[hn_throwaway_99]

While I'd like to agree, I have yet to see a discussion on this topic on HN ever be insightful, or let me learn something new.

It seems like it always devolves into the same opinions, and people just become more dug in and increasingly vitriolic.

I'd love to see a solution to how that problem could be addressed, but if I had to put in a vote for "lowest quality discussions on HN" it would be on the "DEI battle" topics.

[nickff]

Whether this should be flagged depends on the flagging criteria, and I'm not sure there is general agreement on HN about 'flags'. This seems like a good place to have the conversation described by the OP, but I think that people are just flagging posts from viewpoints they disagree with these days.

At the risk of taking the conversation off-topic, this is probably a reflection of HN's changing demographics. It seems like HN is ever-more plagued by low-quality comments, such as reactions to headlines like: 'the title said rails, so I thought they were talking about Ruby on Rails, LOLZ!'. In addition to that, we have more newspaper editorials and polemics on the front page, and fewer 'nerdy' articles than ever before.

[dvfjsdhgfv]

> I'm not sure there is general agreement on HN about 'flags'

Actually, I think there is, at least recently: people flag anything they dislike, they find offensive, they strongly disagree with or simply don't like to see being discussed.