Hacker News Reader

Comment by 323 | Hacker News Reader

FYI: Lex Fridman mentioned on multiple podcasts how much he admires Putin, and how one of his life goals is to interview him. Which apparently will happen soon.

He also didn't condemn the invasion, just basically said that "war is bad", as if both sides are equally to blame.

View on HN

I don't think that's an honest characterization of what Lex actually said about Putin. I don't want to put words in his mouth, but my impression is that Lex has a fascination for the capacity of humans to do both good and evil, and I think it's obvious from this point alone why he would have a strong desire to speak to Putin face to face.

I think there would be a lot of value in the world seeing him interview Putin. Not because of admiration, but because of what that interview could teach us about human nature.

Also, note that it's possible for someone to have highly admirable traits, such as intelligence, and highly despicable traits, such as evil, at the same time. Therefore it's possible to both hate and admire someone, for different reasons. Or rather, to both admire and hate different aspects of a person at the same time.

>Lex Fridman mentioned on multiple podcasts how much he admires Putin

I think that is a distortion of Lex's opinions.

Completely.

interest != admiration. If you watch and talk about Mindhunter it doesn't mean you admire serial killers.

I like Lex, but I dont understand why he has such a hard-on for dictators. I suppose he believes in the goodness of people.

Admiration for Putin is frankly despicable.

Why him specifically? People admire Trump and Obama and they have both sanctioned drone strikes that killed civilians too.

How naive to assume that there is even remotely a comparison. Get back to me when journalists and activists are assassinated

Are you implying that lives lost from the drone strikes are somehow less worthy than those of journalists and activists? Or is it the degree of closeness to the murders? (not trying to troll, genuinely interest since you did not disagree with drone strikes killing humans)

No, I'm saying that the crimes are different and that to me one is far worse. Drone strikes and civilian casualties are the consequences of America's counter terrorism efforts. Putin having journalists, activists assassinated in his country because they criticize his dictatorship is state terrorism. You can disagree with every aspect of America's foreign policy. Civilian casualties are tragic, and collateral damage is bad. But murdering your own citizens to silence free speech is far more outrageous to me.

OH no!

Reply on news.ycombinator.com