
Stuff You Can't Say in Silicon Valley - mr_spothawk
https://elaineou.com/2017/11/24/stuff-you-cant-say-in-silicon-valley/
======
chasing
You can say any of those things in Silicon Valley.

I mean, people might make some judgments about you. But that happens whenever
you state any opinion, especially if it isn't the mainstream.

I think a lot of people are used to saying what's on their mind without
consequence. They're used to other types of people remaining quiet on certain
topics -- especially topics related to race, gender, and sexuality. And that's
changing.

So: For some people it's a shock and they suddenly feel attacked from all
sides for opinions they've been vocal about for years. Feels weird. But in
many cases what's actually happening is people who have historically been
silent are suddenly speaking up and offering their own differing opinions.

For example, it used to be acceptable to behave in certain ways towards women.
Some men didn't see the problem because women wouldn't or couldn't speak up to
make their opinions known. Now many women feel more empowered and it turns out
many attitudes men have about women that seemed mainstream _are_ in fact
controversial (or, worse, actually destructive). And they always were. The
opposing voices just hadn't been speaking. Now they are.

~~~
electrograv
I 100% agree with your premise that “the more voices the better” (i.e. the
fewer voices that are silenced, the better). What you describe certainly
covers much of what’s happening, but something else is happening too: Voices
are being silenced.

And to respond to your opening sentence, I don’t mean anyone is silenced
physically (who does that?), but rather psychologically, culturally, and
socially. That’s not a good thing.

Giving everyone a voice is good precisely because it facilitates debate, such
that good ideas rise to the surface and bad ideas sink. Silencing voices
opposed to your own views may serve you in the short term, but as a principle
it’s incredibly dangerous and almost certainly harmful in the long run.

Edit: P.S. This doesn’t mean that bad ideas shouldn’t float down to a point
where their advocation questions ones’ rational credibility, nor does it mean
we should be entitled to say anything we want (no matter how extreme) without
consequence.

For example, if you blurted out “The earth is flat - it’s all a conspiracy!”,
most people would shake their heads in pity and keep walking away. But if
someone presents evidence or ideas to a claim so extreme, the degree of our
interest must be proportionate to the credibility of the evidence and the
logical consistency of the argument — _not_ the social stigma attached to the
topic. This is a subtle distinction, but so important.

Social stigma can serve perhaps as a caching mechanism of consensus, but it is
a tool we must wield with extreme caution.

~~~
ender7
On the contrary, silencing voices is a necessary thing. All societies have to
determine what speech is allowed and what isn't. There are lots of things you
can say in general American society that will get you censured. Claiming that
black people are biologically inferior to white people, for example. Claiming
that women are biologically inferior to men, though? Some still seem fond of
that one.

This all boils down to the fact one group is trying to add a number of new
entries to the list of censurable topics. It's fine to disagree with that, but
then you have to state a) what topics you think shouldn't be added to the list
and b). why. When people walk around loudly complaining about how they can't
say anything anymore without being specific as to what they want to say, it
suggests that perhaps they know that those positions are not really
defensible.

[EDIT: To explain things a little more. Societies must limit some forms of
speech because some speech limits who can be a member of a society. "We should
murder all Asian people" is not compatible with a society that contains Asian
people. And no, it is not fair to expect Asian people to have to constantly
defend their humanity to others who have nothing to lose in the argument. Much
as it's nice to think about abstractly entertaining every possible idea, when
some of those ideas actively push out or dehumanize members, the society is
_forced_ to choose between accepting debate on the idea or excluding those
members. So yes, if you want to complain about how SV society shuns people for
not wanting to experiment on human embryos or whatever, go ahead. But assuming
that all ideas should be up for debate is ignoring the fact that some ideas
are incompatible with your fellow society members. And you get to choose
between debating those ideas or having those people in your society as equals.
You do have a choice, but you can't have both.]

~~~
electrograv
Wouldn’t it be far more effective (and safe) to defeat bad ideas with evidence
and reason?

~~~
rectang
That's what's happening: bad ideas are being defeated. But if those bad ideas
are still near and dear to you even while society moves on, it feels bad.

Not everyone has to be persuaded. Some will have to be left behind.

~~~
Veelox
I think part of the issue is the tactics. The original post was pointing out
that the way that bad ideas are being defeated is through force, not through
reason. If the law says "Be happy or else" everyone is "happy". The problem
being pointed out is that SV is becoming a place where you must believe the
right things or else. The or else part is what makes it McCarthyistic.

~~~
rectang
It's hard for me to get worked up over this when the injustices suffered by
those who are now being heard were many times worse.

~~~
asabjorn
Two wrongs does not make a right. For instance, I fail to see how you can fix
things like racism, bigotry and sexism with more of the same.

~~~
rectang
The indefinite perpetuation of a one-sided wrong does not make a right,
either. Relentless oppression must be broken.

~~~
Veelox
>Relentless oppression must be broken.

I am going to quote the man who has arguably done the most to end oppression
in the USA.

"Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive
out hate; only love can do that." \- MLKJ

------
vbtemp
I'm glad it mentions H-1Bs.

Similarly to identity-conservatives, for whom belief in global warming is
heresy and tax cuts are gospel, I believe there is a similar phenomenon with
identity-progressives around immigration, in this case specifically the H-1B
program. There seems to be some belief in its sacred power that is not to be
questioned and not to be curtailed.

As I see it, big businesses - not least the major tech companies - are loaded
with incredibly bright, incredibly well-compensated staff. These companies can
figure out solutions to the toughest scientific and technical problems, can
create new markets when regulations shift, and change the world. They sure as
sh*t will figure out how to adapt if immigration policies change and the H-1B
program is reduced. As it stands right now, to me it seems - by and large - a
handout for companies to get mid-range IT talent enslaved to them for a
fractional price of what they'd pay an American.

~~~
dmode
Do you know anything about H1B ? Have you checked the average H1 pay in SV for
H1 before making an asinine observation that H1 is used to enslave mid range
IT talent. Disclosure: I am on H1 and I know alleast a 100 people on H1

~~~
calvinbhai
How about the ones born in India /China/Philippines on h1-b? They are not
treated equally (compared to a h1-b born elsewhere), and Indians are the most
abused (by law).

Basically Indians on h1-b are highly paid shackled slaves of America, because
they wait crazy number of years (10-70 years) to get a green card. During that
wait their options to demand better pay/raise/jobs are extremely limited.

And these shackles are the source of conscious/ subconscious abuse.

Now try saying to anyone in America who is a DACA sympathizer that those in
the green card backlog are in a much worse situation. (I did to one in Bay
Area and it didn’t end well)

------
mr_spothawk
I mentioned it in the @sama thread earlier... but we're also missing Brendan
Eich being canned for his views on gay marriage

~~~
tachyonbeam
To be fair, he's also responsible for JavaScript.

~~~
goatlover
True, but I listened to his podcast on the history of JS, and he was hired to
put Scheme in the browser, but then management decided it needed to be
something else, which turned into a compromise with Sun because they were
wanting Java. And then there was a limited time to make it happen before
Netscape shipped.

After that time, whenever Brendan wanted to fix things in the language, he
couldn't, because you can't break the web for people already using things as
they are. This happened several times.

------
pg_bot
I can probably add a few more to this list:

"Income inequality is not an actual problem"

"The affordable care act was bad for America"

"It would be beneficial if we got rid of all government guaranteed loans for
university tuition"

"People should be allowed to own automatic weapons"

~~~
junkscience2017
and more:

"wikimedia has plenty of money"

"Mozilla is institutionally focused on supporting left wing views exclusively"

"all of the rich people who speak out against guns have bodyguards who carry
guns. they basically don't want poor people owning guns"

"fwd.us is against Trump's wall but Mark Zuckerberg wanted to buy a city block
in Palo Alto to keep the masses out"

~~~
dulse
On your last one, there is also a funny story about his Hawaiian resort:
[https://www.theverge.com/2017/1/19/14327854/mark-
zuckerberg-...](https://www.theverge.com/2017/1/19/14327854/mark-zuckerberg-
facebook-hawaii-kauai-property-lawsuits)

------
closure
I stopped reading here:

“If San Francisco residents really believed that sea levels were rising,
they’d have all sold their homes by now.”

Apparently the author has never been to San Francisco or seen the sea level
estimates for the next 30-70 years.

The last time I looked the northernmost and easternmost parts of SF will have
some trouble, but by far the biggest areas of concern are east of 101 south of
the city. And yes, if people thought ahead that far they would probably be
concerned but even in the areas that are predicted to have the most impact
we’re still talking 25+ years.

~~~
yongjik
Yeah, seriously. Anyone who's ever driven in SF should know this city is not
going to be underwater (well, mostly). There are hills smack in the middle of
SF that are > 200 ft (~60 m) high[1].

Meanwhile, to pick a random example, "Much of Florida has an elevation of less
than 12 feet (3.7 m), including many populated areas such as Miami which are
located on the coast."[2]

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_hills_in_San_Francisco](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_hills_in_San_Francisco)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geography_of_Florida](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geography_of_Florida)

------
afpx
If I had a nickel for every time someone told me that they were not allowed to
say these things shortly after saying one or more of them ...

~~~
toomuchtodo
I think the greater concern are weaponized codes of conduct in an at-will
employment environment. If you can’t say something without losing your job,
you’re not free to say something.

You can take every effort to respect someone else, not allow any of your
behavior to be construed as harassment, and still be out the door because
someone objects to or is offended by what you’ve said.

~~~
mcguire
That's always been the case.

~~~
tachyonbeam
Doesn't make it okay. It used to be considered a left position to believe that
everyone is entitled to their own opinion. We also used to argue in favor of
freedom of speech. One thing hasn't changed, which is that the people in power
want to suppress any speech they disagree with.

------
roenxi
People cannot make decisions using facts; there are too many issues at play
and the interactions between the facts are too complicated. In practice
decisions are made by copying other socially successful persons.

It seems completely obvious to me that any social grouping will have some
strongly held convictions that are not based on fact. A unique set of sacred
cows that persist because it is orders of magnitude faster to copy successful
examples than figure out why they were successful.

I mean, I applaud efforts to align cultural conversation with fact. Very
worthwhile activity. But it seems more important to me to accept that social
groups can behave erratically, and that nothing should be taking precedence
over the rule of law; and anything that looks like mass hysteria should be
resisted.

The enemy is the idea that 'everybody knows' something and therefore due
process can be thrown out. I recall the slogan 'Not My President' being
trotted out when Trump won. That sort of thing is dangerous. Disagreeing with
the result of an election? That is fine. A bout half the population can do
that. Chipping away at the legitimacy of the electoral process, because you
can't say and do what Trump says and does? Huge threat.

~~~
mcguire
Weirdly, that doesn't seem to have been a problem for those whose president
was Charlton Heston.

------
tzs
> If San Francisco residents really believed that sea levels were rising,
> they’d have all sold their homes by now

Anyone who says that is, frankly, unobservant.

We have government bail outs for people who live in areas that frequently
flood due to things that have nothing to do with climate change, such as
normal rain and hurricanes. Many of these areas flood almost predictably, yet
we keep providing government support to keep people living there, or to help
them move to someplace that floods less.

There is no way that something similar won't happen to people when climate
change induced sea level rises starts making some coastal property unlivable.

Also, a good fraction of the population live in areas where there is a good
chance that _something_ will destroy their house over the next 30 or 40 years.
Besides the aforementioned floods, there are earthquakes, wild fires, and
tornadoes.

The only real difference between those and gradual sea level rise destroying
your home is that with sea level rise afterwards you have to go live somewhere
else instead of rebuilding where the old house was. No one claims that people
who live in states that can have earthquakes or tornadoes do not really
believe that earthquakes or tornadoes happen.

~~~
goatsi
The scale of the impact from rising sea levels will be much different than a
single flood or hurricane. Government resources will be very thinly stretched
and the bailouts will likely be much less than what people have invested in
their property.

------
minimaxir
It should be noted that this article was posted a few weeks ago, and is not
directly related to Sam Altman's recent (controversial) essay:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15924093](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15924093)

~~~
pwaai
ugh I stopped reading after the first sentence:

"Earlier this year, I noticed something in China that really surprised me. I
realized I felt more comfortable discussing controversial ideas in Beijing
than in San Francisco."

I also feel comfortable speaking about controversial things foreign cultures
would not have the appropriate context to judge, out of concern for being
rude, culture value differences etc.

I'm losing a lot of respect lately as it turns out more and more people
involved with YC seem somehow okay with Peter Thiel and Trump supporters. Even
VICE for fucks sake (Gavin McInnes's all white trash fuck boys) etc.

Have a little respect for your country fellow Trump supporters!!! You have a
fucking KGB puppet in charge! Actively working against the long term interests
of your country who also happens to assault women, writes asinine shit and
gets in the bed with the enemy.

that's enough anger seething...im just anxious that the US is veering off
course and into a different beast that would allow more nastier beasts to come
into power.

------
chipotle_coyote
I see that a new poster was quickly downvoted into oblivion for writing
"Clearly you can say this stuff. It's just that the speakers seek to demand no
consequences from their speech," but...I think that's largely true. I'm not
making a moral judgement about that, per se, but it's worth engaging with the
sometimes uncomfortable truth that free speech entails both what you say _and
how people react to it._

Furthermore, this isn't a new thing. One of the other things "you can't say in
Silicon Valley" is that black people are only fit to be slaves to white
people, but if anyone's out there shaking their heads and clucking their
tongues about how great it'd be to be able to say that if it weren't for those
terrible lefty PC liberals always SJWing up the place, do you wanna be
associated with them? It turns out that being openly racist in that way is, to
most people in most parts of the country, _really unacceptable._

Also, I've noticed that when these discussions come up, nobody ever talks
about the "stuff you can't say" in more conservative parts of the country.
Perhaps part of the reason people out here in the Bay Area are so "intolerant"
is because so many of us have suffered consequences for what we say--or even
what we don't say, but just what we _are_ \--when we've lived in other parts
of the country. Try putting a "Black Lives Matter" bumper sticker on your
Prius, drive to rural Alabama, and strike up conversations about your strong
support for Obamacare, abortion rights, and gun control. Then get back to me
about how gosh-darn friendly everyone was to you.

~~~
swimfar
Have you actually ever lived in Alabama? Or are your views based on anecdotes
and stereotypes of the South? I lived there for a short while and it's not
Deliverance. In my experience it's a lot more integrated than the Bay Area.

Note: (spoilers?) Deliverence doesn't actually paint the negative picture of
the south that people associate with the movie. It's just as much about
prejudices people have against rural people.

~~~
gamechangr
I Second that. The south is much more accommodating of opposing views.

I've been to Alabama with a large group of friends that were very liberal and
I have to admit...the people were incredibly friendly. (maybe not always
willing to engage on the issues - but clearly friendly).

------
pwaai
I'm glad this submission was flagged as I've done so as well out of sheer
disbelief. It's baffling why somebody who spent so much time building up their
reputation would throw it under the bus for ideological cause. You can say
anything you want, write what you want in SV but do not mistake people
distancing from you afterwards as 'silencing' you. If somebody goes around
saying it's okay to love Trump, _as a women_ AND _as a minority_ is just pure
mind fuckery.

I can see why some people feel threatened by the sudden rise of opinions that
differ from the mainstream narration _but this is precisely because the
silenced voices are SPEAKING UP_.

The most bizarre part about this is that a minority female would openly become
a doormat for the very people that told everybody who wasn't like them to shut
the fuck up....

This is hardcore Uncle Toming from a woman who wouldn't be viewed as a white
women by mainstream America but through the lens of fetish. Especially,
shaming another Asian American women like Ellen Pao to further her article's
message.

I apologize for any harsh words but as a minority myself, it was hard to
contain the anger.

------
publidat
I feel like it’ll take another dozen years before some people are ready to
admit that “Liberal McCarthyism” is exactly what emerged around 2017.

And in the meantime, as someone who’s not interested in waiting on the current
power-brokers in SV to admit to it, I think it makes sense for those who are
the primary target of this new McCarthyism to engineer a way to preseve their
rights.

Depending on SV’s prevailing power structure is obviously a terrible idea.

~~~
mcguire
Personally, I wouldn't start worrying about "Liberal McCarthyism" in the
United States until liberals have control of the presidency, the congress, and
at least a fair majority of the states.

~~~
publidat
The fact that this post, and the Sam Altman posts, have been made invisible on
this site is the millionth depressingly predictable example of why it's well
past time for the people who are endlessly silenced to engineer their own
solutions and not rely on the infrastructure of the current power-brokers.

------
whatshisface
If political opinions can impact your career, then there's a massive potential
for abuse. What happens if your boss fires you for supporting a measure that
would damage your employer? Even worse, what if some corporate interest issue
got programmed in to people by a PR campaign, and then your boss fired you for
resisting _that_? You'd be torn apart by the public. There would be nowhere to
turn.

------
throwaway177171
The trend to refuse debating is more harmful than it looks.

Here are some defences I've seen so far

1\. Debating is pointless because the person wont change their mind

On the Internet, you're not debating a person. You are also debating for the
benefit of uninformed (yet potentially well meaning) bystanders that are
watching and reading. Hard as it may be to imagine, a lot of these people just
don't know what you know.

This is the exact time to bring out your best, most convincing material and
information. Why not do it?

Its not a stretch to assume a lot of generally well meaning people will be
sceptical to progressive ideas at first. After all, isn't the whole premise
that we've normalised unfair behaviour so much that people can no longer
easily see it from within their bubble?

Can we really afford to write off everyone that is like that completely? Why
not try and give them a peak outside their bubble instead?

2\. Debating will legitimise the other person's reprehensible point of view.
We are taking a huge step backwards just by engaging.

Assuming no other information is available to the uninformed bystanders, here
is how this looks like to them:

    
    
      * Person A makes a plausible-looking argument;
      * Person B says they're wrong, 
        * wont even dignify that with a debate
        * will continue to be enraged
        * will do everything in their power to get person A fired.
    

A bystander might try and find some resources on their own. Or they may
conclude this is a matter of "free speech": person B, having no arguments in
their favour are just trying to shut person A down.

3\. I'm outraged right now. Not quite in the state to educate people. I also
just debated with 50 others before this person and I'm sick of doing it over
and over.

Thats understandable. Please though, if at all possible, consider the
potential consequences of continuing to engage without a debate.

------
karpodiem
I voted for Trump and I'll vote for him again. Hi HN!

~~~
the_cat_kittles
why?

~~~
prakster
Why not?

------
cannonedhamster
You can say all of these things anywhere with minimal actual consequences
other than social consequences. You have to be so deep into first world
problems that you can't see that social consequences are not the biggest
problem for most Americans right now.

* You can support Trump, it doesn't mean other people don't have the right to think you're a moron, bigot, or supporter of fascism for doing so. You go right ahead and think the same thing about them. NO ONE ACTUALLY CARES. Most people are too busy working to get caught up in politics.

* Diversity of thought often comes with diversity of skin color because people with different skin color have a hell of a different experience than white people. They even have different experiences among their different ethnicities. Does it mean white people can't have different thoughts? No, but when you're in a bubble how would you even know?

* The way the H1-B is written now is terrible both to the H1-B holder and American workers. It forces workers to get paid below what they should get paid both as an H1-B worker and as the American worker. H1-B holders should not require sponsoring by a company. If their skills are in such high demand they should have no problem getting a job.

* If they could afford to sell. If they were stupid. Maybe they are optimists? Seems like San Fran has a ton of optimists. Maybe they plan on selling before sea levels rise or trust their government to bail them out.

* If this was all he said, sure, there's room for conversation about how and why we got into this situation, but it was a stupid screed against diversity. This guy is no champion of discourse. I doubt you could do what he did anywhere and have it go over well. You keep your politics out of your work whenever possible and speak your mind at home. A company is not a free speech zone.

* Equality of treatment doesn't mean equality of outcomes. That's a strawman argument.

~~~
awaythrowaway
> Diversity of thought often comes with diversity of skin color

I definitely agree (ethnical?) diversity is desirable, but the idea that
differences in race correlate highly enough with differences in thought to
justify largely using race to locate thought diversity is _the very racist
idea_ itself; that people who look like this think one way, and people who
look like that think another way. It's a low-resolution view of the world; in
reality, the variance between individuals within a given race is greater than
that of individuals between races.

------
superquest
This post has 195 points in an hour, and it is currently #20 on the front
page.

Why isn't it higher?

~~~
dang
For the usual reasons: user flags, software, and a moderation penalty. The
latter can vary in weight but at the moment is a small downweight applied to
follow-up discussions that don't contain significant new information. The
software involved is HN's flamewar detector a.k.a. overheated discussion
detector. All of these are typical responses to articles with a large heat-to-
substance ratio.

~~~
gkop
> All of these are typical responses to articles with a large heat-to-
> substance ratio.

To save others from having to look it up themselves: according to [0], it took
13 hours for Sam's article to fall off the front page, while this article fell
off after about 1 hour.

dang didn't say it was ONLY heat-to-substance ratio causing the downmod.
Clearly, there are other factors than heat-to-substance ratio causing it
though. It's hard to dismiss the suspicion that either "embarrasses YC
president" could be a factor in downmodding this article or that Sam's article
was _not_ downmodded in order to avoid embarassing Sam :(

HN is tremendously influential in tech culture, so even a tiny difference in
moderation of similar articles reflecting opposing points of view could
compound to a very destructive effect.

[0] [http://hhn.domador.net/](http://hhn.domador.net/)

~~~
dang
This is a hard comment to respond to because there appear to be several
misapprehensions in it, and at the same time I find it hard to understand what
you're saying. Let me try to address a few though.

You say "clearly" and then switch to "hard to dismiss the suspicion". There's
no "clearly" there, just suspicion. I'm sure it's a natural suspicion or you
wouldn't be posting it, but it lands with me as strange somehow. How could an
article that doesn't mention Sam embarrass Sam? It was written weeks before
his essay anyhow.

What you're missing, perhaps, is that the reaction here, by both the users who
flagged and the moderators, probably isn't about the subject matter per se,
but about the fact that this topic was thoroughly covered yesterday and in
follow-up threads like
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15936614](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15936614).
Doing the same thing every day is boring, and the current article doesn't
clear the bar of substantiveness enough to justify overriding that.

There's another point that sits a bit uncomfortably with me. You say HN is
influential in tech culture, but if that's true, it's because of qualities HN
has that are the product of the very system (community plus moderators plus
software) that you seem to object to. That comes up all the time and to me it
seems incongruent.

You overrate the power of moderation to control this community. Even if we
wanted to control it, which we don't, we couldn't, not even close. We serve it
and we never forget that.

~~~
gkop
Thanks dang!

All I meant by “clearly” was that the signal-to-heat was the same between the
two articles.

Sometimes user flags are overridden by mods, so it seemed like maybe that’s
what happened on Sam’s article but not on this one?

I am worried by your argument that we just discussed his yesterday so let’s
not today, it’s just as much about the articles as the discussion, this
article has substance and is a neat counterpoint to Sam's article, don’t you
think? Perhaps in these cases lock comments but leave the article on the front
page?

Regarding the influence of HN, please don’t ignore that Sam is YC’s president
and YC operates HN, so maybe the issue is just that HN isn’t sufficiently
independent from YC? Under the status quo the optics look really bad.

Thanks for the thoughtful reply and your hard work! It reassures me that you
take the judgment calls you make seriously. Communities like HN are
challenging to moderate indeed.

~~~
dang
I sure appreciate the good faith here, especially where we disagree.

Re yesterday: if we didn't moderate HN like this the front page would consist
mostly of repetitive stuff. There's no doubt in my mind that the community
wouldn't like that, and certainly it would make HN a different place.
Intellectual curiosity shrivels under repetition.

------
goseeastarwar
> If San Francisco residents really believed that sea levels were rising,
> they’d have all sold their homes by now.

What an absurd argument. Is it possible instead that people are capable of
believing that sea levels are rising _and_ the US government wouldn't allow
$500B worth of GDP to sink into the Bay?

------
mc32
I think one problem might be that people don't want to tolerate anything, any
exception to a position, that while true, might perceptively undermine their
narrative.

Essentially, in colloquial, they don't want to give an inch for fear they'll
grant a mile.

For example. A position might be, yes, means yes, but it can also mean no, if
the person saying yes, feels they were forced into yes. So unless it was a
resolute yes, it means no.

Someone might want to take exception to that and say that, no, it depends on
the situation and personality, etc., and that there are grey areas and there
will always be and we also know people might initially think something is a
good idea and retroactively take back a yes. But some people may not want to
admit that people do on occasion retroactively change their minds on
something.

------
mythrwy
When I was a kid in a deeply religious community I never could keep my mouth
shut and irritated a lot of folks until I was big enough to leave home which I
did at the stroke of 18. This cost me a lot of effort and struggle and I had
to make my own way and was behind others who just went along.

Because what I saw were a bunch of smug, self righteous hypocrites with a
dubious moral code based on non-realistic understandings proffered by cynical
opportunists who's real agenda was far from what they preached.

Remaining true to myself, to my understanding of objective reality, to not be
afraid to give voice to that reality was every bit worth it then and it's
worth it now.

Smug hypocrites suck and it isn't worth becoming one at any price, no matter
what flavor the unrealistic hypocrisy and groupthink is.

------
calvinbhai
If a white male (the google guy) can get fired for being open about his views,
imagine how tough it can be for minorities to be open about their views!

It’s like everyone knows they are in an echo chamber but not daring to be the
first one to speak up.

~~~
photik
That entirely depends on the arena in which one finds oneself. In far-left
circles women and minorities tend to be given carte blanche, while in far-
right circles older white men receive similar treatment. It is a spectrum of
acceptable norms based on implicit values surrounding group identities.

e.g. if a white man offers a controversial opinion in a left-leaning arena, he
is more likely to be dismissed.

~~~
calvinbhai
Agreed.

As a brown guy (I think right of Center) my views tend to piss off the far
right/left equally. And I think there are many like me who are just keeping
their mouth shut listening to garbage from both the far ends.

------
sunseb
Yes, I am kind of tired of this dictatorship of the minority too.

It's like everybody need to receive a gold medal for being different nowadays.

But we never speak about the average Joe, who struggles in life too!

------
pkd
Saying things has consequences. All these articles seem to be complaining
about the sudden realization that you can't say something without suffering
from consequences in SV.

I don't generally care about SV and I think it has its fair share of problems
but being accountable for sharing your (mostly ill-informed) beliefs,
especially when you have the social reach to influence millions is not
"oppression". It's the simple fact of there being consequences of what you say
and do.

------
aresant
You want to know what I think is way, way scarier than self-censoring in SV?

Is that as a CULTURE we are self-censoring due to the Chilling Effect from
learning that the NSA collects unfathomable dossiers on every citizens private
browsing behavior.(1)

It is sad and hilarious that SV leaders - who have spawned & continue to lobby
for anti-privacy technology in the name of data collection and personal
information dealing to sell advertising are crying that they can't be honest
with their peers.

If we want people to be more open and honest, to be open to broader views than
their own how about start by fixing the fucking group-think algorithms that FB
/ Twitter / Goog are so fond of?

(1) [https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/apr/27/nsa-
surveil...](https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/apr/27/nsa-surveillance-
has-had-chilling-effect-internet-/)

------
asveikau
> If San Francisco residents really believed that sea levels were rising,
> they’d have all sold their homes by now.

I wonder what effect the hills have on that.

I googled "sea level rise san francisco" and found this:

[http://geology.com/sea-level-rise/san-
francisco.shtml](http://geology.com/sea-level-rise/san-francisco.shtml)

At the default view of +7m, it seems like the parts of the city that used to
be water (Marina, Mission Bay, parts of the Mission, east part along the bay)
are most vulnerable. The interior looks like less of a problem.

~~~
tytytytytytytyt
What's so bad about saying that one?

~~~
asveikau
Maybe because it's not true outside of certain high-risk neighborhoods? (And
those are also higher risk for earthquake damage for the same underlying
reason.) People who are buying property in SF can and do look up these risks.

~~~
tytytytytytytyt
Sure, but that doesn't seem like it'd make it such a horrible thing to say.

~~~
michaelhoffman
It's not a horrible thing to say. It's an _ignorant_ thing to say. If you say
it, people will think you are dumb.

------
RickJWag
It's true. PC culture is so strong it's dangerous to have an opinion outside
of what popular culture pushes on us.

It's not a good situation. There's blatant hypocrisy in the air as well. (Many
of the same voices calling out politicians for past sexual misdeeds have yet
to sever ties with the Clintons, for example.)

It's to our collective detriment. I can't wait for the pendulum to swing back
the other way so we can all speak what we think without fear of falling on the
wrong side of the PC police.

------
mcguire
" _If San Francisco residents really believed that sea levels were rising,
they’d have all sold their homes by now._ "

To be fair, that probably hits too close to home.

------
jdlyga
Makes me glad I live in New York and not Silicon Valley.

~~~
electrograv
Honest question: How does New York compare on this spectrum? I had the
impression that the political atmosphere there is very similar to California.
I loved New York City when I visited, so I’m very curious to learn more about
it from this perspective.

If you don’t feel safe talking about it publicly, feel free to email me (you
can track it down via my account). I wish I didn’t have to say that last
sentence, but this is the USA we live in right now.

~~~
insickness
In NYC, coming out as a Trump supporter is a cardinal sin that will lose you
friends.

~~~
dionidium
In my first month in NYC I was yelled at by someone I'd met in a bar because I
didn't do enough to _stop my mother_ from voting for Trump. [0]

[0] My mother didn't actually vote for Trump, but this woman got the
impression that she had and was _appalled_ that I hadn't done more to stop
her.

~~~
emerged
You are also apparently being downvoted for daring to mention that you were
yelled at for your mother voting for Trump when she didn't. The communication
shut-down knows no bounds anymore.

------
21
I'm in London, and the day after the US elections we needed to name an
internal project, so we just named it Trump. One of the team members also had
for a while a red Trump hat on his desk (if he was alt-right in any way, I
couldn't detect it). None of us was a US citizen.

I'm genuinely curious if such things would be accepted in a SV software
company.

------
jaimex2
Is this something that applies to large corporate Silicon Valley companies
only? I've only worked in small startups.

------
jancsika
Does this qualify:

"Use my code as you please. Just promise to contribute back any improvements
you make to it."

------
jpeg_hero
47 upvotes, and zero comments ... that tells you something, doesn’t it

~~~
ekianjo
thats another stuff you cant comment about in SV.

------
rectang
I don't miss hearing the voices of the historically dominant. Other voices are
being heard instead: the voices of those who have long been beaten down.

As someone who is loyal to the human race before my demographic, I'm thrilled.

------
akhilcacharya
It never ceases to amaze me that some people that went to the best schools,
make the best salaries and occupy the highest levels of the social ladder
still find ways to feel oppressed.

------
gamechangr
Is McCarthyism in Silicon Valley real?

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15937836](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15937836)

------
AaronFriel
It's interesting that lists of the verboten keep rising to the top of Hacker
News. If this keeps happening, it would only be rational to believe these
things aren't verboten and their authors (whose work keeps rising to the top
of link aggregators like this) aren't writing in good faith that they were.

In fact, isn't it - to a degree - virtue signaling to write that one thinks
it's such a shame that these verboten things are so verboten as to write an
article enumerating them and describing how verboten they are?

And yet, ctrl-f, "virtue". Ah, there it is.

~~~
photik
... it has since been modded off of the front page.

~~~
AaronFriel
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15938241](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15938241)

------
scottmcdot
Isn't this stuff you can't say anywhere?

~~~
ekianjo
You wont be fired in most parts of the world for saying that kind of stuff.

~~~
scottmcdot
I don't feel like I can say this around my office (big 4 bank, Melbourne).

~~~
ekianjo
I said "most", so yes there are definitely cases like the one you mention. In
general, the larger the corporation, the more likely your freedom to have
"diverse" opinions is diminished.

------
dmode
These "Silicon Valley and free speech" articles are so laughable that it is
hard to believe that they are taken seriously in HN. It is literally a first
world problem. Compare this to the other #1 article where Trump admin is
literally banning words in CDC, Project Veritas is sending fake people to
malign journalism, an out of control President is on constant tirade against
media, mention of climate change is systemically purged from government
websites. Those are serious issues

------
nautilus12
Hmm flagged eh? Maybe title should read stuff you cant say on hacker news..

------
ej_campbell
The cherry picking of this article is extreme. A company chooses to not employ
someone based on a multiple page essay and this article takes a sentence and
tries to make it look ridiculous.

~~~
insickness
What else from that essay was grevious enough to fire him?

~~~
jonathankoren
The whole thing made a textbook hostile workplace. He said the people around
him only got their jobs because of their race or gender and were therefore
incompetent.

~~~
freedomben
It's pretty clear you didn't actually _read_ it. I didn't at first either
because I trusted the sources I was reading to give me a fair summary. That
was a mistake. I didn't necessarily agree with what he said, but it was
nowhere near as bad as what 90% of sources were reporting.

~~~
mikeash
I read it and I think it was just as bad as people said. It just happened to
be stated in friendly, neutral-sounding language.

------
evo_9
The fact that this is flagged just reinforces his point about frail
narcissists in the valley.

------
QML
What’s the worse that can happen?

------
yandrypozo
hard to believe this's in the first page of HN

~~~
rdtsc
> hard to believe this's in the first page of HN

Is it because you disagree with the statement or you agree but believe that it
would have been flag killed quickly?

------
fmihaila
Wow, that didn't take long. Why is this discussion being flagged?

~~~
r00fus
Because it's uninformed clickbait.

------
sunseb
This story is not on HN front page anymore...

------
dahdum
That article is completely out of line. For the record:

I think SF is doing a _great_ job tackling homelessness, human excrement
management, and broad daylight IV drug abuse. They just need to raise taxes to
increase funding for all the really successful programs underway. I'm sure
they've got a handle on it. It's a wonderful vacation destination for
families.

Affordable housing will definitely be solved by higher taxes, implementing
rent control, and subsidizing below market rents in luxury buildings. It's
important to keep the character of our neighborhoods by preventing higher
density housing.

~~~
aphextron
Can't tell if this is serious

~~~
johndevor
I don't believe so. And I think SF has some real problems too.

------
Helloworldboy
Title could just as well be: Things you can't say on HN without being censored
by an archaic down voting system.

------
lotsofpulp
Trump is literally putting the health of my country's citizens at risk for
political posturing, I think animosity towards him is easily warranted:

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-
science/cdc-g...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/cdc-
gets-list-of-forbidden-words-fetus-transgender-
diversity/2017/12/15/f503837a-e1cf-11e7-89e8-edec16379010_story.html)

Apparently, there's nothing better our tax dollars can be doing than
destroying some of the most important and successful organizations human
civilization has managed to create.

~~~
eksu
You are literally part of the phenomena described.

This, "I'm right, you're wrong, this is the only lens to look at this through"
positioning is really bad.

In Policy Debate (CEDA, Cross-Examination) it's part of the sport to take
mundane issues like creating a tax credit for electric vehicles and both teams
try to extrapolate out to the worst possible impacts. Nuclear war, mass
famine, extinction, etc.

It seems to me that we're adopting this quality for our public discourse, and
that's a bad way to go. There is no 'discourse' in debate, that's an activity
about winners and losers, not about truth seeking or implementing any real
policy.

Sure, people can hold animosity toward Trump, just like most trump supporters
hold animosity towards Secretary Clinton. But you shouldn't extend this
animosity towards the people that support that candidate, and you shouldn't
convince yourself that there aren't two sides to every issue, because there
are.

~~~
strangecasts
_But you shouldn 't extend this animosity towards the people that support that
candidate, and you shouldn't convince yourself that there aren't two sides to
every issue, because there are._

That doesn't mean those sides are _equal_. Take anti-vaxxing and young-earth
creationism: do they offer any truth or useful insights for policy proposals?

e: Another point: why should I not hold animosity towards hucksters who hamper
efforts to slow climate change, or indirectly cause deaths from preventable
diseases?

~~~
BRAlNlAC
No, but those people get to have a say in our government. So in some ways yes,
they are equal. If you want that to change, be a missionary and convince them,
but to deny them representation is violence upon a class.

~~~
strangecasts
I'm not "denying representation", I'm saying that there _aren 't_ two sides to
every issue, there _are_ ideas which have been proven false and _offer no gain
from discussion_.

------
grandalf
Apparently this story is one such thing, as it has been flagged.

------
the_cat_kittles
im sure you dont care how correct i think the statements you make in your
piece are, so ill just address the larger point you seem to be ignoring: there
is no shortage of things to say that are correct, but serve no purpose. are
you really shocked that people would not like you if you went around calling
every fat and ugly person "fat and ugly"? given that our attention is a finite
resource, the choice of where to focus it itself carries significant meaning.
i suspect that many of those statements, when contextualized, imply things
beyond their literal meaning. you are acting like its unfair to make this
interpretation, and im sure there are many cases where it is. but you are
pretty dumb if you really dont understand why saying "diversity of thought is
more important than diversity of skin color" can sound like "im racist"
depending on the context.

------
woodruffw
For better or worse, popular society has become a _lot_ better at detecting
dog whistles. "Diversity of thought is more important than diversity of skin
color" is one of those dog whistles.

I don't find the discussion itself objectionable, but I also don't want to
grant intellectual capital to anybody who is going to use a controversial
topic in bad faith to control the discussion. I don't want to be used to
legitimize more extreme views. Sometimes people don't bring these topics up in
bad faith, but it's been my experience that they're the minority.

FWIW, I don't live in Silicon Valley or in CA.

~~~
fmihaila
> "Diversity of thought is more important than diversity of skin color" is one
> of those dog whistles.

I find it highly unlikely that a black woman in charge of Inclusion and
Diversity at a most socially progressive company would blow into that
particular dog whistle.

~~~
woodruffw
The _point_ of a dog whistle is to say something with a secondary meaning that
escapes some part of the audience.

When that part of the audience starts using the dog whistle, the goal has been
met: they're using it in good faith, while the original user is still
signalling the secondary message.

That's why "family values" works so well as a political slogan -- _nobody_ is
against "family values" in a superficial sense, and half of the population
understands that "family values" is really code for "christian values."

~~~
fmihaila
I see your point, but somebody losing their job in the blink of an eye for
expressing their thoughts on a sensitive subject _in good faith_ just because
other people are trying to hijack the English language seems like an
overreaction, no? That's what the OP, Jessica Livingston, Sam Altman, Tim
Ferriss, and many HN posters here are pointing out.

~~~
woodruffw
I agree. I also don't have a good solution, unfortunately.

------
prepend
This article seems to be debating an issue that doesn’t exist. It seems to
call Ferriss for not speaking his mind, but I listened to the podcast
referenced and it was one short statement amongst lots of other stuff.

I would like to hear an entire podcast from Ferriss. But this author seems to
criticize a Ferriss for not going into detail and that’s inappropriate. It
would be valid if Ferriss left out these details in a book or in depth
coverage, but he author is taking a few sentences and reading way too much
into it.

What do you call it when someone uses a bigger name to try to rouse
controversy in order to get clicks? It’s not yellow journalism, but there must
be a term for this kind of shitposting.

~~~
gamechangr
I posted Tim Ferriss direct words...He didn't leave out details.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15937836](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15937836)

