Everything the Government Did to WikiLeaks Is Now Done to Mainstream Reporters
freedom.press
freedom.press
Much of the discussion that has been suppressed by mods on HN has had to with the knee-jerk characterization of stories like this as political. It will be interesting to see whether this story survives on the home page or whether the thought suppression regime (mods and their cronies) is able to suppress it.
Press freedom is, in a sense, in opposition to authoritarianism. HN mods have shown a strong pro-authoritarian sentiment, so I would not be surprised to see this story (and even this comment) come under attack.
Warning: Up-voting this comment will put you on the radar of the moderators.
For a crowd that likes to consider itself the internet's intelligentsia, HN readers at large seem surprisingly ignorant of the fact that since technology is a human endeavor, politics and tech are forever inextricably linked.
Thus, the blanket ban on political articles only makes sense for articles that have no technological aspect.
Surveillance of journalists, pervasive state- and corporate-enabled surveillance at that, is exactly what HN should be discussing.
But I guess it's easier to just stick our heads in the sand, not think too hard about where our paycheck comes from, and discuss the latest Electron Bloatware as a Service.
I think many HN readers agree with the point you make, but a vocal and influential minority (as well as the mods) do not.
the truth is actually very simple; politics is merely one aspect, not always present, rarely the most important, and even more rarely interesting
Whether something is worth talking about is distinct from whether the discussion that observably occurs was worthwhile.
Political discussions usually descend into arguments about competing values. People have different interpretations of the trade-offs, and the friction turns into a lot of heat, without much light.
The same can be said for discussion of any topic that pulls in peoples' identities and not just their rational faculties. It's something we should strive to overcome through thoughtful discussion, feedback, and examples from the community of HN users, not something to suppress or avoid.
Most people go through some period of time in their lives when they are highly emotional/irrational in their analysis of important factual information. It's something to be outgrown, not simply shut down.
Sadly in this case, the mods have not outgrown it and they have been given moderation powers, and rather than respectfully engage with others they use those powers to suppress and intimidate, in the process decimating what was once an occasionally feisty but ultimately respectful community.
It was truly bad judgment to give the mods such power. Unlike the youthful vision that makes young startup founders visionaries, the mods have youthful hubris and a strange, disturbingly machiavellian taste for authoritarian control.
This means accepting that certain topics are not a good fit here. Do we really need to re-litigate "what about the jobs?" anytime an AI discussion comes up? Or "what about Trump?" every time Twitter comes up?
This story about the inexorable scope creep of surveillance technology is far too important to ban discussing simply because some users will be vitriolic.
Surveillance and the technology that enables it will be the defining issue of the next decade.
In the end there are places on the internet to discuss just about anything. HN is limiting politics is a large part of why I am here and not somewhere else.
Suppose two people have differing beliefs, call them A and -A. One person might explain why A, the other might explain why -A. The arguments (in the logical sense, not the conflict sense) can be very well reasoned and informative. In the end maybe both will believe A or both will believe -A.
The problem you cite seems to occur when the arguments include ad hominem attacks or generalizations about "everyone who believes -A".
Some of these types of generalizations occur because the people involved believe the generalization to be true. Of these, some are due to prejudice, others are due to lack of actual data, others are due to lack of thoughtful analysis and reasoning.
Making such generalizations is not typically a helpful way to engage in the discussion of A or -A, but I'd argue that they are sometimes used a shorthand for broader sentiments. In other words, they are as likely to be due to sloppy articulation as they are to signal deeper beliefs, identity or emotional state.
It takes practice to be able to discuss politics. It (frankly) takes practice to be able to discuss politics with smart people who don't necessarily fit the mold of the typical identity-driven partisan.
Just as HN should be patient with someone who argues that PHP is a superior language for systems programming, we should be patient with someone who holds ill-founded beliefs on political issues. Having the remark down-voted to oblivion, or making a snarky reply will only cause the poster to recoil and feel defensive about the belief. But writing up a detailed response that respectfully addresses the problems with the analysis and sheds light on important themes is one of the most respectful things one human can do for another.
Strangely, HN mods have zeroed in on the most surface level aspect of identity-correlated discussions and have failed to articulate a principled ethos for moderation decisions. Most egregiously, they have failed to lead by example and offer respectful contributions to important, politically and emotionally charged issues our society has been dealing with over the past few years.
One day anthropologists will study HN for evidence on how we ended up in a heavily authoritarian society that had no respect for enlightenment values. I suspect it will be fairly obvious what kind of chilling effect HN moderators had.
HN is one of the few places where smart people congregate, and HN mods prefer a world in which such people simply report to work for some silicon valley firm and do not take responsibility as citizens for their beliefs. HN moderation is anti-citizenship and anti-rationality. While it can be broadly characterized as a response to the rise of Trump (it didn't really get bad until after the election in the midst of the Russia story), it has gone way beyond what could be considered a reasonable and temporary response.
New account, go deep into threads, experience throttling. No mods required.
> HN mods prefer a world in which such people simply report to work for some silicon valley firm and do not take responsibility as citizens for their beliefs.
This is very uncharitable and does not match what I see here everyday. The mods try ridiculously hard to keep discussions civil and productive. If they have a bias, it is against topics that almost unfailingly produce more heat than light.
> HN moderation is anti-citizenship and anti-rationality.
No, they've just pissed you off as they've pissed of others people who want to go at it.
False. This account is just as new.
The guidelines only say to avoid "most" stories about politics.
The blanket ban on political articles was very brief and ended a long time ago. Many political articles (including, IMO, this one) run afoul of the general guidelines, “Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon”, but that's not a blanket ban.
It would be very difficult to overstate how strongly I disagree with your statement. HN mods have shown a strong tendency to shut down discussions that turn into flame-fests. The most common topic for such discussions is politics. But they will post on political discussions, begging people to keep it civil so that they (the mods) don't have to shut the discussion down.
If you think that HN mods are taking a political side, well, I have to say that I don't see it. I see them trying to behave as authoritarians only to the degree that they need to to keep the conversation from crawling into the gutter. (And I see them not always doing that perfectly, but it seems to me that the intention is not to take sides.)
And I would say, then, that the problem is more likely that the anti-authoritarian political crowd posts flames, or else that they attract flames in response. If you can't state your anti-authoritarian view without pouring gasoline on the conversation, it's going to look (to you) like the moderators are pro-authoritarian. But if every time you state something anti-authoritarian, your opponents consistently light the conversation on fire, it may have the same effect.
Bottom line: I don't think the problem is the mods. The problem may be you. I'd encourage you to seriously consider that possibility, rather than just dismissing it. Or it may be that there are enough trolls and flamers on the other side that we just can't have a conversation without it destroying the forum.
I assure you that my comments are always thoughtful and respectful, even when replying to a flame.
Seems like the mods just revealed that they can watch people type in real time :)
I'd say it's more likely that they are watching new accounts that come from the same IP address as old accounts that they already throttled. They could do that automatically.
If you feel that this was unjustly done, you can shoot deng an email.
SV has long leaned that way. YC's success depends on the financial support of upper echelon SV people.
It's no surprise that what is considered "too political" here usually leans anti-authoritarian. You'll never get flagged talking positively about the GDPR or large ISP market fixing (also known as NetNeutrality™). You'll just find that your comments are instantly pushed to the bottom, without any rebuttal.
It is political. That's not even really debatable.
> Press freedom is a much more fundamental issue than political affiliation.
Maybe, but that doesn't make it not a political issue.
> Much of the discussion that has been suppressed by mods on HN has had to with the knee-jerk characterization of stories like this as political.
This story is one “relating to the government or public affairs of a country”. It is, therefore, squarely political.
This story is also badly distorted and hyperbolic; most of the things at issue were done to mainstream reporters before they were done to WikiLeaks, especially including investigating attempts to get and reveal classified information as potential espionage or conspiracy related to espionage, and not giving reporters advance notice of surveillance related to investigations in which the reporter or the people they were communicating with were subjects or targets. (Notifying the subjects and targets of surveillance of the surveillance tends to be counterproductive.)
> HN mods have shown a strong pro-authoritarian sentiment
Support for this inflammatory claim is called for here.
> Support for this inflammatory claim is called for here.
HN was initially very friendly to discussion of Wikileaks when it was revealing the misdeeds of the Bush administration and foreign governments. But more recently some more beloved political figures have come under attack and now anything about WL on HN is quickly removed.
What is WL? To some it is a journalistic organization. It symbolizes the place where there is first amendment related tension between the people and the government. It is not fundamentally different from other news orgs (many publish leaked info), it just does so in a way that irritates those in power.
HN mods have actively suppressed this, etc. I need to stop typing b/c surely they have throttled this account by now so not sure it's worth time explaining further. Many examples abound.
There's certainly an argument that can be made that virtually everything connects to government or public affairs in some way, but this is literally and directly discussing the actions of government directed at people who are, overtly, trying to provide information about the actions of government to the public so that the public can effectively supervise the actions of government. The connection to government is not distant, indirect, or of dubious centrality to the issue.
> HN was initially very friendly to discussion of Wikileaks when it was revealing the misdeeds of the Bush administration and foreign governments.
Initially, WikiLeaks was itself an example of a novel phenomenon, which is right there in black and white in the guidelines as an exception to the general rule that most political, crime, and sports stories are off topic.
HN is not, and does not want to be, a general-focus news channel. There are plenty of those, most people in HN have their preferences for those, but HN is something else, by design.
I'm not sure that major news outlets leak classified information that may put US military and government officials in danger. That's where this article lost me and I stopped.
Can you link to a single item that put a single military person in danger? Even intelligence officials couldn't when asked by congress.