Comment by thaumasiotes | Hacker News Reader

Comment by thaumasiotes | Hacker News Reader

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> YOU are of opinion it would be proper to establish a company of firemen in Nicomedia, [similar] to what has been practised in several other cities. But it is to be remembered that societies of this sort have greatly disturbed the peace of the province in general, and of those cities in particular. Whatever name we give them, and for whatever purposes them may be founded, they will not fail to form themselves into factions, assemblies, however short their meetings may be. It will therefore be safer to provide such machines as are of service in extinguishing fires, enjoining the owners of houses to assist in preventing the mischief from spreading, and, if it should be necessary, to call in the aid of the populace.

( Plin. Ep. 10.34; https://www.bartleby.com/9/4/2043.html , or in the original at http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:19... )

That's the Roman Emperor Trajan denying the administrator of the province of Bithynia permission to establish a fire department. If you let men get together, for any purpose, they'll start talking about politics. It's better to let things burn.

If you look at the history of many early US volunteer firefighter organizations, he wasn't exactly wrong. They often became gangs of a sort, taking advantage of people who they were "helping" and competition between groups often got violent. That's how Boss Tweed got his start in politics.

It's also how Marcus Licinius Crassus made his fortune.

"How Censorship in China Allows Government Criticism but Silences Collective Expression"

https://gking.harvard.edu/publications/how-Censorship-China-...

What happens if you get women together?

Please don't post unsubstantive comments here.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Is this a joke? Half the damn comments on this site are entirely unsubstantiated bullshit and you’re enforcing the rule on THIS comment which doesn’t even make a claim to be substantiated?

If you’re claiming it is without substance you’re simply erasing sex, which is OBVIOUSLY A SUBSTANTIVE CONCEPT.

Sure, and the GP was not a substantive comment. It was a generic, off-topic, flamebait tangent. Why flamebait? Because people can't discuss that topic without yelling at each other, and certainly not when the trigger is an information-free one-liner.

Speaking of yelling, can you please not use allcaps for emphasis on HN? This is in the guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

By the way, "substantive" isn't the same as "substantiated". It just means containing information that would be of interest to a curious reader. For example, if I describe an anecdote from my experience, that can easily be substantive without there being any need to substantiate it (e.g. by proving that it happened).

If this is off topic, so are all topics of substance. “Flamebait” is just a term for “topic you’d rather not have on the forum”.

I don’t particularly care for the guidelines as they significantly harm the quality of conversation. You’re welcome to ban me.

I have posted and do frequently see "unsubstantive" comments, but somehow the mere connotation of gender is a flag.

From a historical perspective, such a question in even its simplest form is entirely valid given the nature of gender roles in societies. Are/were conspiring women's groups more or less feared than men's? I don't know myself, and my comment was sincere in that regard.

It is my understanding that, in the classical world, conspiring women's groups were viewed with suspicion by men in general, but not viewed as a threat to the government.

The concept of a women's conspiracy was familiar. Lysistrata involves all the women of Athens conspiring to end the Peloponnesian war by calling a general sex strike.

Gender isn't a flag per se. The problem is that invoking it with a generic, informationless one-liner is almost always going to be flamebait. Not just gender—this is true of any divisive topic. If you add something interesting and thoughtful to the discussion, it's a different story. That's welcome. You just need to express it in a flame-retarding way, not the internet equivalent of a lit match.

All this is covered by the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html. We didn't come up with these rules in a bubble bath! They've all been hammered out by the brutal processes of the internet forum.

Both you and pmontra above are completely misreading thaumasiotes's comments in a knee-jerk reaction. They were simply paraphrasing the intent of the quote from Trajan... If you have an issue with it, bring it up with Trajan.

So thaumasiotes was sarcastic here

> Women getting together is fine. Not once have groups of women ever been known to rebel against the government.

I agree with the sarcasm. Women are generally less problematic than men but they rebel when it matters. Another example, Rosa Parks.

Speaking for myself, no, that statement is entirely serious. Women are not now and never have been a direct threat to any government. They don't fight wars.

Would Trajan have known this? Of course.

Compare your descriptions of suffragettes' terrorist activities with the research on how effective terrorist campaigns are at even getting their favored policies implemented. (And then, of course, ask yourself whether Trajan could have been aware of a 20th-century women's movement.)

Women work. Withholding labor is a threat to the state. Women were a crucial part of the civil rights movement. Women are absolutely a threat to the state.

Please keep cheap gender rhetoric and grandiose pop-historical generalizations off this site.

So we can discuss men but not women on this forum?

Could you please review the guidelines and stop posting comments that clearly break them? They include: "Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize."

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Women getting together is fine. Not once have groups of women ever been known to rebel against the government.

Were you also attributing "It's better to let things burn" to me personally?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suffragette

> A suffragette was a member of militant women's organisations in the early 20th century who, under the banner "Votes for Women", fought for the right to vote in public elections, known as women's suffrage.

> The suffragettes heckled politicians, tried to storm parliament, were attacked and sexually assaulted during battles with the police, chained themselves to railings, smashed windows, set fire to postboxes and empty buildings, set bombs in order to damage churches and property, and faced anger and ridicule in the media.

Men and women are human beings. We all fight for what we want.

I assume the commentor you were replying to was being sarcastic.

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