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Comment by currymj | Hacker News Reader

truly talented writer, not really the kind of guy who should be held up as a moral teacher. had a long-term pattern of sleeping with his students. committed serious domestic violence against one of his partners.

this wasn't well-known at the time this speech was given, or after he killed himself and the speech became hugely popular. It seems like it still isn't.

I think there's some kind of minimum bar where you shouldn't take spiritual and moral advice from somebody.

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People can have flaws and do things wrong and still be right about some things. Indeed, everyone has flaws and does things wrong, so if you're looking for someone who doesn't before you consider any advice, you're unlikely to ever be able to learn anything.

If someone failed out of school and tells you to study hard, are you going to discount their advice because they failed to live up to it?

>truly talented writer, not really the kind of guy who should be held up as a moral teacher. had a long-term pattern of sleeping with his students

So? Unless the students where kids (as opposed to 18 and above), that's a moralist, religious-derived, US-centric concern (not that such moralism hasn't made its way and infected other parts of the world)...

People that call out adults for sleeping with whoever adult they like are worse than people that sleep with their adult students...

> that's a moralist, religious-derived, US-centric concern

It's a conflict of interest, like an employee sleeping with their boss. It's hard to trust somebody to fairly assess somebody they're sleeping with.

>It's a conflict of interest, like an employee sleeping with their boss

It's only bad if it's part of blackmail or exchange (e.g. for grades, etc). Else, if it's a consentual relation, it's fine just like any other.

Lots of employees have had great relationships and marriages and kids with their bosses and vice versa. And even more students and professors had affairs (this will include someone like French President Macron). Humans are humans they don't easily compartmentalize their attraction or sexuality just because some bureaucratic rules say so.

I don't think the fact that it sometimes works out well means that it's generally a good idea. Relationships probably end in breakup as often as not, and then you're left in the awkward position of still needing to go to class (or to work) with your ex as your "superior."

>I don't think the fact that it sometimes works out well means that it's generally a good idea.

That it's not generally a good idea is inherent in the "sometime it doesn't work out well" (the complamentary to "it sometimes works out well"). But that's also true for most affairs/relationships, and according to statistics, marriages (if we consider a divorce as "the marriage not working out well"). And it can be awkward, like those.

But my point was, it's human, and not some moral issue to condemn a person or a writer's writing for.

>Humans are humans they don't easily compartmentalize their attraction or sexuality just because some bureaucratic rules say so

This is exactly my point. Even if the professor and student don't intend it to be a grades-for-sex exchange, it would be hard for the professor to be completely objective, and not unfairly grade that student higher than other students with whom the professor didn't have such a close relationship.

Typically, older teachers who sleep with a lot of students do abuse their position and authority in order to be able to do it. Whether by giving favorable/unfavorable grades, by visibly preferring some students or by more direct threats.

> moralist, religious-derived, US-centric concern

Then again, if teacher touches you inappropriately in US or is trying to manipulate you into that, you can actually complain. It is not easy and you may not be believed, but you are is still in better compared to less moralist places.

It is not exactly US-centric concern to think that any of above happen. The same happen everywhere. It is that complaining about it in US is not a taboo.

>It is not exactly US-centric concern to think that any of above happen. The same happen everywhere. It is that complaining about it in US is not a taboo.

I think it's more that sexuality in the US is a taboo, and everything is seen in the prism of violation and litigation.

There is such a thing as violation. There is such a thing as teacher or boss abusing his authority to get sex where he has upper hand. In US, that topic is not taboo. If where you are such option is not accepted as possibility, then it is not US who has taboo.

Non american women do get touched inappropriately and they do not like it. And they do complain about it, if you know them close enough.

Also, would there not be value in the words from someone who had experience with moral corruption? If I wanted to hear what the world was like outside the city walls, I'd expect that person to have gone outside the city walls before.

i see what you’re saying in the broader case — i can imagine it would be worth listening to someone who had reckoned with the evil they did — but that’s not how people sold DFW.

The pitch was “here’s a book of good advice from a man who was brilliant, morally decent, and struggled with depression”.

Some of the greatest geniuses in history were incredibly troubled people. The fact that they were terrible messes does not change the fact that we are still standing upon their shoulders.

What if the advice that would really help someone just happens to be from people who are all below this person's purity test bar?

I don't know if it's a purity test. We've all failed. We've all had bad behaviour patterns. None of those things are disqualifications. In some cases it's overcoming these things that make someone worth listening to.

But if the person failed to do so perhaps something about their world view needed to change? Perhaps listening to them could lead you down the same path?

If the ghost of Hitler tells you not to hit your sister and take her toys, it's still good advice.

I think if you erased the name of the author, and prefaced the post with "Here's some life advice from a man who committed suicide 3 years after giving it" - few people would give this a second glance. I'm more inclined to do the exact opposite of what he says, because clearly it didn't work for him.

DFW - a great author, and a profoundly sad human. Enjoy his works but don't look to him for anything more than entertainment.

I'm willing to bet there's a not insignificant fraction of society who are profoundly interested in the lives and writing of people who have done harm to themselves and / or others.

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