6 ms·

The HN crowd like reddit leans massively progressive/democratic. As such any thinking outside normal or contrarian views are massively suppressed. Classic cont

The HN crowd like reddit leans massively progressive/democratic. As such any thinking outside normal or contrarian views are massively suppressed. Classic contrarian (to HN) around WFH, Capitalism, Elon Musk, Tesla, Regulation is downvoted and even flagged

hnpolicestate 2y ago
The HN crowd is far right but they would never admit it. Most people are unaware of how political parties shift in composition and ideology over the decades. The contemporary American software engineer resembles the professional class Reagan Republicans who dominated the suburbs in the 80's and 90's.
- gruez 2y ago
  >The HN crowd is far right ??? Is anyone who isn't a card carrying DSA member "far right"?
  - hnpolicestate 2y ago
    Most of that stuff is a LARP.
- alsetmusic 2y ago
  Center-right, I'd argue, but that's true of the Democratic party. HN is very far from far-right in that bigotry and racism isn't tolerated here (nor should they be). But HN is USA in origin and USA politics are further right than most of Europe.
  - sangnoir 2y ago
    > HN is very far from far-right in that bigotry and racism isn't tolerated here (nor should they be). As in no outright slurs, right? I've seen plenty of race realist comments, as well as "James Damore is right about women in tech".
  - hnpolicestate 2y ago
    Moderators don't tolerate bigotry and racism on HN. I agree with that. But there were quite a few comments yesterday discussing Fyodor Dostoevsky who implied it was impossible for Russia to produce culture because it's people are monsters or something. Extreme ethnic hatred. So the users within the software community share many of the same faults regarding bigotry that the rest of humanity has. Same goes for commentary on Chinese people or Palestinians, though nowhere near as extreme in animosity as that towards the Russian.
    - dang 2y ago
      Just by coincidence, I was posting some moderation comments in that thread a couple hours ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41379890 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41379890. If you see a post that ought to have been moderated but hasn't been, that by no means implies that the post is ok or somehow blessed by the mods. The likeliest explanation is that we didn't see it*. We don't come close to seeing everything that gets posted here. You can help by flagging such a post or emailing us at hn@ycombinator.com. It was only because someone brought those unacceptable comments to my attention that I was able to respond. We can't moderate what we don't see! * https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=likeliest%20explanation%20by%3Adang&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
  - Sunspark 2y ago
    The general problem with "racism" online is that people tend to use the word for things that they don't like hearing. E.g. there is an issue of some sort, let's say unemployment caused by subsidized temporary foreign workers being brought in to act as wage suppression for corporations. Saying that you have a concern with policy can often result in a response of "that's racist!". This is a variation of the little boy who cried wolf. If "racism!" is cried for every single little thing that needs discussion, then one day it actually is racism and nobody will be listening.
    - immibis 2y ago
      Very few people ever complain about this in an egalitarian way, though, like: if wages are too low, let's make them higher. If the market isn't doing what we want, we should change the market. Instead, it's always about how the immigrants should be locked up or deported. And that's always about immigrants from Mexico, never from Canada or other places.
      - Sunspark 2y ago
        [flagged]
        immibis 2y ago
        Aren't most people eligible for $150,000 loans to buy houses?
        Sunspark 2y ago
        If you're a legal resident of the country yes, but now the California Senate has passed the bill allowing undocumented illegals to be eligible for a state-backed loan of $150,000 for them to purchase housing in California. Congratulations to the California taxpayers who are now subsidizing people who walked across the border without paperwork.
  - consteval 2y ago
    Sure nobody says slurs. But I see misogyny and what I would classify as racist every time I'm on hackernews. Complaining about Indians, complaining about women. But they don't even know that's what they're doing so you can't say "hey stop being sexist". They're surrounded by men all the time, of course it will never click in their heads.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- JohnMakin 2y ago
  This observation is always highlighted by the absurdity of american politics when they describe candidates like Joe Biden as "far left" when on the european political spectrum (or even an absolute one, if such a thing exists) he'd almost certainly be on the right.
  - gruez 2y ago
    >This observation is always highlighted by the absurdity of american politics when they describe candidates like Joe Biden as "far left" Joe Biden is by all accounts, center-left. However, the parent comment also describes the "HN crowd" as far-right. What probably is actually happening is that America is extremely polarized, where any side you don't agree with has the "far-[left/right]" label slapped on.
    - JohnMakin 2y ago
      Not trying to start a political discussion but people describing someone like biden as center-left are usually basing this off the policies people of his particular political flavor say they want. What they end up doing is usually very much right-aligned.
      - gruez 2y ago
        No need to involve whatever "political flavor" of people making the judgement. If you compare his views to other politicians, or the electorate as a whole, he's clearly a centrist.
        JohnMakin 2y ago
        I don’t think that’s clear at all, and I’m not involving the political flavor of people making a “judgment” - I’m saying his particular brand of establishment democrat politics all tend to have the same tendency.
    - halostatue 2y ago
      In Canada and most of Europe, Joe Biden would be a hair right of centre-right on most things and centre-right on a few other topics. Only in America is he centre-left, which says a lot about America's Overton window shift. Biden sounds a lot like Stephen Harper (pre-barbaric-practices-hotline) and just to the right of Brian Mulroney. Joe Clark would be well to his left.
- hn-89019 2y ago
  "Far right" as measured by a hardcore leftie, maybe. If you stand against illegal immigration, criticize superficial DEI "me-too" gestures that do nothing to solve the real issues underneath, or are moderately conservative in any other way, you will have you comments routinely downvoted into oblivion and will be called a Nazi and the second coming of Hitler. Not only in this place, it has become the the norm these days.
  - coding123 2y ago
    [flagged]
  - hnpolicestate 2y ago
    Illegal immigration is a far right wing policy goal. It's how mega corps keep wages down. The old "we need illegal immigrants because who else is going to pick lettuce for $1 an hour!" When the answer is well without illegal immigration you'd be forced to pay a legally protected citizen a fair wage. I think you're looking at the DEI phenomena incorrectly. It's a way for the economically comfortable class to signal virtue without having to experience any of its detractors. Check the Wikis of many DEI proponents and writers. They live in both highly segregated economic and racial neighborhoods. They live a 1950's far right wing lifestyle at home but wax poetic about DEI for the virtue.
  - JasserInicide 2y ago
    I find that HN is generally receptive of criticisms of those things granted you're using enough tact in your post and not just going "I'M SICK OF THESE WOKE JEWISH LEFTISTS RUINING EVERYTHING" in which case go to 4chan and cry there.
  - consteval 2y ago
    [flagged]
- zooq_ai 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - Apocryphon 2y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Californian_Ideology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Californian_Ideology
    - mrmetanoia 2y ago
      I hadn't read about this concept - it's interesting. It was really heart breaking coming up in the hacker culture of the late 80s through the 90s, then seeing the potential of "Don't be evil" Google, when it became clearer and clearer that no, hackers hadn't penetrated the capitalist class it was more the other way round. The only "disruption" was a set of new levers for the bankers, handed over freely by people eager to join them.
- bodiekane 2y ago
  The HN crowd is far left but they would never admit it. Go watch Bill Clinton talk about illegal immigration and border security in the 90s. He'd be considered far right today. Read a book or newspaper from 50 years ago or 100 years ago and look at how much more freedom people had to build homes and businesses without a thousand licenses, permits, taxes and inspections. There was a time in America where the notion of an income tax or of restrictions on running a business out of your home were considered far-left authoritarian and unconstitutional, but now we've all gotten used to a million regulations on how we use our private property, the government surveilling our communications and finances, government oversight and permission required for all activities. Admittedly "left vs right" is hardly useful in contemporary politics, things are so multi-faceted and people's notions of what those terms mean is variable. But nonetheless, it's obvious that "the center" of American politics today is drastically far to the left from where it was previously. In some sense, the 1960s counter-culture liberal progressives "won" and became the center and the establishment. A leftwing extremist in 1968 on issues of feminism, race, social welfare, tax policy, foreign policy, housing policy and probably others is a centrist today. Environmental issues and unions are the only two areas I can think of where America has stayed the same or moved right since WWII.
  - ribosometronome 2y ago
    >But nonetheless, it's obvious that "the center" of American politics today is drastically far to the left from where it was previously. Ronald Reagan gave 3 million illegal immigrants permanent resident status.
  - consteval 2y ago
    The US is the most right-leaning country out of the first world. > but now we've all gotten used to a million regulations on how we use our private property Many of these originating from the right. Because the right is not, and has never been, a party of small government. They want big government, just their big government. That has meant historically enforcing slavery, then segregation, suppressing women's rights, suppressing abortion, dictating what you can do in the bedroom, and on and on and on. These are all conservative policy - and all HUGE government. > it's obvious that "the center" of American politics today is drastically far to the left from where it was previously Yes, this is called the progression of time. This is why people who are unable to change their mind over time end up falling behind and sounding crazy. Have you ever asked an old dude about how they feel about black people? Whoa! Clearly they grew up in a different time. Some let that shit go like they should, some don't. Those that don't are destined to be left to the past. Just a few decades ago a slight right winger might be anti-integration. Slight. A far right-winger would be lynching people in their neighborhood. So you're correct - we've moved past that. And, in 40 years, if I personally don't change my beliefs, I will also sound crazy. To conservatives that's scary or something. To me, that's how the world works. I say either adapt or be relegated to the insane.
- hnpolicestate 2y ago
  Because orthodoxy blinds the masses, the people upvoting this are the very far-right who LARP as leftists/liberals I'm referring to lol. The detractors are actually liberals who have been painted as far right. Ideology is such a powerful delusion. Nobody can be sure of who they are due to external labeling.
swader999 2y ago
I'm pretty far out the mainstream thinking on some topics and I've felt like I've been treated fairly in most interactions over the years on HN.
mrgoldenbrown 2y ago
I would not call HN progressive. Democratic yes, but Democrat nowadays means centrist at best/leaning right.
matrix87 2y ago
HN crowd is democrat but not progressive. Reddit crowd is progressive Also HN doesn't censor as much, libertarian-right posters that would've gotten downvoted to hell on reddit actually have an outlet here. Religious right has no outlet on either site

hnpolicestate 2y ago

The HN crowd is far right but they would never admit it. Most people are unaware of how political parties shift in composition and ideology over the decades. The contemporary American software engineer resembles the professional class Reagan Republicans who dominated the suburbs in the 80's and 90's.

gruez 2y ago
>The HN crowd is far right ??? Is anyone who isn't a card carrying DSA member "far right"?
- hnpolicestate 2y ago
  Most of that stuff is a LARP.
alsetmusic 2y ago
Center-right, I'd argue, but that's true of the Democratic party. HN is very far from far-right in that bigotry and racism isn't tolerated here (nor should they be). But HN is USA in origin and USA politics are further right than most of Europe.
- sangnoir 2y ago
  > HN is very far from far-right in that bigotry and racism isn't tolerated here (nor should they be). As in no outright slurs, right? I've seen plenty of race realist comments, as well as "James Damore is right about women in tech".
- hnpolicestate 2y ago
  Moderators don't tolerate bigotry and racism on HN. I agree with that. But there were quite a few comments yesterday discussing Fyodor Dostoevsky who implied it was impossible for Russia to produce culture because it's people are monsters or something. Extreme ethnic hatred. So the users within the software community share many of the same faults regarding bigotry that the rest of humanity has. Same goes for commentary on Chinese people or Palestinians, though nowhere near as extreme in animosity as that towards the Russian.
  - dang 2y ago
    Just by coincidence, I was posting some moderation comments in that thread a couple hours ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41379890 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41379890. If you see a post that ought to have been moderated but hasn't been, that by no means implies that the post is ok or somehow blessed by the mods. The likeliest explanation is that we didn't see it*. We don't come close to seeing everything that gets posted here. You can help by flagging such a post or emailing us at hn@ycombinator.com. It was only because someone brought those unacceptable comments to my attention that I was able to respond. We can't moderate what we don't see! * https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=likeliest%20explanation%20by%3Adang&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
- Sunspark 2y ago
  The general problem with "racism" online is that people tend to use the word for things that they don't like hearing. E.g. there is an issue of some sort, let's say unemployment caused by subsidized temporary foreign workers being brought in to act as wage suppression for corporations. Saying that you have a concern with policy can often result in a response of "that's racist!". This is a variation of the little boy who cried wolf. If "racism!" is cried for every single little thing that needs discussion, then one day it actually is racism and nobody will be listening.
  - immibis 2y ago
    Very few people ever complain about this in an egalitarian way, though, like: if wages are too low, let's make them higher. If the market isn't doing what we want, we should change the market. Instead, it's always about how the immigrants should be locked up or deported. And that's always about immigrants from Mexico, never from Canada or other places.
    - Sunspark 2y ago
      [flagged]
      - immibis 2y ago
        Aren't most people eligible for $150,000 loans to buy houses?
        Sunspark 2y ago
        If you're a legal resident of the country yes, but now the California Senate has passed the bill allowing undocumented illegals to be eligible for a state-backed loan of $150,000 for them to purchase housing in California. Congratulations to the California taxpayers who are now subsidizing people who walked across the border without paperwork.
- consteval 2y ago
  Sure nobody says slurs. But I see misogyny and what I would classify as racist every time I'm on hackernews. Complaining about Indians, complaining about women. But they don't even know that's what they're doing so you can't say "hey stop being sexist". They're surrounded by men all the time, of course it will never click in their heads.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
JohnMakin 2y ago
This observation is always highlighted by the absurdity of american politics when they describe candidates like Joe Biden as "far left" when on the european political spectrum (or even an absolute one, if such a thing exists) he'd almost certainly be on the right.
- gruez 2y ago
  >This observation is always highlighted by the absurdity of american politics when they describe candidates like Joe Biden as "far left" Joe Biden is by all accounts, center-left. However, the parent comment also describes the "HN crowd" as far-right. What probably is actually happening is that America is extremely polarized, where any side you don't agree with has the "far-[left/right]" label slapped on.
  - JohnMakin 2y ago
    Not trying to start a political discussion but people describing someone like biden as center-left are usually basing this off the policies people of his particular political flavor say they want. What they end up doing is usually very much right-aligned.
    - gruez 2y ago
      No need to involve whatever "political flavor" of people making the judgement. If you compare his views to other politicians, or the electorate as a whole, he's clearly a centrist.
      - JohnMakin 2y ago
        I don’t think that’s clear at all, and I’m not involving the political flavor of people making a “judgment” - I’m saying his particular brand of establishment democrat politics all tend to have the same tendency.
  - halostatue 2y ago
    In Canada and most of Europe, Joe Biden would be a hair right of centre-right on most things and centre-right on a few other topics. Only in America is he centre-left, which says a lot about America's Overton window shift. Biden sounds a lot like Stephen Harper (pre-barbaric-practices-hotline) and just to the right of Brian Mulroney. Joe Clark would be well to his left.
hn-89019 2y ago
"Far right" as measured by a hardcore leftie, maybe. If you stand against illegal immigration, criticize superficial DEI "me-too" gestures that do nothing to solve the real issues underneath, or are moderately conservative in any other way, you will have you comments routinely downvoted into oblivion and will be called a Nazi and the second coming of Hitler. Not only in this place, it has become the the norm these days.
- coding123 2y ago
  [flagged]
- hnpolicestate 2y ago
  Illegal immigration is a far right wing policy goal. It's how mega corps keep wages down. The old "we need illegal immigrants because who else is going to pick lettuce for $1 an hour!" When the answer is well without illegal immigration you'd be forced to pay a legally protected citizen a fair wage. I think you're looking at the DEI phenomena incorrectly. It's a way for the economically comfortable class to signal virtue without having to experience any of its detractors. Check the Wikis of many DEI proponents and writers. They live in both highly segregated economic and racial neighborhoods. They live a 1950's far right wing lifestyle at home but wax poetic about DEI for the virtue.
- JasserInicide 2y ago
  I find that HN is generally receptive of criticisms of those things granted you're using enough tact in your post and not just going "I'M SICK OF THESE WOKE JEWISH LEFTISTS RUINING EVERYTHING" in which case go to 4chan and cry there.
- consteval 2y ago
  [flagged]
zooq_ai 2y ago
[flagged]
- Apocryphon 2y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Californian_Ideology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Californian_Ideology
  - mrmetanoia 2y ago
    I hadn't read about this concept - it's interesting. It was really heart breaking coming up in the hacker culture of the late 80s through the 90s, then seeing the potential of "Don't be evil" Google, when it became clearer and clearer that no, hackers hadn't penetrated the capitalist class it was more the other way round. The only "disruption" was a set of new levers for the bankers, handed over freely by people eager to join them.
bodiekane 2y ago
The HN crowd is far left but they would never admit it. Go watch Bill Clinton talk about illegal immigration and border security in the 90s. He'd be considered far right today. Read a book or newspaper from 50 years ago or 100 years ago and look at how much more freedom people had to build homes and businesses without a thousand licenses, permits, taxes and inspections. There was a time in America where the notion of an income tax or of restrictions on running a business out of your home were considered far-left authoritarian and unconstitutional, but now we've all gotten used to a million regulations on how we use our private property, the government surveilling our communications and finances, government oversight and permission required for all activities. Admittedly "left vs right" is hardly useful in contemporary politics, things are so multi-faceted and people's notions of what those terms mean is variable. But nonetheless, it's obvious that "the center" of American politics today is drastically far to the left from where it was previously. In some sense, the 1960s counter-culture liberal progressives "won" and became the center and the establishment. A leftwing extremist in 1968 on issues of feminism, race, social welfare, tax policy, foreign policy, housing policy and probably others is a centrist today. Environmental issues and unions are the only two areas I can think of where America has stayed the same or moved right since WWII.
- ribosometronome 2y ago
  >But nonetheless, it's obvious that "the center" of American politics today is drastically far to the left from where it was previously. Ronald Reagan gave 3 million illegal immigrants permanent resident status.
- consteval 2y ago
  The US is the most right-leaning country out of the first world. > but now we've all gotten used to a million regulations on how we use our private property Many of these originating from the right. Because the right is not, and has never been, a party of small government. They want big government, just their big government. That has meant historically enforcing slavery, then segregation, suppressing women's rights, suppressing abortion, dictating what you can do in the bedroom, and on and on and on. These are all conservative policy - and all HUGE government. > it's obvious that "the center" of American politics today is drastically far to the left from where it was previously Yes, this is called the progression of time. This is why people who are unable to change their mind over time end up falling behind and sounding crazy. Have you ever asked an old dude about how they feel about black people? Whoa! Clearly they grew up in a different time. Some let that shit go like they should, some don't. Those that don't are destined to be left to the past. Just a few decades ago a slight right winger might be anti-integration. Slight. A far right-winger would be lynching people in their neighborhood. So you're correct - we've moved past that. And, in 40 years, if I personally don't change my beliefs, I will also sound crazy. To conservatives that's scary or something. To me, that's how the world works. I say either adapt or be relegated to the insane.
hnpolicestate 2y ago
Because orthodoxy blinds the masses, the people upvoting this are the very far-right who LARP as leftists/liberals I'm referring to lol. The detractors are actually liberals who have been painted as far right. Ideology is such a powerful delusion. Nobody can be sure of who they are due to external labeling.

swader999 2y ago

I'm pretty far out the mainstream thinking on some topics and I've felt like I've been treated fairly in most interactions over the years on HN.

mrgoldenbrown 2y ago

I would not call HN progressive. Democratic yes, but Democrat nowadays means centrist at best/leaning right.

matrix87 2y ago

HN crowd is democrat but not progressive. Reddit crowd is progressive Also HN doesn't censor as much, libertarian-right posters that would've gotten downvoted to hell on reddit actually have an outlet here. Religious right has no outlet on either site