Ask HN: Is this really what America is like? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Is this really what America is like?

9 pointsytadesse15 comments

Question:

I'm black and I live in Canada and I am hard at work at pivoting my business to position it for success. One option I've always considered for various reasons is to move the business to the US. At the same time, I've become increasingly concerned about the level of bigotry, division, and outright hate being spewed publicly by what seems like an increasing portion of the population. At first, I attributed this to TV sensationalism but the more I scour the internet, the more I come upon hateful videos, articles and comments from non-anonymous users.

This all culminated today when I read an article a friend shared about an NJ robber who was choked to death after he tried to rob and subsequently headlock one of his victims. My question is not about the appropriateness or legality of the action on either side. My question stems from the downright insensitive, hateful, divisive, racist views expressed in the comments section of the post on a seemingly neutral website like NY's Channel 4 NBC News: http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Smackdown-NJ-Robber-Killed-by-Former-HS-Wrestler-138711694.html

Is this really what America has become? Has the United States become a place where a shockingly large number of individuals feel comfortable with placing their name and image beside the same type of hateful rhetoric that would have been spewed back in the days of segregation?

Why am I asking this on HN?:

I am posing this question on HN because I generally feel that people on HN are rather open and deliberate with their responses. Scoble (after what he felt were numerous personal attacks) chastised this community about this a few days ago but there is definitely a benefit in this - most of the time. As such, I feel the HN community is more than capable of providing me with a response to this regardless of whether or not it's a tech question.

I think it is a logical result of more and more people coming online and more people having access to more efficient ways (smartphones & always on 3g+...) of posting these comments/blogposts you are confronted with.

Did you ever go outside and talk to random people on the street, asking them for their views on several topics? Personal worlds are shielded by our social circles and our neighborhoods (which, if you read HN, is probably not the slums) and yet, if you really talk to random people, you'll find that a lot of these people say scary things. Interesting things as well, but also scary things. I stepped out of a hotel a few months ago, bumped into a man on the street; we started talking. He was French, a private jet pilot, sounded quite well educated. He was going to the drugstore to get cough medicine and I had to go in the same direction. When we were about halfway, an Middle eastern man passed us; when he was out of ears reach, the French guy said, while nodding to the man, 'we should bomb all those fckers, they don't deserve to live'. People who say this kind of crap to total strangers have no qualms posting it online either; these people were not online before in the numbers they are now.

How would they know that if you are logged in with Facebook or Gmail that your name/profile link automatically appears next to the post? People know very little about computers (including smartphones) and integration + apps make it very easy to blend in such a way that it would be hard* for people to actually not make their name appear.

In regards to the "random people" scenario, I have found that people who harbour such feelings will almost never make them public in a public forum even if they feel comfortable telling close friends or acquaintances. I have found that this has somewhat changed over the past few years where more and more people are somewhat saying "meh" and openly voicing any anything-phobic thoughts.

I certainly think you're right about the fact that this can partly be attributed to the fact that more and more people have more efficient ways of posting these sorts of comments/articles but there also seems like there's something more to it. There seems to be some fundamental social change in the US that has emboldened people to feel comfortable to spew rhetoric publicly. It's almost like a legalized form of hate under the guise of free speech laws in ways that have never happened before.

I think there is also a bit of backlash to government programs that tried to mandate equality and fairness, but many served to just be bureaucratic money sinks. Unfortunately in some peoples minds, the inefficiencies of these systems, and the outright deception by some politicians in support of these programs to further their own aims, get blamed on the recipients of these systems. It is not fair, but I think it is a natural product of people that don't analyze the situation fully.

Lets take immigration for example, there are politicians in the system that are in total support for the current situation, because it creates a market for less than minimum wage workers for companies, some of which contribute to and lobby political offices. As such, it creates a financial system that encourages bureaucracy that is intended to look like something is being done about it, when in fact the intent is to maintain the current status as long as possible. Unfortunately in this situation, people just looking to make a life for themselves and doing what anyone else would do in their situation, are left to bare the brunt of the outrage, a situation said politicians are more than please with. There is a lot of scapegoating going on in the US right now, which I fear could be leading to a dangerous situation.

Well I have tried this actually on numerous occasions; people are willing to tell a lot, especially when stimulated into emotion. This goes for online as well; if you stimulate people, like for instance; i'm from the Netherlands and there is this whole Joran van der Sloot crap going on in the US. In forums here, you often see people saying 'no matter what, he needs a fair trial', which is followed by 100s of 1000s of messages, posted by people with their real name, that he should 'hang', 'be shot', 'shanked in prison', 'tortured', 'have no fair trial as he doesn't deserve it' etc. If (some, but that's unfortunately most) people are passionate enough about something, they'll say/do anything.

So I still think you live in a slightly skewed world if you don't encounter that when you randomly approach people. I do think it has been like that for a long time (10 years ago I walked into a bar in Germany, the guys at the bar were openly and loudly talking about wanting Hitler back as the foreigner problem has to be dealt with; these people have internet in their hand now through smartphones) though, only now you see it popping up on the internet.

Don't take internet comments too seriously. People say stupid shit all the time, anonymous or not.

I will play the part of the alarmist and also be the first to invoke Goodwin's law by stating that unchecked rhetoric was the first psych-ops that the Nazi's used. Group acceptance of dehumanizing a different group is the first step down a horrible path. It should be checked at every advance. The seed in America seems to have happened with Muslims, as it was acceptable in good company to view them all as fundamentalist psychopaths, the government and media where all to willing to reinforce such group think as it strengthen their case for war, now that the seed has set it has grown to bear fruit. Vilifying or dehumanizing a group of people always leads down a path of darkness. I would not hastily blow it off as being stupid and crap said on the internet, it is a dangerous mindset, that is easily infection to those susceptible to group think and the sewers of it tend to be far too willing to act when they feel emboldened by numbers and the echo chamber.

Brilliant comment. Couldn't agree more that the culture of "us against them" that has been prevalent since 9/11 has played a huge part in propagating hate and laying the foundations for a bring "them" down culture.

Good point, maybe I've been jaded by spending so much time on the internet. Or maybe I have a separation in the magnitude between what people write online and what people actually do in public.

The real danger is that they would still think it, even if they did not have an online venue, and when they feel safe they offer sympathetic support to those that will act on their hatred. The more echo's heard in the echo chamber the more empowered those that will act feel, at some point they will feel that their actions will be accepted or at least not countered, and at some point they will be right. I am not arguing against free speech by any means. The hate is still there even if they cant say it, so limiting speech only serves to treat the symptoms and not the infection. As well limiting speech also has the nasty side affect of limiting the ideas of those that are not in power, even if they have the moral high-ground. Unfortunately the only solution to fixing this infectious thinking is good old fashion education which seems to be a harder and harder thing to do. Willful ignorance is a merit badge now days and we celebrate it as being the epicenter of our culture by idolizing individuals that so predominately display the characteristic.

Fair point and I am certainly aware of that. I was actually hoping that would come across in my post.

My main concern is that it's becoming increasingly more acceptable to be publicly hateful in a non-anonymous fashion. This is somewhat unprecedented in the internet-age. I mean, some of the comments were outright disgusting.

America is a big place. There are 300,000,000 people in here. Some places are worse than others (NJ, for example).

The racist/anti-Obama/anti-Democrat remarks are getting many more "likes" than those with opposing viewpoints. That does seem kind of odd for a site like NBC; I would expect the numbers to be more balanced, at the very least. I wonder if an influential right-wing site linked to the article, and this is what's driving all the traffic.

Good point. I was curious about that too. Didn't consider the fact that there could be various in-bound links from various sites.

The comments in that thread aren't much different than what's said on talk radio or even certain mainstream TV news and opinion programs. It's probably not worth worrying about for your business aspirations but certainly is an unpleasant facet of living in the USA.

As an update, I thought I'd share this with everyone here:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-57372861-71/bbc-confronts-...

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