Hacker News Reader

Comment by coryl | Hacker News Reader

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.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com