I dunno. You might be right, but another thing about that is whereas Slashdot had a moderation system that enabled voting along a dimension such as "funny", "interesting", or "insightful", I believe that a +1 Funny rating didn't actually boost your karma. So in theory you get something that is less inundated by sarcastic circle jerks of in-jokes than Reddit but less sterile and devoid of humor than hacker news. The no-nonsense attitude of frowning upon humorous mischief and misdirection is one of the first things that I noticed about this site, and, which while superficially appears to raise the level of discourse, I think is a sign of weakness, since a community that can't tolerate jokes isn't really a community at all. In fact at very least it goes against the ethos of computing, which always had an element of mischief and clever pranks. Look at the culture of the MIT AI lab or, well, Slashdot and its ilk to see the contrast.
Copypasta isn't a clever prank, though, it's banal and derivative. Trolling sucks, please quit it. I say funny stuff on HN all the time. I aim to keep it 100% original, and mixed in with relevant and topical discussion, and I rarely get downvoted for making jokes in that context.
I dunno. What I posted was a reference to a 20 year old in-joke that poked fun at GP for (in the eyes of his father) conforming to a humorously incorrect cliche of a "computer hacker", that anyone who frequented Slashdot would have been amused to come across again. It's more of a reference than derivative "copypasta".
That all said, I totally get that this kind of thing doesn't mesh with what Hacker News seems to strive for, although in my personal opinion it's worse for it.
Hm. I've still had trouble integrated gender-neutral pronouns into my brain (for years and years I had been taught that "their" was strictly plural).
Believe me when I say I meant nothing by inserting a default gender. If nothing else I was projecting myself into your situation. I honestly am sorry for the mistake.
