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Ask HN: Are important topics welcome on Hacker News?
It seems like we should be able to have discussions about important topics. Topics important enough to have differing opinions seem to get flagged with regularity. It would be really nice if we could be allowed to discuss topics of importance where people can express non-politicized opinions and have discourse. The weeks' events seem significant, and we have not been allowed to have even non-political discussions about it. I don't have a political option to share, I'd just like to have a mature, respectful discussion with like minds. Curation is increasingly resembling censorship.
- jrflowers 2y agoYou want to have non-political discussions about political events?
- __d 2y agoIt's Hacker News. Unless it's a technical topic, or fairly closely related to a technical topic, this is the wrong place. There are plenty of other places to have discussions about non-technical things.
- Jimmc414 2y agoThe topic is very technical, actually. There were some significant statistical anomalies this week that both camps seem positioned to acknowledge.
- Jimmc414 2y agoOn an unrelated note, how close, do you think AI is to simulating a real television production? We might be wise to question a lot of the content leading into this cycle.
- talldayo 2y ago"significant statistical anomalies" include the weather, variations in soil composition and the population count of wild stoats. The fact that numbers are changing doesn't mean that something qualifies for the guidelines of HN. Shoehorn politics into a tech forum and you're just gonna get flagged.
- slater 2y agoDon't vaguebook it. Tell us what these "significant statistical anomalies" were this week.
- 6510 2y agoI thought this was hilarious. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wg7FTjBe14 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wg7FTjBe14
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- ThrowawayR2 2y agoFrom the Hacker News guidelines at https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html "Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime ... If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic." You may contact the moderators at the email provided on that page if you think submissions are being improperly flagged.
- seattle_spring 2y agoTurn on showdead and go look at maaaaany of the comments on articles related to the big political news yesterday. For most people, that should be evidence enough as to why those sorts of topics don't create productive conversation.
- r721 2y agoIf you mean Trump assassination attempt dang turned the flags off for one of the big discussions eventually: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40957564 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40957564 (dang's comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40963142 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40963142)
- ungreased0675 2y agoI come here for tech news and discussion. Other stuff is discussed endlessly on nearly every other social network. I’d actually say the curation here isn’t strict enough. Pretty much every NY Times, Ars, Wired, Atlantic, and FT story get posted. I’d rather those sources be throttled so more weird small blogs can get through.
- 6510 2y agoHow does one find all the weird small blogs nowadays?
- fuzzfactor 2y agoThis is actually a pretty good forum for extreme differening opinions, as long as it's interesting to the core audience and not covered significantly by other news sources.
- Jimmc414 2y agoGuess not