I don't think I've ever seen a thread this bad on Hacker News*. The number of commenters justifying violence, or saying they "don't condone violence" and then doing exactly that, is sickening and makes me want to find something else to do with my life—something as far away from this as I can get. I feel ashamed of this community.
* Edit: It would have been clearer to say "I've never seen a mob dynamic this bad on Hacker News", since that is the type of bad thread I was talking about. (Obviously there are lots of other kinds of bad thread.) Alas, that didn't occur to me in the moment, and it led to various misunderstandings.
If you're wondering why I called this a "mob dynamic" it's because comments like the following were dominating the thread when I originally ran across it (but in order to read these, you'll need to have 'showdead' turned on in your profile.):
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47727099
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47726427
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47725722
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47725717
I'm pretty calloused after years of doing this job, but seeing so many comments openly exulting in, and egging on, violence against a specific person on Hacker News was deeply shocking to me.
* Edit: It would have been clearer to say "I've never seen a mob dynamic this bad on Hacker News", since that is the type of bad thread I was talking about. (Obviously there are lots of other kinds of bad thread.) Alas, that didn't occur to me in the moment, and it led to various misunderstandings.
If you're wondering why I called this a "mob dynamic" it's because comments like the following were dominating the thread when I originally ran across it (but in order to read these, you'll need to have 'showdead' turned on in your profile.):
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47727099
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47726427
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47725722
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47725717
I'm pretty calloused after years of doing this job, but seeing so many comments openly exulting in, and egging on, violence against a specific person on Hacker News was deeply shocking to me.