Hacker News Reader

Comment by boobsbr | Hacker News Reader

> Netflix’s Mr. Hastings warned Mr. Thiel last August, a few weeks after Mr. Trump had accepted the Republican nomination for president, that he would face consequences for backing Mr. Trump.

> In contrast, Mr. Hastings, a supporter of Hillary Clinton ...

From my PoV, the fact that Hastings has received no backlash for supporting Clinton after Trump won, is a sign that right-wingers/conservatives/Trump supporters are more tolerant of the opinions of left-wingers/liberals/progressives/Clinton supporters than the other way around.

View on HN

Right-leaning professionals who live in major urban areas are completely surrounded by left-leaning people: almost all of their colleagues, friends, bosses, etc. I know many conservatives in these environments who would never admit it outside of a very trusted circle. They would never think of making their job a platform for their views, like left-leaning people routinely do (often at the encouragement of management and HR). They fear precisely what happened to this Google engineer: a smear campaign, weaponized outrage, and a ruined career.

I'm sure there's challenges to being a left-leaning person in rural Georgia. But moving to rural Georgia isn't necessary, or really even an option, for people seeking economic mobility.

Weaponized outrage online has become a real problem, no matter your leanings. Or I prefer to call it the "Outrage of the Day" or even the daily "Two Minutes Hate" since people only seem to be outraged at that issue for about a day before finding some new shiny thing to be outraged about.

But it can really screw up people's lives in that short period of time, and scares everyone into not sharing any potentially controversial views in public nowadays, which I find disconcerting living in a country that's supposed to hold Freedom of Speech as one of its highest values (yes, I know freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom from consequences, but the consequences have gotten extremely severe, career ending in a lot of cases, for statements that are sometimes taken out of context).

I'd rather people see these statements they dislike as an opportunity to engage in discourse and try to change these people's minds, instead of swift retribution, often without examination of how guilty the people in question actually are, just being told they're guilty by some random person they like on the internet is often enough to get them to jump on board.

It's especially concerning considering a lot of these people turning their shame button up to 11 consider themselves to be religious people, and most religions tend to espouse not letting yourself get swept up in hatred and casting stones at others. I'm not particularly religious, but I still don't think it's a healthy mentality to have, and I've had to ignore and heavily filter my social media in order to not see this presented to me every day, and even then I still get a lot of it shoved in my face (I can only imagine what all a person who actively looks for these things must see).

The Two Minutes Hate seems more and more appropriate the more I reflect on it. Here's a quote about it from 1984:

"The horrible thing about the Two Minutes Hate was not that one was obliged to act a part, but that it was impossible to avoid joining in. Within thirty seconds any pretence was always unnecessary. A hideous ecstasy of fear and vindictiveness, a desire to kill, to torture, to smash faces in with a sledge hammer, seemed to flow through the whole group of people like an electric current, turning one even against one's will into a grimacing, screaming lunatic. And yet the rage that one felt was an abstract, undirected emotion which could be switched from one object to another like the flame of a blowlamp."

Dire times for the Republic indeed. How can citizens govern themselves if they cannot engage in good-faith disagreements?

Outrage is addictive and social media only makes this easier: commenting is quick and there's always the urgency to jump on a bandwagon before it disappears.

"Outrage of the Day" is appropriate because what else can fill the mundanity of your life? The trouble is they accumulate and you inevitable form judgements, courtesy to the echo chambers (I'd like to see a new word echosystem!) This also makes it harder to introduce new ideas because the 'right' opinions and argument trees are already set.

I don't see social media as good/bad, but my observation of it is making me wonder if I'm turning into a reluctant Luddite.

Megan McArdle had a good piece on the social value of shame and how the Internet subverts that:

https://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-04-17/how-the-in...

"I have found a single sample from which I will generalize broadly about the entire country."

Do you have any examples of people punished for supporting Clinton? I'd be interested to hear about them; I'm not aware of any.

The far left is dunking on the center / Clinton establishment pretty hard all across the internet, which has been immensely satisfying.

That being said, Clinton was pretty tepid and corrupt, not openly offensive and terrifying the way Trump is. Unless you're REALLY desperate you can't honestly say supporting one or the other is the same.

> not openly offensive

Basket of deplorables...

Clinton was pretty terrifying in a different way.

A big part of her campaign strategy was to generalize from a few actual white supremacists and paint everyone who opposed her as a deplorable sexist Nazi white-supremacist who couldn't stand the idea of a woman President.

That kind of McCarthyism is always a threat, but it was doubly dangerous in the current environment, with leftist groups declaring that violence was justified against anyone they thought fit that description.

Compared to Trump's rhetoric during the campaign, "basket of deplorables" is about as mild as it can get...

She didn't stop there...

> racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic

> ... irredeemable

In what situations would people be punished for supporting Clinton? In the case of Hastings and Thiel and the Facebook board of directors, correct me if I'm wrong, but Trump winning the presidency didn't change the membership of Facebook's directors or their political leanings.

Sorry, are you unaware of any people who've been attacked by Trump supporters? Really? Besides the obvious politicians (Senator Ben Sasse, for example), there are viral incidents like these: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/11/2...

> there are viral incidents like these:

Putting aside the question of why she felt she was being discriminated against, that's a story about a woman who said some nasty things.

Is that the worst of it?

Hardly comparable to what's been done to Trump supporters.

No, that's not the worst of it.

But back to the matter at hand. You seem to be arguing that Thiel faced particular abuse for being a Trump supporter, given the example of Reed Hastings calling him out after Trump secured the Republican nomination (the GP comment [0]). I think it's worth pointing out the pre-conditions in this situation: Thiel, a known conservative, is allowed to serve on the board of directors for one of the biggest institutions (Facebook) in one of America's most famously liberal enclaves [1]. When it's revealed that he's a Trump backer, the liberals, who far outnumber those of Thiel's mindset in his peer group, threaten to kick him out. And let's be fair, Thiel is by far not the only example, as similar liberal outrages have been inflicted upon conservatives in other liberal enclaves, such as Hollywood.

But that's exactly what happened to the Clinton-supporting members on the board of directors for Hobby Lobby and the NRA. Oh wait, no such Clinton-supporting members exist. At least that we know of. If those conservative institutions could even tolerate a Clinton-suppporting board member in the first place, I imagine those Clinton-supporting members would face the same kind of backlash from their colleagues that Thiel faced from his for supporting Trump.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14968956

[1] https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/nearly-all-of-silicon-v...

While your imagination may be interesting, I was asking about actual, not theoretical examples.

May I assume that you also don't know of any?

Know of any what, exactly? Why don't you go and list the times Trump supporters have been punished, since the previous examples I've mention don't seem to be that big of a deal to you.

There are so many, I could hardly list them here.

Search for "fired for supporting Trump" or "Trump supporters assaulted" if you'd really like a list.

Here, I'll just mention what I consider the most egregious example:

In San Jose, a leftist mob attacked people leaving a Trump campaign event, while police stood aside and watched. "The only people arrested the day of the rally, Dhillon added, were those who attacked police officers."

http://www.mercurynews.com/2016/11/15/san-jose-new-allegatio...

There have been worse events, including kidnapping, torture, murder and attempted murders, but in that case the police seem to have been accomplices.

> There are so many, I could hardly list them here.

OK, just try to list ones that you think are important examples.

> In San Jose, a leftist mob attacked people leaving a Trump campaign event, while police stood aside and watched

OK, here you go:

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/man-accused-of-assaulting-...

http://www.lex18.com/story/35275736/transylvania-university-...

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/22/us/pizzagate-attack-sente...

> There have been worse events, including kidnapping, torture, murder and attempted murders, but in that case the police seem to have been accomplices.

OK. Yeah, I guess if police are covering things up, then there are all manner of awful events that we don't really know about.

Those are three stories about individuals. There will always be crazy individuals.

I consider the organized attacks by companies, protestors, and other groups, some with the tacit approval of the government, to be worse.

Your story was about a mob, which can behave just as erratically and uncontrollably as any individual. And individuals don't always get their ideas from inner reflection. You think the guy who decided to attack a pizza parlor with an assault rifle was also the creator of the PizzaGate controversy and its ensuing discussion?

Were there any right-wing mobs during or since the election?

Are you without access to the Internet or to Google? Your original question was:

> Do you have any examples of people punished for supporting Clinton? I'd be interested to hear about them; I'm not aware of any.

I'm not particularly interested in getting into a link-fest fight that will ultimately stall at a No-True-Scotsman appeal. I took issue at your apparent complete obliviousness of violent attacks originating from the right-wing. Are any of the incidents I've mentioned sufficient for you and all those awful incidents you have in your head but can't be bothered to find the links to?

Oh what the hell. Here's another one for you: "Couple charged with assault in shooting, melee during UW speech by Milo Yiannopoulos"

http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/crime/couple-charge...

Oh, I guess that doesn't count as a "mob", because apparently when members of one group of protestors shoots another protester in the stomach, police swoop in and shut everything down. Do you imagine that if the police weren't there, that the right-wing protesters (including the ones carrying and firing guns) would have amicably resolved things?

I don't expect to find scores of examples of angry right-wing mob action. The winning side tends to have less reason to protest or lash out. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you are aware of angry anti-Obama protests and retaliation that happened back in 2009. But let me know if you are equally oblivious of such incidents and I can search the news archives for you.

As a registered Republican, I can only imagine what my reaction as a Democrat would be upon hearing of attacks on Obama supporters. I would hope that my reaction would not be to assume that such attacks were coordinated by Senator McCain/Governor Palin, or use such incidents as a sweeping indictment against the Republican party. It's been several hours since you claimed that there were "so many" anti-Trump attacks and yet you've still only been able to come up with that one link from the Mercury News. Save yourself the effort, I can think of several incidents in which Trump supporters were harmed, but I'm not the one who was ignorant of such incidents nor do I deny that such incidents, whether they involved angry words or actual violence, were considerably harmful to the victims.

But -- looking at the most recent election cycle -- it's hard to ignore that the most direct examples of a party's leader sanctioning violence comes straight from Trump himself, which is why a lawsuit accusing him of inciting violence has been allowed to go forward:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/apr/3/trump-campaig...

http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/both-sides-blame-tru...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/04/03/th...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/get-him-out-racial-t...

Again, not a mob action since campaign attendees far outnumbered the protesters, meaning that a few punches could put an end to the protests before things descended into a riot. I don't think that makes the situation better.

So, are you now aware of attacks against Trump opponents?

You misunderstood me again.

Of course there were actions by crazy individuals on both sides. That's not what I'm talking about.

I'm talking about people punished by organized groups and the powerful. I'm talking about Google firing people and the police ignoring mob attacks.

And you still haven't mentioned any such things.

I agree Trump's rhetoric was dangerous but he hasn't acted on it, as far as I know.

Google didn't fire someone for supporting Trump.

The police chief/city officials ignoring mob attacks based on politics is indeed a huge problem. If I'm reading the example you posted correctly, and the most recent update [0], a judge has so far dismissed claims against the defendants who would have the power -- e.g. the mayor and police chief -- to tell police to not protect Trump supporters. Did police officers intentionally decide to harm Trump supporters? I suppose the court case will examine that, though it's worth noting that Trump was endorsed by the nation's largest police union [1], so the thought of police being part of a conspiracy to hurt Trump would be pretty surprising.

In case you were unaware of Democrat-supporters who were either fired, or were threatened to be fired, for their support of Democrats, here you go:

- https://www.aol.com/2013/01/18/utah-terry-lee-forensics-fire...

- http://www.cbsnews.com/news/was-employee-laid-off-for-voting...

- https://www.mediaite.com/online/fired-for-voting-ohio-woman-...

- http://www.salon.com/2017/01/20/newt-gingrich-wants-to-fire-...

- http://money.cnn.com/2012/10/09/news/economy/siegel-email-em...

For your own pro-Trump files:

- http://www.foxnews.com/us/2016/11/10/boss-tells-pro-trump-em...

[0] http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/03/15/judge-wont-throw-out-t...

[1] http://www.npr.org/2016/09/18/494451660/the-nations-largest-...

From my point of view, the religion-proxy-based travel ban, the abandonment of the Paris agreement, the attempt to dismantle the ACA, the (so-far attempted) banning of transgender soldiers, the refusal of the Census office to collect LGBT+ statistics, and the stepping-up of civil forfeiture, are all signs that right-wingers/conservatives are not tolerant of the existence of many people, let alone the opinions of left.

I desperately hope this is not, in fact, the prevailing sentiment of half the country. But to be convinced, I could really use examples of right-wing politicians affirming that LGBT+ people, the non-Christian religious , and people who can't afford their own living expenses are welcome in society.

Are these the tolerant right-wingers still chanting "lock her up" and wearing "kill all the liberals" t-shirts[0] at those space-time-confusing election rallies Trump does?

0: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/08/the-tru...

That's because the election was over, and they got to taste victory, at least for a little while. Most people don't feel the need to lash out at other people when everything just went their way.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com