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Comment by maybelsyrup | Hacker News Reader

> the telecommunications infrastructure has been severely damaged

Distal to the tech here but man, once you see the passive voice vs active voice stuff on this issue, you really can't un-see it. Astounding.

Edit: finished the article. The tech here really is stunning -- like, the ratio of ingenuity to resources is insane.

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Can confirm can’t unsee it! And you realize it’s used a lot. If Russia destroys infrastructure in Ukraine, our news says “Ukrainians adapted after the Russian military destroyed their networks”. When the IDF destroys Gazan networks, the story is “Gazans adapted after their networks were destroyed”.

Same thing happens with police shootings. “A stray bullet killed a child during police encounter” is a common type of headline. “Police officer shoots kid” is less common.

> “A stray bullet killed a child during police encounter”

To be pedantic, this isn’t passive voice at all. See Pullum on this particular misconception: http://www.lel.ed.ac.uk/~gpullum/passive_loathing.html

Oh good point! Thanks for the note.

You’re welcome!

>Distal to the tech here but man, once you see the passive voice vs active voice stuff on this issue, you really can't un-see it. Astounding.

The author is an Arabic speaking, English as a second language pro-Palestinian activist/writer. I'm not sure what point you're trying to make?

I believe political judgements are against the Hacker News guidelines as I've been reprimanded for making them in the past. Your comment should be removed by the moderators.

If you'd said it about Ukraine/Russia, it wouldn't be removed.

Pointing out communication styles in the media is not a political judgement. There is a political judgement being made here, but it's done by the author of the article. Your parent comment is merely pointing out the political judgement. And if doing that is against HN guidelines, then your comment is too.

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