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Wow! When that one DHH blog went around the other day, I didn't actually pay attention to who the author was. All I saw was yet another bigoted rant and just

Wow! When that one DHH blog went around the other day, I didn't actually pay attention to who the author was. All I saw was yet another bigoted rant and just skimmed it and rolled my eyes. (e: here it is to save people the effort: https://world.hey.com/dhh/as-i-remember-london-e7d38e64 https://world.hey.com/dhh/as-i-remember-london-e7d38e64 ) I should not have skimmed it. From your link: > In the same post he praises Tommy Robinson (actual name Stephen Christopher Yaxley-Lennon), a right-wing agitator with several convictions for violent offences and a long history of association with far-right groups such as the English Defence League and the British Nationalist Party. He then goes on to describe those that attended last weekend’s far-right rally in London as “perfectly normal, peaceful Brits” protesting against the “demographic nightmare” that has enveloped London, despite the violence and disorder they caused. > To all of that he ads a dash of Islamophobia, citing “Pakistani rape gangs” as one of the reasons for the unrest, repeating a weaponised trope borne from a long since discredited report from the Quilliam Foundation, an organisation with ties to both the the US Tea Party, and Tommy Robinson himself. This is ... disqualifying. That's the best word I can summon here to express my dismay. This is a crossed line. Absolutely nutso. edit2: Uh wow I really should not have skimmed it. Here's one paragraph from DHH's blog itself: > Which brings us back to Robinson's powerful march yesterday. The banner said "March for Freedom", and focused as much on that now distant-to-the-Brits concept of free speech, as it did on restoring national pride. And for good reason! The totalitarian descent into censorious darkness in Britain has been as swift as its demographic shift. Well, if that doesn't speak volumes as to DHH's values, I don't know what does.

ethagnawl 1y ago
... and this is the guy whose Linux "distro" Cloudflare has just announced funding for.
- bigiain 1y ago
  Not all _that_ surprising. From where I see things, pretty much every time you see "Cloudflare" and "free speech" in the same sentence, it always end up being about Cloudflare supporting free speech for nazis or white supremacists. DHH's racist and xenophobic views are totally on-brand for them.
- aquariusDue 1y ago
  Yeah, it was funny the first time a YouTuber[0] did something like that but now I feel like the joke got out of hand a bit, I blame the uptrend of opinionated configs to turn code editors into bona fide IDEs[1][2][3] for this. Welp, looking forward to the holy wars between people running different influencers' configs five years from now. Who knows, maybe we'll see premium versions of those too. [0] DistroTube which maintains DTOS, https://distro.tube/dtos/ https://distro.tube/dtos/ [1] LunarVim [2] AstroVim [3] Doom Emacs
cratermoon 1y ago
He makes his position clear enough in the second paragraph, for those who know how to read between the lines. "London is no longer the city I was infatuated with in the late '90s and early 2000s. Chiefly because it's no longer full of native Brits."
vr46 1y ago
OMFG This post is full of outright nonsense. I was in Central London last Saturday and watched a lot of it go down, before heading to Islington and then catching the last dregs of the crowd nearer Euston and chatting in the pub with some of them. As a "native Brit" and "native Londoner" that DHH wouldn't recognise as such, he can absolutely do one.
scuff3d 1y ago
2025 has been wild but DHH outing himself as a crazy racist was definitely not something I was expecting...
- simianparrot 1y ago
  If he’s a crazy racist, what would you call an actual racist?
  - scuff3d 1y ago
    The venn diagram of actual racists and crazy racists is a circle.
    - simianparrot 1y ago
      So if I understand correctly, people want a state for the Palestinian people. But they do not accept that people want a state for the Danish people. Is that it?
      - pjc50 1y ago
        Ethnostates are a terrible idea regardless of whose ethnicity we're talking about, because they can only be maintained by violence. The state of Palestine is an answer to the question of "what nationality do the residents of Gaza and the West Bank have?"
      - maleldil 1y ago
        "People" have differing opinions, but the one I mostly see from the left is that they want Palestinians to live in the land they owned before Israeli colonisers invaded it and forced them to relocate to subhuman conditions. What I haven't seen is the desire to expel the Israelis currently living there, as long as they agree to let the Palestinians lead a decent life.
        kgwgk 1y ago
        You have never seen the slogan “from the river to the sea”? https://harvardharrispoll.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/HHP_Dec23_KeyResults.pdf https://harvardharrispoll.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/HHP... Do you think that the long-term answer to the Israel-Palestinian dispute is for Arab states to absorb the Palestinians, for there to be two states, Israel and Palestine, or for Israel to be ended and given to Hamas and the Palestinians? 51% in the 18-24 group chose the third option.
simianparrot 1y ago
As a fellow Scandinavian, DHH is just writing what the vast majority of us think. And it isn’t racist. That word is being misused until it soon has no value left; you sure you want that?
- BoredPositron 1y ago
  What's the right use for the word and the value of it in your mind? You are commenting in circles in this thread and you could clarify it easily.
- fredrikholm 1y ago
  I'm happy to say that ~80% of Sweden and Norway don't vote for right wing populist parties like SD and Fremskrittspartiet, so "vast majority of us" might be a bit of a stretch.
  - deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
  - simianparrot 1y ago
    That's a misrepresentation of statistics though. FRP is the second largest party this election, with 23,8% of votes, only second to AP who got 28%. But many people won't vote based on the immigration issues, because so far, other issues are more pressing. But my point was that I am absolutely sure the majority of Norwegians _want Norway to remain a country that retains its cultural history_ while not being exclusive to one ethnic group. It's about retaining a majority. I don't understand why that sentiment is so problematic here on HN, because simultaneously people are clamoring for a Palestinian state for the Palestinian people. Why can't Norway have a Norwegian state for the Norwegian people? Or Denmark? Or the UK?
    - fredrikholm 1y ago
      > That's a misrepresentation of statistics though. I can't speak for Norway, but in Sweden the only party worth keeping an eye on that adheres to the usual combination of pro-Russia, anti-abortion, anti-immigrant, anti-EU rhetoric etc is Sverigedemokraterna (formerly Bevara Sverige Svenskt, a party based solely on the idea of an ethnostate). They're hovering around 20%. > But my point was that I am absolutely sure the majority of Norwegians _want Norway to remain a country that retains its cultural history_ while not being exclusive to one ethnic group. It's about retaining a majority. Is the existence of history dependent on the ethnicity of the person reading it? I'm sure you've met non-native people who are in all other respects very much Norwegian. Unless you mean to imply that culture is constrained to genetics. I deeply hope that that is not what you meant. > I don't understand why that sentiment is so problematic here on HN, because simultaneously people are clamoring for a Palestinian state for the Palestinian people. How many Norwegian cities were leveled by bombs this year? How many were murdered by foreign military? > Why can't Norway have a Norwegian state for the Norwegian people? Or Denmark? Or the UK? They do. Here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norway https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norway https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denmark https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denmark https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UK https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UK All fully functioning sovereign states, all internationally recognized by their peers and enemies alike.
kgwgk 1y ago
> To all of that he ads a dash of Islamophobia, citing “Pakistani rape gangs” as one of the reasons for the unrest, repeating a weaponised trope borne from a long since discredited report Were independent inquiries also repeating weaponised tropes from long since discredited reports? “By far the majority of perpetrators were described as 'Asian' by victims, yet throughout the entire period, councillors did not engage directly with the Pakistani-heritage community to discuss how best they could jointly address the issue. Some councillors seemed to think it was a one-off problem, which they hoped would go away. Several staff described their nervousness about identifying the ethnic origins of perpetrators for fear of being thought racist; others remembered clear direction from their managers not to do so.” https://www.rotherham.gov.uk/downloads/file/279/independent-inquiry-into-child-sexual-exploitation-in-rotherham https://www.rotherham.gov.uk/downloads/file/279/independent-...
- pjc50 1y ago
  https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/07/29/officer-raped-rotherham-grooming-gang-victim-in-police-car/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/07/29/officer-raped-ro... The ultimate problems lie in the police: they are generally terrible at handling rape cases, and in this case there are claims that they were actively complicit in some of the rapes. Using the actions of some members of an ethnic minority to justify .. well, any action against people who were not actually personally involved, is textbook discrimination.

ethagnawl 1y ago

... and this is the guy whose Linux "distro" Cloudflare has just announced funding for.

bigiain 1y ago
Not all _that_ surprising. From where I see things, pretty much every time you see "Cloudflare" and "free speech" in the same sentence, it always end up being about Cloudflare supporting free speech for nazis or white supremacists. DHH's racist and xenophobic views are totally on-brand for them.
aquariusDue 1y ago
Yeah, it was funny the first time a YouTuber[0] did something like that but now I feel like the joke got out of hand a bit, I blame the uptrend of opinionated configs to turn code editors into bona fide IDEs[1][2][3] for this. Welp, looking forward to the holy wars between people running different influencers' configs five years from now. Who knows, maybe we'll see premium versions of those too. [0] DistroTube which maintains DTOS, https://distro.tube/dtos/ https://distro.tube/dtos/ [1] LunarVim [2] AstroVim [3] Doom Emacs

cratermoon 1y ago

He makes his position clear enough in the second paragraph, for those who know how to read between the lines. "London is no longer the city I was infatuated with in the late '90s and early 2000s. Chiefly because it's no longer full of native Brits."

vr46 1y ago

OMFG This post is full of outright nonsense. I was in Central London last Saturday and watched a lot of it go down, before heading to Islington and then catching the last dregs of the crowd nearer Euston and chatting in the pub with some of them. As a "native Brit" and "native Londoner" that DHH wouldn't recognise as such, he can absolutely do one.

scuff3d 1y ago

2025 has been wild but DHH outing himself as a crazy racist was definitely not something I was expecting...

simianparrot 1y ago
If he’s a crazy racist, what would you call an actual racist?
- scuff3d 1y ago
  The venn diagram of actual racists and crazy racists is a circle.
  - simianparrot 1y ago
    So if I understand correctly, people want a state for the Palestinian people. But they do not accept that people want a state for the Danish people. Is that it?
    - pjc50 1y ago
      Ethnostates are a terrible idea regardless of whose ethnicity we're talking about, because they can only be maintained by violence. The state of Palestine is an answer to the question of "what nationality do the residents of Gaza and the West Bank have?"
    - maleldil 1y ago
      "People" have differing opinions, but the one I mostly see from the left is that they want Palestinians to live in the land they owned before Israeli colonisers invaded it and forced them to relocate to subhuman conditions. What I haven't seen is the desire to expel the Israelis currently living there, as long as they agree to let the Palestinians lead a decent life.
      - kgwgk 1y ago
        You have never seen the slogan “from the river to the sea”? https://harvardharrispoll.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/HHP_Dec23_KeyResults.pdf https://harvardharrispoll.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/HHP... Do you think that the long-term answer to the Israel-Palestinian dispute is for Arab states to absorb the Palestinians, for there to be two states, Israel and Palestine, or for Israel to be ended and given to Hamas and the Palestinians? 51% in the 18-24 group chose the third option.

simianparrot 1y ago

As a fellow Scandinavian, DHH is just writing what the vast majority of us think. And it isn’t racist. That word is being misused until it soon has no value left; you sure you want that?

BoredPositron 1y ago
What's the right use for the word and the value of it in your mind? You are commenting in circles in this thread and you could clarify it easily.
fredrikholm 1y ago
I'm happy to say that ~80% of Sweden and Norway don't vote for right wing populist parties like SD and Fremskrittspartiet, so "vast majority of us" might be a bit of a stretch.
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
- simianparrot 1y ago
  That's a misrepresentation of statistics though. FRP is the second largest party this election, with 23,8% of votes, only second to AP who got 28%. But many people won't vote based on the immigration issues, because so far, other issues are more pressing. But my point was that I am absolutely sure the majority of Norwegians _want Norway to remain a country that retains its cultural history_ while not being exclusive to one ethnic group. It's about retaining a majority. I don't understand why that sentiment is so problematic here on HN, because simultaneously people are clamoring for a Palestinian state for the Palestinian people. Why can't Norway have a Norwegian state for the Norwegian people? Or Denmark? Or the UK?
  - fredrikholm 1y ago
    > That's a misrepresentation of statistics though. I can't speak for Norway, but in Sweden the only party worth keeping an eye on that adheres to the usual combination of pro-Russia, anti-abortion, anti-immigrant, anti-EU rhetoric etc is Sverigedemokraterna (formerly Bevara Sverige Svenskt, a party based solely on the idea of an ethnostate). They're hovering around 20%. > But my point was that I am absolutely sure the majority of Norwegians _want Norway to remain a country that retains its cultural history_ while not being exclusive to one ethnic group. It's about retaining a majority. Is the existence of history dependent on the ethnicity of the person reading it? I'm sure you've met non-native people who are in all other respects very much Norwegian. Unless you mean to imply that culture is constrained to genetics. I deeply hope that that is not what you meant. > I don't understand why that sentiment is so problematic here on HN, because simultaneously people are clamoring for a Palestinian state for the Palestinian people. How many Norwegian cities were leveled by bombs this year? How many were murdered by foreign military? > Why can't Norway have a Norwegian state for the Norwegian people? Or Denmark? Or the UK? They do. Here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norway https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norway https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denmark https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denmark https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UK https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UK All fully functioning sovereign states, all internationally recognized by their peers and enemies alike.

kgwgk 1y ago

> To all of that he ads a dash of Islamophobia, citing “Pakistani rape gangs” as one of the reasons for the unrest, repeating a weaponised trope borne from a long since discredited report Were independent inquiries also repeating weaponised tropes from long since discredited reports? “By far the majority of perpetrators were described as 'Asian' by victims, yet throughout the entire period, councillors did not engage directly with the Pakistani-heritage community to discuss how best they could jointly address the issue. Some councillors seemed to think it was a one-off problem, which they hoped would go away. Several staff described their nervousness about identifying the ethnic origins of perpetrators for fear of being thought racist; others remembered clear direction from their managers not to do so.” https://www.rotherham.gov.uk/downloads/file/279/independent-inquiry-into-child-sexual-exploitation-in-rotherham https://www.rotherham.gov.uk/downloads/file/279/independent-...

pjc50 1y ago
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/07/29/officer-raped-rotherham-grooming-gang-victim-in-police-car/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/07/29/officer-raped-ro... The ultimate problems lie in the police: they are generally terrible at handling rape cases, and in this case there are claims that they were actively complicit in some of the rapes. Using the actions of some members of an ethnic minority to justify .. well, any action against people who were not actually personally involved, is textbook discrimination.