Hacker News Reader

Comment by masondixon | Hacker News Reader

> I promise not to argue against you, and certainly not to slur you.

Please argue! And thank you for not slurring :)

> Would you be willing to articulate your argument for Trump here?

I supported Obama. I always considered myself a liberal. I support gay marriage, I support gun control. I support universal health care. I support decent welfare and a safety net.

As a programmer, the formative moment for my Trump support came when a prolific open-source developer was forced to leave the community because he would not accept a trivial change to the documentation to change gendered pro-nouns to non-gendered pro-nouns. His reason was he didn't want to mess up the revision history with a trivial change like that. And he was from South America where nouns are all gendered anyway. But one of the big companies came out and said that "they would have fired him". http://www.dailydot.com/news/github-gendered-pronoun-debate/

This was non-sensical to me, and was bullying. But I soon realised that this overly sensitive behaviour had pervaded all walks of life and all aspects of society and I soon discovered the cliched political correctness run wild with third-wave feminist bloggers, social justice, Black Lives Matter protesting of clearly non-racially motivated attacks, and that was it.

Its ironic that my biggest reason for voting Trump is to stop the bullying from the left - who are protesting against...bullying (sexism, misogyny, racism).

One side is for freedom of speech, the other side is for controlling what you can say.

One side thinks controlling what you can say will be abused and unfairly target people, the other side thinks that freedom of speech is a means of control by the entitled.

There's a calm, complex, and nuanced debate to be had here to find a middle ground.

But unfortunately there is no Liberal ready to accept that this is the debate that needs to be had.

The alt-right, the new right, the Trump supporters - we are ready and waiting to have this debate...

View on HN

I think you're right about the need for debate around how identity politics can be better expressed and that is a debate that seems to have been slightly suppressed on the left. I would say two things about why I don't think this is a good reason to support Trump:

1. The situation you describe is fundamentally about freedom of speech vs the right not be be offended. Trump is not an advocate of freedom of speech and doesn't believe in a free press. In my estimation this is much more dangerous than what you describe.

2. This doesn't even register on my scale of the pros and cons of Trump. The Presidency is not about who decides who gets to say what to whom, that is a matter for society at large. As has been described elsewhere in this thread the damage he will do (if he enacts even half of his platform) to immigrant and womens rights, America's standing in the world and free trade will outweigh a hundredfold any small gains you get from a backlash against political correctness.

> how identity politics can be better expressed

Do you not think that the elections showed that identity politics do NOT matter, instead national politics matter more?

I'm talking to OP's specific point around siding with Trump. I think the point is that no body on my side understands what matters in terms of motivating the electorate.

> As has been described elsewhere in this thread the damage he will do (if he enacts even half of his platform) to immigrant and womens rights, America's standing in the world and free trade will outweigh a hundredfold any small gains you get from a backlash against political correctness.

But in four years will you admit you're wrong if it doesn't turn out to be the case?

No. It will go on and on and on.

I feel I respond to all this fear mongering constantly:

> immigrant rights

Immigrants are better off with stronger borders. People don't have to suspect them of being illegal. Has that occurred to anyone on the left?

> womens rights?

Trump: I oppose the use of government funds to pay for abortion.

A supreme court judge may be an issue though, but it is unlikely to reverse policy.

> America's standing in the world

It is bad at the moment.

> free trade

Both candidates oppose TPP. Canada wants to talk about NAFTA. Free trade destroys local jobs.

I disagree that it's fear mongering and I don't think it's helpful to reasonable debate to call it that. I'm trying to understand what Trump wants to do by looking at what he has said.

On immigrant rights, maybe you're right, maybe all Trump wants to do is secure the borders but he certainly hasn't done much to discourage the nasty parts of his base form thinking otherwise.

On abortion rights you're taking a massive gamble with a hard won and important right. If you're comfortable doing that in the name of marginal free speak then that's for you to decide. I'm not.

The perception of Obama abroad is pretty good still. I live in the UK so I can tell you that he's perceived as one of the few grown ups on the world political stage.

They both may be opposing TPP but only Trump was talking about putting a large tariff on Chinese steel. Irrespective of the issues with global trade, trade wars are definitely bad for everyone involved.

You've hit the nail on the head. Liberalism has spent the last 10 years being the language and thought police. Where is the liberalism that brought us social security and desegregation? Why isn't liberalism talking about and fighting for basic income? None of that, just "use phrases and words as I want you to".

I am reminded of a common quip, which I am going to modify:

First they came for the word nigger, and I stopped using it because it was hurtful to black people. Then they came for the word faggot and I stopped using it because it was hurtful to gay people. Then they came for the word retarded and I stopped using it because it was hurtful to disabled people. Then they came after the words he and she, and I was called a bigot, racist, xenophobe for not bending my knee to "they".

Haha.

Its such a waste of energy. There are real problems and its such a diversion. I think its social justice bikeshedding. Its easy and they think they are making a difference.

There isn't any contact info, your account is green (meaning shiny new) so this comment isn't related to your thread.

However I just wanted to compliment you on your seemingly boundless reserves of patience while still taking the time to respond to questions.

I've personally taken a silent stance on everything until I know enough to have a good discussion about things. It has been refreshing to read a perspective, your's, which I don't ever remember seeing before the vote.

Thank you.

Honestly, there is no way I would ever publicly say any of the things I have commented here for fear of retribution. Going anywhere near topics like racism, sexism, and xenophobia is outright scary in today's political landscape - especially in the tech world. Imagine living in a world where what you say could lose you friends, your reputation, your job, etc. The attacks on Thiel epitomise this. The US feels as polarised as ever.

I believe the silent Trump vote was very, very real. There is a huge response to the progressive movement that flies under the radar. All you have to do is venture into https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/ and watch Milo's college tour on YouTube and you will get a good sense of the silent Trump vote.

We are now unable to discuss certain topics because the many of the words of language necessary to communicate on the topics are considered offensive. Communicating properly via talking is hard in the sense of transferring the exact same thought on my mind into your mind without loosing the context in which that thought is valid. It takes many to and fro clarification from both parties that are trying to communicate. If you add getting offended to anything, then the process of communication looses almost all of the original signal. I came across Milo's videos a week or two before election. It was in some article that reports it as being rude and offensive, so I went and watched the video. People are getting offended just because he support Trump. The reporter trying to interview him was trying their best to get him to admit what he says is wrong but could not. He stood his ground. Milo is also a human, he could get somethings wrong like all people, but he is genuinely trying to correct the problem of oversensitivity.

I was tracking both candidate's campaign and I couldn't even remotely say the results of polls published by media was correct. They all said Hillary leads. All most all traditional media channels and news papers all said Hillary leads. I live in a different country and even the media here were having occasional articles saying Hillary is leading. Each time I say in my mind "No its not true". I cannot blame the media in my country as they get the information from media in USA. Only in quora did I see someone almost accurately predict what the outcome of election will look like.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RG6rNcsVOaA

The woman being interviewed in CNN describes many of the problems. But the CNN anchor is not interested in getting into any details on any topic. Its like the media has Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and jumps from one topic to another within seconds and does a poor job being a news channel.

So you were worried that the repercussions for saying whatever you like may be too high, and in exchange you were willing to potentially sacrifice women's rights, minorities rights, lgbt+ rights, the environment, business regulations, and whatever else conservative Trump appointments might do?

If only the third-wave feminist bloggers, social justice warriors, black lives matters activists, etc, had kept their mouths shut! It's good they were shown there are repercussions to saying whatever you like.

> you were willing to potentially sacrifice women's rights, minorities rights, lgbt+ rights, the environment, business regulations, and whatever else conservative Trump appointments might do?

You see how here you are saying that I am in favour of sacrificing womens, minorities, lgbt, etc. rights.

You see how it is basically saying: You are are a sexist, misogynist, racist?

Why don't you ask me what I think about those issues? Why don't you ask me my views on how they are best improved, and how the current approach is bad? Why don't we have a debate on the effects of introducing female quotas in workplaces. Why don't we have a debate on illegal immigration?

You know why? Because before we start talking about illegal immigration, you will be calling me a "xenophobe" for not using the correct terminology of "undocumented immigrant" or something like that. Its tiring. But I'm always up for it.

> If only the third-wave feminist bloggers, social justice warriors, black lives matters activists, etc, had kept their mouths shut! It's good they were shown there are repercussions to saying whatever you like.

Sadly its true. If you reach too far, and attack everyone who doesn't hold your viewpoint, there are repercussions.

If people don't agree with your approach, you make an argument about why it will result in a better society. You don't label people sexist and racist, and not worth speaking to. Its childish. And this election was a referendum on this.

You have to make logical arguments and engage in debate. Your ideas have to be able to be challenged.

We all want to help, but no one wants to listen.

> You see how it is basically saying: You are are a sexist, misogynist, racist?

Oh cry me a river. It's starting to look like your only debating tactic is "stop oppressing me".

You said it yourself that you voted for quoting "a racist, sexist, misogynist, xenophobe" because "One side is for freedom of speech, the other side is for controlling what you can say."

How is floodyberrys post not a fair representation of your views?

http://carlosmariscal.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/logical...

There are errors in your argument, others agree as you have been down-voted. I will not respond.

It does seem like that alt-right has basically appropriated the anti-oppression-speech of feminists and other civil liberty advocates, to construct the appearance of a minority of oppressed white men. It's a very frustrating process to see, and it's even more frustrating to have to tip-toe around white males who victimize themselves, as if they are actual minorities with long histories of oppression, like females, black people, LGBT-folks, latinos, or Muslims in America.

They've also appropriated the 'there is no absolute' truth idea, that is used to try to make people understand differing perceptions. It was used to try get people to accept different view points, basically something that liberals and hippies came up with in the 60s. Now it's been appropriate to further the post-truth politics. If there is no truth, why not always lie.

The real frustrating part is that this conflict was totally unnecessary. Yes listening to feminists and black people can sometimes by hard to white males, it sometimes appears unfair and as if they want to 'reverse' the world. But overall, that's not the aim of these movements. And we (the white males) should really just give them the benefit of the doubt. We should listen. It hurts, but the conflict hurts them more.

Instead, some of the people in a traditional position of privilege have successfully turned around the conversation, into "no, you should listen to us".

And now this group of people, many of whom were traditionally democrats (even may have voted for Obama), now voted for Trump. They are the swing vote.

I cannot stand irrationality. I don't care who you are, what you look like, all we have is logic and reasoning.

I am not going to give someone the benefit of the doubt. If it doesn't make sense it doesn't make sense.

It is irrational because it caused them to lose control of the government.

This is the tough love approach and will help them become stronger in the future.

I don't think you realise how rare it is to find any kind of spokesperson for these groups who can make a good argument and debate someone else without resorting to calling someone a racist, sexist, etc. and deeming them not worthy of speaking to. They will grow up during the Trump years.

The liberals only offer short-term comfort, that will hurt them in the long run.

You do realize that people are falling over backwards to be polite to you. People are listening to you because out of intellectual curiosity, because they want to better understand the delusions of the alt-right.

You sound like some sort of misguided 'red pill' type person who lives in a strange parallel phantasy world where privilege doesn't exist and where racism and sexism are just words used in 'name-calling'. Your patronizing 'tough love' argument is straight out of something like Uncle Tom's Cabin. You're hiding your overt sexism behind 'rationality'. You're denouncing the anger of the less privileged but are smug and unforgiving in considering their problems. You severely lack empathy. You are truly part of the problem.

I care more about the less privileged than you do. You satisfy your own selfish desires thinking its empathy.

You couldn't even make it through this comment without calling me sexist, and stating that you shouldn't have to listen to me, without making any arguments.

Thank you for your ignorance, you are only hurting yourself.

The key to rational thought is not just logic and reasoning, because both rely on axioms and information. You need to make sure you're getting the correct data and proceeding from sound foundations. Thats where the skepticism comes in -- double and triple check your sources.

I'm going to be straight here -- what are your sources?

I mean try not to take this too defensively, but you pegged Reagan as a political outsider when arguing for trump. You think an investigation is the same as a conviction. You think that political correctness is the substantive issue difference between HRC and Trump. None of these things are true. In fact, they are so obviously not true that I have to wonder about your rationality.

> Why don't we have a debate on illegal immigration?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but while you personally may want to have a debate about illegal immigration, the person who you support to represent you (Trump) does not want to debate. He just wants to make a sweeping change without anyone in his path.

The people elect the president.

The people had the time to debate. We had the referendum. So now we live with it.

If you weren't busy calling everyone xenophobes maybe you would have got some support and won the senate and we could discuss it more.

Next time...

Wow, this escalated quickly. Where did I call everyone a xenophobe? I thought we were going to have some rational discourse and you quickly resorted to name calling and finger pointing. Thanks.

> Why don't you ask me what I think about those issues?

You didn't vote for your views, you voted for Trump. You had to believe that whatever would result from a Trump election was at least balanced by your desire to show the left the consequences of their free speech, yes?

> balanced by your desire to show the left the consequences of their free speech

There is no vengefulness here. We just wanted to be able to debate freely and openly without ad-hominem attacks all the time. Because we think that it is bad for the country.

If your freedom of speech is about shutting down the discussion by shaming people, then we will not reach a middle ground. So now we took complete power.

There are liberal policies I like, but now you get a mix of Republican policies I might not like.

The left polarised the country. The right is just trying to get by and talk about things.

Ok then, you valued your free speech more than the rights of those whose speech you think shouldn't be so free. There isn't anything more to say here.

> One side is for freedom of speech, the other side is for controlling what you can say.

There was just one candidate in this election that wants to control what you can say. And it wasn't Hillary.

“We’re going to open up those libel laws. So when The New York Times writes a hit piece which is a total disgrace, or when The Washington Post, which is there for other reasons, writes a hit piece, we can sue them and win money instead of having no chance of winning because they’re totally protected.”

> This was non-sensical to me, and was bullying.

I agree that it was bullying and that it shouldn't happen. But again, one side wants to fight against online bullying and the other side thrives on it. Just check the Trump's twitter account if you want to see what bullying looks like.

On one side you're saying you're all for free speech, on the other hand you're against the people exercising the right. Especially people you don't agree with (like Black Lives Matter). This all just sounds like a front to silence people who are pushing society in direction you don't want it to go (social justice things like fighting racism, sexism, homophobia, ...).

> There was just one candidate in this election that wants to control what you can say. And it wasn't Hillary.

I don't agree Trump here.

But I am not talking about the candidates.

I am talking about BLM, SJWs, and Feminists vs. everyone else.

With a racist, sexist, misogynist, xenophobe in the White House now, they must now show prove that his actions reflect their fears...or realise that they were misguided and tone it down.

This is the victory for Trump supporters. The man himself is but a vessel :p

> Just check the Trump's twitter account if you want to see what bullying looks like.

You can always block. Everyone defines bullying differently, and for this reason, every person can control what they see online.

Trump is by far the bigger victim. Look at all the relentless and repeated attacks on his appearance by liberals. I have never seen anyone chastise a fellow liberal over an attack on Trump's appearance.

When everyone can accuse everyone else of bullying...where do you draw the line?

> on the other hand you're against the people exercising the right.

My beef is with irrationality. I'm a natural altruist and intrinsically want to help people. But its frustrating when they don't listen and aren't willing to have a fair and reasoned debate.

So I am not against them exercising their right. I just want to help. The left may produce a good candidate in the future who I want to vote for, but if they are accusing everyone of being racist and sexist, if they are cheating in election debates, if the DNC remains corrupt, then they will continue to lose election like they have.

But as a Trump supporter, I don't have to fight for a rationale debate, the ball is not in their court as they have lost complete control of the government, and hopefully will come back to the debate floor when they realise they need to, in order to get there next guy (girl, et al.) elected.

> This all just sounds like a front to silence people who are pushing society in direction you don't want it to go (social justice things like fighting racism, sexism, homophobia, ...).

> racism, sexism, homophobia,

I don't want any of these things either :D

I just think their approach is wrong. But before I can say why...I am called a racist.

I recognise that you are trying to engage and explain your point of view. I respect that, even though I disagree with you.

You may have grievances (legitimate or otherwise) but you have to weigh up the pros and cons.

In 1920s Italy you might have been daily frustrated by the poor reliability of the railways but that didn't mean that voting for Mussolini would have been a good idea overall.

Also, not that I ascribe this to you, personally, but apparently 22% of Trump's supporters think he would start a Nuclear War. I'm struggling to understand what pros they think would outweigh that particular con.

> Italy you might have been daily frustrated by the poor reliability of the railways but that didn't mean that voting for Mussolini would have been a good idea overall.

Except you would know Mussolini had clear fascist positions. Trump was a ex-democrat and never far from the spotlight. He does not talk much about gay marriage and abortions. He doesnt have clear positions, although he does have directions like reversing illegal immigration, less interventionism. It seems none of them were judged bad enough to make trump supporters reverse their decision.

That's where the diagnosis of the democrats has gone wrong: they think it's possible that half the US is legally stupid, unable to think. They would have to back that up with statistics, iq tests etc.

Clinton was known as the more war hungry candidate. And there is proof in her track record. Trump wants to be friends with Russia.

Re: libel laws, europe has much much stricter libel laws than US, i don't think they are controlling what we say.

I'm not against stricter libel laws. I think speech should have limitations. And not just in cases of libel.

But I also don't think that liberals and "SJW" are controlling what we say.

I was just trying to point out the double standard in the post I was addressing.

well, you did say that he wants to control what you can say by opening up libel laws

There was just one candidate in this election that wants to control what you can say. And it wasn't Hillary.

Hillary wants to change the constitution to take away your 1st amendment right to make and distribute "Hillary: The Movie".

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/hillary-clinton-citize...

Keep in mind that Thiel sued Gawker to stop freedom of speech and freedom of the press. Trump doesn't care and will appoint Thiel to a major position in his administration anyway. Trump also repeatedly sued (or threatened to sue) newspapers who published factual stories about him as well as women who he sexually abused. This is a chilling precedent for free speech: if you are rich enough, then you can just sue to silence the opposition. I don't know how you can ignore the bullying by the right.

You think that this kind of thing only happens on the right?

You think that the right-wing parties are more wealthy than the left-wing parties?

You are trying to confirm the "trump is bad" case. But when it is shown that Clinton is the same, and liberals are the same...we have to argue on a case-by-base basis...which is not as easy as calling out conservatives that you don't like.

This is called bias.

I never said this only happens on the right (whether I think it occurs more on the right is a separate argument but not one that I made here). But the post I responded to was saying they voted for Trump (despite his repeated racism, sexism, and bullying) because the poster perceives the left as bullying. My point is simply that Trump and friends are serious bullies so this isn't a credible reason for choosing him over the left.

Here is the exact quote I responded to: "Its ironic that my biggest reason for voting Trump is to stop the bullying from the left"

I think masondixon's point was bullying by the left, not by Clinton. Trump is in fact a bully, and at least some of his friends seem to be too, but that doesn't actually address masondixon's point.

And in fact I think masondixon is right. The left, taken as a whole, is more bullying to most people than the right is. You can argue that, if you're LGBTQ, say, the right is more bullying. If you're just a middle class person with no personal stake in the culture wars, though, the left says that you have to agree with them (and even use their words) or you're a morally bad person who may face ostracism or even lose their job. So for the majority of people, the left is more bullying than the right.

And, as masondixon keeps pointing out, this is all in the context of an election, so how the majority feels is directly relevant.

I strongly disagree.

First of all, more than half the population is female (not to even look at race, sexual orientation, those who don't identify as male or female, etc.) so the majority of people by far are not white males who have "no personal stake in the culture wars." I see every day how people use male pronouns when talking about engineers, implying time and time again that women aren't engineers or that it would be very atypical for them to be. This pushes women out of STEM fields slowly but surely over time, both because they feel they don't belong and because their superiors actually assume males will be better subconsciously due to stereotypes and language norms. You can literally put a man's name on a woman's resume and it is more likely to be accepted.

Secondly, the truth is that in most of America you are still much more likely to be harassed for being female, non-heterosexual, non-caucasian, etc. than for using the wrong pronoun. Its not like every time someone says "he" without knowing the person's gender they get called out on it. I appreciate that the original poster felt strongly about one particular case where it put someone's job at risk, but race, gender, and sexual preference put millions of jobs at risk daily.

> how people use male pronouns when talking about engineers

In French, if there are 99 women and 1 man, you use the masculine plural.

Some languages are sexist, but it ain't a big deal.

> that it would be very atypical for them to be

It currently is atypical for them to be. When there are more, it won't be atypical.

> This pushes women out of STEM fields slowly but surely over time

But do you really think this is about pronouns? I think there are other issues like women making choices to go into other fields for other reasons. There are innate psychological differences between men and women (I'm not even sure I am allowed to say this let alone go near this topic in PC-world).

Open-source programming is a place where your gender doesn't matter at all. No one ever needs to know if you are female if you don't want them to.

Its a very objective field. If I do a code review - I don't ever need to know your gender, and I can judge the quality of your code.

I mean if you are a gun female coder, and someone says "women are scared away by pronouns and are being pushed out", what are you going to think of this?

You don't want a world of male programmers thinking that a women got a job because of some diversity hire.

If I were a male entering a female dominated industry, the thought of telling them to change the she's to they's makes me a little ill.

I'd like to see a survey on women complaining about this.

If there was a quality survey of women saying their top ranked issue preventing them from entering STEM was gendered pronouns, then this would absolutely be the biggest priority!

I think there are bigger issues and this is just a bike-shedding thing that is easy for SV white knights to make themselves feel good over.

> the truth is that in most of America you are still much more likely to be harassed for being female, non-heterosexual, non-caucasian, etc.

100% agree. But the nitpicking over pronouns enrages people, and distracts from the more serious cases of outright and blatant sexism. Everyone is crying wolf these days, and it is driving sexism underground.

I know it sucks real bad, but you have to bring people along with you to change their minds. This is why Trump won.

AnimalMuppet is right.

The key is that the left's bullying aims to shut down the discussion.

The right's does not have the same objectives. It is simply for comedic value to add some flavour to an argument, and get some attention. Most of the time it is the right wanting to engage and debate, and the left refusing.

It's my perception part of Thiel's motivation was to stop Gawker from outing closet homosexuals.

And the freedom of speech you so vigorously protect was to reveal details of a B-List celebrities sexual activities. Where is the moral courage on that?

Yes Freedom of Speech is paramount among our rights, but it's not inviolately absolute. The Gawker guys were scum but that's not why they lost their lawsuit. They lost their lawsuit because a jury felt their actions lacked news value and were a violation of privacy.

This is more about privacy.

Yes Thiel had a vendetta against Gawker so he funded an unrelated lawsuit against them and used his billions to shut them down. The vendetta stemmed from the fact that the gay founder of Gawker found it horrifying that Thiel would hide his homosexuality when he should be a role model for other homosexuals that you can be gay and still be a rich and powerful VC. Whether or not you agree with Denton on that point, secretly funding unrelated lawsuits against small publications and shutting them down doesn't feel too morally courageous either. There are ways to get a sex tape removed from the Internet that don't involve permanently silencing an entire team of journalists by outspending them in lawsuits.

> shutting them down doesn't feel too morally courageous either

Why? What did the world lose with Gawker?

An independent media organization that uncovered quite a few stories: https://www.wired.com/2016/06/10-stories-exactly-need-gawker...

I don't agree with Wired that all of those were super important but some of them clearly are. For example, Buzzfeed removing articles that were critical of their advertisers, the first exposes of the Silk Road and The Armory, evidence of Greg Hardy abusing his girlfriend, etc.

> Buzzfeed removing articles that were critical of their advertisers

Wasn't that Bethesda? Somewhat important I guess, (not "we should be able to freely out gays" important) but where was Gawker during GamerGate?

> the first exposes of the Silk Road and The Armory

That helped bring it down? Maybe.. But how much investigation did it require. And how harmful was silk road? I'll admit though, if this was the first expose, it was good.

> evidence of Greg Hardy abusing his girlfriend

I'm a little concerned here, the evidence came from "court documents" - so a real court was exchanged for the court of public opinion? Was actual illegality (in court) discovered?

I don't claim to be an expert on all these cases but I think I've made my point.

Regarding Bethesda, the linked Wired article indicates Gawker exposed both Bethesda and Buzzfeed for removing negative articles at different times.

I'm not necessarily anti-Silk Road but exposing it is still worthwhile investigative journalism

We lost a militant vigilante that wants to out private information about people including their sexual preference, apparently.

I never said I would have picked that battle. I simply said spending boatloads of money to shut down the entire publication in response was a strong arm bully tactic.

See my response to the parent comment if you want some actual examples instead of just cherry picking the one you don't like that they famously were shut down for.

And the US intervened to cut off julian assange's internet access. They gave hillary debate questions . It's a veritable jungle between media and politics over there.

i honestly cannot agree with you.

showing a sex tape and refusing to remove it (which is why hogan was suing gawker) from your site is not freedom of press. if it was, the leakage of celebrity pics (also known as 'the fappening') would be fine, no?

also, gawker outed thiel, which is bullshit. people should come out when they are ready, not when a yellow-paged blog decides.

also, let's change genders and say gawker not only leaked but refused to remove jennifer aniston's sex tape from their site. would you call that freedom of press?

Whether or not you think what Gawker did was right, it is a terrible precedent that a billionaire can shut down the entire publication by funding lawsuits for other people against the publisher. There are ways to get the tape removed without simply outspending the press to the point where they cannot feasibly fight your lawsuit.

It is a slippery slope. No one feels too bad about a sex tape getting taken down, but cases like this ensure that journalists will have to self-censor what they publish and err on the conservative side or else risk their entire publication being closed. This has a chilling effect on investigative journalism.

> it is a terrible precedent that a billionaire can

only people without money should be able to sue?

> There are ways to get the tape removed without simply outspending the press to the point where they cannot feasibly fight your lawsuit.

So this is Thiels fault, not Gawker? Gawker got away with a lot of shit before it was finally called on it.

> cases like this ensure that journalists will have to self-censor what they publish

Yes, is that difficult?

> This has a chilling effect on investigative journalism

I disagree, the degrees of freedom Gawker had were far too much, it didn't even try to be fair. What actual good did Gawker do?

> only people without money should be able to sue?

Is this what I said? No. But outspending a publication by an order of magnitude so that they either go bankrupt fighting you or lose the case is an example of how you can abuse the court system if you have way more money than your opponent. Its the same tactics large corporations use to sue small corporations in order to force them to settle regardless of whether they are right or wrong.

>> There are ways to get the tape removed without simply outspending the press to the point where they cannot feasibly fight your lawsuit.

> So this is Thiels fault, not Gawker? Gawker got away with a lot of shit before it was finally called on it.

Well yes, I see it as Thiel's fault because he wasn't a party to the case in any way but decided to give Hogan a blank check to send a huge team of lawyers after Gawker. Even if that was perhaps fair game, they didn't have to sue for so much that they literally shut down the entire organization.

>> cases like this ensure that journalists will have to self-censor what they publish

> Yes, is that difficult?

Yes it is. Its not black and white so there will necessarily be cases in the gray area (cases that could be very important and in the public interest) where publications will say "we can't publish this because we only have $10 million and someone with $10 billion could sue us and we will lose simply based on lawyer fees." For example, see the woman who was sexually harassed by Trump but backed down from talking about it publicly after Trump said he was sending an army of lawyers after her. How can someone who might make say $50,000 defend herself against a multi-billionaire? So we get censorship for no reason other than fear of billionaires suing.

> I disagree, the degrees of freedom Gawker had were far too much, it didn't even try to be fair. What actual good did Gawker do?

I already answered this above but here is one series of examples: https://www.wired.com/2016/06/10-stories-exactly-need-gawker...

> Its the same tactics large corporations use to sue small corporations in order to force them to settle regardless of whether they are right or wrong

The suggestion here is Theil bought the verdict?

> they didn't have to sue for so much

Doesn't the court decide if the amount is fair? And my point about "Gawker got away with a lot of shit" is that it is a net gain - Gawker did more harm then good.

> we will lose simply based on lawyer fees

Was that the case here? Gawker had merit, but could afford to even defend itself?

> there will necessarily be cases in the gray area

Then don't pusblish. Or just publish evidence. Neither apply here; It isn't important that Thiel is/isn't gay, it's important that Gawker shouldn't have published it. Where is the "gray area"? That Denton personally believes this personal information to be important? He should ask a lawyer. Or not use the publication as a vehicle for his personal values.

> How can someone who might make say $50,000 defend herself against a multi-billionaire?

This is a tangent, in in this case, there would be plenty wealthy liberals who hate Trump. Would it be unfair of them to do that?

Would I be way off in saying you're voting against the left more than you are voting for the right, then?

I think the right has changed. 10 years ago it was all anti-abortion, anti gay marriage, super religious, anti-healthcare.

I always use to say "I could never vote for the Republicans because of this".

So I support most the left-wing policies. But mostly it is a vote against the progressive movement, and the Bernie faction. And corruption is the ultimate destructive force in politics and the Clinton's oozed it.

I think that the more time that passes since the hey days of communism, people forget how terrible it was, and we start heading back towards it.

What do you think characterizes the Bernie faction?

Socialism. Rich should pay for everything. Entrepreneurs are homogenous and replaceable. Someone is always going to create Apple Computer. Etc.

Money out of politics is good - but the Dems will never let it happen.

I think the Dems are a long, long way away from anything which vaguely passes for communisim. They're almost as capitalist as the Republicans, but - I think - more protections for equality.

The problem is that Capitalism doesn't care about people. It is a system, and the worth of commodities and even people is determined by the market. People lose their jobs because either automation can replace them, or the job can be done cheaper elsewhere. Either way, that is capitalism, and if you support capitalism then that that is the inevitable result. You can try and restrict the impact by reducing global trade, but even if you built a wall around the USA and didn't import anything, as technology gets more and more efficient there will still be fewer and fewer jobs in the USA.

What's your proposal for people who can't get jobs because there aren't enough of them?

> I think the Dems are a long, long way away from anything which vaguely passes for communisim.

Yes Dems are not communism at all. I am talking about Progressives and Bernie ppl. The next primaries will see if this faction takes over.

> What's your proposal for people who can't get jobs because there aren't enough of them?

I'm not sure, but I like the idea of basic income.

The side effects have to be addressed though.

You think that basic income is a good idea but you think that Bernie Sanders is communism? What exactly don't you like about Sanders? I'm genuinely curious because my impression was that Sanders would have done better against Trump, at least in the Midwest where Trump did very strongly.

I like being entrepreneurial and making things more efficient. This takes away jobs. I don't want to stop making things more efficient through automation. I don't want to hold back progress. But these people need to live. So basic income.

Sanders has too much animosity towards the wealthy.

The key is to reward people for doing good valuable work and route more of society's resources to them for productive use. The consequence of working badly or not at all can be a very modest life, it doesn't have to be starvation or homelessness.

Communism seems to assume everyone will want to work, and send out the murderous thugs when it doesn't go to plan.

I'm not an expert on communism so I can't speak to your assertion about thugs. Please could you provide a citation?

I'm interested in your idea of routing resources to people to be used productively. Can you give some examples?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com