[hopefulengineer]

yup, Silicon Valley is a hivemind of people patting themselves on the backs as being intellectual contrarians. If you want to see what happens when someone with actual contrarian thought voices their opinion, see James Damore or Peter thiel and how fast they were excommunicated for their heresy.

[feynmanistheman]

While Damore was ostracized relatively quickly, I don't think you can say the same of Thiel. He's had his views since his days at the Stanford Review, yet that hasn't stopped him from being almost idolized (indeed, he's referenced in the parent comment as a source of this thinking). If anyone's patted themselves on the back for being a contrarian and been rewarded for it, it's Thiel.

[hopefulengineer]

The difference is that most people weren't aware or didn't care until he announced his support of Trump. Nothing objectively changed, but like a bunch of robots everyone immediately started calling for him to be removed from the Facebook board of directors and the relationship with YC to be ended.