Comment by rustynails | Hacker News Reader

Comment by rustynails | Hacker News Reader

I don't think this article adequately captures the problem. I'll try to illustrate.

I explained to my children about the 2 US candidates. I described both of them as bullies and said they promote a culture of bullying. We discussed how they set a bad example for the broader community and how media condones this behaviour.

I was picking up my children from school when one young boy called me by my first name in a mocking tone. I approached him and asked how his day was and took a moment to ask about him. When I now see this boy, he goes out of his way to say hello.

I recently went to a computer club open day. The rules were "we will only allow the same number of boys in as girls". I looked around and saw about 20 boys and 1 girl. I went to this girl and her mother and said "good on you for giving it a go, a variety of experiences is essential to helping you find your true self". The mother went on a sexist rant about patriarchal societies (the usual politically correct thinking) and I said "why would you deny any child the opportunity? Why would you force the same numbers of girls and boys? What's gone wrong in such basic thinking?" She stopped the hardcore feminist routine and apologised. She was big enough to say "no one has ever put it like that, that really makes sense".

The problem with hate is that the Internet has given it a collective voice of monumental proportions. Our community leaders have let us down by selectively promoting prejudice (eg. Emma Watson is glorified for hypocrisy) while aggressively condemning others, especially passive people like Matt Taylor. What's worse is that most people don't recognise hate and bullying when they see it, or they are apathetic to it.

My simple rule: if someone promotes one group over another, they are as bad as someone who excludes or vilifies a group (especially politically correct people who are huge bullies). These people who marginalise are the true haters and bullies. The article really misses the breadth of hate and bullying.

Thought for the day. Do a search on breast cancer websites. How many of these sites do you think alienate men who suffer from the condition? Why do you think many of these sites quote percentages of male victims?

Why do you think feminists like Emma Watson glorify prejudice? She does no such thing. To the contrary: she is painfully nice to everybody.

Why do you equate the meanness of Trump and Clinton? In what world are their personal faults comparable? Donald Trump is petty and vindictive to an unusual degree. Clinton is a normal politician.

You cannot change society without criticizing it. Social justice activists spend a lot of time pointing out injustice in society, in the hope to persuade people to become less discriminatory. This doesn't make them mean or bullies. The problem is that any time sexist, racist or otherwise nasty behavior is pointed out people tend to get angry, and they want to lash out at person who criticized their behavior instead of reflecting on the merits of the accusation.

It's embarrassing to see your post at the top of this thread. And people wonder why there aren't more women and minorities in tech...

A conspicuous and large campaign contribution by a key figure associated with this site sure won't encourage women or minorities in tech either.

But it sure seems to have attracted a flurry of disturbing posts (eg my grandparent and sibling post's)

   Clinton is a normal politician.

Isn't it problematic that being directly involved in the destruction of Irak, Libya, and probably Syria is considered normalcy?

I would say so -- US foreign policy horrifies me time and time again.

I'm not a US citizen but from what I understand, if Clinton was seen as mediocre politician, there would no Trump-danger. The only thing that makes this election somewhat interesting for outsiders like myself, is that she's the only candidate I could think of that has a real, although slim, change of losing.

Given recent events in Europe, I will wait for election day, polls doesn't mean anything. Also, the fact that nearly all mainstream US media I read is extremely pro-Clinton might have an unexpected backlash a-la Brexit.

   nasty behavior is pointed out

This trivialises the discussion because there is no agreement on what is sexist, racist or otherwise nasty behaviour. For example a certain form of radical feminist thinks all heterosexual intercourse is rape. Plenty of people think affirmative action is racist.

Finally, and maybe most importantly, the communist tradition has murdered millions of people in the name of social justice. And older people who still remember the communists often can't help but see that eerie similarities ...

The parallel you draw to communist purges is illogical. When you look at historical conflicts all parties think their actions are righteous, no matter where they fall on the political spectrum. Purges are justified (rationalized) by the need to solidify power for the greater good. In other words: it's about expedience. It doesn't matter whether the purges are committed by communists, fascists, or religious zealots.

I read that as their point to begin with.

A lot of contemporary SJWism follows Leninist, Trotskyite and Gramscian scripts. The boots on the grounds don't realise this, they are young and naive, but their leaders know exactly what they are doing.

So pointing out unambiguously[1] bad behavior is wrong because communists murdered people. wow.

[1] unambiguous = something you would not want done to your mother

If A then B, but C, therefore D. Modus indisponens.

There is considerable disagreement on how one's mothers should be treated, as you'd realise if you left your bubble. I recommend a holiday among the Taliban for contrast.

I agree that it's necessary to often look at society with a critical eye if you want to improve it. I think no small part of a lot of the heat in these discussions is that people do care about making things better.

> This doesn't make them mean or bullies. The problem is that any time ... behavior is pointed out people tend to get angry, and they want to lash out at person who criticized their behavior instead of reflecting on the merits of the accusation.

I elided the behavior qualifiers because I think you're getting at a deeper point that works in general. (Please correct me if this is unfair.) The way the criticism is presented is important. There's an effective difference in listing faults, presenting evidence, or making accusations that put people on the defensive (and they're no longer listening to you), and figuring out ways to take into account human psychology in ways that are more likely to make a change. As you said, "people tend to get angry, and they want to lash out ... instead of reflecting." Engaging people in a way that encourages that reflection rather than the anger is hopefully going to be more productive.

This can be increasingly difficult when tensions are high. And that's usually when it's even more important. And sometimes I feel like this is a slower path, but then if the alternative isn't likely to make a change at all--or make it worse--, slower seems like a better alternative.

This comment is in part me working through my thoughts. The fact that it's attached to your comment is because it prompted me to think more about this, so thank you!

To the general reader, in the hopes of better communication, if you'd like to down vote this comment, will you also take the time to add a brief reply? I appreciate it.

Last month a woman of arab origins went to speak with far (extreme~) right people at their party meeting. Reactions would be the usual rant about immigration, reflex anger. She didn't debate the arguments, mostly asked about them, calmly. 3 minutes later they were in an understanding discussion, almost friendly.

My reaction was that we should find a way to handle social gathering, political parties. It's so easy to turn into an echo chamber based distortion field.

There's something about our minds and how we interact that creates walls. We should approach things a bit like buddhism, with new eyes and not prejudice. And ability to amort people which are already walled up so they can climb it down themselves and go back to relaxed open minded, honest interactions.

I practice mindfulness, and yet I find myself creating those very same walls with my wife. In the past two and a half years, some of our arguments have gotten intense. I could see it escalating, worse and worse. It's only in the past month or so that we are both figuring out better communication patterns.

It's why I'm so arrested by this article and @rustynail's examples. I don't know what it is, but I feel like I'm on the verge of grokking something here.

So to combat all of this you're going around correcting people and dismissing their perspectives as, among other things, the usual PC culture? Do you not think your attitude will evolve in your children and theirs into the same mockery of kindness and it's own principles that has befallen everyone else?

@kingpawn thank you for bringing this up. It's a good test, and something that my friends and I have been batting around privately for awhile. I have friends who see themselves as SJW activists as well as friends who see SJW as an obstacle for better communication.

I clearly don't speak for @rustynails. However, I think he is establishing a genuine connection with people, exactly an application of what Kierkegaard was explaining. Rather than dismissing other people's concerns, in his examples, he is instead establishing their personhood. He makes it personal without make it personally insulting. There are probably other things I'm missing, but I'm eager to try them out. I notice similar breakdown in communication with my wife, but I think this would help a lot.

>So to combat all of this you're going around correcting people and dismissing their perspectives as, among other things, the usual PC culture?

I think you've only got the correcting part right.

The parent 's interventions, as explained, where not dismissing, and especially where not dismissive of anything and everything -- they were only answering hostile behavior or exclusion with more openness and understanding.

> Emma Watson is glorified for hypocrisy

That doesn't seem very charitable. From everything I've seen Emma Watson acts altruistically in good faith and makes a point of not making her advocacy adversarial.

Yeah, you sound like the usual person who wants to sweep away a strong history of oppression by pretending that being equal is all that's necessary, and uses that as a tool to suppress dissent from populations experiencing significant active oppression that you don't see because of your privileged position.

We say "black lives matter" not because white lives don't, but because it is a defacto truth of our system that black lives are treated as mattering much less. What you're doing is suppressing dissent in a way that maintains the status quo.

>We say "black lives matter" not because white lives don't, but because it is a defacto truth of our system that black lives are treated as mattering much less.

And you really think that people protesting police shootings in general, and e.g. shouting "all lives matter", whether the victim is black, latino, asian, white or whatever would harm things?

It's the NON PROTESTING that's the problem, not the change of angle from "black lives" to "all lives". If anything insisting on "black lives" is only just addressing a narrow part of the problem and alienates people from the more general cause to boot.

Here's the thing.

-- police violence is unambiguously a racial issue [0]

-- "white lives matter" contains implicit parallelism to "black lives matter" and cannot help but be viewed as responding to BLM. Its use in general has been to deny the racial aspects of police violence.

-- if you wish to address police violence for all groups, then use language which does not function to deny or derail other movements. Choose a new catch phrase. BLM is necessary to address the particularly black aspects of police violence, and trying to turn it into a race-blind movement is to destroy a core part of the problems it is trying to address.

Make a movement which is interested in the general problem of police violence, but recognize that you're not addressing the same types of problems as a movement like BLM and don't try to stop what BLM is doing.

The claim that <a movement which addresses the particularly black aspects of police violence is alienating> is a condemnation of non-black culture, not a condemnation of BLM. Race exists and has strong effects on culture and treatment, and race-blindness' only function is to deny marginalized groups the opportunity to address the oppressions specific to them.

[0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/07/1...

> Race exists and has strong effects on culture and treatment, and race-blindness' only function is to deny marginalized groups the opportunity to address the oppressions specific to them.

I think this depends on who is blind to race, and if they really are or are just not saying it because they like the status quo. If everyone was blind (literally) to race, there would be no racism... I don't think the world is helped by everyone talking about race. It's not that exciting, it's some minor physical traits. Culture, and history, are the deep topics.

And I think it misses the point that if you're bullied by a sexist, or a racist, you're going to feel the same. We'd have to ban a thousand topics and it still wouldn't keep the bullies from bullying. It's better to go to the root of the problem and deal with bullies.

Bullies feelings don't matter, so we don't have to worry about being PC, etc. Everyone has been bullied, so everyone can get into it.

What we need to do to make this work is talk about race just enough that we don't discourage the victim revealing their bullying, but not enough to give the bullies anything to work with.

> police violence is unambiguously a racial issue

Right, but we won't fix it by being equally but opposite racists. We fix it by firing and charging any officer who breaks a law.

No, it's the politically correct who go there to pitch a fit, change the chant, and then leave when satisfied they've meddled enough who would "harm" things.

I'm not black, but have been threatened by police (with guns) for perfectly legal activities. But I'm not going to fight my way into a Black Lives Matter protest to try to change their story. Theirs is true - they are black and their lives matter. Their lives are the ones being systematically undervalued. I was only targeted because the cop was having a bad night, they're targeted every day by racists who think they're doing the right thing for society.

I think they feel that all lives matter (except maybe cops and cop supporters). But that doesn't help the point of focusing on those who are the most under attack and the racism causing it.

Those are fascinating examples. I'm looking forward to applying this in my communication patterns. Correct me if I'm wrong, what I'm seeing here is seeing the person as that person and interacting with them. That in turn, defuses the kind of, detached, bullying that takes place. Am I missing something?

Have you found this to be effective online?

Just curious, how does this rule affect your stance on affirmative action and similar policies?

Do you really think nobody had explained it to the girl's mother like that? It sounds like she was trying to end the conversation in the easiest way possible, and she knows how to do it because she's ended that conversation so many times before.

Seems that you know what she actually thought better than she that said it.

What reason do you have for believing she was honest in what she said?

Mainly the fact that unless we're talking about a person that's known for being a liar -- or a situation where people mostly lie --, this should the default assumption.

That is, the burden on proof is on the one saying she's lied.

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