> Silicon Valley also has an insidious infection that is spreading -- a peculiar form of McCarthyism (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism) masquerading as liberal open-mindedness. I'm as socially liberal as you get, and I find it nauseating how many topics or dissenting opinions are simply out-of-bounds in Silicon Valley. These days, people with real jobs (unlike me) are risking their careers to even challenge collective delusions in SF. Isn't this supposed to be where people change the world by challenging the consensus reality? By seeing the hidden realities behind the facades? That's the whole reason I traveled west and started over in the Bay Area. Now, more and more, I feel like it's a Russian nesting doll of facades -- Washington DC with fewer neck ties, where people openly lie to one another out of fear of losing their jobs or being publicly crucified. It's weird, unsettling, and, frankly, really dangerous. There's way too much power here for politeness to be sustainable. If no one feels they can say "Hey, I know it makes everyone uncomfortable, but I think there's a leak in the fuel rods in this nuclear submarine..." we're headed for big trouble.
I've witnessed this first hand, and alongside the congestion and housing problems that no one wants to handle, it was a big reason I decided to leave the Bay Area for good.
I was kind of skeptical of this lack of tolerance to conservative view was as described by conservatives. Living outside of Silicon Valley (and USA) and being more aligned with this "socially liberal" thinking myself, it seemed conservatives defensive attitude as they were losing space.
But then I read this "Ask A Female Engineer: Thoughts on the Google Memo" (http://blog.ycombinator.com/ask-a-female-engineer-thoughts-o...) and the one point most of them seems to agree with the memo is that there is this lack of tolerance to conservative thinking.
I still believe there is a lot of good being done by people labeled "social justice warriors" and the so-called "political correctness" is undoubtedly a net good to the world. But I now also think that this lack of tolerance is a real danger that must be fought by the people that are in the same side of the political spectrum that is perpetuating this intolerance (i.e. the more left-wing socially liberal).
As I consider to be part of this group, in this particular dimension, I think we should be listening carefully with open minds and hearts to these accusations from people at the more conservative side.
But what conservative viewpoints do you think are most under stress? The viewpoint on the proper separation between men and women, a viewpoint which still grates women even in liberal churches? Even in liberal churches, female leadership may hear aloud and respond to verbiage like "But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence."
The proper separation between men and women is a major American conservative need. Can we say this out loud?
Also, when we say liberal views, do we mean secular views? Religiously agnostic views? Views which are based upon religiously agnostic shared facts? Which of these views experience the most tension with conservative views?
Note that I bring specifically Christianity into this, because it's hard to imagine (perhaps even an abstraction terribly departed from reality) what American conservatism means without Christianity. If Christians voted one way or another, the very meaning of American conservatism would change overnight.
I think there are actually two separate issues here. First, old hardcore social conservativism is indeed under fire, and I would argue that's a good thing. It's a good thing that LGBT people have more rights; it's a good thing that race relations are being talked about openly; it's a good thing that women are being viewed more equally; it's a good thing that we are undergoing secularization in my opinion etc.
However, just as some conservative ideals used to be unquestionable, now some liberal ideas are becoming sacred cows as well. One of these is indeed diversity hiring as mentioned by the parent. I have politely asked numerous people to make the business case to me for explicit diversity hiring. I have yet to hear a very compelling one outside of making sure that your dev demographics at least partially represent your user base demographics which is only really relevant for certain products. I have frequently been met with surprise and scorn for daring to even investigate the usefulness of these programs. I think this is what the parent poster is referring to.
> The proper separation between men and women is a major American conservative need.
It's way off topic for this thread, but I've never heard a conservative talk about needing to separate men and women.
> But what conservative viewpoints do you think are most under stress?
Well, minority religious viewpoints now that you bring it up. Religious people certainly feel feel like they have to be closeted. They don't use the terms "microaggressions", "soft bigotry", and "privilege", but orthodox religious people (of all stripes) talk about being at a disadvantage in professional settings all the time. Pastors routinely give sermons basically encouraging them (again, using different terms) to "come out of the closet", "celebrate their identity", and "engage in healthy dialogue".
Some think (including in this thread), "Good! It's their turn now anyway! They had their chance, now they can be the minorities!" not realizing that the imagined Mad Men suit is actually unlikely to be religious. Church membership is over-represented by women, the poor, the disabled, and so on. African Americans and Latinos are much more likely to attend church than Caucasians.
Some think, "Hey, they chose to be this way. They can be like the rest of us if they want respect." Again, I find this attitude ironic given the obvious parallels to other social justice issues. The religious do not feel like they have any say in who God is or what he wants. No more than atheists feel like they have a say in whether God exists. And, perhaps more than (most) athiests, a religious faith is a core part of someone's identity.
Basically, I find the fear of religious diversity is a glaring (and intentional) gap in the prevailing postmodern take on diversity. The usual response is usually some form of "they have it coming", which is frankly unrealistic, unhelpful, and combative.
This is a well written post from a valid perspective. People wondering where the intolerance is should note that this comment is greyed out as I type this. Disagreeing is fine. But it disappoints me when people silently downvote a reasonable comment.
Besides its being off topic, one reason the site guidelines ask you not to comment on voting is that it takes time for the community's reaction to settle. Hasty downvotes get corrected by fair-minded users who give corrective upvotes. The comment you're talking about is now well into positive territory.
Well, the thread was partly a metathread about our culture, so I don't consider it off topic. It seemed particularly tangible and demonstrative in a thread with a lot of subjective back and forth.
And maybe the comment would have been upvoted on its own. Maybe not. It's hard to draw a conclusion either way after the fact. I just did what seemed to be the right thing at the time. Anonymously upvoting and shaking my head didn't seem enough.
I think people no longer feel fine with lip service to hate speech as free speech. You have the right to believe that Hitler was right and to share that, you don't have the right to make people listen or respect that view.
People are no longer as religious as they once were. Gender and race equality are accepted more than dissented. These ideals are the cornerstones of conservative beliefs, as well as the whole Fake News era. It's not surprising to me that people are choosing not to share their space with ideas that are so obviously discriminatory and outdated.
All that said, I'll defend, against the country and every other government apparatus, any conservative's right to say such things. I will not be sad when a company or a person doesn't want those views affiliated with them or their brand though.
Free speech is only protected by and from the government. It's not protected by and from any other repercussions. I don't have to like you or accept you because I support or defend your ability to exercise your freedom of speech to the government. I do not have to allow that in my home, my business, or my friendship circles.
At what point is it discrimination, though? Sure, you can fire me for "bigotry", but at a certain point your definition of "bigotry" is my definition of "discrimination".
Is it cool if I fire all democrats from my company because I don't like their speech?
>Is it cool if I fire all democrats from my company because I don't like their speech?
Only if they bring it to work or make it affiliated with your company/brand outside of work and then only individually, not as a whole. Ultimately though, you can fire whomever you wish for whatever you wish outside of a narrowly defined set of restrictions in most states.
>Employees, as well as many employers, commonly but mistakenly believe that the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees "freedom of speech" at work. In fact, the First Amendment applies only to government action and neither limits the rights of private employers to regulate employees' communications nor provides any constitutional right for those workers to express thoughts or opinions at work. As a result, there is no constitutionally protected right of "free speech" in the offices and factories of private employers. Although employees may be entitled to express their views freely on their own time or on a soapbox in the park, they have no such wide-ranging constitutional rights at work. Absent rights provided by one of the limited exceptions discussed below, there are no legal protections for political activities in the workplace, so private employers generally may refuse to hire, adjust pay/benefits and even discharge "at will" employees because of their political views.2 In short, "political discrimination" often is not unlawful discrimination.
I think a big part of this divide is semantics. What is a conservative? Is it a Rockefeller republican (center right)? Is it a populist Trump supporter? Is it a member of the current Republican party? Is it a traditional social conservative? Is it a traditional economic conservative?
You say that religion and (it seems) discrimination are cornerstones of conservativism but I would categorically disagree with that notion. I hold many of the classical conservative values (limited gov, thoughtful regulations, primacy of the constitution, belief in public investment in education, health care, defense, and research to support the public good etc) and would consider myself to be at least an economic conservative in the classical sense, yet I am an atheist, am socially liberal, and do not support racism, sexism, or xenophobia in any way. I would say some of these negative ideas are represented by the Republican party in its current incantation, but the ideals of the Republican party and conservative ideals are not necessarily one in the same, in the same way that the ideals of the Democratic party are not equivalent to classical liberalism.
> I would say some of these negative ideas are represented by the Republican party in its current incantation...
That's largely fair, but I'll point out that Trump didn't get a majority of the Republican primary vote. I think it's largely because there are plenty of Republicans who dislike Trump and weren't looking forward to all the blowback we're discussing in this thread even though Trump was in their bottom two choices for who would make a good President.
Painting entire people groups as bigoted due to election results they didn't necessarily even want is... well it's a conclusion based on an incomplete view of reality. With some charity, I can say there's an opportunity to share and learn what people actually think, but at some point the ignorance seems more willful than accidental.
Frankly, with the proclivity of all sites to either push these conversations into bubbles (Twitter, Facebook) or suppress them (professional settings, Hacker News), I'm not sure there's any suitable public space for actual understanding to happen. The problem is that all the spaces I listed seem (to me) to be controlled by the same social forces that conservatives are concerned about with respect to free speech and actual dialogue.
>The problem is that all the spaces I listed seem (to me) to be controlled by the same social forces that conservatives are concerned about with respect to free speech and actual dialogue.
Whenever I hear conservatives talk about free speech and dialog I think about Fox News and Breibart and think that I'll pass on whatever amounts to the conservative version of free speech and dialogue.
>That's largely fair, but I'll point out that Trump didn't get a majority of the Republican primary vote.
True, but he got enough to get the nomination. It also shows a lot about conservatives that more than not thought he was the best option and also how bad the other options had to be to get to this point.
You and I are not going to have a conversation about this on Brietbart or Fox News. There's really not a healthy place to have this conversation anywhere. That's what I meant.
> I'll pass on whatever amounts to the conservative version of free speech and dialogue...
Conservatives love Lincoln-Douglas, Adams-Jefferson, the Federalist Papers, the Declaration of Independence, etc. Asking people to reach for (philosophically) liberal ideals from the enlightenment about civic mindedness and rational debate are a conservative version of free speech and dialogue.
> It also shows a lot about conservatives...
"GOP voter" and "conservative" aren't synonymous. Conservatives generally dislike pettiness, identity politics, and strong-man tactics and those qualities defined Trump's candidacy more than any given policy issue.
Actual conservatives mostly split their vote between Rubio and Cruz at the end, though, it might have been too late. Trump doesn't have to be the "best" option to get a plurality and win out based on first-past-the-post rules.
What topics, exactly, are so taboo? McCarthyism was about a specific ideology. And, mind you, people were getting dragged into court over it, which Ferris is certainly not at risk of. In fact, this is in a thread about a guy who shut a media outlet down. What is Ferris worried that he can't talk about?
There are a tiny minority of liberals who, rather than embracing breaking down barriers and a hunky-dory co-existence like the rest of us, erect barriers of purity and constantly call people out.
They're annoying.
On the other hand, that's the dominant mode for the entire right half of the spectrum so take their complaints with a grain of salt. And who gives the above-mentioned annoying liberals their biggest platform? Right wing media. Gotta feed the wurlitzer.
It's not a "differing and diverse political opinion" to think people of color and women are inherently less worthy, it's just racist/sexist.
> It's not a "differing and diverse political opinion" to think people of color and women are inherently less worthy, it's just racist/sexist.
It actually is both, which neatly answers the "why are you against diverse political opinions": Saying something is 'just' an 'opinion' doesn't absolve it from being racist/sexist.
Self described liberals. What happened to "live and let live"? At some point using too much violence turns even this into a thinly veiled religion with witch hunts.
The cure is measuring impact and the results of interventions accurately.
Still no one is willing to name the beliefs that 'you just can't say.' In McCarthyism it was communist/socialist beliefs. What political beliefs can't you espouse in public without being shunned? For Thiel it's probably the pro-authoritarian/pseudo-monarchist beliefs of the neo-reaction guys he runs around with. Gotta be honest, I don't mind those being shunned.
You just named some of the beliefs that you can't say. Basically you agree with Thiel.
One more thing to note: you've called the guy "pro-authoritarian/pseudo-monarchist". Is this how he describes himself ( I guess no )?
I grew up in a country with strong far-right culture. Nazis are calling themselves nazis.
Peter Thiel himself doesn't describe himself that way but the people he pays attention to explicitly do. Here:
Yarvin told Yiannopoulos that he had been “coaching Thiel.”
“Peter needs guidance on politics for sure,” Yiannopoulos responded.
“Less than you might think!” Yarvin wrote back. “I watched the election at his house, I think my hangover lasted into Tuesday. He’s fully enlightened, just plays it very carefully.”
and then combine that with the fact that Yarvin calls himself a Jacobite and you've got the monarchy/authoritarian connection.
The Thiel thing goes a whole lot deeper than Damore or some of the other common examples of "SJW" pushback.
I understand the grievance against McCarthyism was mostly about preventing people from getting work if they held the wrong political views. In that respect what Thiel complains about isn't too dissimilar.
I personally know 3-4 people who are loudly vocal against illegal immigration working at FANG. I'd like to control it myself. We just differ on strategies on how to do so.
As long as you are not yelling at your Hispanic co-workers about building a wall, you'll be fine.
I don't live in they Bay area, but from what I keep seeing on HN: A strong hostility to those who say things that support a particular policy that Trump supports. An extreme hostility to those who admit voting for him.
I'm pretty sure I have seen comments on HN which pretty strongly hint that the commenters feel Trump supporters should have no place in SV tech companies, because they are, by virtue of supporting him, bigots. These were not greyed out comments, either.
The taboo is that differences between groups of people could be caused by something else than systematic oppression ( for ex.: biology/genetics, or the culture of that particular group ).
James Damore was fired from Google for posting his opinion on a private company board that solicited said opinion. I'd say that what he said is pretty taboo in SV.
I'm not sure why it seems so revelatory to people that there are some opinions you don't get to express out loud without consequence, even if you're asked about them.
If my boss says, "Hey deong, what do you think about black people?", that's not a get-out-of-jail-free card for me to start dropping n-bombs. There's one answer you're allowed to give to that question, and it's not because there's some conspiracy to oppress dissenting opinions. It's because there are extremely reasonable standards for employment that include not shouting racial epithets and white supremacist propaganda. Being asked your opinion doesn't change the rules.
Damore was certainly less inflammatory than that, but the point remains. You can argue that his opinions didn't warrant firing, but there's no reasonable way to argue that because he was responding to requests for comment, it's unethical or otherwise shady to hold him accountable for those comments.
The problem is that on the flip side of the coin what is allowed to be said at Google is much more inflammatory than anything Damore said. It's not even just tolerated but celebrated.
You use racism as an example but what Damore said was not racist, he didn't use any epithets, he isn't a white supremacist. It's really odd that you try to lump him in with them.
I didn't lump him in with racists. I explicitly said the opposite. I just used racist views as an example of an opinion you're not allowed to share, even if asked for your opinion on racial matters.
Since you missed it, the point was this: it's irrelevant that he posted it on a company board that was asking for opinions, so stop trying to use that as a defense. If you want to defend what he said, go nuts. We can argue the merits and whether Google overreacted. Just don't whine, "but they asked his opinions!" as though that's some sort of shield.
You're using a strawman argument about racists. It has no bearing whatsoever on what Damore said.
The actual problem, as I stated, is that Google accepts extremely vitriolic commentary from the left (at work!) but even Damore's relatively tame memo caused him to be fired.
Refer to Damore's lawsuit for many examples of the the extreme rhetoric that is allowed within Google corporate.
Conservatives at Google know this all too well. They've seen eng-misc and memegen and know that there is a very limited spectrum of "acceptable" opinion. The problem wasn't that political content was posted, as that happens all the time, it was that it was political content that was deemed to be "wrong."
Ask conservatives/GOP supporters how they felt after Trump was elected and the TGIF presenter tried to comfort the audience, which they assumed all voted for Clinton...talk about ostracizing your workforce that may hold a different private opinion
Particularly given that what the way he expressed his opinion may have been clumsy but it wasn't at all the anti-women manifest that I heard decried in the media.
I'd imagine being a outspoken Trump supporter would have some fairly serious negative consequences at many companies in the bay.
A lot of right wing political opinion would probably be in the same boat. Being pro life or against gay marriage both come to mind as opinions one may have that would immediately change others opinions about them.
I'm not defending these opinions rather the belief that just because someone believes something different than me doesn't mean we are destined to vilify each other.
I'd add that in this celebration of diversity, SF has become intelorant toward poverty. Being poor is now almost impossible due to astronomic rent. I might be wrong, but I assume you find very few working class people having anything to say about the tech utopia being built. Unless you talk to your uber driver once in a while.
Counter intuitively I think we might be entering a time when being poor in SF is a boon.
With all the wealth going around many people feel ashamed of the obvious disparity of their success and the truly destitute. This could lead to a competition of virtue signaling among the SF wealthy to "give back" to the poor. Kind of like how you see the rich always donating to needy charities or celebrities at canned food drives.
Of course, helping the poor will just be social lip service but it will lead to tangible resources for the destitute.
The comment is interesting, because it proposes that an engineer with a 100k salary is now taught as somewhat poor. Hence the impossibility of being working class poor. I'm from a G7 country and still, 100k a year is understood here as being rich. Call it the Silicon Valley distortion maybe?
The coastal elite are pro-housing except in their own backyard. Unfortunately for them, there are too many renters/millennials now so that the tide will turn if they can organize effectively.
Is it ironic that we are having a discussion about diversity of thought in SV on an SV-based platform that says if you don't agree with something, then you should downvote it into oblivion such that fewer people will see it?
That should be your response versus asking questions and engaging in actual thoughtful discussion?
Does that promote tolerance and diversity of thought? Or does it reinforce the notion that we should stick our fingers in our ears and balkanize ourselves in the face of ideas we don't like? And, worse actively work to prevent others from seeing those ideas?
In my opinion, this is what happens when things become "Serious Business". Silicon Valley and its individuals have become so powerful and wealthy that the stakes are insanely high.
Imagine working your way up from the middle class to fabulous riches. Cars, houses, 5 star travel. You have the american dream, things are good. Now people are coming in and challenging you. The culture of "challenge everything" is a huge risk to your empire, your comfortable life is at risk. Quick! Consume the challengers or burn them at the stake!
That's why DC is like this; they have power over an entire country (arguably the world, too). Everyone there needs to be incredibly careful, there's 1000 people waiting to eat them alive and take their job/power.
If you want an environment where people challenge things, go where nobody is looking. Go somewhere that the MBAs and C-levels have given up. Those are the places where nothing matters, so you are free to make mistakes and break as much as possible; you can't do any worse than what's already there.
I grew up in Alameda and have lived in LA for 10 years now. Oakland/Berkeley/SF notwithstanding, LA isn't that significantly different when it comes to politics and I'm sure Mr. Thiel is aware of that.
It goes beyond the general political mindset and what parties people in respective cities vote for. In SV people will blacklist you and even publicly call for you to be fired/ostracized if you are a conservative, as Thiel himself experienced. I have many friends who are moderates - not even conservatives - and they can't speak their minds among coworkers because they fear that their careers will suffer. It's a weird echo chamber where only the most radical left gets to dominate the conversation.
In LA, I mean entertainment is a fairly liberal industry, but it's not the only game in town. Plus Orange County is nearby and that's the last bastion of Republicans in the state.
LA definitely feels very different to me too. It's similar politically if you take only one bit of information, "votes mainly for Democrats", in which case yeah it's also liberal. But that's a very broad lens for understanding the political and cultural climate of an area. SF has far more of a very specific kind of liberal, the affluent white liberal who is focused primarily on social issues. LA's median Democrat is instead Latino and makes $50k. His or her politics are also likely to be left-of-center, but not quite in the same way. In some ways probably more left, in other ways less left, but not the same profile of issues or overall cultural feel.
Society goes back and forth on what is considered 'right' and 'wrong'. You only need to look at older movies to see how things change.
What was once considered neutral or even progressive is now considered racist/sexist/etc. Watch 'Dumbo', 'Animal House', 'Blazing Saddles', etc. None of those would be filmed today. Yet we still have not cured many of the ills that plagued society in both times.
The left must relent and let conservative voices be heard. In the long run, it will be destructive to the left if they do not.
If you are on the left side of the aisle and are not disturbed by this modern day McCarthyism because you are absolutely certain you are 'right', you need to review what was 'right' in past days and realize it is all relative and will change. Persist in smothering free speech and you'll end up as tomorrow's Nazi.
1. I have the feeling that this is not limited to the silicon valley. It feels very similar in my industry (banking) and I assume some other industries too.
2. I think there is more than one force at hand. A more militant liberalism may be one force but I can think of another major one: social medias. Basically an army of "anonymous" twitter / facebook / other accounts (they may not be individually anonymous but together they are), waiting for any pretext to shout their indignation, always looking for new ways to be offended. I don't think the population and opinions behind is a new evolution, but it just has a very powerful way to express itself now, by inundating social medias with angry comments, memes, effectively running virtual mob-lynchings.
This is combined with a traditional bias in medias to give some legitimacy to "the street", i.e. if enough people are demonstrating, vociferating slogans, they are deemed to somehow be representative of the opinion of the population when in reality they only represent the opinion of this limited group. Combine that bias with social medias, and medias tend to report these outrages as a mainstream opinion, even if it is only that of a vocal minority, adding their own weight to the lynching. I don't think we should give much credit to these social media storms, no more than an angry mob should be a party to a civilized debate.
People should protest instead of tweet. It's more effective. I think a lot of groups are also trying to get their voice heard and understood. I think the essay style (that PG used) is a good one and maybe the speech format.
Sometimes I wish California would simply purge all republicans so it can become the bluest of blue state. That way, we can have a large scale experiment to see what kind of "utopia" will be cooked up under 100% liberal control.
>>That way, we can have a large scale experiment to see what kind of "utopia" will be cooked up under 100% liberal control.
You don't even have to wait for that. The economy of California today rivals economy of certain continents and large countries like Russia. And people are some of the most awesome kind assembled in there, in the entire history of human race.
Only nice things seem to be coming out of this experiment.
lol. SF home owners & board of supervisors have over time voted against housing density to keep a neighborhood as-is, believe it was perfect the day they arrived, and that proposed changes to it must be stopped, definition of a conservative. Many of these were the anti-establishment in the 1960s and 1970s turned conservative once they became the establishment. They just don't want to admit it to themselves.
This is good for LA and the broader community. I don't believe that Thiel will be getting out of tech.. but maybe media tech is his next big thing. I think there is a big play in the conservative social network news area. These filter bubbles become their own verticals as Murdoch knows well. He can also have a big impact shaping the LA tech industry. This is also good for UCLA and USC.
The Liberal / Conservative culture wars need to stop and we need to have debate. There is too much passive aggressive behavior on both sides. If debates have to be moderated than so be it but the moderators need to do their jobs and people need to respect them.
It's a loss to the sector to lose somebody who thinks deeply (Zero to One is a good book), cares and wants to make the World better through technology and investment in firms dedicated to the same.
It's not a loss to the sector to lose somebody who thinks the path to doing that is intolerance, dominance, lack of accountability and an insistence on some Ayn Rand-ian gibberish philosophy of the World.
He was intolerant of Gawker. He dominated them by suing them to the hilt via the Hogan case. He is anti-regulation which in this case is a synonym for anti-accountability. Most of his political and economic philosophy seems to be the same gauche pastiche of SV's obsession with Rand. So, yeah, good riddance.
If software is eating the World, it's important the people building and operating it are as diverse as possible, otherwise there is a risk it unconsciously or consciously becomes biased in its actions and consequences towards a single social group at the expense of others.
Of course a one-party political philosophy is a problem in the long term, but so is Trump's stance on equality - one Thiel endorses - and for now at least it's important the voices of diversity and accountability win out for the long run.
TL;DR: Bye! Don't let the door hit you on the ass on the way out! Come back when you've got a little more mature and empathic towards others if you want!
-You seem to say diversity is good, but not diversity of political thought?
-What are Thiels stances on equality that you see as so abhorrent?
-He was involved (as a financier) of a lawsuit... I struggle to see the huge moral deal here. He didn't decide the outcome - six jurors did, abiding by the laws, in a court![1]
-Is being a strong supporter of Ayn Rand a good reason that someone shouldn't be involved in Silicon Valley?
Peter Thiel - "People here don't accept conservative ideas"
Commentor - "I love diversity, but get the hell out with those opinions!"
...
Obviously there are some opinions I find abhorrent and wouldn't want to be associated with (Nazis, etc). However, I think both that I'm more tolerant of offensive opinions than the commentor, and that I also find really nothing very offensive about what I've read about Thiel.
Thiel doesn't seem that far right to me, and has been ostracized. But is any thought too far-left to be accepted in SV? You can support Venezuelan policies, Cuban policies, taxing rich people 90%, racism against whites and asians... and no one's trying to kick them out of civil society.
Yes, I think it's socially ok to criticize the extreme left (all my examples were extreme left positions).
I do not think it's socially ok in SV to be more than a little conservative. After all, companies Thiel was associated with were pressured to kick him out just for the fact that he supported a candidate that was voted for by ~50% of the country! Maybe that's because of Trump's other non-political characteristics, but I'm not so sure.
Since 1920, the vast increase in welfare beneficiaries and the extension of the franchise to women - two constituencies that are notoriously tough for libertarians -have rendered the notion of "capitalist democracy" into an oxymoron.
It’s funny the way that supporters of Ayn Rand always seem to be keen on using the courts to get their way on things unrelated to their business. Just like John Galt.
And diversity of thought is for new interesting ideas, not discredited old ones.
Your first point, while a good observation on the hypocrisy of Objectivists, is also a facile argument akin to when people can't criticize (something|a philosophy|a phenomenon), or some part of that thing, because they benefit from certain aspects of it.
The second point is just bad – judge a thought on its own merits and implications, not fashionability or novelty.
Happiness as a function of money/power/etc is a logarithmic function. Given that there is a finite amount of these things to distribute among a given number of people, the distribution that will maximize total happiness of the population is one where everyone is equal. That isn't theory, that's fact, with mountains of evidence.
Marxism is the strawman that the right wheels out to try and push back against policies that encourage equality. Equality doesn't equal marxism, proving marxism won't work doesn't prove that policies for equality won't work.
One point I concede to conservatives is that being too strict about equality dampens personal autonomy (which is very important to happiness) and reduces incentives to innovate. A balance must be found. I should note that happiness from autonomy follows an inverted U curve, where too much autonomy (e.g. too many choices) causes just as much unhappiness as too little. Additionally, many extremely wealthy people don't spend in proportion to their earnings, the money is just their score in the game of capitalism, so redistributing more of their earnings doesn't materially affect them as long as you are doing the same thing to their competitors. Based on these facts, I believe that the autonomy/equality balance is currently very sub-optimal in terms of happiness.
"Given that there is a finite amount of these things to distribute among a given number of people, the distribution that will maximize total happiness of the population is one where everyone is equal. That isn't theory, that's fact, with mountains of evidence."
"Evidence" like, say, North Korea? Cambodia under Pol Pot? The Soviet Union under Stalin? Maoist China?
Heck, people are so happy with the equality in Cuba that they'll cross shark-infested waters in rafts they've made of trash bags stuffed with styrofoam packing peanuts.
I think your "fact" is not supported by the...err...facts.
It isn't me you have to contend with, it's math, and the real world data on the correlation between wealth and happiness. Your right wing strawmen aren't going to be of much use there, I'm afraid.
That's actually an apt comparison, at least in regards to the prescriptive parts of Marx's writings.
One remaining difference was that Marxism was at least well-intentioned, whereas Ayn Rand basically turned enjoyment of other's suffering into a philosophy.
And, luckily, it seems we will be spared any attempts to implement Randian cruelty, since it has turned from an actual political force to no more than many people's college embarrassment, even in SV.
> "Ayn Rand basically turned enjoyment of other's suffering into a philosophy"
I'm no Randian by any means, but I'd still treat her ideas honestly. By your statement, you either haven't read her works, don't understand them, or understand them and you are simply being dishonest in your representation of them. In any case, her philosophy, whether it is correct or not, is not one that "turned enjoyment of other's suffering into a philosophy."
It turns out you can treat her Objectivist philosophy like any other philosophy and actually attack the premises of her arguments. Disagree with her supposed solution to the "is-ought" problem, fine, present an argument against it...in my opinion, that is a much better route to take than completely misrepresenting her philosophy.
> One remaining difference was that Marxism was at least well-intentioned, whereas Ayn Rand basically turned enjoyment of other's suffering into a philosophy.
Irrespective of what you think she said, her core point was that "If a man lives for anyone but himself, he will be a deeply, deeply sad man".
Ayn Rand herself get that question asked to her whenever she did something which your misconception about her idea would lead you to believe that it should be a contradiction by her philosophy to act in such a way. For instance she supported her husband's art venture for a while, and the interviewer asks her why would she do that, and she explains the same thing. [1]
Clearing of this misconception DOES NOT mean that you agree with her, I'm just saying that your point of disagreement isn't what you think it is.
Her philosophy doesn't think (which was made clear in Galt's speech) that a mother buying food for her kids by forgoing to not buy a fancy hat for herself is a 'sacrifice'. She values her children's wellbeing more than the hat.
The problem also does not come in when Bill Gates gives up majority of his wealth to a charity as long as he truly does want to do that. The problem comes in when society takes 99% of these 'non-sacrificial actions', creates a moral scale out of it and asks everyone to follow it.
It translates to two levels of action:
Individual level: "I don't really want to become a doctor but my mom and dad would get upset if I didn't so I will".
Societal level: "Sure you don't want to pay for poor people's healthcare because you'd rather buy an XBox, but you must make this sacrifice for society's sake".
Rand's core philosophy of Objectivism says that both these paths to individual (like Peter Keating in Fountainhead) and societal unhappiness (like any socialist/communist society out there).
> You seem to say diversity is good, but not diversity of political thought?
Encouraging diversity is a means of letting those who have been marginalized from positions of power for centuries have a seat at the table. Are there similarly marginalized political opinions? I don't think Thiel or others who think like him are in short supply of power. The idea that conservative political opinions are suppressed is so ridiculous, especially as Thiel's party is in control of all branches of the federal US government and in most states. It is perfectly reasonable to have a local imbalance of opinion as long as in general power is not withheld for one side.
How about actual open mindedness, grace, and rational discourse? Everything doesn't have to be about rules and legislation. Let people be wrong but still humans sometimes.
Sometimes is feels like we're in a neopuritan age, complete with analogs to The Crucible and The Scarlet Letter, but the new sins are sins of thought and speech, not the occult or sex.
Well, open mindedness needs to come from both sides. Being told you're wrong is still part of rational discourse. Conservatives are just not used to be argued with, that's the problem.
The second source about apartheid is nothing but a political hit piece. Let's break it down:
- One source from 30 years ago where Thiel said that the moral issues of apartheid were irrelevant to their economy. He did not say "apartheid is good", he just said it didn't matter to their economy. I wouldn't agree with that statement, but even more important, I would make the link "Thiel thinks apartheid is good".
- The first source has the standard "this has been a lump in my throat for 30 years". Thiel has been in the media for far longer than that, so I guess it's just a coincidence this was timed during the Trump campaign.
- The second source seem irrelevant. She simply says Thiel said "morality and governments shouldn't be connected". Hardly a statement in support of apartheid.
- Note both sources are from individuals who had separate conversations about hot political issues 30 years ago. I have no doubt they were upset, but again that doesn't mean Thiel supports apartheid and he has already stated he doesn't.
I'm not really surprised by the article because politics in the US has become a "win at all costs" and "score points whenever you can" game. Rationale, logical discourse is gone. It's all about how many negative sound bits you can get and how many people believe them.
If this is the worst they can dig up about Thiel (30 years ago), he's got a cleaner record than most people in politics.
Regarding the apartheid thing, I was expecting some sort of smoking gun - a video or a blog post or something. We have little to back it up other than two people's memories of an event 30 years ago. I'm not disputing he may have said it. My concern is we do not know the context. If I think of all the interesting conversations I had in my years of university - I'm sure I've said much worse (with no regrets). Playing devil's advocate and intellectual games (not the manipulating kind, but the "let's imagine" kind) are par for course there.
Don't get me wrong - I'm a huge fan of NPR.[1] However, it's a problem when one uncritically accepts what they say. Many are predisposed to disliking him since his support for Trump, and so they lower their standards when it comes to pieces like this.
[1] Kind of sad that I feel I have to put this disclaimer.
1. Discussing the economic effects of apartheid seems totally ok. In the 40 year old "quote", he seemed to separate the moral issues of apartheid and he just thought it was economically beneficial. Lots of things can be immoral but make money! It does perhaps show a lack of social intelligence in how he discussed it, but he was presumably ~18-20, this was 40 years ago, and a lack of social intelligence doesn't make someone a bad person.
2. He didn't say rape is made up! Certainly in theory rape can be either too broadly defined or too narrowly defined. Have certain situations moved toward too broad a definition? Thiel thinks so.
I have no idea if rape has or hasn't been too broadly defined, but seems a reasonable enough position to be part of the discussion.
It's potentially worth noting that both those statements should be past tense, not present.
My understanding of the apartheid thing was he said something in college that someone else heard and remembered for many years. I think that 1. People say stupid stuff in college, and 2. Thiel could have easily said something in an exploratory philosophical kind of way without fully believing it.
He has denied the apartheid comments and apologized for the rape comments. I'm not saying this should get him off scot-free, it just seemed important to note that he doesn't currently say these things, publicly at least.
He didn't call them "fake news", he called them leftist media sources and that's a factual statement. The Guardian especially is anything but a neutral source.
The newspaper's reputation as a platform for liberal and
left-wing editorial has led to the use of the "Guardian
reader" and "Guardianista" as often (but not always)
pejorative epithets for those of left-leaning or
politically correct tendencies.
Are those links editorials? No, they're not. They're straight reporting.
Are you disputing the quotations attributed to Thiel in the reporting? No, you don't seem to be.
You asked for examples of toxic viewpoints held by Thiel, someone delivered, and you plugged your fingers in your ears and said "lol facts don't matter". Don't be that guy.
It would have helped if somebody actually posted examples of toxic viewpoints held (as in present tense)by Thiel. Nothing like that has been produced so far here.
That's hardly definitive. People really should be more careful about throwing around these extreme labels; it completely dilutes their impact when you apply them on a whim.
Sure, it's second hand information, and the author may have had reasons to play up Thiel's dedication to the cause. But still, when white nationalists are calling him "fully enlightened" and having meetings with him it certainly suggests at best a willingness to work with an assist white nationalists to achieve his aims, which is bad enough.
Is Milo a white nationalist? I always thought he was just the Breitbart court jester. In any case, I don't agree with just discarding nuance in these discussions; "fully enlightened" could mean anything from his libertarianism to his support of Trump as a candidate.
Unless Thiel, or anyone else really, comes out with some statement on the superiority of whites or the need to get rid of non-whites, let's desist from rushing to slap these labels on them.
> intolerance, dominance, lack of accountability and an insistence on some Ayn Rand-ian gibberish philosophy of the World.
> Most of his political and economic philosophy seems to be the same gauche pastiche of SV's obsession with Rand. So, yeah, good riddance.
> TL;DR: Bye! Don't let the door hit you on the ass on the way out! Come back when you've got a little more mature and empathic towards others if you want!
LOL... I really don’t understand where he got the idea that there's an intolerance of conservatism in SV... /s
There's nothing definitive in this article specifically, mind you; but for one you can read more about his and his buddy Yarvin's toxic philosophy here:
> If software is eating the World, it's important the people building and operating it are as diverse as possible
> TL;DR: Bye! Don't let the door hit you on the ass on the way out!
The cognitive dissonance in this comment is astounding.
This bizarre drive to purge different points of view is really grating. Not everybody has to share the same values as you. Respecting that is exactly what diversity means.
Diversity of opinion is one of those facile concepts that look good on paper until someone uses it to prop up support for shit like white supremacy and trickle down economics. Not all opinions are equally informed, or equally valid.
Indeed. Which is why I provided an exampe of one that is both far more nefarious than anything I have ever heard from Thiel, responsible for deaths of tens ofd millions of people, and at the same time being rather welcome in SV.
McCarthyist talking points on body counts? 45,000 Americans die annually from preventable illness due to lack of access to healthcare. ~200,000 Americans die annually from poverty-related causes. Meanwhile the US military and CIA are responsible for ~30 million deaths worldwide since WWII. Assuming the McCarthyite propaganda around Holodomor is accurate, it pales in comparison.
I am not sure if this even should be dignified with a reply.
Leftist talking points about "access to healthcare" only work on those who have no idea or first-hand experience with healthcare in countries that attempted to build that workers' paradise.
Worse, your account has been using HN primarily for ideological battle. We ban accounts that do this, for reasons I've explained at length at the links listed here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16402816. If you'd please look through some of those, reread the guidelines, and use HN only as intended from now on, we'd appreciate it.
>thinks the path to doing that is intolerance, dominance, lack of accountability and an insistence on some Ayn Rand-ian gibberish philosophy of the World. He was intolerant of Gawker. He is anti-regulation which in this case is a synonym for anti-accountability. Most of his political and economic philosophy seems to be the same gauche pastiche of SV's obsession with Rand.
I have trouble figuring how you reconcile these two views. What about Thiel makes you say he "wants to improve the world"? Is it because he says so? Because anybody can say, like, they are "committed to improving the world through technology"; what actually matters is actions. And all his actions seem to indicate he his passionate about accumulating wealth and accumulating power to himself, very little else.
Gawker outed him, and leaked a sex tape of Hulk Hogan (and did a bunch of other really terrible things). He was lucky enough to have the money to bring them justice.
I've honestly never heard of anyone taking Gawker's side in this.
Billionaires buying the justice needed to wipe out a major news outlet... in secret...
This is an argument where people who feel differently about "money as free speech" tend to have wildly divergent opinions. I find it quite alarming that billionaires have the power to squelch the free press.
I think you could make the argument that illegally leaking a sex tape isn't "free press". Granted I don't think you should have to be a billionaire to achieve justice, but sadly it costs a lot of money to take on a company like Gawker. Many people look at what Thiel did as a public service.
> Many people look at what Thiel did as a public service.
How they feel about that is going to closely track partisan allegiance.
And what constitutes "justice", in the context of a sex tape or other journalistic malpractice? Tens of millions of dollars? Uncountable millions? Any number of millions so long as it's enough to put the company out of business?
I don't agree that shutting down Gawker was the appropriate remedy. Damages yes, annihilation no.
As a result, in your world and mine, the press now has to fear secret reprisals should they offend the wrong billionaire. It is now more dangerous to report on the powerful. You can't fight them with your free speech, because you can't even know who's financing the campaign against you, or even that it's happening.
> As long as they stick to reporting factual information and not releasing private gossip and sex tapes they have nothing to worry about.
There's no constraint on billionaires as to what might motivate them to spend their money secretly financing lawsuits. Reporting on say, their bribery of a government official, could also persuade a billionaire to adopt Thiel's tactics.
They still have to win the case though, they can’t just sue without justification. Again, I wish this option was available to more people but I won’t begrudge billionaires for financing legal defenses for people the media have illegally attacked.
That's not what happened though, they (Hogan) did win. Gawker was in the wrong. We're not talking about individuals, we're talking about global media brands. They can overwhelm most people with their resources, sadly only the rich can defend themselves.
But when the press defend themselves, it is obvious where the financing is coming from. Thiel's innovation was the secrecy of his passing ten million dollars to a third-party litigant.
I see no issue with that. We shouldn’t audit people before we give them a chance at justice. I’d gladly take his help if a large media company slandered me. I’d feel no obligation to disclose the source of my funds. I wouldn’t expect anyone to divulge that information.
And in fact, Thiel has stated that Gawker is not the only time he's doing this. I wonder if we'll ever hear about the next enemy Thiel's finances destroy.
How can you advocate for someone leaving Silicon Valley based on his "philosophical jibberish", and at the same time promote diversity? "Diversity" increasingly means nothing. SV is one hell of a political echo chamber.
Diversity of thought, REGARDLESS of age,sex, skin color etc should be the goal, not ideological purity.
Nothing of what you listed has anything to do with conservatism, really. It's just as easy to come up with a list of terrible (even if they don't think so, of course) things far left believes in as for far right.
Racism and Nazism are guaranteed a voice by the Constitution. Good or bad, we need to respect the importance of free speech in our country. What a Nazi says can't hurt you, and if what they say can hurt you (e.g. inciting violence or hate crimes), it's likely illegal.
I'm a conservative for socialized healthcare. I think that it's a strong moral good with high social utility. But I think it should be something managed at the state level, because I think my state tends to do a better job with social programs than the federal government.
The national parks service was created by a conservative. Being a greedy, bought and paid for capitalist has nothing to do with being conservative. I'm very much in favor of defending our wildlife and using our global political capital to make the world a better place to live.
I don't care what you look like or who you marry. Women are mostly equal right now, and will continue to be more equal over time. Lets focus on groups that are actually disenfranchised, like African American men.
Your comment was very insulting to me, as someone who considers themselves a conservative. We aren't a caricature of bible thumping, gun-toting, minority hating, woman hating mongrels. We have the same needs and values as anyone else in life, simply different priorities.
I think you're correct that you're not getting into the overall premise. But, it makes me wonder what your point is in lobbing that little factoid in there?
So, I'd respond to what you seem to be implying by pointing out that Sheriff David Clarke also exists. So do anti-immigration immigrants. There's also a phenomenon called Stockholm Syndrome.
Doesn't really prove anything except that counterintuitive ironies exist and that people don't always act in their own best interest and/or they make tradeoffs. It's actually rational to not be a one-issue voter, especially in a two-party system.
In short, a gay person being a member of a party doesn't make that party pro-gay rights.
I'd stop short of knowing or caring whether their respective ideas suck or not, because getting back to the first point, it's really not so all-fired, gull-darned important what a guy thinks who's being quoted mainly because he's rich (or some other variant of a cult of personality). Take me, add a billion dollars, and boom: instant quotable thought-leader and visionary whose every tantrum and brain-fart is broadcast for all. Elon Musk goes in that box as well.
Besides which, you can move wherever you want. It's not like you have to turn in your Silicon Valley membership card and secret key. And there's a big world out there. Especially if you're rich. Just move, don't try to make a "statement."
I explicitly said "or some other variant of a cult of personality." But being rich is enough. Some billionaires choose to be quiet, but if tomorrow they decide to become "vocal proponents" of something or other, and make use of their prerogative to be quoted, the outlets will absolutely carry it, knowing the clicks will follow.
Well, is it really that surprising that the Silicon Valley is not this thought freedom paradise, being under such strong government control in so many levels? Call me a conspiracy theorist if you want.
So torn about this being posted. I get his relationship to the tech scene. I get how it makes sense. At the same time, the comments are going to quickly devolve onto the very sniping he's leave. Probably more so today given the Florida shooting.
With all due respect to @alva, can we let this post wither on the vine? Not today. Not after yesterday.
No. His stated reason in the article or leaving is an anti conservatism streak in SV. Intrinsic to them is a belief in self defense and weapons ownership. You can't debate the whole concept of his exodus without name calling and vitriolic attacks lobbed by both sides.
In the past month there have been two, at least , posts that became so political that they were flagged. Ironically one was on free speech. I just don't have the stomach for it today. In general I'm not sure there is any good to be had with this kind of material on HN.
You make a statement decrying the politicization of comments directly after making a sweeping incorrect generalization about conservatives?
Owning a firearm is not some prerequisite for being a member of a political party. There are large numbers of conservatives that do not own firearms and do not care about firearms ownership. It may surprise you that there are also large numbers of people who are socially liberal who own firearms, such as myself. None of us are ok with school shootings. I am perfectly willing to have rational conversations about the merits of responsible gun ownership with people who are capable of having that conversation, but that has nothing to do with the issue at hand here.
I am too. I own an AR15. Sad, and looking at the comments was right, that this particular post not going to provide a beneficial discuss on any topic defined as good by the site guidelines. There are comments that say that conservatism needs to be eradicated. Why is that HN appropriate?
No, seriously. I think I align with at least some of your ideals, but that connection doesn't make any sense.
There's nothing wrong with the article, either. I think reasonable discussion can be had about it.
If you're for free speech, you'll know you can simply not participate in discussions you "don't have the stomach for today" instead of asking moderators to close the post.
I didn’t ask the mods to kill the post. I asked the community to vote with its upvote and not sanction this on the front page. I mentioned that the mods have killed prior discussions because they devolved into armed camps that just bitched at each other. This is merely politics that focus on a particular man from SV. It doesn’t help the larger community.
Maybe he just takes the rules here seriously, and a big one seems to be avoiding politics and political flame wars.
Looking at this thread, it’s degenersting into predictable armed camps. This is the polar opposite of satisfying intellectual curiosity, it’s stultifying and boring and predictable and tiring. It’s this kind of discussion that poisons a site and its community.
"Having the stomach" has nothing to do with "taking the rules seriously".
> it’s stultifying and boring and predictable and tiring
I agree. Anything becomes boring when repeated enough times, like once a week in this case. That's why I wanted to move on from talking about laws that will never happen, towards trying to understand what a gun advocate feels when this sort of thing happens. It's interesting from a psychological perspective.
In a perfect world that discussion might happen, but in the world we live in we get this thread and others like it. I really believe that online is the worst way to discuss these matters, and I think that’s a supportable position based on track record alone.
