"Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially of other people's work. A good critical comment teaches us something.
"Please don't use Hacker News for political or ideological battle. It tramples curiosity
"Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith.
"Eschew flamebait."
> Please don't use Hacker News for political or ideological battle. It tramples curiosity
This article is on HN only for such a reason. There are many better treatments of the history of the Barbary Coast neighborhood, if that's of interest.
I would be fascinated to read a substantive contrary viewpoint that clarifies inaccuracies or highlights controversial assertions in TFA, because I don’t know how accurate it is. Write that!
Here's merely one (of many) better articles that explains why people of San Francisco, than as now, might not favor having an openly lawless neighborhood in their city: https://theculturetrip.com/north-america/usa/california/arti...
But… as a relatively disinterested observer I feel compelled to point out that the link you provided is at least as loosely footnoted and uses at least as much (if not probably more) charged language. It has the word “Bloody” in the title.
TFA is clearly written by someone who believes that prostitution is not inherently bad, bordering on a tacit endorsement of the practice. To its credit it doesn’t use language like “unfortunate men seduced by the temptations of…”
If I missed it please correct me, but I didn’t find anything like: “Having been seduced by prostitutes affiliated with the Sydney Ducks, the unfortunate men who entered these brothels…” or “den of violence and vice” or “Gone were the scheming criminals and overarching sense of moral decay”.
It’s a bit much with the purple prose about scheming this and degenerate that.
It’s only my opinion, but I don’t really see any controversy over which of these things is a relatively sober précis with a subtle but detectable slant, and which is a breathless tale of sin and lawlessness.
Your critique of the posted article as being part of an ideological battle advancing class oppression dynamics seems overblown to me. This particular article reads like museum-pamphlet history to me.