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Techies like to think of themselves as different from the very wealthy, but many of our attitudes are very similar and most techies aspire to join their ranks.

Techies like to think of themselves as different from the very wealthy, but many of our attitudes are very similar and most techies aspire to join their ranks. There's a persistent belief in common with the wealthy that we have earned, solely through our hard work and perseverance, our position in society. Never mind the advantages we had along the way.

lbrandy 13y ago
Your comment is good and worth reading, but your opening line is unfortunate especially in light of what happened in the 15 minutes following. Just remove that line. I won't tell anyone.
- mratzloff 13y ago
  Thanks. The thread got a lot more up votes after my comment. ;-)
  - larrys 13y ago
    "larrys" law states that a comment that "larrys" replies to and all the parent comments get automatic up votes.
- larrys 13y ago
  With respect to the line that was removed, if anyone is curious, it had said something like "I suspect this is why it didn't get many upvotes". Or similar iirc. But to my actual point. Upvotes or downvotes on HN vary from the time of day to the way the headline is written (which will attract different groups of "techies" or whatever) and possibly the age group of the people who decide to take notice. Not to mention that there are non techies who read HN and so forth. I don't think you can make a statement, as is often done, trying to characterize a typical HN reader or poster. Because nobody is taking a poll of the entire group only the group at a snapshot in time and only then based on something that attracted that particular group to make comments and/or vote.
n72 13y ago
What does "techies" mean? Greg Gopman's Angel List profile says: " Business Development, Communications, Community Management, Networking, Sales and Marketing, Working Really Hard." This isn't a techie. He happens to be working in the tech industry because that's where the money is at the moment, but I wouldn't call him a techie. (I'd call him a douche, but that's a whole other topic.) I think we need to start divorcing the thought that SV these days is primarily a techie place and that the people who work at SV companies are techies. Many of them are like this guy. Moreover, many of the programmers are programmers, but (and this may be being elitist) can we call them techies? If someone learns a bit of JS or ruby to throw together proof-of-concept copy-cat site, can we really call them a techie?
busterarm 13y ago
I see so many comments on HN, especially as of late, basically to the effect of "the poor deserve to be poor" and usually with a "they could work hard like I do" tacked on. It's been leaving a really bad taste in my mouth. I've been both rich and poor and never forget where I've been in life. A lot of people forget how much support they've had to get where they are. When you really take a good hard look at why many poor people are in the situations they're in, you see a total absence of a support network around them. Working hard to get somewhere without any support around me is the single most frustrating thing I've had to deal with. It's easy to fail and often I have. I have cousins with trust funds and millions of dollars to back up the pursuit of their dreams. I'm not really envious, but I know that I would be much further along towards my goals if I didn't have to work my ass off to get to somewhere in life where I can even afford to take a risk. Then it can take years to recover from failure. Phrases I never expected to become part of my vocabulary like "class struggle" are starting to. I grew up in a poor, but conservative family! At least not all of us think in the way you described, but a significant number sure do.
- jjoonathan 13y ago
  Exactly! I come from a middle-class background. Not trust-fund level, but enough to shield me from the catch-22s of poverty. It disturbs me, when I reflect back on my life, just how many "steps to success" would have been complicated had my family been lower on the economic totem pole. It disturbs me even more how many of my peers (disproportionately many of which share the same background) don't acknowledge this fact with respect to their own lives. It's easy to be a libertarian when the market is treating you well. It saddens me that the concept of "class struggle" was sullied by its connection with a certain well-known failed attempt to solve the problem. Just because our rivals failed doesn't mean we have succeeded!
  - busterarm 13y ago
    > It's easy to be a libertarian when the market is treating you well. I'm really glad that my brief flirtation with libertarian ideas didn't even last into my 20s. It was more like an unfortunate stepping stone from growing up in a Limbaugh household to being the radical lefty I am today. Though I try not to identify with any of that either. At least I can understand where libertarians are coming from. It's really the objectivism and the worship of Ayn Rand in privileged and powerful economic/political circles that makes me worry about the future. Things are going well when there's a reasonably fair balance between rich/powerful and poor/powerless, especially with respect to rule of law. There won't always be justice but there needs to be a reasonable idea of it. It feels like lately that is slipping away and that such a state of affairs is more common historically -- the culture of (potential) prosperity that our society worked hard for after WWII is gone.

lbrandy 13y ago

Your comment is good and worth reading, but your opening line is unfortunate especially in light of what happened in the 15 minutes following. Just remove that line. I won't tell anyone.

mratzloff 13y ago
Thanks. The thread got a lot more up votes after my comment. ;-)
- larrys 13y ago
  "larrys" law states that a comment that "larrys" replies to and all the parent comments get automatic up votes.
larrys 13y ago
With respect to the line that was removed, if anyone is curious, it had said something like "I suspect this is why it didn't get many upvotes". Or similar iirc. But to my actual point. Upvotes or downvotes on HN vary from the time of day to the way the headline is written (which will attract different groups of "techies" or whatever) and possibly the age group of the people who decide to take notice. Not to mention that there are non techies who read HN and so forth. I don't think you can make a statement, as is often done, trying to characterize a typical HN reader or poster. Because nobody is taking a poll of the entire group only the group at a snapshot in time and only then based on something that attracted that particular group to make comments and/or vote.

n72 13y ago

What does "techies" mean? Greg Gopman's Angel List profile says: " Business Development, Communications, Community Management, Networking, Sales and Marketing, Working Really Hard." This isn't a techie. He happens to be working in the tech industry because that's where the money is at the moment, but I wouldn't call him a techie. (I'd call him a douche, but that's a whole other topic.) I think we need to start divorcing the thought that SV these days is primarily a techie place and that the people who work at SV companies are techies. Many of them are like this guy. Moreover, many of the programmers are programmers, but (and this may be being elitist) can we call them techies? If someone learns a bit of JS or ruby to throw together proof-of-concept copy-cat site, can we really call them a techie?

busterarm 13y ago

I see so many comments on HN, especially as of late, basically to the effect of "the poor deserve to be poor" and usually with a "they could work hard like I do" tacked on. It's been leaving a really bad taste in my mouth. I've been both rich and poor and never forget where I've been in life. A lot of people forget how much support they've had to get where they are. When you really take a good hard look at why many poor people are in the situations they're in, you see a total absence of a support network around them. Working hard to get somewhere without any support around me is the single most frustrating thing I've had to deal with. It's easy to fail and often I have. I have cousins with trust funds and millions of dollars to back up the pursuit of their dreams. I'm not really envious, but I know that I would be much further along towards my goals if I didn't have to work my ass off to get to somewhere in life where I can even afford to take a risk. Then it can take years to recover from failure. Phrases I never expected to become part of my vocabulary like "class struggle" are starting to. I grew up in a poor, but conservative family! At least not all of us think in the way you described, but a significant number sure do.

jjoonathan 13y ago
Exactly! I come from a middle-class background. Not trust-fund level, but enough to shield me from the catch-22s of poverty. It disturbs me, when I reflect back on my life, just how many "steps to success" would have been complicated had my family been lower on the economic totem pole. It disturbs me even more how many of my peers (disproportionately many of which share the same background) don't acknowledge this fact with respect to their own lives. It's easy to be a libertarian when the market is treating you well. It saddens me that the concept of "class struggle" was sullied by its connection with a certain well-known failed attempt to solve the problem. Just because our rivals failed doesn't mean we have succeeded!
- busterarm 13y ago
  > It's easy to be a libertarian when the market is treating you well. I'm really glad that my brief flirtation with libertarian ideas didn't even last into my 20s. It was more like an unfortunate stepping stone from growing up in a Limbaugh household to being the radical lefty I am today. Though I try not to identify with any of that either. At least I can understand where libertarians are coming from. It's really the objectivism and the worship of Ayn Rand in privileged and powerful economic/political circles that makes me worry about the future. Things are going well when there's a reasonably fair balance between rich/powerful and poor/powerless, especially with respect to rule of law. There won't always be justice but there needs to be a reasonable idea of it. It feels like lately that is slipping away and that such a state of affairs is more common historically -- the culture of (potential) prosperity that our society worked hard for after WWII is gone.