Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by AlexTWithBeard 2191 days ago
Information bubbles on all sides of the spectrum.

People not willing to compromise and move in small steps.

Making bogeymen out of your opponents.

And, obviously, downvoting all the dissenters into the oblivion.

1 comments

I think this comment exhibits a few problems as part of the conversation on systemic racism.

"Information bubbles on all sides" is vague, but it seems to imply people trying to fight racism are either fighting for the wrong reasons or misunderstand the problem they're facing. Without more detail, it doesn't contribute anything meaningful for people to take away.

And what is there to compromise on racism? The comment doesn't say any more, so it's again hard to know what it's referring to.

Commenting on the "refusal to take small steps" or "making bogeymen" also detracts from the issue by shifting the conversation to the methods and approach the movement is taking. You may earnestly believe that the protesters and the movement could benefit from changing their approach. Unfortunately, on a wider scale, this sort of rhetoric is consistently used to delegitimize dissenting voices by refusing to cooperate or acknowledge a problem unless dissenters behave themselves. It also implies that doing things in a "respectable" manner is more important than hearing and addressing the problems people are protesting.

"Information bubbles" means that people on both sides are only willing to communicate with those who supports and shares their own opinion. People are not listening to each other, people are not giving the benefit of doubt and even heavily ostracize those who suggests there may be "some fine people" on both sides of the barricade.

A compromise on racism is easy: for most people being non-racist is enough to make this world better. We cannot and we should not mandate everyone to be actively anti-racist. Race relations is a complex topic. It's actually more complex than most people think and there are no easy answers. The same way like everyone should not be actively anti-covid: leave it to doctors and nurses and simply do your part not to make the problem worse.

The BLM issue is too vague to detract it further: the way it's put now it's "against all bad and for all good". Is it about black lives? Or about police brutality? Or about police accountability (or lack thereof)? Or about racism - in its direct sense when people are laid off purely because the color of their skin? Or about black culture which does not promote education and other "white people values"? Or about economic inequality that went through the roof?

And, by the way, when I wrote about refusing to make a compromise, I was thinking more about police unions: they've built the dam that is now broke open.