Clifton Suspension Bridge Leaves X | Hacker News Reader

Clifton Suspension Bridge Leaves X

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8 pointsjones5812 comments

The remarkable thing is really how much hate speech this announcement triggered on X

I didnt see any hate speech. I saw a bunch of critical, reactionary, and stupid takes, but nothing close to hate speech.

Well I guess it depends on where you draw the line. Let's say there was a fair number of openly or covertly aggressive takes among the not too many (dozens) comments that I scrolled over

I'd agree to that. People get stirred up and angry about the Twitter topic. You just see the other side on Reddit or hacker News.

When I think of hate speech, I think of unveiled threats of death of violence. In the US at least, the definition usually requires a racial or minority component.

> threats of death o[r] violence

OK my threshold for that word is sort of lower. Like the other day I watched Rachel Maddow on Youtube commenting on the election, and the comments were full of misogynist, well, 'sneers', let's call them that. No "I will punch you" or worse, but an aggressive, menacing, demeaning, sexist, supremacist tone. To me that already is hate speech, because it is speech that expresses hate and is intended to rile up other people so they chime in and express hate, too.

It's ice cream in the sense that frozen yogurt is ice cream, maybe except for the law.

The problem with codifying hate speech (and, eventually, punishing for it) is that even today the existing definitions are extremely broad and subjective. UN's own definition includes the use of pejorative language, i.e. "disrespectful connotation, a low opinion, or a lack of respect" towards something. This is clearly illiberal, anti free-speech, and extremely dangerous (society-ending dangerous).

It’s advisable to use the clear legal threshold, lest we go the route of diluting all language. Trump was hitler without murdering millions and that probably washes some of the crimes away.

I deleted my Twitter account a while back, so can’t see the replies. I am now imagining people engaging in claims that suspension bridges secretly control all the banks, etc.

Why do people need to make an announcement. Just leave.

Be it hereby made publicly known that I have no intent to post a response to your comment.

Let users know to to expect new posts, where to find updates moving forward, and explain to followers why they are leaving.

I get that many people also want to make a social statement, but there are still many legitimate reasons to communicate something if you have followers.

Social coordination and posturing, same reasons anyone announces their participation in a movement, and let's be clear, leaving Musk Social is a brewing movement

Reply on news.ycombinator.com