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Comment by stringgames | Hacker News Reader

> It sounds like every single person in China has to know about it to know they should never talk about it.

When I was in college I spoke to a Chinese exchange student about Tiananmen square. They had a vague idea that something bad happened there, but they didn't know any details. They had never seen the picture of the person in front of a tank before. They had a belief that lots of bad things happened in China's past, but it's worth it because they are no longer poor.

There's a difference between knowing a subject is taboo, and having a real understanding of the subject.

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> There's a difference between knowing a subject is taboo, and having a real understanding of the subject.

Doesn't tabooing something make it particularly interesting to learn about it? If I know about some mysterious bad thing having happened at a square nobody is allowed to mention I would hardly be able to resist curiosity, I would get interested about this topic above all other and find ways to learn as much as I can.

What if you knew that seeking that information would notify the government and could harm you, your family, and possibly even friends? Would you still act on that curiosity?

Yes. Cautiously.

Why? Are you a journalist? What will you do with knowledge of taboo events?

It seems you would risk much for very little just to know?

Not a journalist nor activist. I wouldn't even tell anybody but those who have earnt my genuine trust and want to know badly. Pure curiosity. What the heck in life can be more attractive than knowing a secret truth?

Most people would say millions upon millions of things are more interesting than knowing taboo secrets when people are interested in hurting you for it, and especially when the motivation is nothing more than "to know".

Perhaps, but I can't imagine any. By the way, did you know simply adding "banned" to a video title in YouTube immediately attracts more views? Banned commercials (I can't imagine myself voluntarily watching an advertisement if it was not banned), banned TED talks, books and movies banned in some countries (I've first learnt about some books and movies I've read/watched right from these lists). I probably wouldn't even ever try drugs if these were not prohibited (I'm not an addict but I'm really glad I had some psychedelic experiences and the ban was what made me curious initially). Of course this doesn't mean I would do something really bad like robbing people just because this is outlawed, it's more about knowledge and experiences. I don't know why does this work but knowing you are not meant to know something but actually can learn about it creates urge hard to resist and I only care to actually resist it when it's about other people's personal privacy or business ethics (so I never read other's emails although, being a system administrator, I can).

But I'm not sure what you're talking about are contexts where people think they're doing a banned or taboo activity.

Looking up a YouTube video on banned TED talks and etc sounds like a safe, banal activity one does from home. You can tell your coworkers, your friends, the police, and nobody will care. I would suggest that for the US, something taboo would be like talking about racial supremacy and eugenics.

But due to free speech rights and history, I'm not sure the US has something similar to a political or national event people can't talk about. I would also say cultural retaliation is different from government retaliation.

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