One was: their skin color looks fecal. The other was: their bone structure doesn’t look human. And they’re just off-reference enough to be much more creepy than if they looked less like people, like bad CGI or shambling undead in a B movie. When I paid close enough attention, these were the three basic data under the revulsion; my hindbrain thought it was surrounded by alien shit zombies.
I think ESR is an idiot for a lot of reasons, but to be honest you're taking that quote a little out of context. The whole point of that blog post was to show his superior rationality and analytical introspective prowess--despite the “irrational” feelings he describes in the quoted paragraph, he was able to reason his way through all that and his neocortex and non-bigotry came victorious. Or so he claims.
One a certain level I agree with what he writes in that post in the sense that we shouldn't let certain mental reflexes, which are no fault of ours, overpower our reason, compassion, whatever... But on the other hand, I have to agree with you at least in part, because that paragraph is just messed up (it's the exact part that startled me when I read the post[0] a few months ago). Without it, that post would be one of the rare reasonable things he wrote lately. It left a bad taste in my mouth not knowing what to think really. Although, he has gone on verbal racist sprees before, without much analysing own visceral processes.
EDIT: Oh, and just to add: he self appointed himself as a speaker for hacker culture. I don't think anyone has taken that seriously. Who cares what one person with delusions of grandeur thinks?
There should be a prize for taking things out of context. You'd win it. Here's some more relevant quotes from that citation [1], to show how you twisted it:
> For the first time in the fifty-five years of my life I found out what it was like to feel racist, from the inside.
> I was able to notice that, when paying attention with the top of my brain, I could not notice any rational reason for me to even dislike these people, let alone feel disgusted and revolted by them. I began to analyze my revulsion as though it were a specimen on a laboratory slide
> The most important point is that black people in particular have never made me feel repelled in the way minority X does. I’ve had black girlfriends and might not implausibly have ended up married to one of them,
> my hindbrain thought it was surrounded by alien shit zombies. My forebrain, meanwhile, was all like “What is up with you, hindbrain?” Apparently my human-recognition template needed some updating.
> The pressure on me eased a bit when I realized that what I was experiencing was a really severe case of Uncanny Valley reaction, and that more exposure to minority X might well stretch my template to the point where they didn’t seem so creepily repulsive any more.
So basically, you took him out of context, and selected choice quotes from your citation in order to make ESR look as bad as possible. You're an excellent propagandist. I'll be adding your nickname to the list of known trolls on HN. thanks.
One was: their skin color looks fecal. The other was: their bone structure doesn’t look human. And they’re just off-reference enough to be much more creepy than if they looked less like people, like bad CGI or shambling undead in a B movie. When I paid close enough attention, these were the three basic data under the revulsion; my hindbrain thought it was surrounded by alien shit zombies.
Speak for hacker culture?