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I'd like to think HN is generally better at this than most communities, but it's hard to imagine we're immune. It's also important to remember that (rightly or

I'd like to think HN is generally better at this than most communities, but it's hard to imagine we're immune. It's also important to remember that (rightly or wrongly) a lot of these culture war issues are really touching a tribalism nerve rather than really touching on the issues themselves. To a lot of people, the EV debate amounts to "those _other_ people trying to force a change on _me_." Mind you, I'm not suggesting this is the right way to look at these sorts issues, but I think that's how it plays out for a lot of people. I had a real-life friend who was very anti-environmentalist, and his view was effectively that it was all made up, and was just an excuse for the left to push things on people.

ajross 9mo ago
> I'd like to think HN is generally better at this than most communities, but it's hard to imagine we're immune. We're much, much worse. "Most communities" are built around consensus. Show up at your Facebook group organized around your favorite hobby and you'll find that everyone has a bunch of similar opinions about most things, and that's the way most people like it. Walk off the reservation and try to pick fights over something controversial and you'll find the community walks away. That sounds bad, right? What if consensus is wrong? Don't we need free thinkers?! HN is an enclave of antisocial nerds[1] who think they're smarter than the rest of society. We live for disagreement. Discovering that we disagree with our peers isn't a mark of shame, it's evidence that we've discovered a Magical Great Truth, that our "peers" at HN are all sheep, and that we're therefore smarter than the herd. Sure, Facebook fishing groups or knitting sites or whatever breed senseless group think. But on the whole "group think" usually works out pretty well and keeps people from wandering off into the scarier weeds of the thoughtscape. HN? We breed radicals. And therefore we're more susceptible to deliberately radicalizing sockpuppetry, not less. [1] To wit: we're basically 4chan but with an older demographic and industry cred.
- tuesdaynight 9mo ago
  About your last point, you hit the nail for me. HN is 4chan without the pure chaos, with people talking smartly. Here you can find all the political spectrum (including nazis), but people will try to not be as inflammatory as 4chan users (most of the time, at least). There's no limit to what people will defend here. I don't think that it's something necessarily bad for HN, but it opened my eyes about how tech billionaires are a bunch of HN users that got a lot of power.
  - Imustaskforhelp 9mo ago
    Its really ironic that I read the term radicalism in Hackernews as being against tech billionaires and this is the sentiment that I usually see here reasonably (atleast in my opinion) But your comparison to HN radicalism to equating tech billionaires as HN users themselves flips my whole comment upside down. I don't know much about the political biases here but I like to think that most people are pro open source and that they dislike the manipulative characteristics deployed by some infamous tech billionaires or those companies. Usually I think that's the case unless of course someone might have a bias themselves I suppose.
- AlecSchueler 9mo ago
  Don't forget that HN is a cold house for women and young men are much more likely to be radicalised.
- rjknight 9mo ago
  Doesn’t that also create a kind of immunity, though? If what I see is a cacophony of differing views, then I am unlikely to be influenced by any particular sock puppet account. Whereas a community that tends towards groupthink might have a narrower range of views, but if those views begin to shift in a particular direction then it’s much harder for those who are disadvantaged by that shift to resist, because to do so requires violating the norms of groupthink. I’m not sure which is better. My own preference is to tolerate a wide range of views in return for robust disagreement being the norm, but I can imagine some (most?) people preferring the opposite.
- exceptione 9mo ago
  That is something we are susceptible to indeed. Our job is to grok complex systems, and that easily leads us to hubris like we can push historians and sociologists away. I think the same can be observed in econometric circles, where I see inevitable complexity arising from human social dynamics, be it historic, cultural, sociological, or religious in nature, often gets ignored.
- Imustaskforhelp 9mo ago
  I feel like people are radicalizing in Hackernews because partially tech is becoming at forefront of finance for many cycles and this combination of tech and finance [for better or for worse] and they are very predatory for the average person (Crypto scams, AI bubbles and the list goes on) They are also very sneaky in their predatory nature at times so the average person either doesn't know the extent or doesn't look out for alternatives (Open Source) and other issues Most people on Hackernews are able to realize predatory nature of Big tech (I think) and are usually very supportive of Open source. Personally I may be wrong but one of the most common things we can discuss in Hackernews is the extent that big tech or such aspects genuinely harm the average person. If we try to talk about this nuance or other related topics with friends and family, they suffer from the same issue and as such Hackernews becomes a place where people discuss this more frequently I don't know if this counts as radicalism but a lot of my political viewpoints stand from that one of the easiest ways to bring as such good points is when country can support Open source and can fight against unethical practices in a fair and square way in general. > [1] To wit: we're basically 4chan but with an older demographic and industry cred. Teenager from High school here. 4chan is genuinely a cesspool where trolling is the key purpose. I feel like hackernews is much more on the knowledge side of things so much so that I feel more confident about knowing certain projects or gluing things together and just this make shift attitude of make things work and curiosity with great influence to Hackernews and I cannot be thankful of it enough Perhaps I try to be more agreeable though and see other person's perspective because I may be wrong I usually am and I think I just get this kick in having an agreeable conversation in the end. I think I can treat hackernews as a book for open source projects which are cool and interesting tidbits. I have found some really really great software which I must not have found if it were not for Hackernews and I am grateful for it Ooh I got a question Let's rephrase it this way, What would you prefer more, if your child used HackerNews or used tiktok?
  - everdrive 9mo ago
    Not being flippant: who _isn't_ radicalizing these days?
    - Imustaskforhelp 9mo ago
lo_zamoyski 9mo ago
Partisan tribalism is such an odd phenomenon, and it has a very obvious deranging effect on people. They no longer pay attention to principle or policy. Instead, everything becomes a matter of some vacuous “groupism”. Parties become little jingoist nations unto themselves. Our of weakness, people are unable to maintain a position rooted in honesty and truth, and instead search for some Borg cube to join in order to receive “protection”, as long as they chant the party’s mantras. Very often, it crosses over into cult of personality territory. People make idols of the party and the party leader. The tragedy of it all is that it completely misses the point. Politics is in service of the common good of the polity. True loyalty is to that common good as an objective good. Loyalty to a party is a false loyalty, as parties are not proper objects of loyalty. They are merely convenient political instruments, not the objects of the good pursued. Things become doubly absurd when this party loyalty remains intact despite a party’s errors. > it was all made up, and was just an excuse for the left to push things on people The fact is that environmental issues - like almost any political issue - can be used by any party to push an agenda in parallel to the actual issue. So, here, environmental concerns can be used by any party as a cudgel and an instrument, whether negatively (e.g., painting all environmental concern as subterfuge in order to push through policies aimed at private profit at the expense of quality of life) or positively (e.g., stopping critical projects proposed by a political opponent by commissioning bogus ecological studies to create impediments). Of course, that’s different than the extreme position that all environmental concern is part of some conspiracy (the Left has its own share of analogous conspiratorial crackpottery).
terminalbraid 9mo ago
> I'd like to think HN is generally better at this than most communities, but it's hard to imagine we're immune. This is a zero-barrier-to-entry forum (not even an email required!) that has the eyes of a people prone to being involved with startups. Why would you think in any way this would be better than an average equivalent? Because you don't personally notice it?
- everdrive 9mo ago
  There's little barrier to entry, but for the most part the community does good internal policing. Stupid emotional comments are pushed down, and the worst ones are flagged. (I've had a few moments of weakness here, so I'm not trying to be sanctimonious here) I see a lot of people who conflate "my opinion, which is the correct opinion just won't fly here, so how can you say the community does a good job of self-policing?" I really don't agree with this. Any community is going to hold some opinions you disagree with, and will hold some bad or even wrong opinions. What I generally (but not always) see is HN upvoting comments that are thoughtful and intelligent, not necessarily ones that I think might be correct.

ajross 9mo ago

> I'd like to think HN is generally better at this than most communities, but it's hard to imagine we're immune. We're much, much worse. "Most communities" are built around consensus. Show up at your Facebook group organized around your favorite hobby and you'll find that everyone has a bunch of similar opinions about most things, and that's the way most people like it. Walk off the reservation and try to pick fights over something controversial and you'll find the community walks away. That sounds bad, right? What if consensus is wrong? Don't we need free thinkers?! HN is an enclave of antisocial nerds[1] who think they're smarter than the rest of society. We live for disagreement. Discovering that we disagree with our peers isn't a mark of shame, it's evidence that we've discovered a Magical Great Truth, that our "peers" at HN are all sheep, and that we're therefore smarter than the herd. Sure, Facebook fishing groups or knitting sites or whatever breed senseless group think. But on the whole "group think" usually works out pretty well and keeps people from wandering off into the scarier weeds of the thoughtscape. HN? We breed radicals. And therefore we're more susceptible to deliberately radicalizing sockpuppetry, not less. [1] To wit: we're basically 4chan but with an older demographic and industry cred.

tuesdaynight 9mo ago
About your last point, you hit the nail for me. HN is 4chan without the pure chaos, with people talking smartly. Here you can find all the political spectrum (including nazis), but people will try to not be as inflammatory as 4chan users (most of the time, at least). There's no limit to what people will defend here. I don't think that it's something necessarily bad for HN, but it opened my eyes about how tech billionaires are a bunch of HN users that got a lot of power.
- Imustaskforhelp 9mo ago
  Its really ironic that I read the term radicalism in Hackernews as being against tech billionaires and this is the sentiment that I usually see here reasonably (atleast in my opinion) But your comparison to HN radicalism to equating tech billionaires as HN users themselves flips my whole comment upside down. I don't know much about the political biases here but I like to think that most people are pro open source and that they dislike the manipulative characteristics deployed by some infamous tech billionaires or those companies. Usually I think that's the case unless of course someone might have a bias themselves I suppose.
AlecSchueler 9mo ago
Don't forget that HN is a cold house for women and young men are much more likely to be radicalised.
rjknight 9mo ago
Doesn’t that also create a kind of immunity, though? If what I see is a cacophony of differing views, then I am unlikely to be influenced by any particular sock puppet account. Whereas a community that tends towards groupthink might have a narrower range of views, but if those views begin to shift in a particular direction then it’s much harder for those who are disadvantaged by that shift to resist, because to do so requires violating the norms of groupthink. I’m not sure which is better. My own preference is to tolerate a wide range of views in return for robust disagreement being the norm, but I can imagine some (most?) people preferring the opposite.
exceptione 9mo ago
That is something we are susceptible to indeed. Our job is to grok complex systems, and that easily leads us to hubris like we can push historians and sociologists away. I think the same can be observed in econometric circles, where I see inevitable complexity arising from human social dynamics, be it historic, cultural, sociological, or religious in nature, often gets ignored.
Imustaskforhelp 9mo ago
I feel like people are radicalizing in Hackernews because partially tech is becoming at forefront of finance for many cycles and this combination of tech and finance [for better or for worse] and they are very predatory for the average person (Crypto scams, AI bubbles and the list goes on) They are also very sneaky in their predatory nature at times so the average person either doesn't know the extent or doesn't look out for alternatives (Open Source) and other issues Most people on Hackernews are able to realize predatory nature of Big tech (I think) and are usually very supportive of Open source. Personally I may be wrong but one of the most common things we can discuss in Hackernews is the extent that big tech or such aspects genuinely harm the average person. If we try to talk about this nuance or other related topics with friends and family, they suffer from the same issue and as such Hackernews becomes a place where people discuss this more frequently I don't know if this counts as radicalism but a lot of my political viewpoints stand from that one of the easiest ways to bring as such good points is when country can support Open source and can fight against unethical practices in a fair and square way in general. > [1] To wit: we're basically 4chan but with an older demographic and industry cred. Teenager from High school here. 4chan is genuinely a cesspool where trolling is the key purpose. I feel like hackernews is much more on the knowledge side of things so much so that I feel more confident about knowing certain projects or gluing things together and just this make shift attitude of make things work and curiosity with great influence to Hackernews and I cannot be thankful of it enough Perhaps I try to be more agreeable though and see other person's perspective because I may be wrong I usually am and I think I just get this kick in having an agreeable conversation in the end. I think I can treat hackernews as a book for open source projects which are cool and interesting tidbits. I have found some really really great software which I must not have found if it were not for Hackernews and I am grateful for it Ooh I got a question Let's rephrase it this way, What would you prefer more, if your child used HackerNews or used tiktok?
- everdrive 9mo ago
  Not being flippant: who _isn't_ radicalizing these days?
  - Imustaskforhelp 9mo ago

lo_zamoyski 9mo ago

Partisan tribalism is such an odd phenomenon, and it has a very obvious deranging effect on people. They no longer pay attention to principle or policy. Instead, everything becomes a matter of some vacuous “groupism”. Parties become little jingoist nations unto themselves. Our of weakness, people are unable to maintain a position rooted in honesty and truth, and instead search for some Borg cube to join in order to receive “protection”, as long as they chant the party’s mantras. Very often, it crosses over into cult of personality territory. People make idols of the party and the party leader. The tragedy of it all is that it completely misses the point. Politics is in service of the common good of the polity. True loyalty is to that common good as an objective good. Loyalty to a party is a false loyalty, as parties are not proper objects of loyalty. They are merely convenient political instruments, not the objects of the good pursued. Things become doubly absurd when this party loyalty remains intact despite a party’s errors. > it was all made up, and was just an excuse for the left to push things on people The fact is that environmental issues - like almost any political issue - can be used by any party to push an agenda in parallel to the actual issue. So, here, environmental concerns can be used by any party as a cudgel and an instrument, whether negatively (e.g., painting all environmental concern as subterfuge in order to push through policies aimed at private profit at the expense of quality of life) or positively (e.g., stopping critical projects proposed by a political opponent by commissioning bogus ecological studies to create impediments). Of course, that’s different than the extreme position that all environmental concern is part of some conspiracy (the Left has its own share of analogous conspiratorial crackpottery).

terminalbraid 9mo ago

> I'd like to think HN is generally better at this than most communities, but it's hard to imagine we're immune. This is a zero-barrier-to-entry forum (not even an email required!) that has the eyes of a people prone to being involved with startups. Why would you think in any way this would be better than an average equivalent? Because you don't personally notice it?

everdrive 9mo ago
There's little barrier to entry, but for the most part the community does good internal policing. Stupid emotional comments are pushed down, and the worst ones are flagged. (I've had a few moments of weakness here, so I'm not trying to be sanctimonious here) I see a lot of people who conflate "my opinion, which is the correct opinion just won't fly here, so how can you say the community does a good job of self-policing?" I really don't agree with this. Any community is going to hold some opinions you disagree with, and will hold some bad or even wrong opinions. What I generally (but not always) see is HN upvoting comments that are thoughtful and intelligent, not necessarily ones that I think might be correct.