3 ms·

Can you share your thoughts without being so hyperbolic?

ajb 2y ago
Not the GP, but I'll give it a go: You may be familiar with the layer structure of communications: Internetwork layer,below that transport, below that link layer, and at the bottom the physical layer. The physical layer is where it gets really messy: noise, interference, reflections,whatever. In human interaction, at the bottom layer is the simple fact that at any time, any human can just not follow the rules. That's not necessarily wrong. Maybe the rule just isn't important, and everyone recognises that. Or maybe some deep moral principle should override it. But at that point, other people have to make a moral call - do they ignore this breach of the rules? Do they object? Do they assess the moral principle as overriding? The military have some usefully neutral terms for behaviors, one of which is 'revisionist'. A revisionist power wants to change the rules, a status quo power wants to keep them. It's fairly clear that the US government is presently a revisionist one. That means that pretty much everyone has now to make the call as to whether what they see is allowable or, given the scale and power of the US federal government, a five-alarm fire. And they will often want to take that to places where they have some kind of trust in the intelligence or good will of the other people there. For a lot of engineers, that's right here. If this were a workplace or uni, there would be break rooms and water-coolers where this kind of discussion could go. But HN has none of that - there's only one category of discussion. So if you flag every such discussion, you're denying them the opportunity to do that. And that's not keeping politics out of HN - that's a political act itself.
jlongr 2y ago
I'm not hyperbolic, you're obtuse. If you think you can bury your head and ignore politics for any amount of time, you are mistaken. Your purchases, comments, and actions are all political and strategic, whether you want to believe them to be or not.
- infecto 2y ago
  Huh? You must not have seen the thread. I recognize that politics pop up everywhere but in HN they usually end up being low signal. There is no nuance or discussion to be had. And that’s why they get flagged. I am not the only member of HN that has no interest in brining political debate into HN.
- airstrike 2y ago
  That argument doesn't hold. HN itself has no obligation to be a political forum. There are many other forums for that already. It's good to compartmentalize topics. Your argument is like complaining you're not learning Geography in your Physics class. The subject of the site is not politics and that is by design. This design has absolutely nothing to do with the merits of any given submission related to the topic of politics. Conflating "people who want to keep conversations on-topic" and "people who support policy X" is not fair, helpful or accurate.
  - jlongr 2y ago
    Amazon Submits Bid for TikTok with US Sale Deadline Nearing Go flag this one then.
    - airstrike 2y ago
      Why? That's a technology company buying another tech company, and so many people here either work at tech companies, have founded companies or some variation thereof. Very much on topic for hacker news.
    - infecto 2y ago
      Why flag it?
      - AlecSchueler 2y ago
        Sounds political to me.
        infecto 2y ago
        You’re more than welcome to, of course—but that feels like a rather trite response to what could have warranted at least a bit more substance.
  - AlecSchueler 2y ago
    > There are many other forums for that already. Could you recommend some other forums where politics are allowed but people also have a deep technical knowledge and understanding? With also an expected level of mutual respect and effort given to discussion?
- infecto 2y ago
  I am not obtuse I just have no desire to get into political debates on HN. It’s been beaten to death already. Now if something new happened or if there was a different way to look at something then it makes sense.
AlecSchueler 2y ago
Facism is taking hold. There's no hyperbole. Everything will be affected. We need to respond. The only over-reaction is here in choosing to bury your head in the sand.

ajb 2y ago

Not the GP, but I'll give it a go: You may be familiar with the layer structure of communications: Internetwork layer,below that transport, below that link layer, and at the bottom the physical layer. The physical layer is where it gets really messy: noise, interference, reflections,whatever. In human interaction, at the bottom layer is the simple fact that at any time, any human can just not follow the rules. That's not necessarily wrong. Maybe the rule just isn't important, and everyone recognises that. Or maybe some deep moral principle should override it. But at that point, other people have to make a moral call - do they ignore this breach of the rules? Do they object? Do they assess the moral principle as overriding? The military have some usefully neutral terms for behaviors, one of which is 'revisionist'. A revisionist power wants to change the rules, a status quo power wants to keep them. It's fairly clear that the US government is presently a revisionist one. That means that pretty much everyone has now to make the call as to whether what they see is allowable or, given the scale and power of the US federal government, a five-alarm fire. And they will often want to take that to places where they have some kind of trust in the intelligence or good will of the other people there. For a lot of engineers, that's right here. If this were a workplace or uni, there would be break rooms and water-coolers where this kind of discussion could go. But HN has none of that - there's only one category of discussion. So if you flag every such discussion, you're denying them the opportunity to do that. And that's not keeping politics out of HN - that's a political act itself.

jlongr 2y ago

I'm not hyperbolic, you're obtuse. If you think you can bury your head and ignore politics for any amount of time, you are mistaken. Your purchases, comments, and actions are all political and strategic, whether you want to believe them to be or not.

infecto 2y ago
Huh? You must not have seen the thread. I recognize that politics pop up everywhere but in HN they usually end up being low signal. There is no nuance or discussion to be had. And that’s why they get flagged. I am not the only member of HN that has no interest in brining political debate into HN.
airstrike 2y ago
That argument doesn't hold. HN itself has no obligation to be a political forum. There are many other forums for that already. It's good to compartmentalize topics. Your argument is like complaining you're not learning Geography in your Physics class. The subject of the site is not politics and that is by design. This design has absolutely nothing to do with the merits of any given submission related to the topic of politics. Conflating "people who want to keep conversations on-topic" and "people who support policy X" is not fair, helpful or accurate.
- jlongr 2y ago
  Amazon Submits Bid for TikTok with US Sale Deadline Nearing Go flag this one then.
  - airstrike 2y ago
    Why? That's a technology company buying another tech company, and so many people here either work at tech companies, have founded companies or some variation thereof. Very much on topic for hacker news.
  - infecto 2y ago
    Why flag it?
    - AlecSchueler 2y ago
      Sounds political to me.
      - infecto 2y ago
        You’re more than welcome to, of course—but that feels like a rather trite response to what could have warranted at least a bit more substance.
- AlecSchueler 2y ago
  > There are many other forums for that already. Could you recommend some other forums where politics are allowed but people also have a deep technical knowledge and understanding? With also an expected level of mutual respect and effort given to discussion?
infecto 2y ago
I am not obtuse I just have no desire to get into political debates on HN. It’s been beaten to death already. Now if something new happened or if there was a different way to look at something then it makes sense.

AlecSchueler 2y ago

Facism is taking hold. There's no hyperbole. Everything will be affected. We need to respond. The only over-reaction is here in choosing to bury your head in the sand.