5 ms·

Had no idea Ben Collins had become an executive at whatever this thing is. He was an excellent reporter and a guy who really, really understands how the interne

• dev_by_day 3y ago
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  • dev_by_day 3y ago
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    • hnlmorg 3y ago
      I really get sick and tired of this ongoing pseudo-religious war between the left and the right. Can’t you express your opinion in a way that isn’t antagonistic?
      • dev_by_day 3y ago
        Ben collins is a promoter of this left right war, he was literally suspended for being biased. That is not a good reporter, he is a beneficiary of the culture war and its disrespectful to actual factual journalism to call him anything else but a political stereographer who is out to push ideology above facts.
        • hnlmorg 3y ago
          Collins isn’t the person writing your comments. You are.
        • orf 3y ago
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          • reaLg_move_in_3 3y ago
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            • tommica 3y ago
              You do have a valid point in what you are trying to say (that Collins got suspended for his strong bias), but the way you communicate it is really doing harm to your message - you are antagonizing too much.
        • concordDance 3y ago
          Worth noting that this reply has a lot of the same content as your first one but isn't flagged. This is mostly due to it being phrased in a far less inflammatory manner I think.
    • defrost 3y ago
      I'm from Australia. I grew up on a cattle station in the Nor'west. I'm downvoting your comments for their strong foaming at the mouth unhinged vibes, and I'd do the same if they ranted in a similar manner against some other part of US culture. I dare say you could make a comment with fewer empty buzz phrases if you tried.
      • 082349872349872 3y ago
        > on a cattle station in the Nor'west. Were B&S Balls a thing there then? (the food dye may not exactly be elegant, but it is reminiscent of Carnival)
        • defrost 3y ago
          Further south in the wheat belt, and often called BnS Inseminators Balls with the <cough> Hay day being more the late 1980s and 1990s. Lot's of burnouts, circle work, lube slides, burning wrecks, food dye, and actual ball in a tent, fire engines, drinking, limousines (both real hires and "bush mechanic" stretched tractors), etc. Being so far away I either flew in from the Kimberleys or hitch hiked across from Perth to go to a couple. This: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yH_RWBSQ9ic https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yH_RWBSQ9ic seems 'typical' of part of the weekend. Not dead yet, it seems: https://www.sistersanguinista.com/bns https://www.sistersanguinista.com/bns
          • 082349872349872 3y ago
            I'm so square that if I'd tried a pun like that, everyone would've baled. Looks very reminiscent[0] of Carnival[1], except not seasonal, no utes[2], and we have very few bogans or muppets[3] so ours are usually urban[4]. Also, confetti[5] instead of food colouring. (good that Sister Sanguinista has a way to relax; people-helping jobs, like vet practice, seem to be a real ticket to burnout) [0] especially the slogan "where the rams get used and the ewes get rammed" [1] some balls are held for charity, and some for fancy dress[6], but holding them for pleasure is the course which we profess. [2] boots and roots, yes. Does "pull" originate from pulling someone into your swag? [3] coming from an anglophone culture, I was amazed that instead of making "glass pinecones"[7], everyone, despite elevated BAC, piles their dead soldiers in ranks by the recycle bins. [4] if you're into Analogue Dance Music, there's nothing quite like doof doof in a medieval guild hall or old town alleyway[8]. The recent shopping malls are not so scenic, and the roman coliseums are historic but are too open for gut-felt acoustics. [5] there's a song somewhere on YT by a young dutch lady about how Karneval is wonderful but it still is a little annoying, mornings, to be picking the confetti out of your pubic hair — with enough compressed air, one can send confetti tens of meters into 2nd storey windows. (we colour our faces via airbrush, and use markers only on exposed skin) Speaking of exposed skin, some of those blokes might could be risking the worst sunburns of their lives. [6] this advert version looks a bit different to your unscripted clip: "are you getting enough?" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQBc2dmUiHs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQBc2dmUiHs [7] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RShAxvg5MJE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RShAxvg5MJE [8] see Schroeder, Fractals, chaos, power laws : minutes from an infinite paradise (1999) for why.
    • bigfudge 3y ago
      It’s so niche that it regularly wins the popular vote in the US despite massive voter suppression. The only reason the god n guns lobby wins in the US is 1. the constitutional settlement which massively overweights rural voters and 2. corporate lobbying in a winner takes all system which is prepared to hold its nose and bankroll racist hicks if it means they get their corporate welfare. You are a great nation, but very little that anyone admires about the US has come from the flyover states (and even then probably because of federal pork barrel science and defence funding for those educated elites you hate so much).
      • dev_by_day 3y ago
        You misinterpreted Democrats and progressives, most Democrats, minorities and liberals are closer to the center left rather than extreme left. Polling from many reliable places, including pew, shows Progressive ideology is dominated by upper class white people. Why do you think stripping resources from the police was so popular amongst upper class intectuals but not what black Americans actually wanted according to the actual data. Progressivism in America is an ideology that represents the upper class, not minorities nor traditional liberals nor the working class.
    • concordDance 3y ago
      I think the downvotes are because we don't really want the culture war on hackernews. It tends to not be a very productive topic and makes people emotional, making discussion quality even worse than most other politics (like economic policy, regulations or international relations).
  • qsdf38100 3y ago
    You just used "extreme", "left" and "leftist" 7 times in 4 sentences. Sounds a bit "extreme" and "biased" to me.
    • dev_by_day 3y ago
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      • berkes 3y ago
        There's a very big difference between "left" and "extreme left". Or, at least, in most of the world there is. Yet you use them offhandedly like synonyms. It gives your response an air of propaganda and FUD.
        • fsckboy 3y ago
          I don't see where he used them like synonyms, his comment seemed to be only about the far left?
      • neilk 3y ago
        According to your comment history you’re a leftist who, among other things, supports Kyle Rittenhouse. I would say this is a rare configuration of positions. The point you’re making about Collins suffers because you only labelled him an “extreme leftist”, over and over again, without examples of this behavior. So I went looking, myself. Apparently he was pulled off Twitter coverage because he made posts mocking Elon Musk for suspending the accounts of other journalists. While this might be too opinionated for a professional whose beat includes Musk, it isn’t evidence of “extreme left” views. > Collins has been yanked off the air from NBC and MSNBC but remains on staff. He has been actively tweeting and retweeting the latest developments related to Musk’s controversial decision to ban the accounts of several left-leaning journalists who were critical of his management of the social media app. https://nypost.com/2022/12/16/nbc-suspends-ben-collins-for-mocking-elon-musk-on-twitter/ https://nypost.com/2022/12/16/nbc-suspends-ben-collins-for-m... I hope you will concede that the NY Post has not yet fallen to left-wing extremism. Labeling critics as “extremist”, without evidence, and attempting to make it stick through sheer repetition, is itself a tactic of extremists.
  • n4r9 3y ago
    That's a lot of accusation. I've not heard of him before but you can view a list of his articles on NBC. He does seem left-leaning for the US, doesn't look that extremist to me. HNers can decide for themselves: https://www.nbcnews.com/author/ben-collins-ncpn858396 https://www.nbcnews.com/author/ben-collins-ncpn858396
  • crashmat 3y ago
    could I ask what kinds of positions the 'extreme American left' takes on issues to distinguish them from the moderate left?
    • pc86 3y ago
      At the risk of engaging in what I'm sure will be a very even-headed and reasonable dialogue, I can think of a handful of things that the moderate American left would do / agree on that the more extreme elements would not. And just because you have to bend over backwards to avoid getting shadowbanned or flagged for even mentioning any of these, I'm not telling anyone where I stand on any of these things. Some I agree with, some I don't. It doesn't matter. 1. Israel has a right to exist and should not just pack up and leave Gaza. 2. Children who are not old enough to get a loan are also not old enough to consent to surgery or hormone blockers. 3. If you transition from male to female you should not be allowed to participate in women's sports. 4. Women's pro athletes getting paid a fraction of what male pro athletes do is a function of supply and demand and is not inherently sexist. 5. There are root causes to the disproportionate incarceration of African Americans that do not boil down to "the system is racist." 6. Taxes should be used to raise revenue in order to provide social and other government services, not as punishment. None of those positions are inherently conservative and all of them could be held by a popular mainstream Democratic member of Congress or Presidential candidate. All of them (or any of them if voiced loudly enough) would get you ostracized from leftist group.
      • k8svet 3y ago
        With those framings, you don't really need to tell us much more.
      • runarberg 3y ago
        As a person firmly in the American political left, I have to disagree with all but one of those (point 6 holds true). 1. If you don’t want Israel’s genocidal war against Gaza to stop, you are not a leftist. 2. If you don’t want trans children to get correct healthcare, you are not a leftist. 3. If you want to discriminate against LGBTQ+ people, you are not a leftist. 4. If you don’t want to fix the gender wage gap, you are not a leftist. 5. If you hold racist views, you are not a leftist. 6. The radical left has many different views on taxes. I want to eat the rich, but many on the left do indeed want taxes only to be used as funding of social services. I’m aware I’m committing No true Scotsman fallacy here. However I don’t see people that hold these views to align anywhere close to me politically—not even moderately. On the left we call people that hold these views conservative democrats, and at best we call them centrists, never moderate leftists. The only people that call them “moderates” are the conservative democrats them selves (and maybe some republicans). I’m also aware that there is a (very small) faction of communists and tankies, particularly in the UK, which holds anti-trans and racist views, and would agree with points 2, 3, and 5, however, even among communists, they are very niche and still very extreme, so definitely not moderate American left.
  • tootie 3y ago
    You can listen to the thing I posted. I think he crystalized really well how unfettered free speech is fundamentally a contradiction. So long as one party's speech can chill the speech of another (ie coordinated harassment or doxxing of trans influencers) then site owners are going to be obligated to pick a side and limit some kinds of speech. That just sounds like logic to me.
• skywhopper 3y ago
  The company was created just a couple of weeks ago with the purpose of buying The Onion. It doesn’t sound like the CEO responsibilities will take a lot of time away from his other work.
• ed_voc 3y ago
  I'm not sure I'd call it good reporting to investigate this case and not look into Doxbin. There has been no evidence that Kiwifarms users have coordinated harassment towards keffals; however, the website that actually coordinated the harassment gets absolutely no mention. When the reporter brings up the Uber hack, he's insinuating that this was done by Kiwifarms, but the receipts were actually posted on Doxbin. Doxbin also goes much much further than Kiwifarms, getting addresses,bank details, and employment history of anyone related to the target. They will work together to contact hotels and employers to get the information they want. Doxbin actually does act the way the media thinks that kiwifarms act. I can understand Keffals not speaking about Doxbin as she legitimately fears them according to leaked messages to Destiny, but it's the media's responsibility to actually understand what's going on. It's insane that people like Ben Collins constantly use Kiwifarms as a shield for Doxbin.
  • howenterprisey 3y ago
    Interesting. I haven't heard of doxbin. Got anything else I can read about them?
• philipov 3y ago
  > who really, really understands how the internet works and how communities flourish or go toxic Got a good article of his on this specifically?