[tomhow]

We’ve turned off the flags.

The story was flagged by many users. The problem with articles like this is the discussions are repetitive and predictable. We rarely see anyone approaching them with genuine curiosity. The topic of whether this president and administration are befitting of particular labels and historical analogies has been continually discussed (in broader society and on HN) since about 2015. And in the discussions we generally just see people trying to justify why they believe what they already believed about the topic, sometimes quite belligerently.

This is why discussions about politics are generally bad on online forums (and considered to be best avoided at dinner parties); it’s a domain in which people’s belief about the topic is deeply entangled with their identity, and by definition, people get defensive and hostile when their identity is thrown into question. Thus, they work much harder to justify why they were already right about the topic, instead of seeking to learn anything new.

The kind of politics discussion that would be good to see much more of on HN would explore the question: if we were to agree that the state of politics globally is terrible (I certainly do), what actions can ordinary people like us working in technology do to make things better?

[mindslight]

The "discussions" are repetitive because the sparks of curious and constructive discussion are shouted down or used up by people who just want to rail against the framing. If you want to support intellectually curious discussion, then letting whole topics get shut down because they are partisan-inflammatory is the wrong thing to do - this merely supports the dynamic of the hecklers' veto. Rather you need to police the partisan disruptors better.

There is a reason there is no downvoting on submissions, right? And yet we've now gotten to a place where submission flags have become an effective downvote. I don't know if this particular post would have generated thoughtful discussion, but I do know that only seeing this submission by chance a day later all of the interest has passed it by.

[tomhow]

Let's consider your own contributions to this thread, most notably this one:

> At this point, it's is just basic table stakes discussion context for anybody who loves individual liberty or believes in the Constitution and limited government. If you're still unable to even entertain the idea, then you're part of the problem. Based on your touchstone strawmen of "leftists", "radical", and "activists", it sounds like you've got a heavy case of TDS - the real TDS, not the accusation-in-a-mirror version.

I understand you feel strongly about the topic, and from the frenetic tone in most of your comments, deeply feel a sense of urgency and peril. I'm sympathetic to that feeling, I really am.

But it still breaks the guidelines, all while you assert that it's our job to make these threads orderly:

> you need to police the partisan disruptors better

The problem is everyone believes they are reasonable, moderate ones and that their opponents are the "partisan disruptors" who need to be policed.

From a moderation point of view, there's no winning in “policing” people on issues that are deeply entangled with their personal identity or their sense of physical safety. (And that's before you even contemplate the perversity of appealing for greater “policing” of a discussion about this, of all topics.)

Our role is to uphold the guidelines, no matter the side, and topics that are repetitive and that inevitably attract comments like your very own are very well established as being against the guidelines.

[mindslight]

>> you need to police the partisan disruptors better

> The problem is everyone believes they are reasonable, moderate ones and that their opponents are the "partisan disruptors" who need to be policed.

I said what I said taking into account the mirror view. The issue I'm pointing out isn't the disagreement between disruptors and myself, but rather the disagreement between disruptors and the context/assumptions of the submission. That is what brings the discussion down into the level of a flamewar battle, rather than conversation being able to grow curiously/constructively within the context of the submission.

Let's say there were some other submission exploring why Trump is so "irrationally" disliked, from the perspective of someone who wants to change people's minds and make them see some redeeming aspects. I'd say that going into that thread, calling Trump a fascist, and otherwise not engaging with the points of the submission would be similarly incendiary and destructive to curious/constructive conversation. And by the same standard it should be policed, even though I'd most likely personally agree with it.

For my comment that you called out, sure, there is some aggression there. I'll own that, and I certainly could have done better. But look at the context - I was mirroring the aggression in the comment that was responding to me, which categorically rejected the entire topic under discussion out of the blue! That is exactly the type of nothing-but-disruptive comment I'm talking about.

If I were to write it again, I guess I'd try to stop after the "Trumpism is fascist" material disagreement and leave it at that. Although I don't see how that version would support constructive discussion either.

edit: Re: the perversity of appealing for greater “policing” of a discussion about this, of all topics I don't see that it is perverse at all. While the simple view is that the police are an authoritarian force that cracks down on freedom (as we're often discussing their abuses), the more encompassing view is that they are necessary as otherwise some other group invariably steps into the power vacuum. There is a general reason you moderate this forum, right?

[tomhow]

If the simplified version of your statement is: this could have been an opportunity for a discussion that led to more people accepting that the USA is fascist, if only we had moderated it better, and we should work equally hard to moderate the discussion well if there's a thread that could lead to more people thinking the USA isn't fascist, then... OK.

But it's unviable to try to moderate like this. Given the demands on our time and the purpose of the site, the upside just isn't there, on a topic that has been discussed frequently for more than a decade. After this amount of time, no meaningful number of people are apt to change their minds on that question.

My comment about “policing” was meant in good spirit, but there's an important point there. We really don't see ourselves as police; we're here to uphold guidelines not enforce laws. Our role is to create the conditions for interesting discussions about new topics.

Usually that's about new technologies and projects, but there's plenty of space for discussions about politics, and as I've said multiple times in this thread, we'd be happy to host regular discussions about new ideas that can move the world beyond the current political dysfunction, and I'd happily spend hours each day helping to make discussions like that more fruitful.

[mindslight]

> If the simplified version of your statement is: this could have been an opportunity for a discussion that led to more people accepting that the USA is fascist

No, this is actually the opposite of where I'm coming from. I don't see many people changing their minds, especially at this point, and especially in the online-impersonal context.

Rather what I'd hope for is some breathing room to foster discussions more of the form: if we take it as a given that the USA is fascist, how do we respond and what are the next steps. That's what I would see as being able to stay in the constructive/curious mindset - not merely prolixly re-litigating basic true/false judgements pertaining to the article.

As it stands there are some comments that point at some direction, but they end up being the apogee of substantiveness rather than a starting point for a greater discussion. Whether it's sabotage from the outright gaslighters, or even people who agree but are at their own limit on the topic so they can't entertain the idea of something working and end up arguing against it. That partisan re-litigating, no matter how couched, sucks up most of the air in the room.

And sure, the word "police" is harsher than you want to think of yourselves. But that is the underlying dynamic, right? For example when you called out the comment of mine there is an implied "or else" there, right? And personally I don't think that outcome was particularly just, as I was responding to a comment that was already strongly against the guidelines of curious discussion. But I do just have to accept what amounts to tone policing - like police, your emphasis is on keeping order.