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There seems to be a certain paranoia among the wealthy and those in power, namely that peaceful cities are burning to the ground. Maybe they get this from their

by k310 1y ago

There seems to be a certain paranoia among the wealthy and those in power, namely that peaceful cities are burning to the ground. Maybe they get this from their "news sources", presidential posts and speeches, but it's entirely untrue. Perhaps it's a kind of deliberate mass hysteria. As an example, A group has set up a website to give the "ground truth" of Portland [0]. San Francisco has always had its problems, but under the control of local authorities with domain knowledge. And the same, no doubt, for every liberal city being occupied under the false pretense that it is in ruins. People go to work, schools and even zoos normally and peacefully. You see, in this case, rampant crime, raging fires and anarchy are to be found in the mind of the beholder. [0] https://isportlandburning.com/ https://isportlandburning.com/

b112 1y ago
We need to return nuance to everything. And we don't need team politics any more. San Fran has major problems. It's under much better control now, than it was a decade ago. Admitting and realising that truth, doesn't mean that there's anything wrong in Portland. This whole "All (red|blue) cities are (bad|good) is insane. Yet I see both sides playing it. Playing it, because one (bad|good) somehow means all are?! Madness.
- k310 1y ago
  Nuance seems to have gone out the window long ago with blatant lies being stated and posted everywhere. Any nuanced statement, meaning out of lockstep with The Information Ministry, is attacked, and with the usual ad-hominem. Seriously, if you disagreed on some point, say, "Portland is reduced to smoldering rubble" and came under attack via media and death threats, how would you nuance that? We in the U.S. have not experienced what other countries have experienced, at least since the Civil War, and any outside view, presumably nuanced, comes down hard on outright lies and personal and group threats. And other countries have fought fascism on their homelands and see the big picture.
- RickJWagner 1y ago
  “We don’t need team politics any more.” Perhaps the single greatest sentence on Hacker News, for quite some time. Thank you.
- anigbrowl 1y ago
  Team politics are a seemingly unavoidable outcome of the way our electoral system is structured: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law San Francisco has ranked choice voting, but it's available to only about 14 million voters, about 6% of the eligible voter population. It tends to be mostly on progressive districts, conservatives are implacably opposed to it in my experience. The federal requirements for single member districts are also part of the problem in my view. Some states have multi-member districts but the practice seems to be in decline over the last century. I also think the strictly scheduled elections in the US are a problem. It's made electioneering into an industry and led politicians to engage in all sorts of abusive behaviors, knowing they can run out the clock. You can see the sam mindset in US-centric sports like American Football and basketball, where coaches and teams habitually exploit the clock period by retaining possession if they ahead or forcing fouls to to create turnover opportunities if not. Fouling has become part of the game and this is a Bad Thing. The same is true of politics. The US would, in my view, be far better off with parliamentary government and a little less institutional stability, so as to limit the overwhelming advantages of incumbency, and the abuses that accompany it.
ageitgey 1y ago
This is more about two sides yelling past each other and playing team sports instead of being credible parties trying to improve society. And given how weaponized especially the right has become recently, I'm not sure how you can even attempt to make an argument in good faith anymore given how you will be treated, so I'm not pretending like I have the answers to any of this. Obviously the right is super exaggerating the state of "blue" cities to justify political grandstanding, shows of power, and increased authoritarian control. But it's also true that a lot of these cities have major, major problems in specific areas and are a sad representation of America in 2025 (the richest country in the history of the world). And these problems are not getting effectively addressed at scale, despite many efforts and resources spent by many different groups. This is why these attacks work - you can say "PORTLAND IS NOT BURNING" (it's not!) but you can't argue with the average tourist that they visit the core tourist parts of these cities, they see horrible things that they've never seen before in their suburban lives. Many areas don't feel safe. That's why these attacks are so effective. The saddest part is we can't talk about this seriously in the current media. You have to be on a "side". Any attempt to have a real discussion is either ignored or lambasted from one side or the other. Both sides have elements of truth which they can use to push their view. Cities are dynamic and constantly changing. Different people have different experiences living in different neighborhoods. My experiences might not match yours. But I can say some of the most visibly terrible places for human misery in the Western world that I have seen in the last 10 years have been: - The obvious places in San Francisco, but also anywhere at any time in the financial district - Downtown Seattle in various areas (between 4th and Pikes Place, around various 7-11s). You want walk from the water front back to your hotel, take the public elevator, it shows up and opens, and a couple is just fully living in it. What do you do with that? - Many parts of downtown Los Angeles - The eastern side of downtown San Diego, around the new library and baseball stadium - Any MacDonalds in the southern part of downtown Chicago - The area in and around the Taco Bell on the main tourist strip in Denver - Many parts of Manhattan - Almost any form of public transit in any city in the US that has one, from a bus in St. Loius to the BART in SF You probably don't live in these neighborhoods. You'll think "yeah, don't live in the bad parts - my neighborhood is delighful". But I don't think any rational person can pretend like the policies in any of these cities are working effectively, at scale.
- 1y ago
kcplate 1y ago
> https://isportlandburning.com/ https://isportlandburning.com/ If the goal is to show how the government is exaggerating or lying why not set up webcams around federal facilities in Portland? Seems to me that this is just the other side of the same coin. If the government is going to be dishonest and just point to where the “fires” are and pretend like there is no place that isn’t under siege…it’s just as dishonest to pretend like there are not places in Portland that are problematic.
- queenkjuul 1y ago
  There are parts of Portland being burned to the ground, as the government has claimed?
  - kcplate 1y ago
    There are certainly parts of Portland that are dealing with protests that appear, to me, to be dangerous enough that I have no interest on being anywhere near them. You certainly do not see those places on that website, nor any mention of them. Everybody has a story to tell and a perspective that they want to tell it from.
    - sterlind 1y ago
      show me, please.
      - kcplate 1y ago
        Do you deny that there have been protests around that ICE facility and that there has been some violence and arrests in connection with those protests?
        queenkjuul 1y ago
        Show us

by k310 1y ago

b112 1y ago

We need to return nuance to everything. And we don't need team politics any more. San Fran has major problems. It's under much better control now, than it was a decade ago. Admitting and realising that truth, doesn't mean that there's anything wrong in Portland. This whole "All (red|blue) cities are (bad|good) is insane. Yet I see both sides playing it. Playing it, because one (bad|good) somehow means all are?! Madness.

k310 1y ago
Nuance seems to have gone out the window long ago with blatant lies being stated and posted everywhere. Any nuanced statement, meaning out of lockstep with The Information Ministry, is attacked, and with the usual ad-hominem. Seriously, if you disagreed on some point, say, "Portland is reduced to smoldering rubble" and came under attack via media and death threats, how would you nuance that? We in the U.S. have not experienced what other countries have experienced, at least since the Civil War, and any outside view, presumably nuanced, comes down hard on outright lies and personal and group threats. And other countries have fought fascism on their homelands and see the big picture.
RickJWagner 1y ago
“We don’t need team politics any more.” Perhaps the single greatest sentence on Hacker News, for quite some time. Thank you.
anigbrowl 1y ago
Team politics are a seemingly unavoidable outcome of the way our electoral system is structured: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law San Francisco has ranked choice voting, but it's available to only about 14 million voters, about 6% of the eligible voter population. It tends to be mostly on progressive districts, conservatives are implacably opposed to it in my experience. The federal requirements for single member districts are also part of the problem in my view. Some states have multi-member districts but the practice seems to be in decline over the last century. I also think the strictly scheduled elections in the US are a problem. It's made electioneering into an industry and led politicians to engage in all sorts of abusive behaviors, knowing they can run out the clock. You can see the sam mindset in US-centric sports like American Football and basketball, where coaches and teams habitually exploit the clock period by retaining possession if they ahead or forcing fouls to to create turnover opportunities if not. Fouling has become part of the game and this is a Bad Thing. The same is true of politics. The US would, in my view, be far better off with parliamentary government and a little less institutional stability, so as to limit the overwhelming advantages of incumbency, and the abuses that accompany it.

ageitgey 1y ago

This is more about two sides yelling past each other and playing team sports instead of being credible parties trying to improve society. And given how weaponized especially the right has become recently, I'm not sure how you can even attempt to make an argument in good faith anymore given how you will be treated, so I'm not pretending like I have the answers to any of this. Obviously the right is super exaggerating the state of "blue" cities to justify political grandstanding, shows of power, and increased authoritarian control. But it's also true that a lot of these cities have major, major problems in specific areas and are a sad representation of America in 2025 (the richest country in the history of the world). And these problems are not getting effectively addressed at scale, despite many efforts and resources spent by many different groups. This is why these attacks work - you can say "PORTLAND IS NOT BURNING" (it's not!) but you can't argue with the average tourist that they visit the core tourist parts of these cities, they see horrible things that they've never seen before in their suburban lives. Many areas don't feel safe. That's why these attacks are so effective. The saddest part is we can't talk about this seriously in the current media. You have to be on a "side". Any attempt to have a real discussion is either ignored or lambasted from one side or the other. Both sides have elements of truth which they can use to push their view. Cities are dynamic and constantly changing. Different people have different experiences living in different neighborhoods. My experiences might not match yours. But I can say some of the most visibly terrible places for human misery in the Western world that I have seen in the last 10 years have been: - The obvious places in San Francisco, but also anywhere at any time in the financial district - Downtown Seattle in various areas (between 4th and Pikes Place, around various 7-11s). You want walk from the water front back to your hotel, take the public elevator, it shows up and opens, and a couple is just fully living in it. What do you do with that? - Many parts of downtown Los Angeles - The eastern side of downtown San Diego, around the new library and baseball stadium - Any MacDonalds in the southern part of downtown Chicago - The area in and around the Taco Bell on the main tourist strip in Denver - Many parts of Manhattan - Almost any form of public transit in any city in the US that has one, from a bus in St. Loius to the BART in SF You probably don't live in these neighborhoods. You'll think "yeah, don't live in the bad parts - my neighborhood is delighful". But I don't think any rational person can pretend like the policies in any of these cities are working effectively, at scale.

1y ago

kcplate 1y ago

> https://isportlandburning.com/ https://isportlandburning.com/ If the goal is to show how the government is exaggerating or lying why not set up webcams around federal facilities in Portland? Seems to me that this is just the other side of the same coin. If the government is going to be dishonest and just point to where the “fires” are and pretend like there is no place that isn’t under siege…it’s just as dishonest to pretend like there are not places in Portland that are problematic.

queenkjuul 1y ago
There are parts of Portland being burned to the ground, as the government has claimed?
- kcplate 1y ago
  There are certainly parts of Portland that are dealing with protests that appear, to me, to be dangerous enough that I have no interest on being anywhere near them. You certainly do not see those places on that website, nor any mention of them. Everybody has a story to tell and a perspective that they want to tell it from.
  - sterlind 1y ago
    show me, please.
    - kcplate 1y ago
      Do you deny that there have been protests around that ICE facility and that there has been some violence and arrests in connection with those protests?
      - queenkjuul 1y ago
        Show us