zlacker

>>dang+(OP)
Tribalism is so toxic. I'm all for this. But for flagging purposes what's the boundary between a political/non-political story?

EDIT: @dang in another comment: Let me clarify. The main concern here is pure politics: the conflicts around party, ideology, nation, race, and religion that get people hot and turn into flamewars on the internet. We're not so concerned about stories on other things that happen to have political aspects—like, say, software patents.

>>pshc+k2
> Tribalism is so toxic.

And yet isn't one solution to tribalism a respectful exchange of ideas and dialogue?

Political changes have many direct impacts on this community - net neutrality, education policy related to STEM, funding for organizations/government agencies that have a long history of supporting technology, legislation concerning the development of new technologies (particularly for the medical and energy sectors), employment legislation, patent laws, and many other topics are likely of interest to a large number of HN readers and contributors.

Personally, I don't come to HN looking for political discussion/commentary but I also don't mind seeing it when it's appropriate.

>>knz+x6
Have you been witnessing respectful political exchanges on this site? the past 18 months have been pretty awful, in my experience.

>>anonba+yb
Compared to other online communities - absolutely. HN rarely devolves into "Damn [liberals|conservatives]" and people often get called out here for ad hominem attacks. Political articles without any basis in technology and clickbait titles are also usually quickly culled.

>>knz+Ee
I think the standard for HN political discussions ought to be other HN discussions not political discussions elsewhere on the internet. HN having better political discussions than elsewhere on the internet might even be part of the problem if HN is attracting people whose purpose is political discussions.