4 ms·

Is this a bot? Is this someone telling an unpopular truth on an alt account? Is this someone telling a fabrication on an alt account? The best part about Hac

by LexiMax 9mo ago

Is this a bot? Is this someone telling an unpopular truth on an alt account? Is this someone telling a fabrication on an alt account? The best part about Hacker News is that you can't really know. It's a problem inherent to the kind of social space HN is trying to be; open registration, and lax control over abuse of user moderation tools.

brightball 9mo ago
Real person. Live in the south. Kamala being a woman had no impact on her election chances. Most people in my circles were big Haley fans. Claiming that half the country wouldn't vote for a woman because Kamala didn't win and couldn't possibly have had any other faults as a candidate is very bot like, however.
- Jensson 9mo ago
  The funny part is that most female world leaders are right wing, since right wing voters are more likely to vote for a woman than left wing voters. There are many more left wing female candidates, but those that win elections are mostly right wing.
  - nobody9999 9mo ago
    In the US, the far-right party elects many fewer women than the center-right party[0] [0] https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/02/21/women-account-for-28-of-lawmakers-in-the-119th-congress-unchanged-from-the-last-congress/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/02/21/women-acc...
immibis 9mo ago
HN is more tightly controlled than it lets on. User moderation tools are suspended if a user doesn't use them in accordance with a pro-corporate right-wing bias.
- LexiMax 9mo ago
  Do you have personal experience with this? I was under the impression that abuse of moderation tools was common due to the fact that user moderation tools and open registration do not mix well.
  - immibis 9mo ago
    Yes, I asked dang by email, and he told me flags from my account have been disabled because I flagged things he agreed with. I think votes are also disabled. The buttons are still there, but they don't do anything.
    - LexiMax 9mo ago
      It's funny, because I had been feeling this in my gut - the idea that they do have oversight over flagging and downvoting, and they just pick and choose who they go after based on biases. To that end, I've actually been avoiding the downvote and flag button entirely. It's handy to close off an avenue of admin retaliation, but on a deeper level I feel like the reflexive race to downvote people you disagree with is the "game" part of gamified engagement. Besides, if an HN user says something horrendous, I feel like other HN users deserve to know the kind of company they have on this site, instead of tone-policing it under the rug.
      - immibis 9mo ago
        [flagged]
      - dang 9mo ago
        There's no aspect of this that we haven't publicly explained over and over again. Here's one example: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46378818 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46378818. Here are countless others: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20flags&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... If you read some of those explanations and still have a question that isn't answered there, I'd be happy to take a crack at it. What you shouldn't do is take commenters' claims about it un-skeptically, because sometimes (as in this case) they are false.

by LexiMax 9mo ago

brightball 9mo ago

Real person. Live in the south. Kamala being a woman had no impact on her election chances. Most people in my circles were big Haley fans. Claiming that half the country wouldn't vote for a woman because Kamala didn't win and couldn't possibly have had any other faults as a candidate is very bot like, however.

Jensson 9mo ago
The funny part is that most female world leaders are right wing, since right wing voters are more likely to vote for a woman than left wing voters. There are many more left wing female candidates, but those that win elections are mostly right wing.
- nobody9999 9mo ago
  In the US, the far-right party elects many fewer women than the center-right party[0] [0] https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/02/21/women-account-for-28-of-lawmakers-in-the-119th-congress-unchanged-from-the-last-congress/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/02/21/women-acc...

immibis 9mo ago

HN is more tightly controlled than it lets on. User moderation tools are suspended if a user doesn't use them in accordance with a pro-corporate right-wing bias.

LexiMax 9mo ago
Do you have personal experience with this? I was under the impression that abuse of moderation tools was common due to the fact that user moderation tools and open registration do not mix well.
- immibis 9mo ago
  Yes, I asked dang by email, and he told me flags from my account have been disabled because I flagged things he agreed with. I think votes are also disabled. The buttons are still there, but they don't do anything.
  - LexiMax 9mo ago
    It's funny, because I had been feeling this in my gut - the idea that they do have oversight over flagging and downvoting, and they just pick and choose who they go after based on biases. To that end, I've actually been avoiding the downvote and flag button entirely. It's handy to close off an avenue of admin retaliation, but on a deeper level I feel like the reflexive race to downvote people you disagree with is the "game" part of gamified engagement. Besides, if an HN user says something horrendous, I feel like other HN users deserve to know the kind of company they have on this site, instead of tone-policing it under the rug.
    - immibis 9mo ago
      [flagged]
    - dang 9mo ago
      There's no aspect of this that we haven't publicly explained over and over again. Here's one example: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46378818 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46378818. Here are countless others: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20flags&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... If you read some of those explanations and still have a question that isn't answered there, I'd be happy to take a crack at it. What you shouldn't do is take commenters' claims about it un-skeptically, because sometimes (as in this case) they are false.