Ask HN: Geopolitical forums similar to HN? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Geopolitical forums similar to HN?

70 pointstoomuchtodo58 comments

Fairly self explanatory. Similar to HN, but less tech oriented and more geopolitical policy/strategy oriented.

Thanks in advance to thread contributors.

The /r/Geopolitics subreddit is surprisingly solid!

Political bias is (supposed to be...) moderated to a maximum to foster only useful discussion. It has better days than others, but know I've definitely learned a lot from the discussions over there.

It is, but the moderators enforce a certain bias.

there is also r/globaltalk

..must either login or use the Reddit app to see comments :(

Edit: https://old.reddit.com/r/geopolitics/

It would be hard to get a solid context around just links, but beyond /r/Geopolitics much of well researched YouTube channels like Caspian Report (https://www.youtube.com/user/CaspianReport) and Quora (https://www.quora.com/topic/Geopolitics) are where I would start.

I love Caspian Report, really amazing content!

To be like hacker news it would have to be filled with actual insurgents, including some who managed to make their own countries.

Indeed. The closest you’ll get to this would be the Café Central in Vienna, circa 1913. A recreation of this on the internet would be fascinating.

The café was opened in 1876, and in the late 19th century it became a key meeting place of the Viennese intellectual scene. Key regulars included: Peter Altenberg, Theodor Herzl, Alfred Adler,[2] Egon Friedell, Hugo von Hofmannsthal, Anton Kuh, Adolf Loos, Leo Perutz, Robert Musil, Stefan Zweig, Alfred Polgar, Adolf Hitler, and Leon Trotsky. In January 1913 alone, Josip Broz Tito, Sigmund Freud, and Trotsky (the latter being regular) were patrons of the establishment.

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

Reminded me of the Polish "Scottish Cafe" I learned about just recently (mathematicians-only, though!): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_Caf%C3%A9

Hitler, Tito, Trotsky, Freud, Musil... Quite a mix they had there.

Theodor Herzl and Hitler in the same cafe? That is almost too much of a coincidence.

Hitler was a fifteen yearold in Linz when Herzl died.

I think that would be one of the most interesting forums on the internet.

I definetly want to make my own country where do I signup?

I guess people would ask YOU where to sign up.

apply.ycombinator.com

Maybe where they are selling old oil rigs outside of territorial waters..

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principality_of_Sealand

If you have to ask, you don't have what it takes

There is a pie-slice of Antarctica that is unclaimed under the Antarctic Treaty System. Some guy in LA has claimed it as Westarctica[1], which is a pretty good name. You could probably go down there with a pistol and claim it yourself. Dress warmly. Would rank in the top 20 countries in square km (1.6M square km)

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westarctica

Under the Anartic treaty, most countries won't recognize new claims and new activity won't effect claims: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antarctic_Treaty_System

This is a gross misrepresentation of the Antarctic treaty. The treaty effectively removed the relevance of any claim from any entity.

I was obviously kidding about claiming it with a pistol

I was rather referring to the part about "unclaimed pie-slice". That's not part of the Antarctic Treaty; it predates it and is made irrelevant by it.

Nobody recognizes even the claimed pie slices (except the 7 claiming countries), just as none of the parties would recognize any claim on Marie Byrd Land (aka Westarctica).

It still remains a fact that no country claims that territory. And that's interesting in some abstract way to people with the fantasy of forming a country. Which is exactly what the parent comment was referring to.

The whole thing is just meant in fun. Aside from the fact that the treaty binds only the signatories.

Couldn't it just be filled with voters?

I haven't used these myself, but I read that discussion on betting sites is less emotional and troll-y. Presumably because people are more focused on being actually correct, rather than on ideology.

Example: https://www.predictit.org/

Very interesting observation, my own experience with GJP, metaculous, and other betting fora agree with this.

I wonder if an HN-like forum with prediction at its core would have legs? I always found the best comments in prediction tournaments at least as interesting as the actual estimates, but none of the platforms really support back-and-forth conversation.

The predictit discussions are pretty bad and troll-y...

Example https://www.predictit.org/markets/detail/3698/Who-will-win-t...

Well, I can't say I regret not checking first.

A lot of discussion on PredictIt is people trying to lie/mislead/emphasize certain facts to perform a pump n dump

Sounds like it might not even be intentional, but sometimes it's just really wanting something to happen, or betting on something because you really expect it to.

The neutral politics subreddit attempts to keep things objective and this might appeal to the hacker news fan.

For anybody curious (like me - thanks for pointing to it) that's presumably: https://www.reddit.com/r/NeutralPolitics

and not the left-wing r/politics.

Incidentally to non-US readers - at least on first look - the slant seems to be heavily USA-oriented, it doesn't seem at all geo.

I've been reading r/neutralpolitics for a while now, and it definitely is less left than r/politics, but conservative points are still buried in the comments. For any post talking about Trump or anything related to him, you have to browse comments using the "controversial" sorting method to see anything not progressive focused.

That goes for the entirety of Reddit.

That would be true for the entire country as well. The amount of support for left vs right is pretty lopsided. This isn't reflected in number of seats because of gerrymandering and electoral college.

>The amount of support for left vs right is pretty lopsided.

In certain areas. In the media, yes. In the population, not so much.

Voting is based on population, not by media articles or the geography. Check the 2018 and 2016 election results.

Yes, that was my point. The 2016 election was roughly evenly split on the popular vote, with a slight advantage to the democrats. Meanwhile the media believed that the democrats a >90% chance of winning.

3 million more votes to left out of only 138 million votes casted.

I honestly don't even understand what objective would mean in the context of politics. Isn't politics literally about the subject?

It's just objectively impossible to have neutral politics discussion in reddit because of the upvote system. Not to mention mods in almost every subreddit are (naturally) biased and heavy handed.

As a HKer I am at the stage of my life when I suddenly realise how much geopolitics influence the course of our lives, and yes I would love to find a forum where smart and informed people have their discussions about the world's events. Should the world's affairs be left in the hands of only politcians? But most of them are so awfully dumb and self-serving! And why do ordinary citizens get no representation in world bodies like UN and WHO? The knowledge, understanding and application of politics and human rights apply to each and every person (even sentient being) on earth, yet most of us pursue spend our time only on economic or entertainment and not about the collective course of our species.

If you find those, please do tell!

Also, any sites discussing real code for trading bots :)

/r/geopolitics, but it is filled with real experts and has less outrage.

edge.org has the intellectual capacity of discussing multi-disciplinary issues however not in a forum style. This would be a great addition to the internet

Financial Times comment section is top tier

I usually browse r/geopolitics

hltv threads

Twitter is good, start from @Halsrethink and branch out from there.

If you want one that's genuinely similar to HN in terms of politics, in being excessively pro-capitalist and woefully dismissive of social justice issues, try https://reddit.com/r/conservative.

Like HN, they touch on geopolitics by assuming whatever the US is doing is generally positive and good for the world, despite evidence to the contrary.

It's not the most intellectual forum, but let's be honest, this place isn't really either.

Not a forum but I had been looking for a good geopolitical podcast and “Bro History” is pretty solid (don’t let the name fool you). Two guys from NYC, one lib and one libertarian/lean right. Good balance of real takes and banter. They do some domestic stuff too.

the conspiracy subreddit until it dies any day now?

I know that's far less than ideal but an open-source public Stratfor is kinda self-contradicting

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