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Most responses were zingers or did not show a basic understanding for what he said. They are noise, and noise is not worth defending. I take his argument as su
by ynniv 14y ago
Most responses were zingers or did not show a basic understanding for what he said. They are noise, and noise is not worth defending.
I take his argument as supporting individual merit, and condemning praise for the seemingly meritless based on being a minority (what is often called affermative action). A proper disagreement with this position might be based around a purposeful cultivation of the minority to overcome the historical imbalance or avoid a flawed evaluation of merit. Debate then between cultivation and pure meritocracy is a valuable exchange, both sides of which are worth defending.
There appear to be many responses to sound bites taken out of context. Many of them are additionally vitriolic reiterations of much less insight and nuance than what antirez said. They do not contribute to progressing the core discussion, and are only valuable to the extent that we attempt to answer a subtle social issue by taking a vote of twitter users. Which is to say, they are not valuable at all.
- _pius 14y agoMost responses were zingers or did not show a basic understanding for what he said. They are noise, and noise is not worth defending. Surely you see the problem with that line of argument. His piece was hardly insightful. In fact, he did not show a basic understanding of the issues he was pontificating on and the piece was mere noise, not worth defending by anyone. Once you start trying to parse out who's right, you're missing the point of free speech aren't you?
- ynniv 14y agoYou're pandering, but you do raise the point that I should have said "worth considering". All speech is worth defending as free, but our time in life is limited and we must each be selective about what we spend it on. Whether or not you appreciated his post, it is probably a waste of your time to make shallow, unsubstantiated comments regarding it.
- _pius 14y agoFor what it's worth, I'm not pandering ... that's more or less how I feel about his piece. But the point is, neither you nor I can have it both ways: free speech isn't just about protecting speech we like or think is substantive.