Hacker News Reader

Sorry, but I'm about to Godwin this thread:

"If Adolf Hitler was such a bad leader why did so many people follow him?"

I think both statements are ludicrous and smell of intellectual laziness.

I think you've totally nailed the naiveté of the OP. The reason both statements are ludicrous is that they judge the person in question outside the applicable context. Hitler was a brilliant leader and speaker, but he was a monster in other aspects. Horror stories about Steve Jobs abound, generally coming from people not working day in day out with him. The fact that he is a narcissistic, egotistical guy ("I'll be employee zero, then") has nothing to do with him being a bad boss in this sense.

In this title I think "bad" is being used in the sense of possessing qualities of bad leadership, not moral badness. For example, the stereotype of having a bad temper, being controlling, calling names, are all traditionally qualities of bad leadership. However, why do some leaders get away with it? What compensates for it? Seems like a perfectly sensible question to me.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com