I have noticed this trend for a long time also, and well before this article was first written. It seems to go in waves though I'll cautiously say that it seems to have gotten somewhat better in recent years. I remember a time in the mid-2010s when these kinds of stories would disappear almost instantaneously. Now some of these articles and topics get a good number of upvotes and occasionally even substantive dialogue.
That said, the comments sections on these articles do tend to devolve pretty quickly.
And when people say they want it discussed, they don't mean they want to read diverse opinions, they just mean they want to see orthodoxy regurgitated.
But the question of how to handle politics on HN is not simple. By the same principle of trying to optimize for curiosity, some content with political overlap is interesting and belongs here. The questions are which forms of it, how much, which particular links, etc.. I feel like after 10 years we arrived at a pretty coherent and stable general answer to that. Not that we get every specific call right—we don't. But the general principle has held up.
For anyone wondering what I'm talking about, here are some past explanations:
>>22902490 (April 2020)
>>21607844 (Nov 2019)
and some related points:
>>23959679 (July 2020)
>>17014869 (May 2018)
and there are lots more at https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so... covering this.
It would be an absolute treasure trove of how to manage public forums and social media, especially as it evolves from a small niche community to a larger one, maintaining as much of its original character as possible, and in a highly politicized, adversarial, and mis/dis-info saturated information environment.
Would be a fascinating read.
Let's look at the specific topic you mentioned. HN had plenty of discussions about the lab leak theory, starting in late 2020 and all through 2021. I've listed some below; there were others (and of course many more in 2022 and 2023). Some fell off the front page rather quickly but the biggest ones spent 15, 16, 18 hours on the front page.
Everyone's memory about the pandemic has been retroactively revised by now, but as I recall it, the rehabilitation of the lab leak theory in (semi-)mainstream discourse began when Nicholas Wade published his article in the Bulletin. HN discussed that one thoroughly (>>27071432 ) and there had been several major frontpage threads even before that.
An appeal for an objective, open, transparent debate re: the origin of Covid-19 - >>28582290 - Sept 2021 (307 comments)
Scientists who signed Lancet letter about origins of Covid-19, have 2nd thoughts - >>27631560 - June 2021 (36 comments)
The lab-leak theory: inside the fight to uncover Covid-19’s origins - >>27388587 - June 2021 (1062 comments)
Wuhan lab staff sought hospital care before Covid-19 outbreak disclosed - >>27259953 - May 2021 (346 comments)
The origin of Covid: Did people or nature open Pandora’s box? - >>27071432 - May 2021 (537 comments)
Scientists who say the lab-leak hypothesis for SARS-CoV-2 shouldn't be ruled out - >>26750452 - April 2021 (618 comments)
The WHO-China search for the origins of the coronavirus - >>26609494 - March 2021 (209 comments)
Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed - >>26540458 - March 2021 (985 comments)
US raises ‘deep concerns’ over WHO report on Covid’s Wuhan origins - >>26125145 - Feb 2021 (632 comments)
Ensuring a transparent, thorough investigation of Covid-19’s origin - >>25799858 - Jan 2021 (74 comments)
Israeli startup claims Covid-19 likely originated in a lab, willing to bet on it - >>25585833 - Dec 2020 (351 comments)
(There of course were many threads arguing the opposite as well - I'm just listing these because they're the relevant ones for answering the GP. If this post makes you feel like HN was too supportive of and/or too suppressive of the opposite side, please re-read the first paragraph - it seems to work the same way in all cases.)
I believe that you have expressed this stance for at least several years now.
Perhaps these people's perceptions are well founded. It seems as if an orthodoxy is being enforced & people whose opinions that run counter to the orthodoxy, particularly when the orthodoxy is covertly political while masquerading as a truism.
You replied to an email from me stating a similar position...except you pointed out opinions of both the left & right of the political divide are moderated. I don't think that's that's the important imbalance though. It's the unorthodox who are more heavily moderated. There's a double standard, where the orthodox frame is given far more leeway, even to the point of breaking guidelines, without moderation.
I don't see much public self reflection on the moderation...mostly denial & self justification whenever someone brings it up. Seems like the same gas lighting that the corporate media, "thought leaders", the management class, the expert class, & elites push onto their subjects.
Perhaps some of the "strong passions" are in part inflamed by the negative reinforcement of the moderation activities...being punished for expressing observations & thoughts, taking a stand on covertly political topics, expressing the unorthodox. I have learned to not care about being downvoted or flagged or being threatened to be banned from this site or told to slow down as long as I am seeking truth & expressing in pursuit of truth. If my karma goes negative, so be it. I've learned to not be impressed by vanity metrics.
Right now it seems that nobody moderates the moderators...meaning there's no effective feedback about moderation activity. The moderator can simply use the same canned denial whenever any form of critique comes up. The downvoter or flagger can use the same knee jerk reaction to quash any self determined unapproved expression. It's too easy. It creates covert hostility on the site.
One thing that could help is transparency of voting & flagging. The people who do these activities also have bias & I don't think it's always done in good faith nor does it always support the stated guidelines of this site. Perhaps a form to explain why the downvote or flagging was done & how the guidelines or culture of the site was violated would reduce retaliatory downvoting/flagging.
If I make a comment I put in effort to think about & express my opinion in the public record. I'm motivated to put forth this effort when I think like I can contribute some to the discussion...which often occurs when the trend of the discussion is perceived to possibly be leading down a false or unoptimal path...an unorthodox view.
Downvoting/flagging should also require effort to weed out retaliation & have a cost if done in bad faith. If someone feels justified & can express why they are justified in downvoting/flagging, why not make it public record as well? The person whose expression was downvoted or flagged will have feedback to improve their expression if they violated a HN guideline. As it stands now, the author has to guess...with a possibility that the downvoting/flagging occurred in bad faith.
I appreciate whoever reads this long comment. I have learned much about human & cultural nature in participating with this site & I am grateful for this.
Dang cited examples; you haven't.
You appear to be going on feeling. I'm an intuitive thinker and subject to that myself. When I've collected data, I often realise that I was wrong. So, three possibilities present themselves:
1. You are correct 2. You have a perceptual bias that makes moderation stick out more to you when it is on unorthodox positions 3. Unorthodox opinions may be correlated with negative tendencies such as lack of factual foundation or inflammatory tone, and are moderated for those reasons
I don't need to. For example, it it possible to cite examples of "bad faith" moderation? There's nothing to cite. It's an ephemeral action. There is no access to who downvoted the comment & why the comment was downvoted.
> You appear to be going on feeling. I'm an intuitive thinker and subject to that myself. When I've collected data, I often realise that I was wrong. So, three possibilities present themselves:
In this case, there is no data to collect. I also check my intuitions with data. I have also told others that they were wrong (period, end of story) only to realize later that they had some great points & were even right.
> You have a perceptual bias that makes moderation stick out more to you when it is on unorthodox positions
I often comment when my position is unorthodox as it's a motivation to express points that have not been expressed in the discussion. I will also add additional information in a reply. I think both tendencies fall within the HN guidelines & contribute to the value of the discussion...whether acknowledged or not.
> I read it, though I don't feel like I've benefited at all.
Not everyone is going to agree with all of your positions. If you only value those who agree with you or somehow contribute to your beliefs, I'm afraid you are handicapped in the pursuit of truth. I find value in your comment & took the effort to respond...This site has a guideline of "intellectual curiosity". Taking a pre-determined closed stance does not really follow that guideline.
> Unorthodox opinions may be correlated with negative tendencies such as lack of factual foundation or inflammatory tone, and are moderated for those reasons
Let's say someone exhibits these negative tendencies. If the moderator must justify the downvote/flag action in the public record, the original author will receive feedback on their lack of factual foundation or inflammatory tone & adjust their posts accordingly. Right now, there is only non-obvious negative feedback...unless someone who downvotes/flags posts a comment explaining the reason, which I observe to be rare.
There is also a double standard. Many orthodox opinions are upvoted without any factual foundation & have an inflammatory tone. I suppose my assertion could be tested with sentiment analysis & score. Are there any open source projects to perform such a test? How could the software developer code what is orthodox or unorthodox? I'm challenged in creating a system as to how to verify the claim with data. Public justification of the downvote/flag would help immensely.
I have to note that this is a weakness of a Positivisist philosophical position. What is easy to quantify is "more real" & what is difficult to quantify is "less real". What is easy to quantify can be cherry-picked to support a pre-conceived position. It's too easy to game the perception of reality. It's too easy to deny the existence of a phenomena when there are no handles to measure the phenomena. Conversely it's also easy to create a conspiracy theory about it. There is no practical way to verify or invalidate the claim in quantifiable terms, so one can only use logical/rational discourse, adopt heuristics, & express subjective perception.
> I don't need to.
Actually laughed out loud at this.
"I don't need examples, you just have to believe that I'm right, trust me!"
Plus you seem to be confusing downvoting for moderation. It is not surprising that strong unorthodox views are downvoted. That's pretty much definitionally what "unorthodox" means, that most people won't like the view.
Tell me how I can cite an example of someone downvoting/flagging a post in "bad faith"? Perhaps I do have an example. My previous post in this thread was downvoted. Who downvoted it? Why was it downvoted? Was it downvoted in good faith? What HN guideline did it violate?
> Plus you seem to be confusing downvoting for moderation. It is not surprising that strong unorthodox views are downvoted. That's pretty much definitionally what "unorthodox" means, that most people won't like the view.
Then it should be added to the HN guidelines. @Dang, please codify "Don't post viewpoints that most people don't want to view" in the HN guidelines. @sanderjd expressed a reason for downvoting unorthodox views & if it's the position of people who downvote/flag posts, then let's make it an explicit rule.
Thank you to @sanderjd & whoever downvoted by previous comment in the thread (possibly also @sanderjd) for providing an example to discuss.
But to try to answer your questions: I think what's weird is that I kind of thought you were complaining about unfair flagging or moderator behavior resulting in comments or posts being removed unfairly. But if you're just complaining about downvoting behavior, well ... honestly that's pretty silly. People can downvote whatever they want. (And isn't it actually explicitly discouraged by the guidelines to complain about this?)
Edit to add (to respond to what I think you added after I first replied):
I guess I don't get what you want here. You have unorthodox views, and seem to foster that and take pride in it. That's great! The world totally does need people with unorthodox views! But you must know that those views will not be popular. That is what the word "unorthodox" means. So I don't get it, what do you want? You want rules enforcing a safe space to express unorthodox views without people disliking them? I'm sorry but that's not possible in a social space. You have to write on a blog with no comments or something if that's what you want.
But I do think people shouldn't downvote just for disagreement with the content. (FWIW, PG and Dang have expressed in the past that they don't agree with me on this, that it's fine to downvote just for disagreement, but I still think it's better not to.) But I think it's fine to downvote for bad faith. And as you've noted, this is totally subjective.
So yep, I downvoted your "I don't have to provide examples" comment (but not any of your others), because I thought it demonstrated that you weren't engaging with dang's many examples in good faith, but were just ranting at him about an unfairness in moderation (again: not just voting) that you've just intuited.
It's all part of the moderation process. Dang frequently mentions the HN guidelines & he justified his position with:
> nearly everyone with strong passions on a political topic feels like HN is biased against, and even is suppressing, their position
In my experience, downvoting & flagging behavior or negative feedback from @dang doing his moderation job can inflame strong passions & instantiating a covert retaliatory cycle. When someone feels that a viewpoint receives this sort of feedback, one is inclined to ask why? Extrapolating my experience/observations to others, I think transparent justification for moderation would provide feedback as to why, leading to less reply comments asking "why was this downvoted?" or "why was this flagged?". It also disincentivizes bad faith moderation activity.
I'm not complaining about downvoting or moderation per se, but expressing ways to make the HN guidelines more clear, create more fruitful discussions, improve feedback loops, & disincentivizing negative moderation/downvoting/flagging activity.
Edit:
> I guess I don't get what you want here. You have unorthodox views, and seem to foster that and take pride in it. That's great! The world totally does need people with unorthodox views! But you must know that those views will not be popular. That is what the word "unorthodox" means. So I don't get it, what do you want? You want rules enforcing a safe space to express unorthodox views without people disliking them? I'm sorry but that's not possible in a social space. You have to write on a blog with no comments or something if that's what you want.
I agree. All views are subject to criticism. The problem is it's too easy to anonymously knee-jerk a downvote as it often has a negative impact on the "intellectual curiousity" (a stated HN guideline) of the participants of the discussion because it adds the notion of punishment. I have learned to not feel a negative emotion toward downvotes & to incorporate the feedback as some sort of ephemeral HN community sentiment. However, it would be even better feedback to both the original author & the person moderating if the justifications were public.
> But I do think people shouldn't downvote just for disagreement with the content. (FWIW, PG and Dang have expressed in the past that they don't agree with me on this, that it's fine to downvote just for disagreement, but I still think it's better not to.) But I think it's fine to downvote for bad faith. And as you've noted, this is totally subjective.
It is. Which is why making the justification public helps in discerning the downvote feedback. I agree with you that knee-jerk downvoting ought to be discouraged in favor of justified downvoting. Overall, it would make a better, more thoughtful user experience & supports "intellectual curiosity".
> So yep, I downvoted your "I don't have to provide examples" comment (but not any of your others), because I thought it demonstrated that you weren't engaging with dang's many examples in good faith, but were just ranting at him about an unfairness in moderation (again: not just voting) that you've just intuited.
I disagree. Please don't confuse verbosity with a rant. I have to be explicit & thorough about my chain of reasoning.
Rather I have gone in-depth into the issues & repeatedly proposed a simple solution to the issues. I don't have a quantifiable study to point to & I don't think it's even practical to make one without funding & a considerable amount of innovation in software. Public justification of downvoting/flagging activity would help with making such a study. I greatly appreciate @dang for providing his reasoning for his moderation activity. It is very helpful & underappreciated. I think public justification of downvoting/flagging would help him in his job & make his job more rewarding to him.
But the answer to this "why?" is just super boring: it's because people don't like unorthodox views (that's what makes them unorthodox). It's not an enlightening answer.
> I think public justification of downvoting/flagging would help him in his job & make his job more rewarding to him.
I do think requiring a rationale for a flag is a good idea. I don't think so for a downvote.
The "solution" for downvotes is just to not worry about it so much.