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I would guess that any given technology-related topic is deeply deeply boring to a significant slice of the HN readership but we don't flag them just because cl

I would guess that any given technology-related topic is deeply deeply boring to a significant slice of the HN readership but we don't flag them just because cloud computing or database design is not a personal interest. We know that if it's a subject we find boring we can just not read it. It's the "sexism in technology" posts that are reflexively flagged and to me that suggests something more than boredom is at work, perhaps an unease with the whole topic. As if certain people can't even stand the idea being discussed anywhere around them.

DanBC 15y ago
There have been plenty of sexism in technology posts recently, many of which were not flagged and got many up votes and spent some time on the first page. But something with a stupid subject line ('OH HAI SEXISM' or whatever it was) is going to be flagged very quickly by lots of people. Especially if there have been lots of sexism in tech threads recently, especially if there have been threads about the same company recently. By "boring" people don't mean "not interesting to me"[1] they mean "unlikely to generate useful or interesting discussion". People tend to know exactly what they think about some subjects (Abortion, circumcision, "middle east problem", etc.). Thus, discussions about those subjects tend to have people talking at each other, not listening to each other, not sharing information. There are many places to have those discussions. It's nice that HN is free of that kind of discussion.