I first visited HN in the 2006 or 2007 timeframe. Possibly earlier. I've seen the site evolve, over the years, from a place where free discussion was valued to a filter bubble where having unpopular opinions results in slow banning and hell banning. At the time I redacted these statements, I had just previously seen dang smear another poster with a dishonest characterization of him, when the poster made less than supportive (or mildly critical depending on your feelings) comments about a company that went thru YC. The threat and the implication was clear. Further it was consistent with the past decade of moderation on this site. I'm not painting the whole HN community based on a few days of posting here, I am painting it based on a decade of observation. This includes multiple times where I have seen dang harass and threaten people who later got banned. I knew I couldn't defend the other poster to him, and so I swallowed it and said nothing. And then there was vaeliled threat in this thread as well from someone at YC.

The culture here is faux intellectual where "civil and substantive" is "valued" only when they agree with the ideology. A little bit of deviation is allowed so long as the posters are sufficiently obsequious. If this were not a filter bubble you could criticize a YC company or even YC without being threatened.

But since those who agree with the party line are immune from these threats they do not post "civil and substantive" responses (you are an exception even though I am disagreeing wit you you've clearly tired to be fair) and far too many of the responses to my posts have been... patronizing, obnoxious or intellectually bigoted.

You say "gracious and well intentioned in their conduct"... you should be going after those who are not gracious or well intended in their conduct who are expressing views you DO agree with, not the contrarian ones. The contrarian ones you should give a wider birth. Right now its reversed... you have to be obsequious to express a contrarian view, and those who express the party line view get away with murder. This hypocrisy, especially coming from moderators, pisses me off, especially when wrapped with the smug self satisfaction that is so common on this site. (Example the "civil and substantive" threat above, which is pretending not to be a threat, and thus gives cover for pretending like it isn't a threat but the threat is obvious to the intended target.)