posted in Technology
Why is Hacker News like that?
drewdevault.com/blog/Why-is-HN-like-that/Replying to @muelltonne@feddit.org
Another article of Drew Devault grasping straws. For example he picks out this quote when trying to diminish Paul Graham:
Racism, for example, is a genuine problem. Not a problem on the scale that the woke believe it to be, but a genuine one. I don’t think any reasonable person would deny that. The problem with political correctness was not that it focused on marginalized groups, but the shallow, aggressive way in which it did so. Instead of going out into the world and quietly helping members of marginalized groups, the politically correct focused on getting people in trouble for using the wrong words to talk about them.
I literally don’t see what’s wrong with this quote. Paul Graham is referencing identity politics, virtue signaling, and other behaviors that were definitely common before, and are still fairly common today.
Replying to @hirihit640@sh.itjust.works
It’s easy: “Woke” and “political correctness” are words that are not really used by left-wing people. There are only a few lefties who would call themselves “woke” or who would advocate for “political correctness”. Those words, however, have been taken over by right-wing conservatives and are used broadly to bash the other side. So if somebody is using that like Paul Graham here is doing, you know that he has a right-wing-conservative world view. Just because using “woke” as a category is nothing somebody progressive left-wing would do.
Replying to @muelltonne@feddit.org
In case anyone reading this is wondering if @muelltonne@feddit.org and Drew DeVault are imagining meanings behind these words, you can go and read the entire article:
In context, it is clear that Paul Graham regards any public protest for social justice to be performative and born from a need to feel morally superior to others. “Racism […] is a genuine problem”, but you are only ever allowed to “quietly” help marginalized groups. His examples for the birth of “wokeness” are people starting to report sexual harassment and racist language. Paul is very mad that people told him it’s not ok to call black people “negros” and it shows plainly in his writing.
He does not give one example of what would be a real racist thing that you are allowed to get mad and vocal about. He does not give one example of proper not-“woke” activism. This is the telltale sign of a fascist pretending to be a moderate worried about the “intolerant left”. Social justices exist, but I won’t name a single one. Helping minorities is good, but every time I see it happen it’s bad and I’m going to call it out.
Replying to @muelltonne@feddit.org
I never said Paul Graham was a progressive left wing? Also that’s the exact identity politics that I was alluding to. Categorizing people and then making large assumptions on the meaning of their words based on the categorization.
As I mentioned in another comment, “Woke” can simply mean “people who virtue signal but don’t bother to engage with the issues deeply”, and with that definition Paul Graham’s quote makes perfect sense