Comment by tqwhite | Hacker News Reader

Comment by tqwhite | Hacker News Reader

The discussion here is painful to read. The 'neutral' discussion of product features and how Austin, TX is more liberal than the rest of Texas are grotesque.

Zuckerberg says Facebook is going to be more "like X" and "work with Trump". It has changed its content policy to allow discussions that should horrify anyone.

"In a notable shift, the company now says it allows “allegations of mental illness or abnormality when based on gender or sexual orientation, given political and religious discourse about transgenderism and homosexuality and common non-serious usage of words like ‘weird.’”

"In other words, Meta now appears to permit users to accuse transgender or gay people of being mentally ill because of their gender expression and sexual orientation. The company did not respond to requests for clarification on the policy."

But Zuck himself says that they are also dialing their algorithms back in favor of allowing more bad content. It's not right.

https://www.wired.com/story/meta-immigration-gender-policies...

I feel the same way and I think the writing is on the wall for the near future of the world. It is disheartening to see people on a forum like HN who I assumed have values similar to mine fall right in line with conservative propaganda and try to act like this isn't an overtly political action. This decision is political, and it goes a lot deeper than left vs right - its about attacking support for a baseline scientific 'truth' and fully accepting a post-truth world where reality is what the powerful deem it to be. This has always been the case to some extent but it has gotten so lopsided in the last decade that its hard to see how we come back from this.

I similarly share your pessimism. Ironically, I think a lot of the propaganda that is effective on HN's demographic works because it frames itself in a way that makes it appear logical and intellectually robust. Us devs love thinking we're the smartest person in the room and strong, logical thinkers who can't be fooled, but that's exactly why those kinds of propaganda and talking points can work so well. (I'm certainly guilty of it myself at times, fwiw.)

Yeah, its pathetic.

Fwiw, not everyone on 'hacker' news is like this, and many of the thoughtful ones are smarter than I am and skipped this post entirely. But its so disheartening the rot in the Silicon Valley ideology that's everywhere here.

>the rot in the Silicon Valley ideology

What exactly is SV ideology?

imo, some combination of TESCREAL ideas https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/TESCREAL , the "disrupt" and "move fast and break things" startup hustle culture , a distaste for anything "political" , and "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" style libertarianism / anarcho-capitalism

After reading that, it seems TESCREAL-ists, for lack of a better word, currently prefer conservative policy due to its loosening of regulation because regulation tends to tighten the reigns on "move fast and break things." I'm not sure how TESCREAL is antithetical to conservatism, which seems to be what you were implying. To me, it seems TESCREAL-ists will support any political party who has the least likelihood to regulate them as the primary deciding factor. This seems to be evident from the political support the TESCREAL-ists described in the article (Musk, Andreessen, Thiel) have given. Can you elaborate more to help me understand how you feel TESCREAL idealism and current conservative ideology are antithetical?

Chain for reference:

>>It is disheartening to see people on a forum like HN who I assumed have values similar to mine fall right in line with conservative propaganda

>Yeah, its pathetic. Fwiw, not everyone on 'hacker' news is like this, and many of the thoughtful ones are smarter than I am and skipped this post entirely. But its so disheartening the rot in the Silicon Valley ideology that's everywhere here.

Sorry, think I worded it badly

I took GP to be saying that they're sad that other HNers are falling for conservative propaganda, and I agree - specifically the sort that appeals to the already rich and incurious.

I don't share that with some of the people here, but we do all find tech interesting. For a while it did really hurt me when I'd see a Supreme Court post talking about how great it is that the EPA is gutted and feel kinda lost, like these should be my people, what am I doing here, sorta thing. Mostly over that now, just have less attachment.

Don't see TESCREAL & conservative thought being opposed. Its silly how someone as Turbo-atheist as Elon is now talking about how schools should teach Christianity

The timing also pretty clearly signals that this should be interpreted by bigoted individuals as a green light for harassing speech.

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