What difference does it make who makes this argument, if the argument itself is sound? On the other hand, if the man is 50% saint, 50% angel, and 50% genius, what difference would that make, if the argument itself was terrible?
Comments suggesting that he shouldn't make this argument do not actually address the argument itself. In the best case, they are a distraction from the subject being discussed.
In the worst case, they are a form of tone policing, which is a tactic for silencing sound arguments by complaining that they are not being made by the right people, or in the right way. Example:
A man murders another man. The police torture him into a confession. He complains about the torture. Is he the last person that should be complaining about violence? But if not him, who? Must we wait for the perfect angel of an innocent victim of police brutality, before we act on it?
[This argument] relies heavily on the idea that there's some universal category of "assholes" that websites should ban, and that if any website doesn't it's their fault and everyone should pressure them to fall in line. [However,] there is no such universal category that everyone agrees on.
That is simple, direct, and leaves him out of it. And I believe it is better without dragging his character and motives into it.
I interpret the comment as: "if the author can't follow his own guidance, or if the author's own compliance with this guidance is subjective, the guidance may not be given in good faith". The comment is not just saying asshole=wrong. It's saying that Anil Dash may be a hypocrite, and thus unable to propose good social policies.
The discussion (to me) seems more moral or social rather than technical. In cases of moral or social judgements, are you sure you completely reject ad-hominem points?
It seems to me that a fully Bayesian perspective requires considering ad-hominem attacks; if the source emitting the message is considered untrustworthy, should we discard that information?
(Even if someone write a computer program or book or movie or whatever but they are murderer and whatever, if the program/book/movie is good then it is good, anyways. And if it is no good, then it is no good, anyways.)
The general point Dash is trying to make about moderating communities is fine. But it's easy to preach about not allowing assholes when you don't consider yourself to be one. The day the zeitgeist shifts considerably in the favor of assessing him as an asshole, I suspect Dash might sing a very different tune about site moderation policies.
You're (possibly unwittingly) making another, an ad hominem circumstantial, by questioning his motives.
It's always best to just debate the argument itself and leave the author's character and motives and misconceptions out of it.
Otherwise we end up spending a lot of time discussing Mr. Dash, instead of discussing moderation of online communities,.
Thus, it is important to consider the motives of people who may end up enforcing them, because there's potentially a large difference between the law-as-intended and the law-as-enforced.
If the difference is large enough, it's worthwhile to examine how the personality of the enforcer may bias the outcome.
I think your argument might be valid in extremely rigorous fields like quantum mechanics - who cares who submitted the proof? But when we're talking about enforcing free speech, the person who is enforcing it has a big effect on the outcome.
It isn't on topic, unless you want to say, "Since Dash is an asshole, that is proof that there exists at least one asshole on the internet, which supports part of the argument he makes."
The premise of the argument is that moderation is a moral imperative. Nothing about Mr. Dash's character supports or refutes that argument.
Simply state, "The problem with moderation is that it can be used as a hammer to ban dissent, &c. &c."
Put like that, there is no ad hominem, and it can be debated on its merits. By the way, the most amusing thing about that argument is that we would be debating it on a moderated platform, that we both use precisely because it is moderated.
If HN was unmoderated, it would cease to be valuable to the people currently using HN.
> that we both use precisely because it is moderated.
That's not true, I'd prefer if HN was unmoderated.
That is very interesting. You do not seem naïve, so I infer you you are well aware of the social dynamics at play in an unmoderated forum.
On such a site, if I say that attacking Mr. Dash for being an asshole itself is an ad hominem, somebody is going to say, "STFU, Nigger!"
A bunch of other people, whether because they're racists, or just enjoy the spectacle, will upvote that comment and downvote me to obscurity.
Somebody else will say, "Incorrect. He's not a nigger, he's a mulatto."
A third person will play along as the straight man. "What's the difference?"
The reply will come by swift rickshaw: "About twelve dollars in confederate scrip," and will get upvotes galore.
A follow-up will say, "Nigger, mulatto, whatever, they're all going to the ovens if they won't relocate out of the white settlements."
Communities that stop moderating quickly become toxic, because even the smallest amount of toxicity drives un-toxic people away, and attracts toxic people, and without anything to stop it, the trend accelerates, until the site is dumpster fire.
And it's not just the comments. People would get away with positing all sorts of political and social stuff, "because unmoderated." Many of the people who come here for the tech would leave, because this would no longer be tech-heavy.
The "truthiness" of the front page would slide rapidly as the site becomes an echo chamber, until it would be unrecognizable as Hacker News in anything except name.
I presume you know that, so I also presume that what you mean is, you prefer a site where we would never have this conversation, because I would no longer be here.
In fact, nobody would have this conversation, because everybody here would be united in their contempt of Mr. Dash, anyone like him, and anyone who doesn't immediately denounce anything he says on the basis of him saying it.
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I am tempted to indulge in a little fallacious reasoning myself and say that what you want is not a "True Hacker News," because it would quickly become a completely different site with different people, talking about different things, in a completely different tone of voice.
But perhaps I am wrong, and what you want is all the same people, talking about the same things, but without anybody getting banned or any posts being killed.
If so... I don't think that is a stable state. Moderation is a local maxima, dumpster fire is another local maxima, and everything in between eventually gets pulled to one of the two stable states.
I think there's also room for inviting users to be moderators on a rotating basis. Anything is better than a centralized moderation team that can direct the tone and voice of a community in my opinion.
Your feelings may have tempted you into making this off-topic post. The linked essay concerns comment section protocols, not personalities.
This isn't about the ad-hominem. The general point Dash is trying to make is fine. But it's easy to preach about not allowing assholes when you don't consider yourself to be one. The day the zeitgeist shifts considerably in the favor of assessing him as an asshole, I suspect Dash might sing a very different tune about site moderation policies.