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Comment by Barrin92 | Hacker News Reader

>but the ideology of the south is just as homogeneous as SF

this is an interesting asymmetry I've noticed too. There are countless of places where salt of the earth Americana is the de facto monoculture.

If I'd go there and try to create a liberal-hippie space for myself they'd probably flip me the finger and tell me that's not the local way of life, and somehow everybody seems to agree that this is perfectly fine.

Yet when people in the valley or in a big city share a common culture they somehow have to defend themselves and painstakingly carve out a space for Peter Thiel et al. Why is that? If he doesn't like California's culture Thiel can move, end of story. Why do we have to treat him like a wounded deer?

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I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that people just don't care enough about those places.

No one cares about Huntsville, AL and most high-profile people would not reside there, so no one hears about any of this bubble behavior from the other side.

The most important cities (culturally and economically) are, at least, left-leaning. So, you'll only hear about conservatives being rejected by the "liberals" in {city}.

I grew up in a conservative town. Personal experience says the bubble on that side is arguably worse and more violent. Being openly gay or not-white or not-Christian (or accepting of those things) in my hometown was a good way to end up harassed and possibly assaulted on a regular basis.

The most important cities (culturally and economically) are, at least, left-leaning.

That's not a coincidence. It's a direct product of cosmopolitanism. The cities that represent it most clearly are its capitals. Like any working system, it has rules. If you want the benefits, you need to play be the rules. If you don't, you're free to leave. Goodness knows your apartment won't go unfilled for long.

Agreed. It’s bizarre to see this argument from people in places that have historically (and even currently) been epicenters of open hostility, harassment, and violence against “the other”, that the real injustice in our society is that too many people in liberal enclaves have disdain for conservative values.

It may be bizarre but it's now a standard tactic - to claim victimhood in order to justify all manner of behavior, ala Fox News and the supposed war on Christmas to support the viewpoint that Christians are under siege in the USA, or that being outed if one wants to discriminate based on gender/sexuality (because of one's religious beliefs like that county clerk who refused to recognize same sex marriage) is unfairly targeting the religious.

To be fair, it was not the salt of the Earth Middle America rioting in Berkeley because they dared to invite Coulter or Milo to speak.

And you know, Roy Moore lost elections. How many Republicans did SFBA send to Washington lately?

Are you so sure about the rioting in Berkley? It takes two to tango.

You don't need two to break store windows.

And as silly and ignorant as Coulter is, at the moment when one starts saying that she does not have a right to speak here, one signs off on his moral and intellectual bankruptcy.

We must be referring to different riots.

I was referring to the one where morons from both sides decided to show up with weapons and assault each other.

Possible. When Berkeley invited Milo to speak, antifa showed up first and broke quite a few windows, same way antiglobalists reliably start riots anywhere G-7 meets. [0]

After that alt-right brought in their own thugs as well, which might be the ones you're referrring to.

In the antifa vs. alt-right contest both sides get a dishonourable second place.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Berkeley_protests

They key difference between Nashville and SV is Nashville doesn't claim to be anything but what's it is. SV culture claims to be inclusive and value diversity of thought. However, plenty of people experience exactly the opposite of this and that makes people feel lied to. Eventually the true SV culture will become more understood but until then I can understand people's frustrations

My perspective as someone not living in California: I imagine that if there is increasing pushback against conservative values it is because the liberal ideology has been suppressed across most of the country and more pressure is being released in the few places where it is still politically preferable. If democrats sweep in the next few years (I am not so sure that will happen) then I also imagine the atmosphere in SV will cool down a bit. However, the mix of capital and somewhat radical liberal politics increase the odds of strange outcomes.

The real problem is increasing polarization of the Congress since Gingrich. We are going to keep flipping back and forth between Republican domination and Democrat domination rather than slight right majority and slight left majority with great debates and comprises until some key issues with the electoral process and congressional procedure are fixed.

I think the end result is an overhaul and optimization of government by sensible, human-oriented technologists but that is a few decades and several bitcoin bubbles away.

You can support diversity of thought and still be against billionaires who shut down media outlets and make additional billions off government surveillance and pervasive tracking of individuals (read: minorities)

How about billionaires who rightfully sue publications that publicly reveal their sexual identity (without permission) in the context that can put the person's life in danger (Thiel visiting Saudi Arabia at the time)? What about publications being sued for publicly releasing private sex tapes of people without their permission and refusing to take them down at the request?

Where has SV claimed to be tolerant of conservative thought? The suggestion that it claims to or ought to welcome racist/sexist/homophobic/anti-welfare-state politics did not appear to arrive on the scene until the fallout of the Damore memo.

>racist/sexist/homophobic/anti-welfare-state politics

This is not exactly what "conservative thought" is, but the conflation does nicely demonstrate SV's toxic mix of ignorance and intolerance.

You'll find plenty of support for disruption of burdensome and anti-consumer regulatory regimes (see: ridesharing), a mix of free traders and protectionists, opponents of price controls, advocates to unleash private capital to fix societal problems (see: YIMBYs), advocates to reduce the administrative burden of redistribution schemes (see: UBI), and a number of other center-right positions.

What gets you in trouble here is talking about pro-life family values, personal responsibility, and how marginalized groups who are over/under represented in certain outcomes must deserve it.

When it comes to really big money principles often go right out the window...

There might be some diversity of economic matterts; depends on whether you make money on walking through the outer fringes of legality (e.g. AirBnB) or not. On social issues that you mention SV is far more of an echo chamber.

Although I do wonder where you're getting the idea about groups that "deserve it". Personal responsibility, vs. identity politics seems to be a rather large dividing line between liberals and conservatives, and "deserve it" as applied to groups is a liberal belief, not conservative.

Thiel is pretty deep into the 'neoreactionary' subculture with a distinct anti-democratic and racist bent. You're right to say that this isn't exactly conservative thought, but it is the sort of thought that comes from the people who are criticising the valley from the inside. The Curtis Yarvin types seem to be involved in the newest criticism against 'valley liberalism' more than genuinely conservative groups.

I've never seen much opposition to your run off the mill conservatism you find anywhere in the business world.

He well might be, although the accusations of racism all seem to point at some very anciuent and rather vague hearsay.

Economically SV may not be too far from the mainstream, because really, if you drive away not only Thiel but the rest of VCs, who's gonna throw millions on your new world-changing blockchain crowdsourced augmented-reality chat app?!

Socially, though, SV positions itself far, far left of not only mainstream, but even of the outer fringes of common sense. Which comes out quite ironic in the end, e.g. when you look at tyhe stuff in Damore's lawsuit (the ones still proceeding) vs. the fact that Google is simultaneously being sued for underpaying women.

> SV culture claims to be inclusive and value diversity of thought

I don't see many people in SV culture claiming to value "diversity of thought". They value diversity of culture, races, sexual identities, etc. But not thought (unfortunately).

That said, other posters are 100% correct when they write that rural America is just as intolerant, only in the other direction. And you don't see many people moving to those areas and attacking their lack of thought diversity (probably because they'd get shunned, at best, or shot, at worst).

They might not directly claim to value diversity of thought, however accusations of "bigotry" seem to me to be the most common insult/label applied by progressives to non-progressives, possibly behind only "Nazi".

If someone is using "intolerance towards those who hold different opinions from oneself" as an insult, it only makes sense to assume they are claiming that they are different.

Well, because they want to have their cake and eat it too. "Everybody has a voice, we're accepting of all cultures, everybody is welcome" etc.. until they aren't.

And believe it or not, people in the south have to (from their point of view) put up with "the liberals" too - similar to people in SF or wherever.

Frankly, what is interesting here is that instead of the United States becoming more culturally similar with the advent of planes, mobile phones, and what have you it would appear, at least on the surface, that we're becoming more different. I live in the Midwest and when I hear somebody from Vancouver saying that explaining something to someone automatically is "mansplaining" and "placing an emotional burden" on that person I find that just as idiotic and incompatible with my way of life as some bible-thumping anti-climate change person from Mississippi. Now, both of these are of course generalizations, but the most pervasive noise, if you will, is this instead of the most likely interaction I would have with most people which is just a hey how are you, thanks, yes I like XYZ as well.

What we need to do is police the most radical people if we want the United States to be a united country. If we'd rather break it up or something then that's a different story.

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