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This comment is deeply inappropriate. Engaging in ideological flamewar is against HN guidelines and is just plain rude to all of the HN folks who actually work

This comment is deeply inappropriate. Engaging in ideological flamewar is against HN guidelines and is just plain rude to all of the HN folks who actually work in the field you're being casually dismissive of.

phinnaeus 3y ago
Genuinely trying to understand your point of view. How is this potentially offensive to anyone other than the lawmaker who decides that cable theft should carry such a harsh sentence? I don't understand how this could be construed as derogatory toward, for example, people who work at a cable company.
mabbo 3y ago
[flagged]
- torstenvl 3y ago
  > I wonder if there's any good data on the sentencing for cable theft broken down by race. If there were, that would arguably be good content for HN. In the absence of such data, completely baseless allegations of systemic racism are ideological flamewar and do not belong here.
  - stonogo 3y ago
    In what world is "I wonder if" a "baseless allegation"? It seems to me we're still several steps away from alleging anything and you're going off half-cocked.
  - profile53 3y ago
    > completely baseless allegations of systemic racism Pretty much all scientific literature in the last 40 years agrees that there is systemic racism throughout the legal system. Your choice not to believe it does not make most existing scientific research ‘an ideological flame war’.
profile53 3y ago
I don’t think the parent post was engaging in an ideological flame war. As a way to start educating yourself, I’d recommend reading about the correlation between long jail sentences and African American heritage. https://www.opensocietyfoundations.org/publications/racial-disparity-sentencing https://www.opensocietyfoundations.org/publications/racial-d... (Edit: this DOJ report is more relevant to the time period of the article. https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/sfc-drmtsg8690.pdf https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/sfc-drmtsg8690.pdf) Deny the bad sides of America all you want, but given US history, the parent presents a very likely hypothesis.
- deleted 3y ago
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- deleted 3y ago
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- torstenvl 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - l33t7332273 3y ago
    I wish you would use your expertise to share some knowledge instead of just shutting down the conversation.
  - marcus0x62 3y ago
    [flagged]
  - dylan604 3y ago
    [flagged]
- deleted 3y ago
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acheron 3y ago
What a thread. Guy randomly claiming “the racism” with literally no evidence gets upvoted, while you who know what you’re talking about try pointing out that it’s nonsense and get downvoted and flagged. I know it’s an old guideline to not claim HN is turning into Reddit, and I used to agree with it, but at least since Reddit killed Apollo etc and drove people away a lot of them seem to have come here, so it may really be happening this time. HN was pretty good while it lasted I guess.
- shkkmo 3y ago
  There was no claim of racism, there was speculation that was reasonably on topic and at least somewhat credible given the history of racial disparities in sentencing rules. Downvoting this speculation as low value is also fine since it doesn't really add any constructive value to the conversation. The only thing here that is close to "deeply inappropriate" was the response asserting that this speculation constitutes a "flamewar" (which is not what that term means at all) rather than bothering to try to refute the speculation with any real information or data that would contribute to creating a constructive discussion.

phinnaeus 3y ago

Genuinely trying to understand your point of view. How is this potentially offensive to anyone other than the lawmaker who decides that cable theft should carry such a harsh sentence? I don't understand how this could be construed as derogatory toward, for example, people who work at a cable company.

mabbo 3y ago

[flagged]

torstenvl 3y ago
> I wonder if there's any good data on the sentencing for cable theft broken down by race. If there were, that would arguably be good content for HN. In the absence of such data, completely baseless allegations of systemic racism are ideological flamewar and do not belong here.
- stonogo 3y ago
  In what world is "I wonder if" a "baseless allegation"? It seems to me we're still several steps away from alleging anything and you're going off half-cocked.
- profile53 3y ago
  > completely baseless allegations of systemic racism Pretty much all scientific literature in the last 40 years agrees that there is systemic racism throughout the legal system. Your choice not to believe it does not make most existing scientific research ‘an ideological flame war’.

profile53 3y ago

I don’t think the parent post was engaging in an ideological flame war. As a way to start educating yourself, I’d recommend reading about the correlation between long jail sentences and African American heritage. https://www.opensocietyfoundations.org/publications/racial-disparity-sentencing https://www.opensocietyfoundations.org/publications/racial-d... (Edit: this DOJ report is more relevant to the time period of the article. https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/sfc-drmtsg8690.pdf https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/sfc-drmtsg8690.pdf) Deny the bad sides of America all you want, but given US history, the parent presents a very likely hypothesis.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
deleted 3y ago
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torstenvl 3y ago
[flagged]
- l33t7332273 3y ago
  I wish you would use your expertise to share some knowledge instead of just shutting down the conversation.
- marcus0x62 3y ago
  [flagged]
- dylan604 3y ago
  [flagged]
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

acheron 3y ago

What a thread. Guy randomly claiming “the racism” with literally no evidence gets upvoted, while you who know what you’re talking about try pointing out that it’s nonsense and get downvoted and flagged. I know it’s an old guideline to not claim HN is turning into Reddit, and I used to agree with it, but at least since Reddit killed Apollo etc and drove people away a lot of them seem to have come here, so it may really be happening this time. HN was pretty good while it lasted I guess.

shkkmo 3y ago
There was no claim of racism, there was speculation that was reasonably on topic and at least somewhat credible given the history of racial disparities in sentencing rules. Downvoting this speculation as low value is also fine since it doesn't really add any constructive value to the conversation. The only thing here that is close to "deeply inappropriate" was the response asserting that this speculation constitutes a "flamewar" (which is not what that term means at all) rather than bothering to try to refute the speculation with any real information or data that would contribute to creating a constructive discussion.