It was a figure of speech. I still click on the links and scan the comments. The recent links about Ethereum and the large hack were prime examples. There is an extreme undercurrent of skepticism that only gets somewhat masked by HN’s culture of writing critical comments in a roundabout intellectual way. There are also a huge number of low effort hostile ones that seem like Reddit overflow.
I should add that this is hilarious considering the name of this website.
I'm not sure what you mean about the Etherium news, without the specific post it's hard to discuss it.
Either way, I find crypto to be difficult to discuss online, in general. Mostly because there seems to be fanatics on both sides. You seem to notice more the ones on the "anti" side, I see plenty on the "pro" side. Not to mention the wrinkle where many people who were early adopters believed in it as an actual currency. Today, many of the "pro" comments I read seem to view it as an investment (i.e. phrases like "hodl").