Comment by cato_the_elder | Hacker News Reader

Comment by cato_the_elder | Hacker News Reader

Because tech has a left-wing bias [1], and HN is mostly a tech forum.

I personally think that will change in the coming years though. There's a limit on how much tech and denial of reality can coexist. Perhaps the reason that they have been able to coexist for while is that most tech workers tend to work in fields adjacent to computer science. They live in the world of bits, not atoms.

By denial of reality I mean things like denying the enormous role of genetics, or basic economics (see https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_Monetary_Theory), or insisting on human equality at every level (which is of course utterly untrue, e.g. von Neumann was smarter than almost all of us here), or the war on merit (i.e. "affirmative action"), or heavy use of propaganda and censorship and doublethink to avoid social stigma for particular groups, or denial of basic biology (when it comes to fitness, or gender differences), or even Orwellian [2] insistence on the "fact" that 2 + 2 = 5. [3]

[1]: https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2020/07/02/most-liberal-tech-compan...

[2]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2_%2B_2_%3D_5

[3]: https://twitter.com/wokal_distance/status/129047933047724032...

Pretty good list. Don't agree with it, but it's a list indicative of a different world view. You think tech will swing to this reality? I doubt it. But you know, time will tell.

I think the bitter economic reality will swing to more radical views and towards increased collective views. That's because the wreck of AGW is going to be so disruptive, it will be necessary.

Isn't the pendulum due for swing back first?

Fair. Maybe? How do you know it didn't reach the end of its swing back already? It's one of those "you can tell after"

I'm pretty sure the swings have not got in phase worldwide and I have to tell you I am delighted, because when they synchronise the shit gets scary, real fast.

Tech and finance have flipped market cycle dominance and influence since the dollar was debased from gold. Wall Street will be taking its pound of flesh for the next ~decade.

Honestly, I don't think this is true. Tech people tend towards a libertarian bias in my experience, and I'm old. I've been a professional programmer for about 30 years now. I've met more libertarian tech people than progressives, by far.

Given that the Democratic party isn't particularly libertarian, and the fact that most libertarians vote Republican [1], how do you explain the employee donation data?

[1]: https://www.cato.org/commentary/examining-libertarian-vote-d...

Voting and donating are different. Probably particularly so for Libertarians. These data points aren't comparable.

Also in these latter days, since 2016, the Republican party isn't particularly libertarian either. That's a factor.

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