Thank you for your comprehensive, cirumspect and considerate comment, thanks for overruling “the system” and resetting my -16 “karma” score.
Of course I understand the problem about minority and majority positions. Creating majorities, minoritizing dissent, and inciting the (gregarious) majority to actively trample opposition (by mere quantity, not quality; by mass and weight, not argument or intellect) is the bread and butter of how propaganda works and operates. It cannot ever succeed in convincing everybody, but it can succeed in effectively shutting down opposition, which is the purpose.
As for my comment 49670568 (“Incredibly stupid …”), if you read it in context with parent and gp 49668588, you'll see I was echoing to Rob's “Incredibly arrogant/racist take” wrt to Adrian, whose comments I'd been subscribed to via RSS for a couple months prior to creating an HN account, and whom I've never seen posting anything akin to what Rob alleged, and so I was simply taking Adrian's defense (because I felt someone had to).
True, there was a provocative angle to my comment in the last two paragraphs, exacerbated perhaps by being also analytical. People from the US, in my experience, often don't realize how arrogant their self-content attitude in political matters comes across based on how much the US is trampling on other countries (and by trampling I mean to kill and destroy, to cheat and deceive, to plunder and tax, and then to justify or deny).
« The trouble is that users with minority views are often the ones setting fires and stoking flames. » — I usually try to remain factual. Trouble is, facts often are not welcome because psychologically and psychosocially, persuasions dictated by propaganda prevail, and there is pressure to “conform” and “comply”, and to even dismiss dissenters as “whacky” (example 49711252, in context 49708657).
« But would they have been squashed if they had expressed themselves more neutrally and with more relational capacity? It's hard to say; they rarely try. » — I will try. But I have to say that the majority view is very often expressed “in battle mode”, like the bully making it clear there can be no other view, which, again, is simply the result of how propaganda works, by creating the vocabulary and talking points (“global war on terror”, you might remember, “Russian annexation of Crimea”, “pilot suicide”, “Hamas terror”, “Russian war of aggression”), which then are repeated over and over again, and have to be repeated precisely because they are either total lies or meant to suppress the true story, which is much more complex.
« where people are coming from, and how difficult (and even frightening) it might be to give even an inch on the topic » — Yes, I know, a lot of people are frightened, which is also an effect of propaganda. Some, however, and these are the most vocal, do enjoy being in the majority because they enjoy trampling, which could be observed and experienced in real life during the CoVID hoax.
« there is a greater burden on people holding a minority position » — I can see this is the pragmatic conclusion that I would probably also arrive at from your vantage point.
Thanks again for taking the time to elaborate on this meta topic (which I understand is the mainstay topic for you). I might include a reference to your statement in future controversial comments I might make so it gets a chance to be considered by a wider audience.
Finally, on a meta level, the field of propaganda and psychology is interesting in its own right, an important part of social (or perhaps rather post-social) life as shaped by technological mass media, and therefore certainly not unworthy of many a hacker's curiosity, attention, and perhaps even investigation. — Best, Michael