The amount of propaganda is damaging my experience here. Not unlike Facebook and other platforms, HN seems to resist discussing how its platform is being abused and how it damages user experience; users are forbidden from discussing it publicly (in fact, I hope this comment is on the ok side of the guidelines, as I'm not accusing anyone in particular). I'm confident that HN works on the issue, so perhaps my difficulty is with a lack of transparency (again, similar to Facebook) - we have no idea what is being done; we're in the dark. We can't trust that the content we see is in good faith; it's a constant frustration and struggle to read, and most of my time is spent on noise. Propaganda is the worst content; it's noise to the signal and it's worse than noise because it manipulates HN users; we also now know, if it wasn't clear before, that it's a danger to free, democratic society - which is not something abstract, but something that happens right here on HN.
The pattern I see, so often that it's predictable and a source of frustration: 1. It's easy to stay beneath the moderators' radar by sounding 'reasonable' (in fact, on other topics, that's an explicitly taught strategy to white supremacists [0], it's a well-established technique of propaganda going back decades if not centuries, and I expect that professional astroturfers in any domain have the same skills); 2. the astroturfers almost always appear; I expected to see many pro-China comments appear here, including from purported Kenyans / East Africans (I certainly wouldn't say all are propaganda, but the pattern over many discussions seems clear enough that it's predictable); 3. on issues about which few HN users have knowledge or expertise, such as this one, there aren't even many people who can rebut the astroturfers; it's one-sided.
EDIT: Major revisions; apologies to anyone who read an earlier draft.
[0] ... he presented himself as polite, articulate and interested in cultural politics, and though his views are abhorrent, he stated them all so laconically you might forget that he actually believes in the concept of a white ethnostate. And that’s the point: The genius of the new far right, if we could call it “genius,” has been their steadfast determination to blend into the larger fabric of society to such an extent that perhaps the only way you might see them as a problem is if you actually want to see them at all.
No, this is not on the "ok side of the guidelines"—it's a gross violation. They say, and for good reason: "Please don't impute astroturfing or shillage. That degrades discussion and is usually mistaken. If you're worried about it, email us and we'll look at the data." (https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html) You did just the opposite. We've warned you about this before. We ban accounts that keep breaking the site guidelines, and if you keep doing this we will ban you.
No one is resisting discussion of abuse. We work against the abuse of Hacker News every day. When people raise concerns we look into it every time. The problem here is that you're inventing it out of whole cloth. What is the evidence? Some "pro-China comments" that "sound reasonable"? Someone expressing views you don't like is not evidence. People here have a wide range of backgrounds and therefore views.
In one sentence you project astroturfers out of purest imagination, and in the next are already talking about them as if they've been substantiated. That's the cheapest of internet cheap shots, it's poison to the community, and you can't post like this here.
General remark:
In the last few months this class of posts has migrated from "You're a Russian spy" and "how much did Putin pay you to post that" to "You're a Chinese shill". It's obviously the same phenomenon, and the fact that it swings so dramatically with political fashion already shows that this phenomenon is not factual, but mass-psychological.
There's an internet law that the probability of users accusing someone of astroturfing rises with the intensity with which they disagree with their view. I hope someone comes up with a pithy formulation and snappy name for it. Anyone?
> In the last few months this class of posts have all migrated from "You're a Russian spy" and "how much did Putin pay you to post that" to "You're a Chinese shill".
You are confusing me with someone else. I posted none of those things.
> We've warned you about this before.
I don't think so, but maybe a long time ago. Again, I think you're confusing me with another user.
You mischaracterize my comment in many ways; specifically, I didn't ask you to address astroturfing in this discussion, but instead was making a point about my user experience; I wouldn't have a reason to follow the guideline about emailing you as I understood it (though I'm not an HN lawyer and don't want to be one). But more than that, I spoke politely and tried to address problems I have as a user, and tried to avoid violating any guidelines by not accusing anyone. I don't think I deserve attacks and unfounded personal accusations about my motivations introduced into my day; I don't see how the latter is ever appropriate or necessary. Just say, 'that's not allowed here, here is why, please don't do it.' If I make a mistake, I'll apologize and try not to do it again.
Happy holidays.
P.S. I'll edit my other recent comment, which in this context might be inflammatory.
That sentence is a general observation about a large class of posts to HN and how they have been changing lately. I didn't mean you wrote all of them. To make that clearer, I've taken out the word "all" out and added "general remark" above.
Thanks. I still think you're thinking of someone else; please see my edit.
To be clear, I also think those remarks (accusing people of being shills) are a problem; I didn't think I made one, though I'll stay even further away from them.
This seems as if its pointed at me. I will say that I find it sad that modern discourse has reached such a sad state that we suspect everyone who has a nonconformist opinion of being a bot/robot/astroturfer.
All I will say is that I am no lover of China. Chinese civilization, like Western civilization has exhibited anti-black tendencies and attitudes. The Chinese are great lovers of African markets, but not African people.
I do encourage you though to try to understand the African perspective on this issue, as well as other related issues that you may not generally understand before you try to characterize it as propaganda. Modern Africa is in a state of flux and deeply in need of infrastructure. There are many who say there are heavy costs to Chinese built infrastructure in Africa, Those same analysts will not reflect on the severe costs currently to Africa of its lack of infrastructures. The absence of intra-regional rail, highways, of connected electricity grids, of pipes and pipelines. If the West is truly concerned about African welfare, they can always step to the fore with their own expansive infrastructure agenda, but they largely won't, and we all know the reason why.
It was not pointed at you or at anyone; it was a comment about my general experience as an HN user. I didn't realize that your account existed before you replied. My motives and knowledge, including about Africa (a word I personally wouldn't use for a very large and diverse area), are not what you assume; please don't attribute things to me.
FWIW, Western analysts have talked about the problems of Sub-Saharan African infrastructure extensively and for a long time, and the West has attempted to fund it. IIRC, generally it has been found that foreign-built and -funded infrastructure projects fail, due to problems like corruption, rule of law issues, lack of involvement by local communities, lack of understanding by foreign funders, and lack of capacity for maintenance. As an analogy, you can't just drop an infrastructure project on a country any more than you can just drop an ERP system on a company; the company has to be ready, have capabilities, and needs a lot of highly effective consulting if you want a chance of success. The West's prior attempts at funding led to a massive 'debt trap' for many poor countries, making debt relief a major priority (and one that was resolved to a large extent). As I understand it, the predominant view now is that developing local capabilities, including building institutions and functioning government, is a necessary precursor to things like infrastructure. Kenya's problem with the port, on its surface, would seem to be a repeat of the old development pitfalls.
> Here in Brazil people are starting to open up for the Chinese loans.
I read the opposite. What is that based on?
EDIT: In response to the reply below, a search shows plenty of research out there on this topic. (Sorry, I don't have time to read it myself right now.)
It's based on talking to people and watching them change their opinion though time.
It may be completely off due to sampling bias, but I don't think there is any source out there with better confidence, as I have never seen anybody doing a serious poll of the subject.
EDIT: Well, in reply to your edit, how did you search for that research? All I can see is trash news about some huge investment coming from China to Brazil in the future or how the next Brazilian president is a xenophobe that will reject money from anywhere. I still haven't seen any serious handle of the subject, by researchers or the press.
Can you back up this claim? My understanding is that, speaking very generally about a large continent, most African countries did not implement the economic fundamentals preached by the World Bank and IMF, but failed to due to corruption and institutional problems, including a lack of the rule of law. What African country adopted the rule of law, open markets, stable monetary policies, a significant reduction in corruption, and failed to prosper?
> the countries that did ignore its orthodoxy, from China in the late 1970s to then India in the early 1990s, prospered
China and India did not at all ignore the 'orthodoxy', but enacted it and that is credited with their economic expansion. China and India adopted capitalism, opened their markets, and adopted economic fundamentals such as stable monetary policy.
It is to my understanding that China was a relative latecomer to the World Bank and has never been a particularly heavy lender from the bank or the IMF, not to the extent that African states were subjected to. And furthermore while China did follow certain strains of the orthodoxy, it retained heavy state control and influence over many sectors and industries, something very few African states were able to retain following the Washington Consensus.
African states on the other hand, about 40 states in the 1980s underwent what we would call Structural Adjustment programs. State owned enterprises were sold, huge slashing cuts were made to education and healthcare(This in part decimated Nigeria's regional class university system), and various legal reforms for the benefit of Western investors. The results of those experiments were generally failed and led to a disastrous late 1980s and 1990s on the continent.
In terms of a country that implemented many of those reforms and failed to get that far. I would say both Ghana and Tanzania are pertinent examples. Ghana has implemented about three to four rounds of IMF engagement since the 1980s and is hailed regionally for its rule of law and stable political and investment climate, it still only has a GDP per capita of $1,641. Then you have Tanzania which since the 1980s has largely abandoned state socialism and embraced a mixed market economy, its GDP per capita? a whopping $936.
I think simplifying the issue distracts us from the real issues, which are complex. The U.S. uses its military for good purposes and for bad. Sometimes war is due to other country's actions, sometimes due to the U.S.'s (e.g., Iraq), and probably usually due to both.
For example, the immediate causes of many U.S. wars later turn out to be false, such as the destruction of the Maine which precipitated the Spanish-American War, the Gulf of Tonkin which began full-scale intervention in Vietnam, and the WMD in Iraq.
But even wars that are justified lead to bad outcomes, as the author states: What war hasn't had the consequences you quoted? Unfortunately, sometimes, those are the best outcomes available, but it's quite a moral decision to inflict that on others.
> No US military leader wants to fight a war; that notion is absurd.
I think your general point is good, but there are people, including people in government, who see war as a low-cost, acceptable means of achieving ends, including rallying domestic political support.
For example, at one point I noticed that over a short time hawkish Republican leaders in the U.S., including John McCain, favored increasing involvement in Afghanistan, attacking Iran (rather than negotiating), increasing involvement in Iraq, intervening in Syria, intervening in Egypt (IIRC), intervening in Sudan (in Darfur, though that might not have been contemporaneous), and intervening in Libya. If you look at a map, that's war in most countries from central Asia to near the middle of Africa's Mediterranean coast.
The GOP, starting before Trump, often vocally disdains the alternative to war, diplomacy. The Trump administration has taken it to a policy level worked to undermine the United States' relations with other countries and openly advocated, including in written op-eds from administration members, 'a return to geopolitical competition' - i.e., the state of things before WWII, which led to centuries of wars. They've abandoned treaty after treaty, and damaged the U.S.'s reputation so that they can't be trusted to adhere to future agreements (which I think is intentional, an attempt make the move away from diplomacy irreversible). The Trump administration openly works against the rule-based international order and openly opposes international law; the alternative to law and order is anarchy; the alternative to those mechanisms is war.
The Trump administration also has gutted State Department; they've attempted to gut its budget (Congress hasn't always agreed), they've cut and obstructed many programs, forced out a large proportion of talent (my vague memory is that they forced or urged out over a third of the most senior officers, who are, as I understand it, irreplaceable), and disrupted hiring.
Why would you destroy the means of diplomacy if you don't seek war?
In the two Heinlein books I remember, Stranger in a Strange Land and Job, the protagonist is a middle-aged man who has beautiful young women throw themselves at him. The women have no needs or agendas of their own; their only motivation is to please this man. Job seemed so much like the author's personal fantasy that I had to put it down.
Check out Farnham's Freehold, where a middle-aged man gets flung into the far future with his wife, daughter, and daughter's friend (and another guy). The wife goes crazy, and then the middle-aged man knocks up his daughter's friend. Then his daughter mentions to him that, of the men she's been stranded with, he's the one she'd prefer to father her child (if she weren't already pregnant). Her dad is completely undisturbed and in fact flattered by this.
People read what they want to read, but that’s not the Stranger I remember. And you’d have a different conclusion if you read Job to the end. You probably wouldn’t like the book any better, but it’s not remotely what you’re implying.
Edited to add: I realize post-juvenile Heinlein is not to everyone’s taste — and I’m personally convinced Double Star may be his finest single book — but if one is interested — Stranger, Glory Road, Starship Troopers, Moon is a Harsh Mistress, are all worthwhile — and different from each other.
I’m not gonna defend Farnham’s Freehold, but each of the other later Heinlein works not listed above has some merit, though mostly for real fans only.
> you’d have a different conclusion if you read Job to the end
Thanks for the tip. Someone else posted the spoiler. While it does change things, it still is a stereotypical middle-aged guy's fantasy - she is throwing herself at him, whatever her motive.
I read Stranger in a Strange Land when I was 14 years old and it was blindingly obvious, even then, with my incredible lack of life experience, that heterosexual relationships did not actually work like that.
> ...the protagonist is a middle-aged man who has beautiful young women throw themselves at him...
Given that that could be used to describe quite a lot of pulp sci-fi from that era, that is not much of an indictment. Writers, then as now, knew what their audience wanted.
I was thinking of the Buck Rogers novels and William Burroughs's John Carter when I wrote that but both of them turn out to be ~30. Older than the likely audience but younger than I had thought.
You should have finished Job because her throwing herself at him was part of the story. Spoiler alert but she was a plant working for the Devil from the start.
And SIASL isn’t about a middle aged man. It’s about a frickn Martian absolutely nothing like anyone on Earth.
Maybe so, but while Jubal certainly enjoys having three young beautiful women around him, it's made clear that there's nothing but teasing going on. At least that's my recollection.
Could some of the situation be due to differences between German and American conceptions and assumptions about journalism? I mean on a nuanced level; obviously German journalists don't think they should publish falsehoods. Purely as examples of differences that could have an impact: Maybe fact-checking is more the responsibility of the journalist; maybe 'news' is perceived more the way American journalism perceives opinion pieces, with their accompanying lower standards of accuracy (something I still don't understand - outright deception is commonly accepted in opinion pieces, in the most serious publications). It would be a mistake to assume all journalism is conceived of and operates in the same way, in all countries.
Also, Der Spiegel has long had an extraordinary reputation; my impression is that, of publications outside English-speaking countries, Der Spiegel has the best reputation among Americans. I'm not sure that many do their own evaluation, though Der Speigel looks like what we expect serious journalism to look like. Taking a longer view than just this immediate problem, do they deserve the reputation? If not, I'd be interested in who others recommend (outside English-speaking countries).
To be honest, I was quite surprised because I heard that Der Spiegel has an „extraordinary reputation“ in the U.S. for the first time today on HN.
I am German and even when I went to school (before the „life-sucking Internet“ from a comment below) there was the saying that all you could trust in Der Spiegel are the dates and numbers (although this article suggests even that might be too much).
IMHO, there are much better German-language news sources out there (Die Zeit, Frankfurter Allgemeine, Süddeutsche, Neue Zürcher Zeitung, Brand Eins, to name just a few with differing political leanings).
I think in the Netherlands we generally look at Der Spiegel also as a respectable publication. The Dutch Wikipedia entry on it calls Der Spiegel a "moral authority", among other things.
Fact-checking isn't just about dates and numbers, but about all facts presented in an article.
As a German I'm also surprised about that reputation. The Spiegel is somewhere between a serious newspaper (like FAZ, Süddeutsche or Zeit) and a tabloid (like Bild). Hunting for great headlines and stories, but not necessarily concerned with objective news reporting.
It's funny, because the Spiegel is a weekly magazine and the NYT a daily newspaper, which brings a lot of difference in the style of the articles. Th best German comparison to the NYT is the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) oder Süddeutsche (SZ).
Honesty is considered one of the highest of virtues in Germany. You can be blunt to the point of rudeness and people will still praise you for being "plainspoken". And talking about plagiarism: at least two federal ministers have had to resign in the last 10 years after it came out that they plagiarised parts of their PhD theses. Though obviously not all Germans are honest, honesty does has a very high standing in our culture. There is no excuse whatsoever for this kind of deliberate forgery, especially by a member of a profession whose job it is to "tell the truth".
The pattern I see, so often that it's predictable and a source of frustration: 1. It's easy to stay beneath the moderators' radar by sounding 'reasonable' (in fact, on other topics, that's an explicitly taught strategy to white supremacists [0], it's a well-established technique of propaganda going back decades if not centuries, and I expect that professional astroturfers in any domain have the same skills); 2. the astroturfers almost always appear; I expected to see many pro-China comments appear here, including from purported Kenyans / East Africans (I certainly wouldn't say all are propaganda, but the pattern over many discussions seems clear enough that it's predictable); 3. on issues about which few HN users have knowledge or expertise, such as this one, there aren't even many people who can rebut the astroturfers; it's one-sided.
EDIT: Major revisions; apologies to anyone who read an earlier draft.
[0] ... he presented himself as polite, articulate and interested in cultural politics, and though his views are abhorrent, he stated them all so laconically you might forget that he actually believes in the concept of a white ethnostate. And that’s the point: The genius of the new far right, if we could call it “genius,” has been their steadfast determination to blend into the larger fabric of society to such an extent that perhaps the only way you might see them as a problem is if you actually want to see them at all.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/03/magazine/FBI-charlottesvi...