it's been over four years, how have we still not learned the number one lesson from the 2016 US Presidential Election: that highly-engaged views and opinions expressed online so as to create an outward appearance of nearly-uniform perspective, do not necessarily represent the views of the collective whole, because many people with the unpopular view/opinion will actively choose to not express it, for fear of ostracization? there are many people in tech who don't share the popular view/opinion on many different subjects, and instead keep quiet about it. sometimes they push back on things in very measured amounts here and there; other times, they make throwaways just to fire off a rant of their true feelings, knowing the throwaway will be banned. most of the time though, they just shut up.
I would just add that in many subjects, the split between the dominant and secondary policy/idea/candidate is small, like 45% to 40%. That's not a lot of difference and leaves a fairly large minority feeling disenfranchised when the media paints whatever the subject is as closed/absolute/etc.
it's true that there's a simmering underbelly of racist grievance and that it can be stoked and amplified, but let's check in in a few months and see if silicon valley is or isn't vaccinated before we start declaring that there's a broad silent consensus against scientific truths.
I wasn't aware that residing in SV was a prerequisite for posting to HN? especially after a year of increased remote work? I have little doubt that the vast majority of HN readers/posters who reside in SV are going to be vaccinated within a few months and will have zero qualms about it.