Hacker News Reader

Comment by mychael | Hacker News Reader

Someone should let the members of these mobs know that they are not actually liberal or progressive. For example, they appear to prefer mob justice instead of due process; ideological blacklists instead of tolerance; and censorship instead of freedom of expression. The bedrock principles of a liberal society appear to be missing from their world view.

View on HN

To those of us who've been paying attention, those principles always have been missing from a large percentage of people.

It seems comfortable to be a fascist, your moral principles are simple and your path forward, too.

I wonder if the health upsides of having simpler and easier to follow moral principles, would outweigh the downsides of being offended and angry all the time.

I sure hope I won't have to find out. It's a privilege to be a non-partisan, although perhaps I can't quite say I am, because I despise communism even more than I despise fascism. The intellectual dishonesty with which mainstream (which is to say, leftist) media praise communism and attack Nazism is revolting.

Really the most despicable party here is TV media. The coverage has driven recruitment for two really inconsequential groups, both Antifa and the KKK.

A minor dust-up between a few hundred people with weapons and 6000 people yelling and holding signs/shields has become major coverage, like it's the most demanding thing of our attention. It's not like these groups just suddenly appeared...but now because of the attention, we have to do something.

You can barely fill 15% of a minor sports team's stadium with the count (and public influence) of the people involved here. You're not even close to having to pick a side.

I guess I illustrated your point then, the coverage makes it seem like we have to do something; we have to pick sides!

I feel the pull and it sucks. How does one immunize themselves to this?

And could it be done to one or more percent points of the population, or even to the point that herd immunity takes over? How could advocating "mass redpilling" be portrayed as "domestic terrorism" to those deeply immersed in the mainstream narrative?

Turn off the TV. There's a wonderful, beautiful world outside if you look around and participate in it.

You can avoid the conflict completely and actually reach people bring out their reasonable side if you go out there and treat everyone with love and respect.

Unfortunately, just because I turn off the TV, doesn't mean everyone else does too.

Curate what you consume.

https://fredrikdeboer.com/2017/08/16/recalibrating-your-site...

I stopped actively 'reading' Facebook, and I split my entire twitter following (several thousand) into a little over a dozen lists and only browse my lists. Anyone who too regularly posts consistently the same points of view that aren't in the list topic just get removed from that list for using their community position as a platform.

That one action alone dramatically changed the tone of social media and made it obvious that I'm very much a part of several distinct communities with distinct ideas. Highly recommend.

They are also not left, as many claim. To be on the left, you should care about (social and economic) equality of people in general, not just in particular social group.

Remember all the talk of "racist rednecks in flyover country" after the Trump election and "uneducated small Britain in rural towns" after brexit? To me that crystallized the utter contempt they have for the blue collar working class, not something you'd get out of the real left.

As a rural dwelling liberal progressive, I sure felt shit on by all sides. I have never felt so much hate from people I dont know about views I dont hold. Its absolutely insane.

Yeah, but where were you when an actual angry mob, with actual semi-automatic weapons was standing outside a synagogue, yelling violent threats at the congregation inside? Because it appears as if freedom of religion is also one of those bedrock principles, and at least to me, these weapons looked a lot more dangerous than Twitter. Plus, you know: they did actually kill someone.

(http://www.newsweek.com/charlottesville-police-refused-prote...)

Yes, that's dangerous and threat. Is there anybody questioning that?

I don't understand your contention here. You seem to complain that people do not spend more time discussing obvious thing (mob justice offline) rather than non-obvious thing (mob justice online). I think the reason for that is obvious. Or maybe you just want a "collective outrage" instead of discussion?

The congregation in question had to sneak out the back fearing for their lives, and they're complaining that the police did not react to their appeals for protection.

So, yes, I do believe that these people would probably deserve a bit of the support that some programmer at google receives after being fired for being slightly stupid.

I wouldn't even doubt that almost everyone would declare their support if asked (Presidents excepted). It just seems as if nobody particularly cares enough about it, emotionally, to go out of their way to show their disapproval in the same way they do on other issues.

Considering the accusations against the police, such support would also help to actually determine what, if anything, went wrong, and could possibly prevent a repetition, or escalation.

If everyone just shrugs their shoulders and says "yeah, I guess that's bad. Obviously", there's no pressure to do anything that could potentially harm the careers of those involved.

I hear you. There are many reasons for why people react this way, and you might be right that the other situation deserves more attention.

To be honest, though, I don't see complaining about it here changing that. I think it's better to focus your own attention at problems that require it, in your opinion.

For example, if you feel the people were wronged and HN crowd should hear about, why don't you submit the article?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com