10 ms·

I Can't Sleep

158 points by pbiggar 3y ago

pbiggar 3y ago
I hope people will engage with this. I see so many founders and employees in tech who feel unable to speak up about what they see happening in Gaza.
- Zetobal 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - pbiggar 3y ago
    You don't need propaganda. Just look at the death counts: 18,600 in two months.
    - Zetobal 3y ago
      Look at death counts of other wars in other parts of the world you are just ignoring.
      - pbiggar 3y ago
        This is classic redirection tactics, exactly as Lee Fang exposed last week [1]. You talk about those wars, I'll support you. I'll talk about this one [1] https://www.leefang.com/p/inside-the-pro-israel-information https://www.leefang.com/p/inside-the-pro-israel-information
        Zetobal 3y ago
        No it's not tell me why you can't sleep when 18600 people get killed but you can sleep like a baby when you know there is a lot more suffering in places without the limelight. You writing about Palestine but not other conflicts says more about you than you want to admit. Hybris.
        jfoweif 3y ago
        Because he (and many others) are more invested in this war? That's why I care more, I didn't care about Russia/Ukraine but have far more knowledge and understanding of this one, and personal relationships.
        pbiggar 3y ago
        For me, Ukraine and Palestine are the same team: the oppressed fighting a powerful oppressor. Plus, I'm Irish - we're always on the side of the colonized. Though in this one, I live in the country oppressing (that being the US), and I'm part of the movement doing the oppressing (that being tech). So there's duty to speak up.
        borski 3y ago
        I think it’s interesting to equate Ukraine and Palestine, given that there are massive differences between the two. For one thing, Ukraine hadn’t spent the last few decades shooting dozens or hundreds of rocket into Russia every day. Putin’s war was precipitated by exactly nothing. Israel’s war was precipitated by the worst terror attack Israel has ever seen, along with hostages taken back to what is clearly an enemy state (from their perspective). Sure, both are wars. But that’s roughly where the similarities end.
        Zetobal 3y ago
        That's hybris.
        basilgohar 3y ago
        It's really bizarre that to speak out against any atrocity you must first speak out about all other atrocities of equal or greater measure. The funny thing is, the illegal occupation and oppression of Palestine and Palestinians is approaching a century, millions have been permanently displaced over generations, and Israel continues to illegally steal land that is internationally recognized as illegally occupied. The only "peace" deals that Israel has ever offered were ones that cemented and legalized their theft of the majority of Palestine's original land. So, yeah, when you put it that way, the Palestinian cause against the Zionists in Israel is really close to being, if not the most, one of the most outrageous perpetual atrocities of our time.
    - nashadelic 3y ago
      That’s one Oct 7 every 4 days for 67 days straight
    - brettgo1 3y ago
      Paul, tell me how to get Hamas (the terror group) out of Palestine. They killed 1,200 Israelis and foreigners, wounded 3400, took 100+ hostages including 30 children. What would you do? How can the ongoing conflict in the Gaza Strip, involving groups like Hamas and the state of Israel, be approached to reduce violence and improve safety for all parties involved? What strategies could be considered to address the challenges of urban and underground warfare, the protection of civilians, and the preservation of soldiers' lives, while seeking a path towards peace and stability in the region?
      - pbiggar 3y ago
        I'm not an expert on terrorism, obviously. I just believe that it's immoral to drop bombs on civilians. Like any other conflict, for a positive end result there has to be a meeting of the minds on both sides, committed to peace. So this is going to seem very one sided, but if you look prior to Oct 7, you can't have peace where one side controls everything, has all the resources, and uses them to keep the other population "occupied". That is always going to breed resistance. Very simply, for peace Israel should pull all the settlements out of the West Bank, pull back 50 miles from Gaza for a number of years, remove all checkpoints in the West Bank and Gaza, invest in the development of both areas, rebuild the airport they destroyed, stop and sign definitive peace accords allowing free movement and Right of Return for Palestinians, pay reparations for the destruction of Gaza and the damage to the West Bank (plus many other things that I won't list here), and finally on top of that invest in Palestine's future. The only good neighbour is a prosperous one.
        borski 3y ago
        > So this is going to seem very one sided, but if you look prior to Oct 7, you can't have peace where one side controls everything, has all the resources, and uses them to keep the other population "occupied". That is always going to breed resistance. Except that that's not quite true. Gaza could have continued maintenance of the existing water treatment plant (for example) that was working when Israel pulled out in 2005. Instead, they elected Hamas a year or two later and began firing rockets at Israel. It's not as simple as you're making it out to be. > Very simply, for peace Israel should pull all the settlements out of the West Bank, pull back 50 miles from Gaza for a number of years, remove all checkpoints in the West Bank and Gaza, invest in the development of both areas, rebuild the airport they destroyed, stop and sign definitive peace accords allowing free movement and Right of Return for Palestinians, pay reparations for the destruction of Gaza and the damage to the West Bank (plus many other things that I won't list here), and finally on top of that invest in Palestine's future. They pulled out completely, including removing every single settler, in 2005. Rebuilding is important, I agree, but if Gaza is going to run its own government, they need to, I don't know, not elect Hamas as perhaps a first-order approximation to "reasonable discourse." Israel isn't going anywhere, no matter what hopes and dreams anyone has. That means they need someone to negotiate with, and Hamas ain't it. In addition, the current government of Israel is garbage and I'm not sure has much interest in a two-state solution at all - but that is a separate (and important!) issue; there have been plenty of years and decades where Israel was committed to a two-state solution, and Gaza... wasn't. Even if Israel did rebuild the airport, allow freedom of movement and right of return, and all that - what guarantees do you have that Hamas would not then just flood into Israel and partake in the destruction of every Jew? None. And that, my friend, is the problem. It is complicated. It is not simple. You are not the first person to have suddenly found the 'secret' to this problem. To think you are, or to think that it is immensely simple, is honestly a bit arrogant, but more importantly, it's also incorrect. The current situation is awful and absolutely terrible; but sticking our heads in the sand and pretending that only Israel is the aggressor, and that suddenly if they pulled out the problem wouldn't exist anymore, is naive at best, and misguided on avaerage.
    - borski 3y ago
      Which side killed more has rarely been a good proxy for which side was right.
  - pbiggar 3y ago
    To add to this: the two sides in the war are supposedly Israel and Hamas. Can we not agree that either side killing civilians is wrong?
    - Zetobal 3y ago
      Killing in general is wrong.
      - pbiggar 3y ago
        Great, seems we agree. So it should stop and we should speak up about it, right?
        Zetobal 3y ago
        I have no problem with people speaking up just with people that want to be edgy and write a sob story when a opportunity arises. As I said you deciding to speak up now but not about other conflicts says more about you than you think. Do you really not sleep?
        pbiggar 3y ago
        I don't usually post this sort of "dear diary" thing either, but when there's a US ally doing a genocide, and we in the west have the opportunity to do something about it, I figured it was better to post. Not sure what I can do about the Congo, but if I get some small set of folks in tech to feel like they can criticize this genocide, we have the ability to change US policy. But yeah, I'm not being facetious. I haven't slept properly since Oct 7.
        Zetobal 3y ago
        Your previous blog posts are still available for everyone to read. To say you don't normally write emotionally loaded is obviously wrong.
        3y ago
  - jfoweif 3y ago
    I would say your post is the false propaganda, pretending everything is one sided and extremely complex, and that people should not be emotional when emotion is the root of ethics. Whatever your thoughts on how this war started, what's currently happening is clearly a massacre of the civilians of Gaza.
    - Zetobal 3y ago
      No as you admitted in your other comment you are just biased.
      - jfoweif 3y ago
        Again, how can you be perfectly "objective" writing about something when morality is subjective and based on emotion at its core. We can write about the facts and attempt to convince the audience based on appealing to their moral values, which is what OP is doing.
        Zetobal 3y ago
        The problem is that people like you who are overthrown by their own emotions talk about objectivity. The only thing you champion with a view like yours is moral relativism.
        pbiggar 3y ago
        Of course we're biased. 20,000 people have been killed by indescrimimate bombing. I would hope that makes you biased too
        Zetobal 3y ago
        As long as the only solution is a one sided ceasefire there is no solution. That's what you people have to understand. You can be biased as much as you want to just pondering on one solution doesn't help anyone. The people in the region should understand that from experience.
  - ignoramous 3y ago
    [flagged]
    - Zetobal 3y ago
      [flagged]
      - anupsurendran 3y ago
        every side has a story to tell. a story without emotion is not worth telling.
        Zetobal 3y ago
        "story" it's not a fucking story that's the whole point of the discussion.
bluefishinit 3y ago
I fully agree with you. There are more founders, engineers, designers and product people out there who do as well. I will not work with anyone who supports genocide going forward in my career.
rthnbgrredf 3y ago
I'm curious why this blog post is allowed to stay while other very similar postings regarding the topic get flagged to oblivion.
salqadri 3y ago
Wow. Thank you so much for your bravery in writing this.
PalestineWillBe 3y ago
[flagged]
magdyks 3y ago
Thank you for this great write up that expresses the sorrows and pain a lot of us have been feeling.
asadalt 3y ago
@dang is this off-topic or was this taken off frontpage due to high flags? seems like it was.
- romafirst3 3y ago
  I've become very concerned lately with the censorship on hacker news. The only way I found this page was by attempting to post the url. It's been essentially banished from the site, without even a comment on this thread about what happened or why. If we are going to censor things, this should be a transparent process not a covert activity where people don't even know they have been censored.
  - dang 3y ago
    People use the word "censor" to mean so many things that it's hard to track, but in this case was HN working the way it always does and has for many years. It works the same way regardless of topic, and there was no moderator intervention. We sometimes intervene to turn off flags, but this wasn't the right thread for that, as I explained here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38657527 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38657527. The topic itself just had two massive threads on HN (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38616550 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38616550 and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38572675 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38572675), so I don't think it's correct to call the topic censored. Re transparency, we don't publish a complete moderation log (I've written about why over the years: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=by%3Adang%20moderation%20log&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...), but we're happy to answer questions when people ask them, and believe it's in HN's long-term interest to err on the side of openness. I spend half my days these days answering this sort of question through email. Even when we can't answer a question completely, we can usually at least say why (e.g.: some of HN's anti-abuse software would stop working if we published how it works, so we can't answer that question completely). If you or anyone still has a question that I haven't answered here or https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38657527 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38657527, I'd be happy to take a crack at it.
noahamelia 3y ago
[dead]
C6JEsQeQa5fCjE 3y ago
> Unable to think of any way to help. All I can do is retweet and protest and write a stupid blog post. I feel so stupid. By writing this blog post, you have already done something extremely significant and noble. You are giving a voice to those who cannot speak for themselves because they are running from bombs with their children and doing what they can to increase their chances of being able to feed them tomorrow. Very few have internet access, and fewer still have the time and energy to spend writing about their experiences. If people like you and others who share your empathy (a huge shout out to Jewish Voice for Peace who are spearheading the protests and spreading awareness of war crimes that are being done in their name; showing the world that this is not a religious war) did not speak about this, they would have no one to represent them. Thank you.
smashah 3y ago
This is precisely how I, and many in tech, feel. It's as if my own internal monologue wrote a blog post itself. You might be asking why I can claim many on tech feel this way. It's because I've seen similar repression from Saudi Arabia (powered by Israeli cyber weapons). In Saudi, a lot of really loud people barking are able to do so because that is the establishment line. Everybody else who is silenced have, usually the diametrically exact opposite opinion (or even unacceptable tame variations of the establishment line). In Saudi they use Israeli cyber weapons to hack, monitor then jail (even mild) dissent. In tech there are many establishment lemmings who don't think for themselves who essentially act the same as establishment propagandists and their pernicious weapon against dissent is being iced out from opportunities. Tech is meant to be decentralized, meritocratic, (somewhat) contrarian. Yet we've seen in these last two months all that goes thrown out the window when it comes to narratively protecting a genocidal project because unfortunately there is a well oiled Israeli Extermination Force to Tech pipeline that people don't like to talk about (aka Affirmative action for extreme Zionists). Most of the few founders I know will be raising with BDS in mind - that hopefully includes LPs where possible. Don't support right of return? You don't deserve right to my returns.
palistalion 3y ago
[flagged]
becausepc 3y ago
[flagged]
- aneeqdhk 3y ago
  I'm interested in knowing more about both sides. OP has given a bunch of links in the article (almost in every sentence). Could you point out which assertions of OP are biased?
  - becausepc 3y ago
    The entire article seems quite biased. Using footnotes after every sentence doesn't necessarily indicate a well-researched piece. I won't delve into recent events due to the challenges posed by the fog of war effect. A clearer example of Paul's bias is his choice of quotes regarding past events. In reference [19], discussing the April 1948 Deir Yassin massacre, Paul presents the following quote: "Women and children were stripped, lined up, photographed, and then slaughtered by automatic firing and survivors have told of even more incredible bestialities. Those who were taken prisoners were treated with degrading brutality." https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-211346/ https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-211346/ This quote originates from a UN report just 11 days after the event, posing two critical issues: firstly, insufficient time for a thorough investigation; secondly, an erroneous casualty count of 250, later revised through subsequent investigations to a total of 107, inclusive of non-civilian casualties. Furthermore, there's a significant omission. The Deir Yassin events didn't occur in isolation; they were part of a broader context — a battle during the Arab-Jewish civil war, where Jewish militias aimed to break the blockade of Jerusalem enforced by Arab militias. The Deir Yassin incident has undergone extensive scrutiny, exemplified in Eliezer Tauber's book. https://www.amazon.com/Massacre-That-Never-Was/dp/1592645437 https://www.amazon.com/Massacre-That-Never-Was/dp/1592645437
    - ignoramous 3y ago
      > This quote originates from a UN report just 11 days after the event, posing two critical issues: firstly, insufficient time for a thorough investigation There is no reason to not trust first-hand testimonies (see also: believe all women). Of course, investigations did happen, which are a matter of public record, but the circumstances were such that it is hard to prove one way or the other definitively. So, the denials will happen regardless. > The Deir Yassin events didn't occur in isolation; they were part of a broader context It is almost like you're defending 7 Oct. Israeli historian Benny Morris said the militias "ransacked unscrupulously, stole money and jewels from the survivors and burned the bodies. Even dismemberment and rape occurred." Btw, the perpetrators of the massacre (Lehi & Irgun) you seem eager to defend were abhorred as fascists by the very people they were sworn to protect. Even those who took part in the massacre, like Amos Kenan, couldn't come to terms with it: https://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/lover-of-the-country/261333/amp https://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/lover-of-the-coun...
aneeqdhk 3y ago
Thank you for this
romafirst3 3y ago
More people in tech need to speak up. It really does feel like the silence is deafening. For those who think that we should "keep out of politics", that has clearly never been our way before and shouldn't be our way now.
borhan112 3y ago
Thanks for writing this post!
nojvek 3y ago
Thank you for writing this. It’s somewhat sad that we in US have been divided. I don’t stand for Israel, or Palestinians but for a deeper value of protecting life. It makes me sad and mad that our tax payer money is used to build missiles and bombs that are dropped onto civilians. Department of defense is a thin veil on Department of war.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
rbanffy 3y ago
I wish more people in tech could quit their jobs in companies that build the software and equipment used in the weapons being employed. A lot of my colleagues in the US object to it, but are on H1 visas and can’t easily quit.
adhamsalama 3y ago
You're an extremely brave man, Paul, and we applaud you and support you. There aren't many people brave enough like you in this world. Hopefully this motivates more people to speak out.
hbt 3y ago
Another interview where Paul speaks and clarifies how tech (technology and people) plays a role in this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LzXASFo-cf0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LzXASFo-cf0
zhengiszen 3y ago
Thank you Paul for this. You saved your humanity and maybe your soul.

158 points by pbiggar 3y ago

I hope people will engage with this. I see so many founders and employees in tech who feel unable to speak up about what they see happening in Gaza.

Zetobal 3y ago
[flagged]
- pbiggar 3y ago
  You don't need propaganda. Just look at the death counts: 18,600 in two months.
  - Zetobal 3y ago
    Look at death counts of other wars in other parts of the world you are just ignoring.
    - pbiggar 3y ago
      This is classic redirection tactics, exactly as Lee Fang exposed last week [1]. You talk about those wars, I'll support you. I'll talk about this one [1] https://www.leefang.com/p/inside-the-pro-israel-information https://www.leefang.com/p/inside-the-pro-israel-information
      - Zetobal 3y ago
        No it's not tell me why you can't sleep when 18600 people get killed but you can sleep like a baby when you know there is a lot more suffering in places without the limelight. You writing about Palestine but not other conflicts says more about you than you want to admit. Hybris.
        jfoweif 3y ago
        Because he (and many others) are more invested in this war? That's why I care more, I didn't care about Russia/Ukraine but have far more knowledge and understanding of this one, and personal relationships.
        pbiggar 3y ago
        For me, Ukraine and Palestine are the same team: the oppressed fighting a powerful oppressor. Plus, I'm Irish - we're always on the side of the colonized. Though in this one, I live in the country oppressing (that being the US), and I'm part of the movement doing the oppressing (that being tech). So there's duty to speak up.
        borski 3y ago
        I think it’s interesting to equate Ukraine and Palestine, given that there are massive differences between the two. For one thing, Ukraine hadn’t spent the last few decades shooting dozens or hundreds of rocket into Russia every day. Putin’s war was precipitated by exactly nothing. Israel’s war was precipitated by the worst terror attack Israel has ever seen, along with hostages taken back to what is clearly an enemy state (from their perspective). Sure, both are wars. But that’s roughly where the similarities end.
        Zetobal 3y ago
        That's hybris.
        basilgohar 3y ago
        It's really bizarre that to speak out against any atrocity you must first speak out about all other atrocities of equal or greater measure. The funny thing is, the illegal occupation and oppression of Palestine and Palestinians is approaching a century, millions have been permanently displaced over generations, and Israel continues to illegally steal land that is internationally recognized as illegally occupied. The only "peace" deals that Israel has ever offered were ones that cemented and legalized their theft of the majority of Palestine's original land. So, yeah, when you put it that way, the Palestinian cause against the Zionists in Israel is really close to being, if not the most, one of the most outrageous perpetual atrocities of our time.
  - nashadelic 3y ago
    That’s one Oct 7 every 4 days for 67 days straight
  - brettgo1 3y ago
    Paul, tell me how to get Hamas (the terror group) out of Palestine. They killed 1,200 Israelis and foreigners, wounded 3400, took 100+ hostages including 30 children. What would you do? How can the ongoing conflict in the Gaza Strip, involving groups like Hamas and the state of Israel, be approached to reduce violence and improve safety for all parties involved? What strategies could be considered to address the challenges of urban and underground warfare, the protection of civilians, and the preservation of soldiers' lives, while seeking a path towards peace and stability in the region?
    - pbiggar 3y ago
      I'm not an expert on terrorism, obviously. I just believe that it's immoral to drop bombs on civilians. Like any other conflict, for a positive end result there has to be a meeting of the minds on both sides, committed to peace. So this is going to seem very one sided, but if you look prior to Oct 7, you can't have peace where one side controls everything, has all the resources, and uses them to keep the other population "occupied". That is always going to breed resistance. Very simply, for peace Israel should pull all the settlements out of the West Bank, pull back 50 miles from Gaza for a number of years, remove all checkpoints in the West Bank and Gaza, invest in the development of both areas, rebuild the airport they destroyed, stop and sign definitive peace accords allowing free movement and Right of Return for Palestinians, pay reparations for the destruction of Gaza and the damage to the West Bank (plus many other things that I won't list here), and finally on top of that invest in Palestine's future. The only good neighbour is a prosperous one.
      - borski 3y ago
        > So this is going to seem very one sided, but if you look prior to Oct 7, you can't have peace where one side controls everything, has all the resources, and uses them to keep the other population "occupied". That is always going to breed resistance. Except that that's not quite true. Gaza could have continued maintenance of the existing water treatment plant (for example) that was working when Israel pulled out in 2005. Instead, they elected Hamas a year or two later and began firing rockets at Israel. It's not as simple as you're making it out to be. > Very simply, for peace Israel should pull all the settlements out of the West Bank, pull back 50 miles from Gaza for a number of years, remove all checkpoints in the West Bank and Gaza, invest in the development of both areas, rebuild the airport they destroyed, stop and sign definitive peace accords allowing free movement and Right of Return for Palestinians, pay reparations for the destruction of Gaza and the damage to the West Bank (plus many other things that I won't list here), and finally on top of that invest in Palestine's future. They pulled out completely, including removing every single settler, in 2005. Rebuilding is important, I agree, but if Gaza is going to run its own government, they need to, I don't know, not elect Hamas as perhaps a first-order approximation to "reasonable discourse." Israel isn't going anywhere, no matter what hopes and dreams anyone has. That means they need someone to negotiate with, and Hamas ain't it. In addition, the current government of Israel is garbage and I'm not sure has much interest in a two-state solution at all - but that is a separate (and important!) issue; there have been plenty of years and decades where Israel was committed to a two-state solution, and Gaza... wasn't. Even if Israel did rebuild the airport, allow freedom of movement and right of return, and all that - what guarantees do you have that Hamas would not then just flood into Israel and partake in the destruction of every Jew? None. And that, my friend, is the problem. It is complicated. It is not simple. You are not the first person to have suddenly found the 'secret' to this problem. To think you are, or to think that it is immensely simple, is honestly a bit arrogant, but more importantly, it's also incorrect. The current situation is awful and absolutely terrible; but sticking our heads in the sand and pretending that only Israel is the aggressor, and that suddenly if they pulled out the problem wouldn't exist anymore, is naive at best, and misguided on avaerage.
  - borski 3y ago
    Which side killed more has rarely been a good proxy for which side was right.
- pbiggar 3y ago
  To add to this: the two sides in the war are supposedly Israel and Hamas. Can we not agree that either side killing civilians is wrong?
  - Zetobal 3y ago
    Killing in general is wrong.
    - pbiggar 3y ago
      Great, seems we agree. So it should stop and we should speak up about it, right?
      - Zetobal 3y ago
        I have no problem with people speaking up just with people that want to be edgy and write a sob story when a opportunity arises. As I said you deciding to speak up now but not about other conflicts says more about you than you think. Do you really not sleep?
        pbiggar 3y ago
        I don't usually post this sort of "dear diary" thing either, but when there's a US ally doing a genocide, and we in the west have the opportunity to do something about it, I figured it was better to post. Not sure what I can do about the Congo, but if I get some small set of folks in tech to feel like they can criticize this genocide, we have the ability to change US policy. But yeah, I'm not being facetious. I haven't slept properly since Oct 7.
        Zetobal 3y ago
        Your previous blog posts are still available for everyone to read. To say you don't normally write emotionally loaded is obviously wrong.
        3y ago
- jfoweif 3y ago
  I would say your post is the false propaganda, pretending everything is one sided and extremely complex, and that people should not be emotional when emotion is the root of ethics. Whatever your thoughts on how this war started, what's currently happening is clearly a massacre of the civilians of Gaza.
  - Zetobal 3y ago
    No as you admitted in your other comment you are just biased.
    - jfoweif 3y ago
      Again, how can you be perfectly "objective" writing about something when morality is subjective and based on emotion at its core. We can write about the facts and attempt to convince the audience based on appealing to their moral values, which is what OP is doing.
      - Zetobal 3y ago
        The problem is that people like you who are overthrown by their own emotions talk about objectivity. The only thing you champion with a view like yours is moral relativism.
        pbiggar 3y ago
        Of course we're biased. 20,000 people have been killed by indescrimimate bombing. I would hope that makes you biased too
        Zetobal 3y ago
        As long as the only solution is a one sided ceasefire there is no solution. That's what you people have to understand. You can be biased as much as you want to just pondering on one solution doesn't help anyone. The people in the region should understand that from experience.
- ignoramous 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - Zetobal 3y ago
    [flagged]
    - anupsurendran 3y ago
      every side has a story to tell. a story without emotion is not worth telling.
      - Zetobal 3y ago
        "story" it's not a fucking story that's the whole point of the discussion.

bluefishinit 3y ago

I fully agree with you. There are more founders, engineers, designers and product people out there who do as well. I will not work with anyone who supports genocide going forward in my career.

rthnbgrredf 3y ago

I'm curious why this blog post is allowed to stay while other very similar postings regarding the topic get flagged to oblivion.

salqadri 3y ago

Wow. Thank you so much for your bravery in writing this.

PalestineWillBe 3y ago

[flagged]

magdyks 3y ago

Thank you for this great write up that expresses the sorrows and pain a lot of us have been feeling.

asadalt 3y ago

@dang is this off-topic or was this taken off frontpage due to high flags? seems like it was.

romafirst3 3y ago
I've become very concerned lately with the censorship on hacker news. The only way I found this page was by attempting to post the url. It's been essentially banished from the site, without even a comment on this thread about what happened or why. If we are going to censor things, this should be a transparent process not a covert activity where people don't even know they have been censored.
- dang 3y ago
  People use the word "censor" to mean so many things that it's hard to track, but in this case was HN working the way it always does and has for many years. It works the same way regardless of topic, and there was no moderator intervention. We sometimes intervene to turn off flags, but this wasn't the right thread for that, as I explained here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38657527 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38657527. The topic itself just had two massive threads on HN (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38616550 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38616550 and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38572675 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38572675), so I don't think it's correct to call the topic censored. Re transparency, we don't publish a complete moderation log (I've written about why over the years: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=by%3Adang%20moderation%20log&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...), but we're happy to answer questions when people ask them, and believe it's in HN's long-term interest to err on the side of openness. I spend half my days these days answering this sort of question through email. Even when we can't answer a question completely, we can usually at least say why (e.g.: some of HN's anti-abuse software would stop working if we published how it works, so we can't answer that question completely). If you or anyone still has a question that I haven't answered here or https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38657527 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38657527, I'd be happy to take a crack at it.

noahamelia 3y ago

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C6JEsQeQa5fCjE 3y ago

> Unable to think of any way to help. All I can do is retweet and protest and write a stupid blog post. I feel so stupid. By writing this blog post, you have already done something extremely significant and noble. You are giving a voice to those who cannot speak for themselves because they are running from bombs with their children and doing what they can to increase their chances of being able to feed them tomorrow. Very few have internet access, and fewer still have the time and energy to spend writing about their experiences. If people like you and others who share your empathy (a huge shout out to Jewish Voice for Peace who are spearheading the protests and spreading awareness of war crimes that are being done in their name; showing the world that this is not a religious war) did not speak about this, they would have no one to represent them. Thank you.

smashah 3y ago

This is precisely how I, and many in tech, feel. It's as if my own internal monologue wrote a blog post itself. You might be asking why I can claim many on tech feel this way. It's because I've seen similar repression from Saudi Arabia (powered by Israeli cyber weapons). In Saudi, a lot of really loud people barking are able to do so because that is the establishment line. Everybody else who is silenced have, usually the diametrically exact opposite opinion (or even unacceptable tame variations of the establishment line). In Saudi they use Israeli cyber weapons to hack, monitor then jail (even mild) dissent. In tech there are many establishment lemmings who don't think for themselves who essentially act the same as establishment propagandists and their pernicious weapon against dissent is being iced out from opportunities. Tech is meant to be decentralized, meritocratic, (somewhat) contrarian. Yet we've seen in these last two months all that goes thrown out the window when it comes to narratively protecting a genocidal project because unfortunately there is a well oiled Israeli Extermination Force to Tech pipeline that people don't like to talk about (aka Affirmative action for extreme Zionists). Most of the few founders I know will be raising with BDS in mind - that hopefully includes LPs where possible. Don't support right of return? You don't deserve right to my returns.

palistalion 3y ago

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becausepc 3y ago

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aneeqdhk 3y ago
I'm interested in knowing more about both sides. OP has given a bunch of links in the article (almost in every sentence). Could you point out which assertions of OP are biased?
- becausepc 3y ago
  The entire article seems quite biased. Using footnotes after every sentence doesn't necessarily indicate a well-researched piece. I won't delve into recent events due to the challenges posed by the fog of war effect. A clearer example of Paul's bias is his choice of quotes regarding past events. In reference [19], discussing the April 1948 Deir Yassin massacre, Paul presents the following quote: "Women and children were stripped, lined up, photographed, and then slaughtered by automatic firing and survivors have told of even more incredible bestialities. Those who were taken prisoners were treated with degrading brutality." https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-211346/ https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-211346/ This quote originates from a UN report just 11 days after the event, posing two critical issues: firstly, insufficient time for a thorough investigation; secondly, an erroneous casualty count of 250, later revised through subsequent investigations to a total of 107, inclusive of non-civilian casualties. Furthermore, there's a significant omission. The Deir Yassin events didn't occur in isolation; they were part of a broader context — a battle during the Arab-Jewish civil war, where Jewish militias aimed to break the blockade of Jerusalem enforced by Arab militias. The Deir Yassin incident has undergone extensive scrutiny, exemplified in Eliezer Tauber's book. https://www.amazon.com/Massacre-That-Never-Was/dp/1592645437 https://www.amazon.com/Massacre-That-Never-Was/dp/1592645437
  - ignoramous 3y ago
    > This quote originates from a UN report just 11 days after the event, posing two critical issues: firstly, insufficient time for a thorough investigation There is no reason to not trust first-hand testimonies (see also: believe all women). Of course, investigations did happen, which are a matter of public record, but the circumstances were such that it is hard to prove one way or the other definitively. So, the denials will happen regardless. > The Deir Yassin events didn't occur in isolation; they were part of a broader context It is almost like you're defending 7 Oct. Israeli historian Benny Morris said the militias "ransacked unscrupulously, stole money and jewels from the survivors and burned the bodies. Even dismemberment and rape occurred." Btw, the perpetrators of the massacre (Lehi & Irgun) you seem eager to defend were abhorred as fascists by the very people they were sworn to protect. Even those who took part in the massacre, like Amos Kenan, couldn't come to terms with it: https://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/lover-of-the-country/261333/amp https://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/lover-of-the-coun...

aneeqdhk 3y ago

Thank you for this

romafirst3 3y ago

More people in tech need to speak up. It really does feel like the silence is deafening. For those who think that we should "keep out of politics", that has clearly never been our way before and shouldn't be our way now.

borhan112 3y ago

Thanks for writing this post!

nojvek 3y ago

Thank you for writing this. It’s somewhat sad that we in US have been divided. I don’t stand for Israel, or Palestinians but for a deeper value of protecting life. It makes me sad and mad that our tax payer money is used to build missiles and bombs that are dropped onto civilians. Department of defense is a thin veil on Department of war.

deleted 3y ago

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rbanffy 3y ago

I wish more people in tech could quit their jobs in companies that build the software and equipment used in the weapons being employed. A lot of my colleagues in the US object to it, but are on H1 visas and can’t easily quit.

adhamsalama 3y ago

You're an extremely brave man, Paul, and we applaud you and support you. There aren't many people brave enough like you in this world. Hopefully this motivates more people to speak out.

hbt 3y ago

Another interview where Paul speaks and clarifies how tech (technology and people) plays a role in this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LzXASFo-cf0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LzXASFo-cf0

zhengiszen 3y ago

Thank you Paul for this. You saved your humanity and maybe your soul.