[zardgiv]

"Controversial" is the pinnacle of weasel words. How do you feel about his belief that some ethnic groups are genetically better slaves, and do you think that his views would make people from those ethnic groups feel welcome in your community?

[mundo]

It would demonstrate a lot about the HN community if we could get through an entire Urbit post without it devolving in to yet another debate on Curtis Yarvin's (incredibly lengthy, vague and contradictory, and entirely irrelevant) views on race.

[cwyers]

It wouldn't demonstrate anything that would make it a community I want to be a part of, though.

[5F36B5F62640]

The comments that I have seen from him on that topic (and it should be noted that I have only read a small part of his comments so this may not be representative of his thoughts on these matters) implied that those groups were better slaves because they were more resilient or stronger, so were able to better survive slavery than less resilient or weaker groups.

I don't see why that would make people from those groups feel unwelcome. If anything I would expect people from the groups that he says were genetically not as good as slaves to be the ones who would feel unwelcome. The implication is that they are weaker or less resilient.

[ksrm]

Do you seriously not see how someone discussing how good a slave you would make is (at the very least) 'unwelcoming'?

[mixedCase]

Was that on Urbit's homepage? The docs? The IRC? The subreddit? Over e-mail?

Was it something like "yeah it is a functional system... hey have I mentioned how much potential you have for whenever you feel like dedicating your life to slavery?"

...or was it just the guy rambling on a blog of his under a pen name?

It's pretty obvious to anyone that the guy's views are obscenely offensive, but if the guy is strictly professional when it comes to Urbit, treats everyone with the same respect and works just fine along with many people that despise his views, how are the project's goals tainted?

[ZenoArrow]

> "It's pretty obvious to anyone that the guy's views are obscenely offensive"

Is it? From what I've seen so far all the controversy has come from taking statements out of context.

However, I take your main point that it doesn't need to impact on Urbit.

[Rusky]

Because people don't just see Urbit, if they end up participating long-term. They see Yarvin, and he definitely is not one to hide his worldview.

As much as some people like to pretend it's only about tech, tech is made by people and it requires them to interact with each other, and that can never be completely confined to code.

[mixedCase]

>They see Yarvin, and he definitely is not one to hide his worldview.

While talking to Urbit contributors about Urbit?

[Rusky]

By definition no, of course. But I have never done a non-trivial amount of open source-style work (coding or otherwise) with someone who shares their political views online, without learning about them somehow.

And in fact, every Urbit contributor in this thread who's mentioned this has also heard about Yarvin's political views, and not from this thread. It appears to me there's already a kind of self-selection process in Urbit contributors, towards those who are comfortable tolerating his garbage. And that's exactly the problem.

[zardgiv]

Wait, so your argument is that only Native Americans would feel unwelcome in this community?

Is this supposed to be in his favor?

EDIT: For clarity

[lhnz]

> So your argument is that Native Americans should feel unwelcome in this community?

You're putting words in 5F36B5F62640's mouth.

And to be absolutely honest, anybody reading this can see that you're the one attempting to make people feel unwelcome in this community.

Edit: The commenter has now upgraded his comment but the original with added emphasis is quoted above.

[zardgiv]

That was the example Moldbug used, claiming that Africans made genetically better slaves than Native Americans. 5F36B5F62640 contended that the groups that were not better slaves should feel unwelcome. This is just the basic logical implication of taking those two claims together.

Rather than attacking me personally, is there something I missed or was incorrect about?

[lhnz]

You created a 'should' from a 'would', and therefore implied that 5F36B5F62640 had ill-feelings towards Indians.

I'm not attacking you personally, nor am I speaking to you personally. I am just pointing out to anybody reading this, that you just tried to smear somebody.

Of course, whether you did so on purpose is another matter.

[zardgiv]

You're grasping a bit on this. Logic does not dictate that there were implied ill-feelings on 5F36B5F62640's behalf. In fact, I can categorically state that from the one post I've read from them I do not believe they have any such ill-feelings!

To restate, then: "Wait, so your argument is that only Native Americans would feel unwelcome in this community?

Is this supposed to be in his favor?"

I appreciate your dedication to accuracy, and I must assume this satisfies your complaint.

[TruthAndDare]

> his belief that some ethnic groups are genetically better slaves

I'm curious, do you take that to speak well or ill about the ethnic groups in question?

[chriswait]

It's a shame you were downvoted here, you're asking a pretty interesting question.

[TruthAndDare]

Yeah, I mean, being strong as an ox would mean both that your abilities are superior to those of others and that you would make for a useful slave.