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Comment by coldpie | Hacker News Reader

Why do you want to share your opinions on controversial topics? What do you get out of it? No one cares about your opinions on incest except to dunk on you. You're not going to revolutionize society's opinions on incest. So stop doing that. There's a whole universe of non-politics and non-religion topics out there. Go find a cool one. Maybe explore music theory and analysis, plenty of people to talk to about that. Maybe find a creative hobby, lots of communities to share your creations. Maybe try reverse-engineering an old Nintendo game and documenting your findings.

If it hurts, stop doing it.

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On some level this response seems sane, but the more I think about it the more insane it is.

Are we seriously questioning why someone wants to share their opinions on a topic? Are we actually clueless as to what they get out of it?

Is telling them they should instead spend a great deal of time following a completely unrelated pursuit our solution?

"Hey, I'm having a hard time expressing myself while feeling safe from (as I see it) arbitrary harassment, and managing vectors for imagined retributions"

"Go decompile donkey kong"

...right

> Are we seriously questioning why someone wants to share their opinions on a topic? Are we actually clueless as to what they get out of it?

Yes, feel free to explain why that’s insane. It seems absolutely normal to keep things to yourself

There is no way this is a good faith question. As someone delivering their opinion on the internet - surely you can explain why someone would like to deliver their opinion on the internet.

I personally don’t get anything out of sharing my opinion on the internet, I do it out of reflex and I actually have been taking measures to stop doing it. So no, not asking in bad faith.

I wasted a decade+ on my life arguing online all day. I see what coldpie says. It is legitimately a pointless waste of time.

Obviously I am still on HN so I still do it, but I definitely feel it's futile and it's a guilty pleasure. But even here, I've lurked or posted for many years too and I can't recall anyone changing their opinion on anything.

I dont think mental jousting is completely devoid of value depending on the topic. The benefits are just difficult to measure.

Even if you haven't changed opinions, you may have helped take down strawmen or aid others in steelmaning.

The possibility to have a healthy debate on any topic is the root of progress!

Fair enough, though I would argue it’s impossible to have a healthy meaningful debate on “the internet” (by which I mean reddit or any social media)

Sadly true

"A rule of etiquette -- in business, at the dinner table, at the barbershop and elsewhere -- is 'never talk about religion or politics.' These subjects are highly contentious and usually result in heated argument instead of general agreement. 'Never discuss religion or politics with those who hold opinions opposite to yours' has been cited in print since at least 1840. 'Do not discuss politics or religion in general company' is from 1879."

https://www.barrypopik.com/index.php/new_york_city/entry/nev...

I think we will somehow survive as a society without hearing this dude's thoughts on incest. And yes, I think people would be better served spending their time on hobbies than arguing politics on the Internet.

The person is not walking in to business meetings arguing the ethics of incest. Clearly they understand this given their declaration of a throwaway.

I think it's also probably safe to say they're not delivering these opinions as non-sequiturs. If there is some news article posted for discussion about incest, and I showed up to say "I don't like incest", I doubt I'd find anyone telling me about references to

> 1840, The Corsair, “The Letter Bag of the Great Western,” pg. 775, col. 1

But look what seems to happen at the inverse?

Make of the opinion what you will, but bashing the engagement is a bit rich.

OP is just giving the outsiders perspective to the hivemind. It's worth hearing now and then imo.

> OP is just giving the outsiders perspective to the hivemind. It's worth hearing now and then imo.

Sometimes it can even be fun. I've gotten a surprising number of upvotes with no supporting comments in the past on here, presumably from others too afraid to speak up.

You're on Hacker News saying people shouldn't talk about politics? Either you're badly lost, or you don't recognize politics even when they hit you over the head.

Hobbies are overrated. Arguing politics on the Internet is another hobby.

> Why do you want to share your opinions on controversial topics? What do you get out of it? No one cares about your opinions on incest except to dunk on you. You're not going to revolutionize society's opinions on incest.

One person won't, but echo chambers definitely do solidify people's opinions. I'm old enough to have seen popular opinions on a lot of issues move during my own lifetime, and things really start to get extreme at about the point where people feel like they can't oppose the trend. That happens pretty much regardless of whether the new or old opinion was "right" or "wrong". And if the accepted opinion started out largely "right", it very often ends up getting pushed into a more extreme version that's closer to "wrong".

It's called "groupthink". It's one reason that having persistent handles isn't necessarily as good an idea as you'd think in online discussions. Which is itself an opinion close to some danger areas right now...

I feel like groupthink could be a good thing in the old context where you were part of a community and discussing these things was something you did in the checkout line at the market and people would either nod, or give you odd stares or be like WTF, now that everything is online though, every opinion can find like minded people to champion it, and bad idea-makers are emboldened to take a bad idea and make it a meme and it grows and builds momentum. QAnon is a good example of this.

When you had a smaller pool of people and their political/religious backgrounds were more wide and open you'd be more thoughtful about what you say, and discussions were more academic less political, but now it seems everyone has a motive behind what they say or do and everything is about being grouped under socialist, neoliberal, capitalist, patriot, nationalist, ring-wing nutjob, extremist, etc...

My point is the problem is online echo chambers, if we had a way to build larger but similar wide-view communication platforms maybe we'd have less politicization but then people probably wouldn't use it because that's what they're seeking an outlet for their political idealogies.

What if this was about black people right to sit at the front of the bus? Would you still say: "Why do you want to share your opinions on controversial topics? What do you get out of it? No one cares about your opinions on apartheid except to dunk on you. You're not going to revolutionize society's opinions on black people. So stop doing that."

Not saying incest and apartheid are the same thing, but we need to be able to discuss all ideas in an open way, even the ones that most of us find uncomfortable. Otherwise democracy dies.

Organizing for massive political change has pretty much no overlap with arguing with people on Reddit. Arguing on the Internet is just a lame hobby some people get caught up in, and it would be good for everyone if they found a better one to spend their time on.

If he wants to spin up an Incest Rights Advocacy group, he can certainly go do that. But arguing on Reddit and then feeling sad about it is not Step 1 in that process.

Sure, donkey kong .vs the neurotic generation. It's the same, right?

As long as now one attacks me with the violence of typing mean letters into the intertubes...

> If it hurts, stop doing it.

I'd love to say that in some cases. But boy that may backfire....

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