[mindcrime]

t's not right, but that's apparently what our culture has descended to.

I hope my startup one day becomes successful enough that I have to care about people calling me out in public for my political beliefs.

I'd love for the mob of whiney hipster-wannabe pseudo-leftist statist-hypocrite-idiots to try and "shame" me for saying that government is damage that should be routed around, and for saying that taxation is theft.

Am I wrong? Many of the responses here on HN and elsewhere online about this topic over the last 24 hours indicate that I am not.

Yes and no. I think you're more right than wrong, but it is important for all of us to be aware of the ways in which we create echo chambers around our own positions. "Online" encompasses a LOT of different kinds of thinking, but most of us (I believe) spend most of our online time in communities, and on sites, which are mostly populated with people who share a lot of our own beliefs. And we tend to assume that "The Internet" agrees with us, even when somebody with diametrically opposing views may feel exactly the same way.

IOW, don't mistake the "HN majority" or the "/r/politics majority" or the "/b/ majority", etc., as being representative of the real world.