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Comment by ysavir | Hacker News Reader

They may not have meant weakest in the sense of "least valid", but rather "least likely to change minds".

One of my cats gets freaked out by fireworks and I'd love to see a cessation of the tradition, but I fully acknowledge that fans of fireworks aren't likely to show any concern for the impact on pets.

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Sure, but one does not need to convince the fans of fireworks, rather one needs to convince enough fans of dogs (of which there are quite a few)

Do you really want to follow that logic through to stuff "we" like, but that large swathes of the general public finds objectionable? LIke, say, hacking? Crypto? (I mean communication, not currency) Porn? What you are advoating for is tyranny, not harmony.

See comments above -- its not logic for banning, its a coalition-building tactic, which is generally employed in most decisions we make/persuasions we carry out.

I don't see how your "comment above" is saying anything different than exactly what I said, just dressed up in non-threatening language. There's a razor thin line between 'coalition building' and 'mob rule'.

I think that if you look at a history of social changes you’ll very likely find that they all started with successful persuasion campaigns. Like it or not, if you want to preserve the rights we hold dear (as you mentioned above), you’re going to have to find people that agree with you, hopefully through facts and reason. While it’s possible to preserve rights solely through a well-built technocratic/representative government, the will of the people will always bubble up in some way, and you owe it to your causes to do everything you can to change that will/find people that agree. Whether this applies to fireworks or not, left as an exercise to the reader.

I'm not following you. Lead them to what?

This is tactical in nature. In a democracy, you need to find a coalition to support what you want (either directly to vote for it, or indirectly to pressure their representatives).

All decisions of this sort come from a passionate group of people. I'm suggesting dog owners. This does not extend to how to make decisions.

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