[Xanza]

I just wanted to say two things here. One, this is an incredibly damaging tragedy. I truly wish the best for the community, for the Reisse and Oculus VR family.

Secondly, my father has been an officer of the law for more than 25 years -- can we please not turn a thread which is being used to inform the community at large of a tragedy as a way to defame those who wish to do good in their community.

I ask out of respect of Reisse, and my good natured father that we keep at the very least this thread on topic.

[enraged_camel]

>>defame those who wish to do good in their community.

This is an incredible cop-out. No pun intended.

Just because someone wishes to do good in their community does not mean they are immune to being criticized for their actions.

Furthermore, a lot of cops don't give a shit about doing good in their community. They are bullies who have joined the police force to legitimize their violent tendencies.

We need more "good cops" like your father, but let's face it: we will not get them if we do not draw people's attention to the bad stuff a lot of cops do.

[foobarbazqux]

So because your father is a cop, you don't even want people to question the actions of the cops in the story? And anyway, so what? It sounds like the gang members were the ones out of control, not the police. If the police had struck Reisse that would be different, but they didn't. But then what if the police had done something reprehensible? Nothing should be said because we need to respect your good natured father? It's not about you or your father.

[eieio]

I'm pretty sure Xanza simply means that Reisse's death is a tragedy, and a conversation about the death of an important member in the developer community is hugely different from an argument about the role of police in our society.

Especially since internet discussions about police often turn into emotionally charged and hateful arguments, I think keeping the discussion focused on Reisse is a very good and respectful request.

[mpyne]

Honestly they might as well change the name of HN to Digital Pravda or something. There is practically no story that can hit the HN frontpage now that doesn't turn into bikeshedding about how the U.S. is literally worse than Hitler and how everything is literally perfect in the EU.

I'm not saying that the U.S. is perfect, or that the EU isn't, but does anyone else remember when HN was for NEWS and not just an outgrowth of /r/politics?

I mean, obviously my comment won't change any of that, it's easy enough to see that the interest is there just by comparing comment count. But I do think it's unfortunate how much we have let politics poison the well here.

[Xanza]

No, I simply think it's wrong to, in general, generalize. I've read this thread, and see a lot of police bashing, it's wrong. My father is a good man and has done his duty to the State of Pennsylvania honorably and I don't take kindly to anyone who is not in the law enforcement field and criticizes the actions of those who are. Even more so when they're not at all involved in the situation, or the thread in question (discussion?) is intended to inform, not to inspire hate for law enforcement.

To put it bluntly Reisse was hit by an automobile by a criminal. Should the police have pursued the suspect through a crowded city the way that they did? No, however no one here was at the scene; maybe they HONESTLY believed they could end the ordeal without a lengthy chase and without the suspect getting away. That's a judgement call that every law enforcement officer deals with from time to time; with human nature telling us that we can't be correct all the time.

[davidw]

This site is about hacking and startups, not political ranting. There are other sites for that.

[enraged_camel]

Sorry, what?

https://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/all&q=aaron+swar...

[davidw]

That hit close to home for a lot of people.

If you people want politics here, I guess you'll get it. But you won't get politics and a quality site about hacking and startups.

[mpyne]

That particular case was where HN really shifted, but that doesn't make the parent comment incorrect.

[foobarbazqux]

This is a story about the literal intersection of police, guns, gangs, speeding, pedestrian crosswalks, motor vehicle accidents, and the sudden, traumatic, and innocent bystander death of the co-founder of a visible startup. And you guys expect no discussion of politics?

Can you point to a single story since the inception of Hacker News that quite obviously involved the intersection of hacker/startup culture with the rest of society where politics were not discussed? What is any discussion about wealth or economics if not politics? Is it a vanishingly small percentage of PG's essays that express a strong political opinion?

As far as I'm concerned, discussing politics as they relate to hacker culture is on topic. Discussing the Boston Marathon bombing, not so on-topic, but nevertheless people here had interesting things to say from a hacker perspective. I'll be the first to agree that political extremism is aggravating, but the solution to political extremism is not the avoidance of politics altogether.

[mpyne]

> I'll be the first to agree that political extremism is aggravating, but the solution to political extremism is not the avoidance of politics altogether.

On the contrary, avoidance of all politics is a wonderful individual solution to political extremism. Which is why so many "normal" people refuse to get involved at all, which is why all of us "normal" people end up so surprised every 2 years over a bunch of reactionary representatives being elected.

At least on HN you were able to have reasoned political discourse, which is far less aggravating. Even where I disagree with others I love being exposed to angles I hadn't considered, cultural nuances that might explain why something would work in the EU that wouldn't work in the U.S. (and vice versa), and all of that.

But from what I can tell even on HN we're shifting farther and farther away from that into the creationist mold of "I have decided what the answer must be, now I need only twist the facts to suit". Even where the answer that's decided on is actually right, that's no way to conduct a 'debate'.

[ciupicri]

The case of Aaron Swartz was about hacking and making information free for others.

[rosser]

I'm totally fine with not denigrating the cops that actually care about doing good in their communities. I'm just not convinced that all of them share that sentiment.

[lmm]

Tragedies are and should be a time to re-examine our policies, and try to prevent them happening again. Whether there should be a policy against police engaging in these kind of pursuits (and with the understanding that police do so with best of intentions) is absolutely on topic.

[aaron695]

I'm lost, your father was involved?

[Xanza]

No - I was remarking that my father was a good man and police officer, and I didn't appreciate the police bashing going on in a thread on HackerNews that served to inform the public at large of a devastating blow to the tech community.

[tomjen3]

How many people has he murdered, so far?

The lot is a bunch of bullies who didn't want to grow up.

[sultezdukes]

I ask out of respect of Reisse, and my good natured father that we keep at the very least this thread on topic.

Except there's no point in this story if it's not turned into some general political discussion about random aspect of society.

The template of these types of headlines is "Random incident happened to semi-famous tech dude". Therefore it's going to turn into some kind of "Let's discuss policy surrounding random incident".

Generally, these are just bad stories.