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Comment by jerf | Hacker News Reader

I've been waiting for the inevitable rhetorical attack that Silicon Valley's slowly-but-surely increasing crackdown on everything that happens to offend SV is itself a form of cultural imperialism. Without endorsing or rejecting that argument myself, I think it's inevitable that we're going to start hearing it soon. As the aspirations of SV grow ever more global more conflict of this sort is inevitable. By that I mean that I don't even blame SV culture itself necessarily, because the details of what SV culture is doesn't matter, there is no culture that could run a centralized global social network without these sorts of problems becoming ever-larger, the only difference is where the flash points would be.

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>I've been waiting for the inevitable rhetorical attack that Silicon Valley's slowly-but-surely increasing crackdown on everything that happens to offend SV is itself a form of cultural imperialism. Without endorsing or rejecting that argument myself, I think it's inevitable that we're going to start hearing it soon.

As a non-American, I endorse the argument myself.

The US has a quite particular culture, and yet most of its population (from all my experience) seems to consider it either (a) the pinnacle of human culture that others countries should/do aspire, or (b) the natural state of civilization (what things just "are", with everything else being inconceivable).

Add to that the geopolitical force and might of the country, and the fact that its companies control most of the internet infrastructure, and it gets troubling that a country with very specific interests that it pursuits globally, and where Janet Jackson showing some tit was considered a major cultural "thing" the media and people wrote about for weeks, gets to decide such policies.

>* there is no culture that could run a centralized global social network without these sorts of problems becoming ever-larger, the only difference is where the flash points would be.*

Well, the EU for one has a much broader range of cultures within nation member states, and a much broader cultural and historical and geopolitical perspective.

> Janet Jackson showing some tit was considered a major cultural "thing" the media and people wrote about for weeks

I've heard people who work in radio describe the Janet Jackson Superbowl incident as a watershed moment. Not only did weeks of meetings and memos about "standards and practices" follow, but to this day it remains a moment in their careers that sticks out as a clear "before/after" point, a "life will never be the same" event."

At first, I thought they were exaggerating and being facetious or joking, but it actually was a major event for everyone in their industry: before the Janet Jackson incident, every radio program at their station broadcast live. If a caller on the air started swearing or saying "obscene" things, they would chide the caller and apologize to the listeners. Now, every program broadcasts with a 20-second delay, and they have a board operator with a "dump button" in case anything "obscene" is said. (As one talk show personality sardonically remarked, "What, are they afraid we're going to start talking about Janet Jackson's nipple?")

In most countries this would have been a little side note and forgotten the next day. The US is wasting a lot of time and energy on debating trivial things while the real stuff is going on behind the scenes.

As a German, I can assure you that our media are merely debating a different set of trivial things.

Like Promi Big Brother? I am German but have been living in the US a log time. It's hard to understand how that show can be on front pages.

If we (the US) did not waste so much time, energy and other forms of wealth on what is essentially busywork, we would be forced to deal with the full ramifications of how we have transformed our world.

>...but it actually was a major event for everyone in their industry: before the Janet Jackson incident, every radio program at their station broadcast live. If a caller on the air started swearing or saying "obscene" things, they would chide the caller and apologize to the listeners. Now, every program broadcasts with a 20-second delay,

A profanity delay has been used in radio for _much_ longer than that. The first tape delay was introduced by WKAP in 1952. The delay is usually more like 7 seconds, not 20 seconds.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadcast_delay

There's also the associated tall tale, best told by people in broadcasting. Of course, i'm going to butcher it.

The poor editor is sitting with their finger on the beep button, but a segment surprises them. "Those fuckers <long beep> ..." goes out over the air. It's 5:30 on the drivetime news, prime listening time. The host apologies to the audience and everyone tries to move on.

The general manager calls in, demanding to speak to the editor. Editor is terrified of losing their job. GM asks with as much fury and fire as possible, "Since you didn't have a problem with fucker, i have to know what the hell did they say after that that you decided was sooo much worse you had to beep it out?"

The editor turns bright red, everyone laughs and station pays a small fine. The story gets retold when there's a new audience or a retirement. Guys who tell their version of this story relish the details. even though you see it coming a mile away, almost all of fun comes from those great storytellers.

"Well, the EU for one has a much broader range of cultures within nation member states, and a much broader cultural and historical and geopolitical perspective."

I would say that, exactly as you phrased it, that's multiple cultures. "The EU" can't run a "Facebook", it would be "The French" or "The Polish" or something like that. The EU is definitely in a place where increasing the amount that one of the dominant cultures imposes on the rest decreases the ability of the EU to function. (I'm talking first derivative here, which as you may recall eliminates the original value; I'll leave it to the reader to decide how far the EU is or is not already down that road.)

>I would say that, exactly as you phrased it, that's multiple cultures. "The EU" can't run a "Facebook", it would be "The French" or "The Polish" or something like that.

It would have a base country where its HQ are yes.

But it would still have employees from multiple EU countries, and operate within EU's laws, guidelines and cultural frameworks -- giving it a much wider perspective than 10.000 Americans (+ some wannabe Americans that came there to study/work) in a building in San Francisco.

"and operate within EU's laws, guidelines and cultural frameworks -- giving it a much wider perspective than 10.000 Americans (+ some wannabe Americans that came there to study/work) in a building in San Francisco."

10 years ago I would have disagreed with that statement. Now I can't. SV has gone nearly ideologically monolithic. It may be literally the greatest danger facing SV right now, not that anyone in SV sees it that way of course. I don't live in SV, and I am starting to see people in my real life (not just on the internet, where all kinds of crazy things get said that don't really mean anything) start naming it as a problem. I haven't had to reassure anyone that I work for 'an SV company, but not that kind of SV company' yet but it's probably less than a year away at this rate.

> SV has gone nearly ideologically monolithic

So, are you referring to ideology of neoliberal economics mixed with social justice in the form of minority rights, or right-libertarianism, or something else?

In my humble European opinion, neoliberal economics mixed with social justice gone a little too far and puritanism intrinsic to the Anglosaxon culture but not shared by the rest of the world.

That sums up my impression as a New Zealander as well.

... which is exactly why something like Mastadon is important: the entire concept of a centralized global social network with one party in control of content moderation makes absolutely no sense; I don't see how this issue is "rhetorical". It happens to be that America is "puritan": that's not false and is a problem; and if it had been some other country with some other issue, then the comment would have been exactly as valid.

Oh, it has already started, and it has even lead to new laws targeting SV companies in Germany.

> Why can facebook ban completely legal nude images within of minutes, but don’t even respond to requests from the police or even courts to ban a post promoting the Nazi party and suggesting genocide?

Twitter interestingly has an is_nazi flag in their API in response to the illegality of Nazi symbols: https://twitter.com/antumbral/status/876843545100824576?lang...

That tweet only shows a withheld_in_countries list to me. Can you maybe link to an actual example of said flag?

It also probably covers any video with music thanks to GEMA.

Facebook is in a difficult position, but I would bet that free speech laws (which they don't necessarily have to abide by, but would still want to be mindful of) and general public perception of nudity in US had a lot to do with that contrast.

Germany is a particularly sensitive case with respect to Nazis, but from experience and those of others, European countries in general also tend to be far more accepting of nudity.

IMO, the cultural imperialism started at home - tech's founding nerd culture has been colonized by a pernicious form of identity politics.

Isn't "nerd culture" already a form of identity politics?

Being a nerd hasn't been politicized anywhere near as much as being a woman, being an ethnic minority, or being LGBT. Furthermore, there's active efforts to shut down "problematic" parts of nerd culture. The recent Google fiasco with James Damore is a highly relevant example - creating a safe space for dispassionate debate about controversial ideas is the number one reason why I like nerd culture.

Lol what nerd culture do you participate in. It's "dispassionate debate" until an outsider tries to participate and then it's fire and brimstone.

So long as ideas "follow the narrative" (regardless on how grounded in evidence or just made up) nerd culture will accept you. Otherwise, it's probably the most toxic and politicized groups around.

Certainly nerd culture isn't famous for an endless litany of flame wars. Emacs vs vim, that's pro-wrestling, right?

Maybe "dispassionate" is the wrong word. Like, it's debates that are about ideas, not about people advancing the ideas or a power struggle between the underlying ideology. Or, like, Emacs vs Vim is all in good fun. The Emacs users don't try to get the Vim fanboys fired so that they don't spread pro-Vim heresy.

There's some topics and environments where I feel safe speaking my mind before I figure out what the prevailing political winds are and what my boss believes. Emacs vs Vim is one of them, no matter how animated the debate is. Gender politics is not one of those contexts. There's a really significant difference there.

> Emacs vs Vim is one of them, no matter how animated the debate is. Gender politics is not one of those contexts. There's a really significant difference there.

Yes, you're right. There is a really significant difference between discussing Emacs vs Vim, and discussing gender differences. Which is to say: one is meaningless, and one affects the lives and livelihoods of half the population of our planet.

Yup. That is, in fact, the justification used to make the tradeoff against the discussion norms I need in order to feel safe participating. The Cause is just so very Important, and that importance is used to justify all sorts of anti-social behavior. Shaming, lying, doxxing, no-platforming, not taking your opponent's arguments in good faith, and even physical violence.

Please do not insinuate that I don't care about the lives and livelihoods of women. I do, and that's why I put as much effort as I do into thinking about and discussing community norms, discourse norms, and other meta-level stuff. I generally agree with the aims the social justice types want, disagree vehemently with the costs they're willing to impose on people to get them, and do not feel like I can safely participate non-anonymously to achieve either of those goals. Talking about discourse norms, at the very best, gets insinuations that I'm a Bad Person by misrepresenting me as being one of The Enemy. Working on object-level stuff enables some extraordinarily shitty behavior by The Good Guys. It's quite frustrating.

> Yup. That is, in fact, the justification used to make the tradeoff against the discussion norms I need in order to feel safe participating.

Do you think it's not?

And further: why do you need to participate? It isn't about you, it doesn't affect you. It's not your struggle, and it's not the kind of thing you can get anywhere deducing from first principles. If you don't feel safe contributing to the discussion, then don't contribute to the discussion. If there's a thread talking about some issue in C++ programming, I might read, but I don't contribute. I have plenty of opinions about C++, but no real experience, so I've got no place to participate in the discussion. And that's okay! I don't have to be involved in every discussion.

> It's quite frustrating.

You think you're frustrated, imagine how other people feel! "My opinion isn't valid or wanted" is a new feeling for you, but not a new feeling with to the women in your life. Maybe ask them how they handle it?

Not necessarily. Identity politics is when issues get defacto interpreted through the lens of social identities, even if that identity is irrelevant or even meaningless for the matter at hand.

Observing that there is such a thing as nerd culture does not really qualify. It typifies a particular set of practices and norms that set it apart from more mainstream sensibilities.

I'm eagerly awaiting that backlash. I complain but I'm probably 95% in agreement with the status quo. But I still want the push back.

There's a line I like "Hegemony means never having to admit you have an agenda."

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