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Comment by wry_discontent | Hacker News Reader

What's a controversial opinion you (or any other commenters) can share that you would feel comfortable sharing with the right but not the left?

Without concrete examples, I don't know what to make of a statement like that besides "I have bigoted ideas I want to keep quiet and can only share w/ other bigots"

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That's an uncharitable interpretation.

Here's one of mine: Fetuses have human DNA, and different DNA from their mothers. Saying "The right of the mother over her own body" doesn't extend to a different individual that is temporarily present within her body.

Here's another: If you take the Bible seriously, you also have to take seriously what the Old Testament prophets said about God's concern for the poor, the widow, the orphan, and the alien.

I personally would feel comfortable sharing either of those with people on the right, but I would be rather more nervous sharing one of them with people on the left.

The person you're responding to was flagged, so I'll respond to you to continue.

I don't like diversity initiatives. I've literally worked at companies where the CEO announced we were NOT to hire any more white men. I am not ok with anyone putting a restriction on you because of your gender identity or skin color. Increasingly, woke people are ok with this as long as the restriction is placed on white men. I believe this is because many woke groups mistakenly see things as zero sum games where bringing people down will literally lift others up. I would not be willing to speak out about this since it would label me a bigot and a racist, even though my wife and kids aren't white.

Here is more, I am a Democrat but:

- Not all problems require more/bigger Government, and sometimes makes the problems worse.

- I am pro 2nd amendment and don't think most gun laws are actually legal.

- Actual Socialism is bad, even immoral imo but I do support socialized healthcare and a few other things (see below)

- Capitalism is pretty great most of the time, except when it comes to externalities, transactions under duress (like healthcare often is) and tragedy of the commons scenarios.

- Democrats have been swayed by extreme leftists lately and they are trying to use any tragedy to push a socialist addenda.

Probably many more. If there was a pro capitalism party that supported moderate government intervention (when needed) and stood up for all of our constitutional rights, I would jump ship in a second.

You make the distinction between actual socialism and socialization of certain institutions, but then immediately claim democrats are trying to push socialist agendas which leads me to believe you're being disingenuous or you don't know what "actual socialism" is, which I assure you is not nearly as mainstream as you'd like to think.

Perhaps my post was not clear, but I mean the leftist wing are pushing socialism, not mainstream Democrats (yet). My fear is that there influence in the party will grow and in a two party system where am I to go? It won't be the Republican party.

Also I am sure there is a perception bubble effect but on pretty mainstream sites like reddit I regularly see posts and comments blaming all of societies ills on Capitalism that are highly up-voted.

    Democrats have been swayed by extreme leftists

As an extreme leftist, I need an example of this. Because where I sit, they are all pro-big-business big government centrists.

"extreme leftist" has become so watered down that I basically assume people just mean "liberal who is aggressive on socially progressive stances".

You monster. I'm unfriending you this instant and telling all of my friends they have to unfriend you too in the next 6 hours or else I'm unfriending them also.

While I'm kidding about the op, I see this all the time on my feed. Just today, I saw someone in my Facebook feed just today demand that everyone unfriend person X right away because they're a Trump supporter, and he would go through the list of mutual friends and unfriend everyone who didn't. I'm far from a Trump supporter, but I find this behavior childish.

Why, exactly? What do you think the consequence for sharing those opinions would be?

Sharing the anti-abortion position with a leftist I would expect to result in either a very tense conversation or me getting yelled at.

Sharing the "concern for the disadvantaged" with a rightist I would expect to not result in a verbal confrontation, unless they were extreme right.

Thank you.

You're are demonstrating great prejudice against the parent commenter, and proving their point by example.

Do you want to share an example? My prejudice is based on me listening to one too many people online (and often in person) share their "controversial" opinion with me.

I'm genuinely curious what the HN crowd is going to regard as "controversial opinions" that will get you in trouble.

Pretending to know something unknown is somehow 'bad' with no evidence is the definition of prejudice.

I've been explicitly told by the HN moderators that my opinions on policing - which are well within the American mainstream and probably a touch left of center - are so controversial they constitute flamebait and I shouldn't discuss them here.

That doesn't sound very likely. People make up all sorts of stories about what moderators supposedly said or did. The tell is that they're invariably linkless. If they came with the relevant links, readers could see what actually happened and make up their own minds.

I generally err on the side of not providing links to other comment threads so as not to give the impression I'm calling for a pileon. I'd happily link it, but my old profile https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=SpicyLemonZest no longer shows the comment thread. It was on a post about federal police in Portland from last week which I'm not sure how to find.

it could be you can't see that thread anymore because a lot of it was flagged dead. if you turn on showdead in your profile, threads like that will be visible.

it could be you are talking about the one that starts here:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23867618

dang gets around to taking notice right about here:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23868001

dang says: "We've rate limited your account again for perpetuating flamewars on this site."

you said: "I've been explicitly told by the HN moderators that my opinions on policing - which are well within the American mainstream and probably a touch left of center - are so controversial they constitute flamebait and I shouldn't discuss them here."

that does not to me sound at all like a good-faith representation of what dang said.

I disagree, but unfortunately I won't be able to engage without expressing the views that I've been told perpetuate flamewars.

You can just link the moderator comment in which you were 'explicitly told' the things you say you were explicitly told.

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