Of all fallacies, the "middle ground fallacy" seems to me to be the best.

dotnet00 5y ago

The middle ground "fallacy" as used by most people in reference to social media moderation is usually a strawman. Often pushed by the exact types of people responsible for social media being the divisive cesspool that it is. dang's job sucks, but him pushing for moderation (as in moderate behavior regardless of opinion being expressed) is exactly what makes HN enjoyable even in threads where I don't necessarily agree with the consensus.

aaomidi 5y ago
Liking moderate behavior is because you're a moderate. Which is basically my point. You didn't explain how it's a fallacy rather than just state it is. The middle ground might be right in some stuff, it might also be extremely damaging in others. I'm sure you can think of examples for that.
- dotnet00 5y ago
  In my experience, when people cite the middle ground fallacy, it's because they're so radicalized that they believe that to a self-described centrist, the ideal compromise between genocide and no genocide is half a genocide, which is obviously a complete strawman. I've only ever seen it used in bad faith arguments of that sort, thus my previous comment. In my opinion that sort of ever more absurd "if you're not with us you're against us" type thinking is what has turned social media into such a cesspool, and by enforcing a sort of moderate state, that sort of person gets pushed away, making the space more tolerable for healthier minds. Eg. with abortion it's almost impossible to have a civil, nuanced debate on social media because the extremes of both sides have cemented themselves into (fairly hypocritical) positions that paint everyone who isn't fully with them as an enemy, even though there's a lot of room for reasonable compromise and healthy debate on the effects and tradeoffs of specifics of related policy.
  - aaomidi 5y ago
    I mean the example you give is actually great. The idea that everything should be a debate is kinda how things get pushed to really weird areas. Most Americans would argue (and there's data to back this up) that abortion shouldn't even be something that we need to have a nuanced discussion about. The idea of nuanced discussion for everything is how stuff get pushed into harmful and extremist views. The idea of "nuanced discussion" doesn't really work when the outcome of one side of the nuanced discussion is the subjugation of a whole class of people. America went through "nuanced discussion" about the "Japanese problem". It went through "nuanced discussion" about civil rights. Most of this ended up either literally fucking over a group of innocent people, or delaying action that should've been taken decades prior. The idea that a "nuanced discussion" is the way to go is exactly what that fallacy is talking about. Basically you can't have people's rights and lives talked about as if one side of the discussion has the right to take that away from them. Think about how long it took us to legalize gay marriage. The only thing that got the ball really rolling was stonewall. Or think about the Vietnam War. Extremists helped end it. How about climate change? Do we have a nuanced discussion between the older population who is going to be dead by the time this becomes a problem, or do we listen to the climate extemists who are generally younger and the ones who are going to get fucked by this? Anyway, middle ground politics is a dead area and not something that always works. The people who like it are generally the people who are fine with the status quo. So of course you're going to see angry view points (who most of the time have all the right to be angry) as a cesspool.

baisq 5y ago

I agree with you. In the interest of cohesion and to avoid conflict, every new user who posts their point of view and isn't a centrist-leaning-to-the-left progressive ends up banned in the end. Even if the new user is polite and well-meaning, after so many years the community is completely full of centrist progressives and every post that goes against that is a trigger for a flame war - in the interest of avoiding conflict it's easier to ban the new guy than it is to warn everybody involved.

MrMan 5y ago
There is nothing progressive about HN - it was created to push a libertarian agenda.
- baisq 5y ago
  Back in the day, yes. Today, not at all. Everything you read here is regulation, regulation, regulation.

hoseja 5y ago

Vast majority of people are semi-liberal centrists.

aaomidi 5y ago
That's not necessarily a reason to push conversations to the middle.