Hacker News Reader

Comment by donutte | Hacker News Reader

That seems stronger than what I’m saying. The folks who can’t let it go, who are still trying to circumvent the family’s privacy, they obviously are motivated by something besides concern for the victim and his kin. I don’t have any sympathy for them.

But I think the point I’m trying to make is that there’s a lot of distance between “right to intrude” and “none of your business”. The fact is that the identity of this person was their business, for a decade, simply because it wasn’t the business of anyone else.

Of course there’s no right to know the name of a stranger. But I am glad they made it their business — I’m glad someone cared — and I’m sorry the outcome hurt them. It’s not any more complicated than that.

View on HN

In hindsight, I think my strong reaction is directed more toward those who want to intrude than toward you.

I get that a lot of people invested a lot of time into this, but there's a suggestion in TFA that implies that this effort merits some special privileges, whether that inlcudes knowing the identity of the suicide or some other kind of recognition. It doesn't.

It was a voluntary act, perhaps a kind act, perhaps not from the perspective of the family. The implication is that the family either wanted to know or ought to have wanted to know. We have no information to evaluate those judgments, and there's enough gray there that it's irritating as an assumption.

The reality is that it is morally no different than participating in a subreddit on cats or submitting articles and commenting on them on HN. We're all voluntarily spending time on the internet rather than doing something else.

I hear where you’re coming from, and we seem agreed that there’s nothing internet sleuths are entitled to. I do think we’re going to have to agree to disagree on this:

The implication is that the family either wanted to know or ought to have wanted to know. We have no information to evaluate those judgments, and there's enough gray there that it's irritating as an assumption.

I think if someone has died — even if it was a fairly long time ago — it’s safe to presume that there are people somewhere who still care about them, still think about them, would like to know what happened. From a state of ignorance about who those people are, I think it’s compassionate to try to let them know, especially when no one else is trying.

And naturally, the same compassion instructs one to respect their wishes after that point. Again, all working as intended.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com