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Comment by XorNot | Hacker News Reader

Because if you don't tow the party line on HN you'll be downvoted no matter what. Frankly, go check my post history on the matter if you want. The only topic on which I manage to accumulate downvotes is Snowden/NSA related.

Doesn't much matter what the content or argument or tone is or was.

Though I do chuckle at "disprove the speculation".

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I had a look at what you had greyed out, lets see...

not trusting aspects of textsecure

keeping encryption on all the time

argument about billing bad reviews on yelp

not liking lighttable

ok, whether there is a need to hide political speech from the NSA.

I don't think your claim stands up of it being the only topic.

edit - why are you bothering making claims like this in a medium where the source material is immediately available?

This kind of tactic may work in spoken discussion, but here it just seems absurd.

Of 5 examples you managed to get 3/5 having something to do with the NSA or related matters (encryption, which got explicitly tied to the NSA in that exact comment).

I would question why you think this is a "gotcha" given that I know how far back my post history goes (further then the initial Snowden disclosures for example), and more or less gave up on these topic-threads for exactly this reason.

Which circles around to my original point: these threads turn into echo chambers because who wants to spend karma on that?

People are instead ironically aggressive in silencing dissent.

So I was being somehow unfair in checking your post history, when you explicitly said to check your post history?

Next five before that are:

turning off power in nuclear plant

bitcoin funds transfer

advice on drinking water

theories on OSS

encryption of metadata

This isn't a 'gotcha', just pointing out that you are repeatedly bullshitting about things that are easily verifiable.

And idly wondering why.

edit - Hang on.

After all your fucking winging about how fucking oppressed you feel, on the two things you cited (NSA/Snowden) you get far more upvotes than downvotes on your comments.

https://hn.algolia.com/?q=xornot+snowden#!/comment/forever/0...

https://hn.algolia.com/?q=xornot+nsa#!/comment/forever/0/xor...

I call Shenanigans.

XorNot's being downvoted a lot, and if it's for having an unpopular opinion, one gets to be a victimized martyr screaming out truth in a sea of groupthink. If it's because a lack of reasoning or justification within arguments completely based in innuendo and sarcasm, then the downvotes are deserved.

Which would you choose, if you were forced to rationalize yourself rather than change your behavior?

If they were easily verifiable you'd have gone back to the threads in the Snowden era rather then played pedant with what you can dig up on the first couple of pages of my comment history.

It isn't and you know it.

EDIT: And that search engine definitely isn't fully indexed. But a search for me and points<0 gives nothing but NSA threads. <1 less so, but it's still a sizable portion.

EDIT 2: Though to spin this around for a moment, that is handy utility - thanks!

You are welcome, but it is only the search box at the bottom of the page. It wasn't especially difficult to find.

"The only topic on which I manage to accumulate downvotes is Snowden/NSA related."

Indeed, I got -40 karma on this story. Dissenting opinions are not tolerated on NSA stories.

Therefore people who do not agree with the HN consensus "self-censor", and a vicious circle is created, with only a single narrative displayed.

I dunno, I have got a fair amount of imaginary internet points on here before for suggesting that there is a good chance that Snowden is still working for the NSA, which isn't exactly the popular opinion.

edit - well ok, 4 :) but it didn't get hammered down

>Dissenting opinions are not tolerated on NSA stories.

Tell me about it. Plus all my proofs for perpetual motion machines and the flat earth get downvoted too.

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