The Death of Patient Zero | Hacker News Reader

The Death of Patient Zero

esquire.com

73 pointsiskander12 comments

One of the many sad things in this story is that Stephanie Lee was given false hope by overly enthusiastic technologists. Since YC is now funding biomedical startups, this will hopefully serve as a warning to others who find it easier to sound smart and confident than actually run a clinical trial.

Author lays it on a little fucking thick don't they?

Couldn't wade through the tidal wave of forced narrative. Who starts a story with a 3 minute hero shot? Just poor.

"she never lost the awareness that she had honed over a lifetime—her daunting gift for seeing people and situations plain—nor the voice that always said the right thing, the true thing, the honest thing, the thing that cut to the bone."

"she spoke as if from the deepest well of exhaustion "

"She was always so dignified in her bearing, so erect in her carriage, so put together in every way"

It's like introducing someone to the Lord of the Rings with Boromir's death scene and expecting them to get all teared up.

edit: go ahead and take a look at the author's other pieces. He seems to specialize in Mad Men recaps, lists like "8 ways the world has changed" and "7 things Snowden learned," Obama bashing and celebrity gossip.

I agree that maybe a more objective angle would have conveyed the information a little better. However, your comment is in poor taste. This is a real person they're talking about, someone who suffered and died. Not a character in a movie.

... and the author has failed to adequately communicate that person's story.

I didn't say a thing about the subject of the piece. Is it poor taste to criticize everything associated remotely with something tragic? What about poorly done WWII documentaries? Can I criticize them?

Just saying Nicholas Sparks probably shouldn't be writing news articles.

You're welcome to criticize it. But comparisons to The Lord of the Rings, of all things, were tone deaf. This is not some epic fantasy for your amusement.

comment is in poor taste. This is a real person they're talking about, someone who suffered and died. Not a character in a movie.

I agree that there's poor taste, but I think the poor taste is in writing about a person as if they were a character in a movie, not in pointing out that horrific writing style.

Yes, exactly. Thank you.

Sorry to quote the guidelines, but I've recently been rate-limited on this site for failing to follow them:

Please don't submit comments complaining that a submission is inappropriate for the site. If you think a story is spam or off-topic, flag it by clicking on its "flag" link. (Not all users will see this; there is a karma threshold.) If you think a comment is egregious, click on its timestamp to go to its page, then click "flag" at the top.

Parent wasn't complaining about whether on/off topic, they were being critical of the writing style which sadly suffocates the reader. I may not agree with all their complaints, but the article is somewhat over elaborate in its exposition. I found myself skipping over tens of words and sentences to find out what actually happened to this unfortunate soul.

Agreed, the writing was so badly structured, I couldn't follow the narrative and skipped whole paragraphs

You are entitled to your opinions, but why do you see this as forced? The quotes you present show a piece of prose intended to evoke a mood and set a scene. None of it feels forced, or thick, or unnecessary.

My high school English teach taught me to demonstrate rather then assign traits. Somehow between all the fluff I lost the author's message, and skipped to the last few paragraph.

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