[HN Gopher] Orthodox Privilege (2020)
___________________________________________________________________
Orthodox Privilege (2020)
Author : omarious
Score : 105 points
Date : 2023-11-15 08:40 UTC (14 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.paulgraham.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.paulgraham.com)
| bell-cot wrote:
| (Article is from July 2020, FWIW)
| atleastoptimal wrote:
| The question is, do truly "orthodox" (in the sense that the essay
| means: bearing no controversial beliefs) people exist in large
| numbers? Fully center of every possible overton window?
|
| I'd wager these people are extremely rare. I'd guess the majority
| of people we consider to be fully "orthodox" and uncontroversial
| actually do have opinions it would be hard to express openly, but
| they're good at hiding that they have those opinions and "play
| the role" of an orthodox completely in any social context.
| keiferski wrote:
| _they 're good at hiding that they have those opinions _
|
| I think the answer to this question is that most people simply
| _don 't have opinions_ on the vast majority of subjects, and
| that "having an opinion" is largely an identity marker of the
| intellectually-minded - and not a basic quality that everyone
| has. So it's not so much that such people are good at hiding
| their unorthodox opinions, but that they haven't really thought
| about it in the first place.
|
| PG's other essay, "Keep Your Identity Small" is a good solution
| to this tendency of intellectually-minded people to want to
| have an opinion on everything.
| dauertewigkeit wrote:
| There are a whole lot of people whose "strategy" for navigating
| life is to always pick the side of the strongest group. For
| them being part of the mainstream as a form of protection is of
| higher priority than being correct/truthful/just/moral.
|
| I don't think pg was referring to this demographic, but there
| are certainly a whole lot of people who even take pride in
| being mainstream on every topic.
| bell-cot wrote:
| > ...a whole lot of people whose "strategy" for navigating
| life is to always pick the side of the strongest group.
|
| True. And all too understandable - human history is full of
| "...and things ended badly for the losing side".
| jstanley wrote:
| Your question subtly implies that to be "unorthodox" is to
| merely be not-quite-centered in the Overton Window.
|
| But in fact being in the Overton Window _at all_ makes you
| pretty orthodox.
| yarg wrote:
| This is frequently talked about regarding the scientific
| disciplines - it's very hard to make progress with novel ideas;
| and this despite the fact that every leap in understanding has
| been due to the novel contributions of novel minds.
| robg wrote:
| Great point, Kuhn's Structure of Scientific Revolutions covers
| the orthodoxy well and how it inhibits progress based on merit.
| keiferski wrote:
| A good essay, and one that relates to a bigger idea, which I
| think you could summarize as: a major trait of modernity (or
| post-modernity?) is the insistence that identifying and labeling
| things that happened in the past prevents them from happening
| today.
|
| You can see this play out with religious belief, politics,
| biology, on and on. We read about the Salem Witch Trials and
| laugh at those silly irrational people from the past...and then
| act in extremely similar ways ourselves.
|
| I'm not sure what the solution to this is, but I think studying
| the origins of popular contemporary ideas (in the way done by
| Nietzsche or Foucault) [1] is a good start.
|
| 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genealogy_(philosophy)
| 23B1 wrote:
| You're exactly correct on the solution, but allow me to take it
| down to a more fundamental level; the traditional liberal arts
| education!
|
| 1. Grammar to understand language
|
| 2. Logic to construct arguments based on reason
|
| 3. Rhetoric to articulate those ideas and refine them based on
| communicating with others.
|
| You're also correct in that it is post-modernism which is the
| root of much of this weird new orthodoxy. It has its place in
| academia, it's useful for deconstructing an idea or thing, but
| no place in running a society in which there must be standards
| of truth upon which we all agree.
| keiferski wrote:
| Yeah I wish the Great Books or a similar "classical liberal
| arts education" would make a comeback, but unfortunately it
| faces opposition from both the STEM set and contemporary
| liberal arts departments. Institutionally, I can't think of
| anyone doing this other than St. John's.
| Pet_Ant wrote:
| > Yeah I wish the Great Books or a similar "classical
| liberal arts education" would make a comeback,
|
| Being a better citizen does not result (directly) in a
| bigger economy and all educational institutions are under
| pressure to demonstrate how they are better at preparing
| students for the workforce. The liberal arts education
| suffers for this.
| bombcar wrote:
| There's a few other openly religious institutes doing a
| Great Books curriculum in the style of St John's.
| 23B1 wrote:
| The good news is that all the stuff you need to start your
| _own_ institution is "on chain" in the curricula itself!
| Spooky23 wrote:
| Worse, "classical liberal arts" has been hijacked by more
| reactionary types as a way to whitewash stuff in school.
| jimbokun wrote:
| I fear the people most advocating for "liberal arts
| education" today are also likely to be among the most
| orthodox minded.
| 23B1 wrote:
| Any cause or idea can be appropriated by people you don't
| like. Doesn't make the idea bad.
| jimbokun wrote:
| But it makes it difficult to get a classic "liberal arts
| education" if the people running liberal arts programs
| don't believe in it.
| 23B1 wrote:
| If you need the degree from an accredited institution, I
| suppose. But even then, it's not insurmountable to learn
| these concepts on your own and apply them in the real
| world.
| waihtis wrote:
| Indeed, on one hand you have a convoluted modern caste system
| which can irrationally change form at any given time - and on
| the other hand, you have philosophical ideas that have matured
| over hundreds or even thousands of years.
|
| It's not difficult to choose which way to follow.
| keiferski wrote:
| My point was more that the "irrational modern ideas" aren't
| just conjured from the ether, but can be traced through
| history back centuries, and that understanding this helps one
| recognize the issue.
| contrarian1234 wrote:
| > identifying and labeling things that happened in the past
| prevents them from happening today.
|
| I think to a degree it does? To me it made me think of Freud. I
| don't think you need to dissect the complex origins of things.
| Real life is too complicated and it doesn't give you clear
| answers. Instead you distill human behavior to some rough raw
| patterns that repeat and build a vocabulary to describe them.
| You can then short circuit conversations by calling out
| patterns.
| Almondsetat wrote:
| In order to establish an equivalence you have to develop a
| function that takes a modern situation and perfectly
| transposes it to a past situation. This way a person that
| believes that the past situation was bad will have to admit
| the present situation is also bad.
|
| Problem 1: it's difficult to construct such an equivalence
|
| Problem 2: it's difficult to communicate
|
| Problem 3: humans are not logical robots and can easily
| handwave it and ignore you
| contrarian1234 wrote:
| Right, operating by straight analogy doesn't work. If you
| say "X and Y are acting like NAZIs" that's generally not
| effective. That's why it's critical to distill thing and
| create a new vocabulary.
|
| If you take the Salem Witch trials in conjunction with
| other historical events and distill some general
| conclusions about human (group?) behavior and give it a
| label - then you can use history indirectly to improve
| discourse
|
| To the Freud example .. "You're acting like John at the
| last birthday party" probably won't get through to someone.
| But saying "I think you're projecting right now" likely can
| - b/c you're using a term that describes a common phenomena
| that everyone is familiar with. Before Freud described the
| defense mechanisms, people probably had a much harder time
| "calling people out" on these patterns.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _We read about the Salem Witch Trials and laugh at those
| silly irrational people from the past...and then act in
| extremely similar ways ourselves_
|
| How many of those laughing know have seriously studied that
| event? I haven't come across many who have who didn't
| immediately see the parallels to Nazism, McCarthyism and modern
| scapegoating politics.
| rufus_foreman wrote:
| You see parallels between the Salem Witch Trials and
| McCarthyism because the left made those comparisons
| repeatedly.
|
| For example, "The Crucible is a 1953 play by American
| playwright Arthur Miller. It is a dramatized and partially
| fictionalized story of the Salem witch trials that took place
| in the Massachusetts Bay Colony during 1692-93. Miller wrote
| the play as an allegory for McCarthyism".
|
| But there is a crucial difference between the witch trials
| and McCarthyism. Witches don't exist. Communists did exist.
|
| And by Communists, I mean members of and supporters of the
| Communist Party USA in the US government. The CPUSA was
| dedicated to the violent overthrow of democratic government
| in the US and its replacement with a dictatorship loyal to
| Stalin.
|
| After the release of Venona documents and Soviet archives, we
| know now with certainty that those Communists did exist -
| they weren't imaginary. They existed in high positions in the
| US government, they spied for Stalin, gave nuclear and other
| military information to the Soviets, they made government
| policy that favored Stalin, the US government knew many of
| their names, and did nothing about it for years, in some
| cases over a decade. When people pointed this out, they were
| called paranoid.
|
| I don't see the parallels to the Salem Witch Trials in that.
| I see gaslighting. I see blaming the messenger. I don't see a
| witch hunt.
| orwin wrote:
| Wow, so because a considerable minority of the CPUSA
| leaders and loudmouthes wanted to violently overthrow the
| US government, all their political overt allies needed to
| be removed from public jobs, the party was disbanded and
| all the leaders, even those not advocating for violence had
| to be put in prison.
|
| Imagine if they successfully stormed the Capitol, they
| would have been put to death.
| Joker_vD wrote:
| Yes, of course. Democracy is very important, so in order
| to protect it, even such extreme measures can be morally
| justified. And before you try to mirror this argument
| with what was happening in the USSR: the USSR was _not_
| democratic, it was totalitarian, and protecting
| totalitarism is never morally correct, period.
| p_j_w wrote:
| Can we take similar extreme measures against Trump
| supporters, as some of them actively tried overthrowing
| the democratically elected government?
| cauch wrote:
| I don't think what you call "witch hunt" is what the
| majority of people call "witch hunt".
|
| For example, when Trump says "they are accusing me of fraud
| but it is just a witch hunt", he does not say "fraudster
| don't exist", he says "those people have found someone they
| don't like, or have an interest to get rid of, or are super
| paranoiac, so they will jump on accusations and see
| 'proofs' that these accusations are real everywhere even
| when it's not the case".
|
| (I take Trump as an example where "witch hunt" was used.
| But in the case of Trump, I call BS: the reason he is so
| often accused is because he simply has done a lot of shady
| things)
|
| The historical witch hunt is a good example of that: people
| were trialed and found guilty, but we now know that witches
| don't exist, so it demonstrates that they did not really
| have any proofs, they were just so biased that every little
| thing was a proof to their eyes.
|
| This is the reason the McCarthyism is associated to the
| concept of witch hunt: during this time, any single element
| could have been overblown into the proof the person was
| anti-democracy communist ready to kill their neighbourgs
| even if it turned out this person had done absolutely
| nothing wrong and was innocent. And if there are arguments
| to justify very stringent background checks in some sector
| (military, politics, ...), this was extended to sectors
| where it was not at all needed, such as art and cinema (the
| worst they could have done was to put very hidden
| propaganda messages that would have had no effect on 99.9%
| of the viewers).
|
| And this is also why people talked about paranoia: it is ok
| to be careful and do a lot of background checks, but if you
| find a red socks in the bottom of the drawer and scream
| "ahAh, this is the proof this person is a commie", then,
| yes, you are paranoiac even if communists really exist.
| SenAnder wrote:
| > they were just so biased that every little thing was a
| proof to their eyes.
|
| While all the accusations were indeed false [1], they
| actually had surprisingly high standards of proof, and
| the modern perception of witch hunts is largely an
| ahistoric lie [2]. If there's one thing to learn from
| this, it's to question the stories we're told - both
| their content and their selection.
|
| [1] At least in the sense that witchcraft isn't
| _effective_ , not that there was nobody practicing
| witchcraft: https://www.reddit.com/r/WitchesVsPatriarchy/
|
| [2] https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/book-review-malleus-
| malefic... - Quoting at length because it's too funny:
| _How do you prove an accusation? Kramer's preferred
| method is with at least three witnesses (although judges
| are permitted to occasionally convict with fewer). Who
| may serve as a witness? [..] It would seem that maybe the
| suspect's enemies should not be allowed to testify
| against her, because they might be motivated by grudges.
| On the contrary side, most witches are people of bad
| reputation who have alienated their whole village [..] So
| Kramer compromises again: enemies may testify, but not
| mortal enemies. A person is considered a mortal enemy of
| a suspect if one of them has tried to kill the other, or
| their families have a blood feud, or something of that
| nature. [..]
|
| witch hunters are nomadic types. They don't know who is
| mortal enemies with whom in every little village. [..]
| Kramer's proposed solution is to ask the suspect to list
| off all her mortal enemies; if she names the witness,
| something is afoot.
|
| (Some of you may have already noticed a loophole here. A
| History Of The Inquisition In Spain describes the case of
| one Gaspar Torralba, accused in 1531: "There were thirty-
| five witnesses against him, for he was generally hated
| and feared. In his defence he enumerated no less than a
| hundred and fifty-two persons, including his wife and
| daughter, as his mortal enemies, and he gave the reason
| in each case which amply justified their enmity . . . The
| tribunal evidently recognized the nature of the
| accusation; he was admitted to bail, July 1, 1532, and
| finally escaped with a moderate penance.")_
| cauch wrote:
| By "was a proof to their eyes", I mean "was a
| demonstration to their eyes", in the "mathematical" sense
| of the term.
|
| You can have "legal" proofs that 2+2=5, for example by
| having a lot of witnesses testifying it's the case, but
| you still don't have any "mathematical" proof and you
| will never have any, because if the hypothesis is
| fundamentally incorrect, it is impossible to have a
| correct demonstration that the hypothesis is correct.
| (and I hope no one will react to that with Godel, it will
| just show that they totally missed the point)
|
| In both MacCarthyism and a witch hunt, even if the
| processes were super complicated, people were too easily
| accepting conclusions that are incorrect because they
| were too happy with these conclusions.
|
| This is for me the point of the expression "witch hunt",
| while the message I've reacted to explain that a witch
| hunt makes sense only if it concerns something that does
| not really exist.
| heyjamesknight wrote:
| Witches _do_ exist. Anyone who "practices witchcraft" is
| a witch.
|
| That witchcraft may not work. But you could still trial
| someone for practicing.
| SenAnder wrote:
| > You see parallels between the Salem Witch Trials and
| McCarthyism because the left made those comparisons
| repeatedly.
|
| There were also many other purges, notably in the Soviet
| Union and People's Republic of China, with which parallels
| could be drawn. Purges incomparably larger and bloodier.
| Yet strikingly little media draw these parallels [1],
| essentially lying through omission. There's no better
| example than Handmaid's Tale, that invented a whole new
| sexist society to draw parallels with Christianity instead
| of Islam.
|
| One must be aware that in the Plato's cave of media, those
| casting the shadows are not motivated solely by the pursuit
| of truth, nor are they a representative sample of the
| general population.
|
| [1] https://reason.com/2000/06/01/hollywoods-missing-
| movies/
| krisoft wrote:
| > Handmaid's Tale, that invented a whole new sexist
| society to draw parallels with Christianity instead of
| Islam.
|
| The point of the book is that religious fanatics can take
| over even in the USA. It is a cautionary story. It
| "invented" new things because it is a fictional book, not
| one describing real events.
|
| Atwood talked about how the Islamic revolution in Iran
| inspired her description of Gilead. If you don't
| understand the concept of taking something which happened
| "far away", to "other people", "a long time ago" and
| bringing it closer and making it more personal to the
| audience then you must be very new to this literature
| thing.
|
| > There's no better example than Handmaid's Tale,
|
| What do you think it is an example of?
| SenAnder wrote:
| > The point of the book is that religious fanatics can
| take over even in the USA
|
| That's _her_ point. _My_ point are the gymnastics done to
| substitute Islam with Christianity. If her work was the
| exception, with lots of other made-into-Netflix-
| miniseries works warning of Sharia, I would share your
| opinion.
|
| It gets even more skewed than Handmaid's Tale: The Woman
| King was perfectly fine depicting things that happened
| "far away", to "other people", "a long time ago". What
| the films was _not_ fine with was accurately depicting
| the African kingdom of Dahomey as slavers, and the French
| as (belatedly) fighting against slavery. So the film
| simply _reversed their roles_ [1].
|
| For a more topical example, look at how the Apollo affair
| [2] made it into popular media: Israel stole plutonium
| from the US for their weapons program. It inspired the
| book Sum of All Fears, in which the plutonium was instead
| stolen by Palestinians. By the time it was made into a
| star-studded movie, the villains became Neo-Nazis.
|
| There is always some artistic excuse to justify these
| politically useful alterations.
|
| [1] https://www.historyvshollywood.com/reelfaces/woman-
| king/
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Apollo_Affair
| krisoft wrote:
| > That's her point.
|
| Yup. And it is her book.
|
| > My point are the gymnastics done to substitute Islam
| with Christianity.
|
| Clearly here we disagree. I see no gymnastics. Christian
| religious fanatics are are actively meddling with woman's
| reproductive rights as we are discussing this.
|
| > It gets even more skewed than Handmaid's Tale
|
| The difference is that those two stories you mention are
| purporting to describe something which happened. Because
| of that you can ask if they are accurate or not. With
| something completely fictional that is not a valid
| question.
| SenAnder wrote:
| > Yup. And it is her book.
|
| Are you implying we should not critique or contextualize
| works in a way their authors would disapprove of?
|
| > The difference is that those two stories you mention
| are purporting to describe something which happened
|
| Only the Woman King - The Sum of All Fears is openly
| fiction. In fact, most media are works of fiction grown
| around a grain of truth. Or they should be. When that
| grain is changed to a lie, over and over again, it is
| prudent to notice.
|
| Or we can stubbornly find a different excuse for each
| case, and miss the forest for the trees.
| krisoft wrote:
| > Are you implying we should not critique or
| contextualize works in a way their authors would
| disapprove of?
|
| No. You made it sound like you have a problem with her
| book showcasing her opinion. As if that is somehow dirty.
|
| > When that grain is changed to a lie, over and over
| again, it is prudent to notice.
|
| Sure. You still failed to elaborate on the lie inherent
| in the The Handmaid's Tale. Must not be that great of an
| example if when I asked about it you rather started
| talking about two other unrelated stories.
|
| > Or we can stubbornly find a different excuse for each
| case
|
| I don't know what we are "finding an excuse for".
| woooooo wrote:
| Islam is external (to America, mostly), Christianity is
| internal.
|
| If you make it about Islam instead of Christianity, the
| solution becomes "bomb more arabs", rather than "watch
| out and don't accidentally become this".
| SenAnder wrote:
| As I said, there's always some excuse, different every
| time, but with the same result: defame your enemy. The
| issues in the Apollo affair or A Time to Kill [1] were
| internal, yet the villains and/or victims were still
| changed.
|
| [1] _Unlike Grisham 's depiction, however, the Scotts
| were white and their assailant was black._ - https://en.w
| ikipedia.org/wiki/A_Time_to_Kill_(Grisham_novel)
| p_j_w wrote:
| The only gymnastics going on are your gymnastics to make
| out that any criticism or warnings about fundamentalist
| Christianity are gymnastics because they should be about
| Islam instead.
| hackandthink wrote:
| Maybe you like Houellebecq's book:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Submission_(novel)
| Animats wrote:
| > There's no better example than Handmaid's Tale...
|
| There's Heinlein's "Revolt in 2100" (1953).[1]
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolt_in_2100
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _you see parallels between the Salem Witch Trials and
| McCarthyism because the left made those comparisons
| repeatedly_
|
| Have you read primary documents relating to the Salem Witch
| Trials?
|
| It is difficult to read them and believe key actors truly
| thought they'd found witches. Instead, a frustrated
| population was led to scapegoat their situation on social
| misfits. Yes, _some_ people probably believed they were
| genuine witches. But more crucially, the way they were
| pursued mirrors the way false accusations are levelled at
| marginalised groups across history.
|
| > _there is a crucial difference between the witch trials
| and McCarthyism. Witches don 't exist. Communists did
| exist... When people pointed this out, they were called
| paranoid._
|
| I agree completely. That said, there _are_ parallels, and
| their construction is a recurring theme.
|
| I mentioned the Nazis, but was specifically thinking of the
| _Eparation sauvage_. Nazi collaborators in France existed.
| But the way they were "pursued" was farcical. McCarthyism
| is similar--Communist collaborators existed in America. But
| McCarthy was _not_ considered paranoid, and he did not
| conduct pointed investigations; he was given broad powers
| to pursue and punish those he simply suspected.
|
| The lesson of these periods isn't solely that marginalised
| groups get punished. It's also that false accusations give
| real perpetrators cover. McCarthyism isn't solely a story
| of a breach of the rule of law and civil rights. It's also
| one of demagoguery facilitating actual breaches of our
| security.
| api wrote:
| Identifying and naming doesn't prevent things, but it makes
| prevention possible.
| heyjamesknight wrote:
| Only if we're actually capable of identifying and naming the
| right things.
|
| Calling everyone a Nazi because you don't like them doesn't
| prevent anything.
|
| The modern, cause-effect approach to history is great if you
| can actually identify all the causes and link them correctly
| to the proper effects.
|
| Medievalists would argue that each situation should be
| evaluated according to its place in a universal battle of
| good versus evil.
|
| I'm not currently sure which is better.
| giraffe_lady wrote:
| Took me a minute to catch that by "medievalists" you meant
| people living in the middle ages and not its contemporary
| meaning of people who _study_ the middle ages.
|
| Anyway though I don't think it's true even adjusting for
| that. Good vs evil is a model of causes, but not mechanism.
| Even if you orient in terms of it (which people still do!)
| you must identify causes and act on them, which also middle
| ages people did.
| gosub100 wrote:
| You don't call someone a nazi because you dislike them, you
| do it to circumvent having to address the merits of their
| argument. It's a brilliant tactical ploy: repurpose the
| atrocities of the holocaust (which thereby cheapens and
| lessens the event and its victims) to sling at your
| opponent.
| orwin wrote:
| >> studying the origins of popular contemporary ideas
|
| Isn't that part of postmodernism too? And the main critique of
| Marx's 'ideology' by postmodernism?
| keiferski wrote:
| Postmodernism typically refers to the collection of thinkers
| and ideas, whereas I was referring to our current period in
| time (postmodernity.)
| orwin wrote:
| In that case i think you are exactly right. We need a
| better word than postmodernity though. Information age?
| Knowledge era?
| keiferski wrote:
| Not sure. Those both sound very 90s to me. We do need a
| new term.
| singleshot_ wrote:
| We live in the future. (Of course, we will need a new
| word to call the time after the present shortly but
| that's the best one I can think of).
|
| Parenthetically, this whole idea of orthodox privilege is
| profoundly weak. The feature of our society should more
| aptly be called "normality incentive" and it's profoundly
| valuable to the extent we don't want a nation of hermits
| pulling in 340,000,000 different direction.
|
| If you'd like an example to this idea taken a bit too
| far, see Leo Strauss.
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| Modern era was cannons and muskets starting with the
| taking of Constantinople and ending with WW1.
|
| Postmodern era is machineguns, high explosives, tanks,
| planes, and now atomic bombs. Especially the last one
| plays a huge role in what wars even get started (think
| about the recent Ukraine/Russia and Israel/Palestine +
| Iran, and how they would (not) have happened if the
| ownership of the atomic weapons was reversed) - so Atomic
| age seems fitting ?
|
| But then I am not sure why you would want to separate
| them : for instance I don't think that the postmodern
| relativistic physics and the ideas of moral relativism
| common in postmodern thinking are unrelated...
|
| I think that one issue is when people say "modern" to
| mean "current", rather than "more than a century old".
| tejtm wrote:
| "those silly irrational people from the past...and then act in
| extremely similar ways ourselves."
|
| Aside; The which trials were not irrational, they were
| institution sanctioned land grabs.
|
| The theater is a distraction.
|
| https://salemwitchmuseum.com/locations/border-disputes/
| kubb wrote:
| Could be called "conservative bias" as well, but I guess Paul has
| to be careful with wording.
| chrischattin wrote:
| That's funny because the left currently dominates all aspects
| of culture, academia, work, and society. The orthodox is
| solidly "progressive" right now.
| threeseed wrote:
| The world isn't a binary choice between either left or right.
|
| The overwhelming majority of the world operates in the grey
| middle which is what is codified into policies, laws,
| precedents, standards, norms etc. And much of it is universal
| across the world e.g. the concept of professional conduct in
| companies.
| chrischattin wrote:
| Obviously. I'm just talking about the current state of
| affairs.
| threeseed wrote:
| That's the current state of affairs from your viewpoint.
|
| Which if you're seeing it through a left/right prism is
| flawed.
|
| Because my point is that most people don't see the world
| this way.
| malablaster wrote:
| There something true about it though. People see the
| world through "my tribe, not my tribe". Left vs right.
| Islam vs non-Islam. West vs non-west. Sunni vs Shia. etc.
| api wrote:
| Depends on which industries you are in and where you live. If
| you are in tech or finance this may be true to some extent.
| If you are in academia it's definitely true unless you are at
| one of those far right religious colleges.
|
| If you are in construction, energy, manufacturing, or
| countless other fields it's either not true or only present
| to a "token" degree in the form of some sensitivity training
| seminar you have to listen to for HR onboarding.
| dontlaugh wrote:
| Have workers seized the means of production throughout the
| world while I wasn't looking?
|
| You're just describing a change in ruling class aesthetics.
| Materially, little has changed.
| jimbokun wrote:
| Because the self described left has de-emphasized economic
| and labor concerns, and prioritize intersectional identity
| as defining oppressor and oppressed categories.
| justin66 wrote:
| That's not a difference in a group's emphasis, that's two
| different groups of people.
| jimbokun wrote:
| Two different groups claiming the same label.
| justin66 wrote:
| Or, in keeping with the theme of this comment thread,
| having the label imposed on them.
|
| Union members and people who use "intersectionality" in a
| sentence are not natural associates, let alone allies.
| kristiandupont wrote:
| >the left currently dominates all aspects of culture,
| academia, work, and society
|
| What a weird statement. Dominates _all_ of culture? Work?
| _Society_??!
|
| The extremes on both ends do definitely dominate in the
| public debate which is frustrating (and, I think, dangerous).
| It makes it seem like the average person is much less
| reasonable than I believe they are.
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| The extremes dominate the public debate, because the media
| is outrage-driven for clicks. Thus insane voices get
| amplified, and our public discourse goes insane.
| srackey wrote:
| Lol. They obviously do. For instance: how many people here
| had to change the name of their master git branch to
| "main"?
| Dowwie wrote:
| this is the kind of article where we see what we want to see
| kubb wrote:
| Well, conservatism is about keeping what there is, or going
| back to what there was. About tradition, about preserving
| what's considered familiar, normal. So an unorthodox view is
| not compatible with conservatism.
| Dowwie wrote:
| It is easier than ever to live in a bubble with an
| uncontested worldview that you believe is more widely
| shared and worth protecting. It is familiar to you, normal.
| Not only that but it is the best, to you.
| kubb wrote:
| Sure, it's sometimes easier, but not for everyone (e.g.
| gay people in deeply religious families). It's not clear
| if it's "the best, to you" either (this kind of valuation
| is subjective).
| karmakaze wrote:
| Orthodox: (of beliefs, ideas, or activities) considered
| traditional, normal, and acceptable by most people: orthodox
| treatment/methods.
| kitd wrote:
| > Paul has to be careful with wording.
|
| Ironically, this is the topic of the excellent linked essay on
| taboos and heresies:
|
| http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html
| jimbokun wrote:
| It's odd because much of orthodox thinking today is
| increasingly labeled liberal or progressive. Self described
| conservatives are increasingly out of the main stream.
| sn00tz00t wrote:
| Who are the 'real ones(tm)' on HN with the vision to see
| something that is most often inappropriate or hard to communicate
| here due to downvoting or lame rules? Take the opportunity to let
| us know here.
| chrischattin wrote:
| This place is a progressive echo chamber for sure.
| dannyobrien wrote:
| of course, amusingly, it's also well-known as a right-leaning
| forum too
|
| i used to think that the fact that both ideas were in
| currency indicated that it was probably unbiased. I now think
| that it probably means that the "right-wing"/"progressive"
| indicators are too simplistic a way to describe the actual
| underlying biases.
| chrischattin wrote:
| Good point. It's probably more accurate to say it is biased
| to whatever opinions benefit the YC business model (which
| is understandable. It's their forum, after all). For
| example, speaking out against anything other than very lax
| immigration policy is verboten because driving down
| American labor costs benefits VC's. Saying anything
| positive about the previous president will get you
| downvoted immediately.
|
| (This isn't related to my personal political opinions, I'm
| just using it as an example.)
| notahacker wrote:
| There are definitely strands of HN popular opinion that
| strongly align with YC'S business model (the idea that
| _funding_ and _scale_ are barometers for success and YC
| 's selection heuristics are actually how you should run
| your business) but I certainly wouldn't have picked
| migration as one of the example. If anything, I get the
| opposite impression when the notion of the threat to
| devs' one percenter status posed by _underpaid and
| exploited_ visa recipients willing to wrap text in
| javascript for a mere 100k per annum comes up, especially
| if that 's compared and contrasted with the general
| enthusiasm for the idea automating away everyone else's
| job and replacing it with a UBI. It'd be difficult to
| find anywhere else quite as hostile to the ads so many YC
| companies and their acquirers depend on either.
|
| They are good examples of the GP's comment about the idea
| of a position on a line between left and right wing
| orthodoxy being the wrong way to describe how HN
| coalesces around ideas though...
| meeuwer wrote:
| If the SVB debacle taught us anything, it is that even the
| most libertarian free-market aficionados love their "nanny
| state" when it's them who's in trouble.
| p_j_w wrote:
| Likewise, it's hilarious to see so many right wingers
| gnashing their teeth about orthodoxy now that Reaganism
| is out of style.
| ta8903 wrote:
| >it's also well-known as a right-leaning forum too
|
| Where? Not doubting you, but I've never heard anyone
| describe it that way.
| narag wrote:
| Look for articles about HN in non-technical media. Be
| warned: it's not pretty :)
|
| This one is hilarious:
|
| https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-silicon-
| valley/th...
| cubefox wrote:
| The way the author of this piece spins things seems to me
| a perfect example of showing just the progressive bias
| mentioned before.
| linuxftw wrote:
| This place (commenters) is majority hard-left. Any
| perception that it's 'right-leaning' is because the
| moderators are tolerant of non-leftist viewpoints. This, as
| you may know, constitutes heresy in leftist circles.
| narag wrote:
| Moderation and votes are two different things. Moderators
| only concern themselves with spam and outstanding
| violations of rules, that are mostly politeness rules.
| It's not like there are rules against certain ideology.
|
| Commenters and voters are the same thing and if we were
| all hard-left, any different viewpoint would be downvoted
| into oblivion, no matter what the moderators could think.
|
| My guess is that the people around here is a motley crew.
| Average would be leaning left, but much less than Reddit,
| to compare with something else.
| leoedin wrote:
| Technology is inherently about making things better. Whether
| it's just making a tool easier to use, or fundamentally
| changing how people behave - it's all about altering what we
| do now. It's not really possible to be a technologist and a
| (small c) conservative - the definition being "averse to
| change or innovation and holding traditional values.". Being
| "progressive" - by the dictionary "an advocate of social
| reform" - is at least compatible with the technologist
| mindset (although you could still be a technologist without
| any desire for social reform).
|
| Obviously the values held by "Conservative" political parties
| are not simply about being "conservative" - but it's not
| particularly surprising that people who like the idea of
| changing things aren't a big fan of a political movement
| which is based on doing things the way we always have.
| threeseed wrote:
| You don't own this website or the people that are here.
|
| So you can post whatever you like but you can't demand that the
| moderators allow it to stay nor can you expect that everyone
| should upvote you. Your freedoms can't usurp the freedoms of
| others.
| ogou wrote:
| Lots of people happily surrender the cold unknown of self-
| determination for the warm embrace of conformity. Conformity
| simplifies, affirms, and diffuses accountability. It's easy to
| understand the temptation.
| Joker_vD wrote:
| Besides, it's not like the chances that you will self-determine
| yourself into a better person than if you went for conformity
| are that good: after all, it's your first time doing this while
| the society, on the other hand, has lots of past experience
| with that, right?
| gnz11 wrote:
| It's just being human. Everyone "surrenders" to conformity in
| some way, shape or form. In some aspects of life you will be
| part of an in-group, in others you may lean towards non-
| conformity. Nothing to do with "temptation" here.
| gampleman wrote:
| Do people like that actually exist? It seems odd in a society
| where the words "cancel culture" are virtually inescapable.
| RandomLensman wrote:
| Was there on average a good payoff to being fully non-orthodox?
| Not so sure.
|
| Being somewhat heterodox, perhaps, but certainly within limits.
| WJW wrote:
| In addition to being non-orthodox, you also have to be right
| AND it has to be about a topic that lends itself to having a
| good payoff. You can be unorthodox and right about something
| but since the thing is 80s era laptop stand color scheme design
| there simply isn't a lot of profit to be had. It is also easy
| to be unorthodox about an important (high-payoff) thing, but
| simply be wrong. An airline that makes its route planning based
| on the idea that the Earth is flat could make an absolute
| killing if it actually were flat, but it isn't so it can't.
|
| The combination of all three is pretty rare.
| cubefox wrote:
| Many, if not most, unorthodox truths can be very important,
| but don't offer an individual a large payoff when they
| believe them. For example, it is the middle ages, and you
| believe that witches don't exist. This is both an important
| truth and offers you approximately zero payoff.
| RandomLensman wrote:
| Might have even been a negative payoff if you had pursued
| it more publicly then.
| cubefox wrote:
| Yeah, saying unorthodox opinions out loud results in
| social penalties. That's why examples can't be produced
| for people who believe unorthodox opinions don't exist.
| jimbokun wrote:
| I imagine it's a high risk high reward strategy.
|
| You cannot get outsized returns from following the orthodox
| strategy everyone else is following.
|
| But being unorthodox also risks ostracism from main stream
| society and all the consequences that entails.
| RandomLensman wrote:
| Not sure that orthodoxy itself stops you from getting very
| far.
| bambax wrote:
| > _the source of their opinions is whatever it 's currently
| acceptable to believe_
|
| Is this a typo: _whatever is currently_...?
|
| > _If someone says they can hear a high-pitched noise that you
| can 't, it's only polite to take them at their word, instead of
| demanding evidence that's impossible to produce_
|
| Impossible how? That particular example would be extremely easy
| to test. It's so easy in fact that it's performed many times
| every day by audiologists. _Raise your hand when you hear the
| sound._
| alberto-m wrote:
| People suffering from tinnitus constantly hear high-pitched
| sounds. For a minority of them the sound is really present
| (produced e.g. by the blood in the vessels near the ear), but
| for most of them it is an illusion produced by their brain. The
| latter category have no means to prove someone else they are
| really hearing the sound.
| bambax wrote:
| Ok, but the phrasing _" If someone says they_ can _hear a
| high-pitched noise that you can 't"_ really doesn't sound
| like the OP is referring to (constant) tinnitus, instead of
| an ability.
| anonymouskimmer wrote:
| Impracticable would have been a better word. Audiologists
| typically aren't just around the corner, and even if they were,
| the high-pitched noise may no longer be audible in their
| office.
| boffinAudio wrote:
| Personal responsibility is hard. Responsibility for ones nation
| state, even harder.
|
| When you live in a society which is murdering innocent people
| every twenty minutes, its hard to evaluate ones own privilege in
| that context - especially if you're ignoring the cost of that
| action and its effect on your personal life.
|
| It doesn't matter how enlightened one is, or how woke - if you're
| still using streets that were paid for, in the blood of foreign
| innocents, you're not better than the totalitarian-authoritarian
| fellow citizen you despise so much because of their privilege.
| You're _both_ members of a nation state that is abusing its
| privilege.
|
| So its one thing to have an internal civil war on the subject of
| classes one finds offensive to ones world view - its another
| thing to ignore the impact of your nations' actions on those not
| privileged to have been born in it.
| dustfinger wrote:
| Maybe it is just early in the morning for me, but I am not
| confident that I understand why Paul switched the roles in the
| concluding statement of the essay.
|
| > Similarly, if someone says they can think of things that are
| true but that cannot be said, it's only polite to take them at
| their word, even if you can't think of any yourself.
|
| That statement suggests to me that the responsibility of being
| polite should fall on those in the orthodox privileged
| demographic when challenged by those claiming that there are
| truths that cannot be safely spoken. It seems flipped around from
| the rolls expressed in the body of the essay, and that has me
| confused. How would they know to be polite? How is this actually
| a solution?
| ExitPlatosCave wrote:
| Possibly... Take them at their word that they can they really
| believe what they are saying is true.
|
| Thus being polite versus thinking they are deliberately
| deceiving you.
|
| But not that you have to also accept what they say as correct
| or true for yourself.
| dustfinger wrote:
| I understand that part of the essay. However; the essay
| argues that the orthodox privileged group is the one that
| cannot see that there are truths that cannot be safely
| expressed, but concludes that this same group should be
| polite to those that believe such truths exist. If my
| understanding is correct, how could they know to be polite to
| those outside of their demographic. For that, they would need
| to be sympathetic, or at the very least empathetic.
|
| I guess my big problem with the concluding statement is that
| it places the responsibility of resolving the impasse on the
| demographic that is apparently incapable of imagining the
| world from the others perspective. That seems futile in the
| absence of empathy. Whose responsibility is it then, to
| establish a sense of empathy amongst the majority of the
| orthodox privileged group (empathy would be needed in the
| other group as well of course)?
|
| Consider also that an obligation to be polite and silence
| ones voice from engaging in meaningful discourse, may very
| well be what ultimately leads to an orthodox privileged group
| in the first place, making the proposed solution a paradox.
| AnimalMuppet wrote:
| You can _ask_ them to be polite. They 're not going to know
| that there's anything to be polite about on their own.
| jimbokun wrote:
| Agreed. That seemed a non-sequitur to me, too.
| cubefox wrote:
| > How would they know to be polite?
|
| From being told: "It would be polite if you assumed that there
| are potentially true opinions that cannot be safely expressed
| in public."
| Xcelerate wrote:
| I've always found it interesting how if you know someone's strong
| opinion on issue X, you can typically predict their views on
| issues Y and Z even though there is no inherently fundamental
| relation between X, Y, and Z. All you need to know is the country
| and the time period they live in.
|
| The fact that views are so tightly correlated on the basis of
| party has always fascinated me, and I wonder if there is a way
| you can measure the amount of "in-groupism" someone exhibits.
| This is probably just another term for conformity or a lack of
| independent thinking, as Paul mentions.
|
| I was speaking with a relative recently who claimed he was very
| independent-minded and that his views didn't match the
| mainstream. I replied that his views seemed to exactly match the
| _opposite_ of the views of party X in the U.S. in 2023 and said
| this doesn't make you independent, but rather a contrarian. You
| are still in fact letting party X determine what you think. What
| is the chance that if born elsewhere your morality would just so
| happen to match up with the views directly opposite to those of
| some specific social group in another time period in another part
| of the world?
|
| For someone who is truly an independent thinker, one would expect
| their views to sometimes match party A, to sometimes match party
| B, and to sometimes match neither. This isn't to say that merely
| being a nonconformist makes someone more likely to be correct;
| there are bound to be plenty of mistakes even among independent
| thinkers.
|
| Paul has written quite a few essays on this subject, so by now
| I'm really curious what viewpoint(s) he has that he can't say
| aloud (and whether I agree). I've noticed in Silicon Valley there
| are quite a few people who--after deeper conversation with them--
| seem to be independent thinkers, but they pretend to follow the
| in-group for the purpose of maintaining social harmony; this
| seems especially common among people born outside the U.S. living
| in the Bay Area.
| meeuwer wrote:
| There's a simple litmus test for independent-mindedness: does
| the person in question do the continuous work of collating
| "news" and narratives from all across the spectrum? If not,
| they're likely going with "the current thing" of their
| preferred echo chamber, which may or may not be real.
| mistermann wrote:
| This heuristic would essentially lead one to believe that
| independent-mindedness is largely not possible would it not
| (the explicit "probabilistic" claim in the conclusion)?
| meeuwer wrote:
| I meant it in a more technical sense, as in "I start my
| morning by checking 4-5 news outlets from different corners
| of the political field and try to figure out what's really
| going on by comparing the narratives". That of course is
| not sufficient; one has to do their homework on prior
| history of whatever the contentious issue is.
|
| And yes, probably it's not an activity most people engage
| in.
| Spivak wrote:
| Hello! I work in local politics as a side-hustle/volunteer
| effort. This litmus test is absolute bullshit because it
| ignores the massive swaths of issues that are party
| orthogonal and don't make headlines. When actually pressed
| the liberalest liberal who's ever liberaled with a car bumper
| full of stickers will actually have a unique set of political
| views once you move past the like six wedge issues and vice
| versa. And the more interesting one is the reasons behind a
| view vary wildly. I was taken aback when I talked to a very
| conservative gay veteran who said that trans people shouldn't
| be in the military because, "they won't get the care they
| need" and that people should all have guns to shoot crooked
| cops.
|
| And the other problem is that those "unrelated" views on both
| sides of the spectrum are actually way more related than
| people assume and those common threads _define the group_ so
| it 's not at all surprising that you can see a theme and make
| predictions based on it.
|
| An easy one for liberals, asymmetric power dynamics are bad.
| You can follow this theme to lgbt rights, blm, general anti-
| corporation, defund the police, drug decriminalization,
| generally anti-prison, supporting Ukraine, supporting
| Palestine against Israel, but also supporting Jewish
| populations at home, reducing the size of the American
| military, strong labor laws, unions, immigration, defunding
| ICE, civil rights, anti-insurance/single-payer healthcare,
| breaking up monopolies, taxing billionaires they all stem
| from this. You show me a sympathetic underdog and I'll tell
| you who the liberals will support lol.
| meeuwer wrote:
| Leaving aside your focus on political views (even though
| the test I proposed is more about getting better informed
| than diversifying one's beliefs and prejudices), what's the
| typical case you're getting at: do people have unique sets
| of political views or are those views more clustered "than
| people assume"? You sort of started arguing for the former
| and then pivoted.
| Spivak wrote:
| There are two groups of issues, ones that stem from the
| core defining beliefs of the groups that cause
| individuals to self-label as members in the first place
| and everything else. You'll see a lot of unity on the
| former and surprisingly little unity on the latter
| outside of transient political coalitions of convenience.
| Once you stray from things that are rooted in the core
| values of a group you'll find huge amounts of
| disagreement and that individuals have extremely varied
| views taken holistically.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| > There's a simple litmus test for independent-mindedness:
| does the person in question do the continuous work of
| collating "news" and narratives from all across the spectrum?
|
| Simple? What if they think the entire range to care about are
| "my conservative grandfather" and "my liberal in-laws"? In
| other words this isn't a litmus test unless the person _even
| knows_ what the spectrum is.
|
| Which is the point at which you return to Orthodoxy
| Privilege, or rather Ideology as people other than Paul "Not
| Invented Here" Graham has been calling it for over a century.
| meeuwer wrote:
| Who said the test has to be self-administered? "This isn't
| a litmus test unless the solution even knows what the pH
| range is".
| avgcorrection wrote:
| Who administers the test does not change the point I was
| making.
| BurningFrog wrote:
| Humans are tribal by nature.
|
| We also use Motivated Reasoning to convince ourselves that the
| opinions we hold for tribal reasons are in fact good moral ones
| we came up with ourselves.
|
| I doubt this will change. Act accordingly.
| cptnapalm wrote:
| "seem to be independent thinkers, but they pretend to follow
| the in-group for the purpose of maintaining social harmony"
|
| Preference falsification [0]. There's a book called Private
| Truths, Public Lies by Timur Kuran which delves into this.
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preference_falsification
| bambax wrote:
| > _Paul has written quite a few essays on this subject, so by
| now I'm really curious what viewpoint(s) he has that he can't
| say aloud_
|
| One approach would be to list issues that can't be said aloud
| today...
|
| Many sensitive topics are simply partisan: you can be pro-life
| or pro-choice, as well as pro- or anti- guns, death penalty,
| socialism, capitalism, science, war, even democracy! You can
| say anything on any of those topics without fear of being
| shunned by everybody. You will upset some people, but not all
| of them.
|
| The only opinions that will get one instantly banned from
| pretty much everywhere, that I can think of, are sexism and
| racism. (And rightly so, may I add.)
|
| So when someone says "there are things that are true that can't
| be said", I wonder if they're entertaining thoughts that I
| would find... unpalatable.
| cubefox wrote:
| Some things could be true but still taboo. You may believe
| (with the orthodoxy) that they are false, but this doesn't
| change the possibility that they are true. And if they are,
| believing them can't be immoral.
|
| (Arguably, even believing falsities can't be immoral, because
| beliefs aren't the type of thing that are morally right or
| wrong. It's rather intentions for actions than can be so.)
| bambax wrote:
| > _Some things could be true but still taboo_
|
| Well yes, that's the whole discussion. It's possible that
| some things that are taboo, are true.
|
| It's even likely! because why else would there be a taboo?
| Society doesn't need to put a taboo on things that are
| obviously, totally wrong, like "the earth is flat".
| Arguably, a taboo is only needed to hide a possible truth.
|
| The question is: what are those things? Or if not the
| things themselves, the domains, the general topic?
|
| I can't think of any subject that cannot even be alluded
| to, like Voldemort.
| cubefox wrote:
| You can't think of a subject matter that is taboo?
| oalae5niMiel7qu wrote:
| You just admitted you know of two things that will get
| you banned everywhere. Then you said that taboos (such as
| against the things that will get you banned everywhere)
| are only needed to hide possible truths. Connect the
| dots.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| > Paul has written quite a few essays on this subject, so by
| now I'm really curious what viewpoint(s) he has that he can't
| say aloud (and whether I agree). I've noticed in Silicon Valley
| there are quite a few people who--after deeper conversation
| with them--seem to be independent thinkers, but they pretend to
| follow the in-group for the purpose of maintaining social
| harmony; this seems especially common among people born outside
| the U.S. living in the Bay Area.
|
| Think about this a little more. When you see people being very
| opinionated against or for something it is most likely in
| public in broad daylight. They "toe the line" and rally the
| wagons. But maybe in private--when among friends and they don't
| have to put up a front--they can be more nuanced.
| cubefox wrote:
| > Paul has written quite a few essays on this subject, so by
| now I'm really curious what viewpoint(s) he has that he can't
| say aloud (and whether I agree).
|
| Discussing them here (in a public forum) isn't really an
| option. Because they are generally outside the Overton window,
| they are likely also outside the Overton window here on HN.
| Which means one would get voted down or flagged if one talked
| about it here.
|
| The safe place to talk about such heretical opinions is between
| good friends you know wouldn't ostracize you for saying
| something blasphemous, or when talking to a person you know has
| a very low tendency for conformity.
| oalae5niMiel7qu wrote:
| It's less likely that those people are truly independent, and
| more likely that they simply brought the orthodox beliefs of
| their countries of origin to the Bay Area.
| doriss wrote:
| Very impressive essay, I have this feeling long time ago, but
| didn't interpret well.
|
| I think the best way is to make people realize some of their
| sensor, mindset or feeling are set by others, especially those
| silence area we can't even mention. Like a mobile phone's default
| settings, we have to realize that some things are just set up to
| be this way and can be presented in other ways.
| hibernator149 wrote:
| I found that it is really hard to go against the mainstream of
| the bubble you live in for two reasons: Let's take issue X as an
| example. One side says X is always true, the other that it is
| always false. But you think that actually "it depends". The two
| problems are then:
|
| (1) When you don't fully agree with your bubble on X, the more
| extreme ones will assign you to the opposite bubble and shun you.
|
| (2) There are people in the opposite bubble that will pretend to
| believe X "depends" in order to lure less extreme members over to
| their own bubble. And many in your bubble will believe that you
| are one of those.
|
| We are so caught up in our tribal thinking that many will simply
| not believe that you genuinely think "it depends".
|
| I believe that this is "by design", that someone is dividing and
| conquering the public. Many will agree with me here, and then
| they will finish with "but the other side is too brainwashed to
| notice"... Knowing that it is a trap, does not help you to avoid
| it ;)
| preommr wrote:
| > that someone is dividing and conquering the public.
|
| Yea that someone is society.
|
| Tribalism happens because the feverent supporters are the ones
| that actually give money, time, etc. Someone that sees the
| nuance, is more likely to be okay with either solution, or said
| another way, not likely to give money to one side because they
| don't want to fully endorse one side.
|
| The people supported then go on to be politicans and media
| personalities that then force people to pick sides because it's
| more advantegous to them.
|
| It's an oversimplification, and not always applicable but a
| decent enough explanation for lots of our problems.
| silexia wrote:
| Or consider that certain laws passed by the government suppress
| alternative points of view that conflict with the mainstream, so
| that even if the views are true, they still are squashed.
| jimbokun wrote:
| US still has a pretty robust First Amendment. Laws violating it
| consistently get struck down in court.
| cies wrote:
| I think "orthodox" here is not the best choice of words. After
| reading the article I think "mainstream privilege" better
| captures what PG tries to describe.
|
| This because orthodox tend to refer to "wanting to stick to, or
| go back to, how it was"; which could be very much against the
| mainstream opinion of today.
| TremendousJudge wrote:
| That's not what _orthodox_ means to most people. It usually
| means something like "conforming to established doctrine"
| (especially in a religious context). The definition you posted
| would better fit the word _conservative_ in my view.
| giraffe_lady wrote:
| Literally means something like "correct opinionism" in greek.
| Which as a lifelong member of the eastern orthodox church I
| have always found hilarious. Out the gate starting an
| argument with the name.
| motohagiography wrote:
| This works on a micro level in companies where groupthink has
| taken hold, but also at a macro level where our media exalts
| sycophancy. Privilege for mouthing orthodoxies describes "the
| banality of evil," well. It was a reference to people who thought
| in slogans and recieved cliches, which dulled them to the
| consequences of what they were actually doing.
|
| Coining new phrases to respond to the present may shed some light
| for younger people who lack perspective, but it doesn't capture
| the gravity of what we're watching happen. There are precedents
| with strong predictive power for all of this.
| asow92 wrote:
| > This works on a micro level in companies where groupthink has
| taken hold,
|
| As someone who feels this daily, appealing to politeness as the
| essay suggests often does help. You're basically living in
| different versions reality, which is frustrating, but that
| doesn't mean you can't find some common ground and work
| together. After-all, it's just a job, and we shouldn't take it
| personally.
| stratigos wrote:
| Except for when those that live in some alternate reality
| demand that you also abide by their alternate reality or be
| punished.
| asow92 wrote:
| /s But isn't it fun to role play as thought criminal in
| 1984?
| woodruffw wrote:
| Insofar as orthodox privilege is a real phenomenon, one of its
| greatest strengths is its ability to cast a smokescreen around
| wealth, power, and influence.
|
| Paul Graham is an obscenely wealthy and powerful man; he benefits
| disproportionately from controlling the public discourse around
| what is or isn't "orthodox." This is worth remembering when he
| (or any other phenomenally wealthy and powerful person) attempts
| to lay out these kinds of oblique culture war positions.
| robg wrote:
| Isnt this ad hominem itself a "culture war position"?
| giraffe_lady wrote:
| What? No. Y'all use this word way too much get a grip.
| Floegipoky wrote:
| No, this is class consciousness, and by conflating these
| things you've strengthened their point.
| Floegipoky wrote:
| I'll assume that this was downvoted because the "culture
| war" dividing America is one of the preeminent expressions
| of class warfare in this country, and therefore
| acknowledging class _is_ inherently engaging in the
| "culture war". Which, fair point.
| Levitz wrote:
| I think that's naive. Class consciousness is being aware
| that those with wealth _are the ones who set the orthodoxy
| to begin with_. Paul Graham writing a blogspot is
| irrelevant, he is barely exercising his position while
| doing so.
|
| Look for corporate meddling into politics and culture war
| if you want a smokescreen. The current culture wars being
| identity-based isn't an accident, for example, there won't
| be a worker's right month same as there won't be a worker's
| right parade, no corporation is putting money into that.
| anonymouskimmer wrote:
| > there won't be a worker's right month same as there
| won't be a worker's right parade
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cesar_Chavez_Day
|
| https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=Cesar+Chavez+Day+parade&
| atb...
| woodruffw wrote:
| I don't think that the underlying observation (wealthy,
| powerful people stand to benefit disproportionately from
| confusion about how society allocates privilege) is ad
| hominem. Unless being characterized accurately as wealthy and
| powerful is an insult.
|
| It's a culture war position in the sense that it's a response
| to one.
| sdwr wrote:
| Paul Graham is (was) a lonely nerd who felt different than
| other people. The smokescreen is maintaining this self-
| identity when his practical situation changed.
|
| Reminds me of Kanye, who has been keeping his embattled
| underdog act up the entire time.
|
| EDIT: not to criticize too heavily, the post is very good
| jimbokun wrote:
| This is a perfect example of an ad-hominem argument.
| woodruffw wrote:
| It's an observation; I don't think I've stated anything that
| isn't (1) public knowledge, or (2) common sense about how
| wealthy and powerful people maintain wealth and power.
| cal85 wrote:
| Yes, all ad hominems are observations. The point is they
| are merely observations about the person making the
| argument, not the argument itself. They aren't necessarily
| false, and they may even be interesting to some people, but
| they fail to tackle the argument. An argument's validity
| doesn't depend on who spoke it, so if you think it is
| invalid, you might attempt to explain why.
| woodruffw wrote:
| I don't have an opinion about whether it's valid or
| invalid, and I don't think 'pg does either. I think this
| _kind_ of argumentation is psychological dressage for
| ego-dystonic rich and powerful people.
| lcnPylGDnU4H9OF wrote:
| This seems to be not an _ad hominem_ argument because it
| seems to be not an argument. What are they arguing?
| cubefox wrote:
| > he benefits disproportionately from controlling the public
| discourse around what is or isn't "orthodox."
|
| I don't see any evidence this is true, not even that he
| controls public discourse in any significant way.
| woodruffw wrote:
| We are posting on a website that he created, and that he
| defined the original (and primary) scope of discourse for.
|
| But more directly: at least two people have called my comment
| an ad hominem; 'pg is arguably the single person most
| responsible for popularizing the dismissal of critiques as
| "ad hominem" among technical people[1]. Note that even he
| doesn't make the ridiculous claim that personal observations
| are _inherently_ irrelevant.
|
| [1]: http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html
| cubefox wrote:
| It seems the Overton window on Hacker News is pretty much
| the same as elsewhere. Which doesn't look like pg is
| controlling anything.
| karmakaze wrote:
| I see this as the yappy little dog that's only yappy when its
| owner is around to 'back em up'. We can't really blame the dog
| growing up in its environment and turning out the way it did. We
| should all avoid bubbles and have more intermingling of groups so
| we don't end up with default views for too many things.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| Alexa, what is ideology?
| whalesalad wrote:
| My favorite use of chatgpt is having it explain pg's posts to me.
| It does a pretty good job there.
| stratigos wrote:
| If you dont believe Orthodox Privelege exists, work in San
| Francisco for a few years. Provided you are a critical thinker,
| it will become obvious that the culture is akin to
| excommunication for declaring the universe is not geocentric.
| Floegipoky wrote:
| On the one hand, I think this highlights an important "blind
| spot" in human thought. Our ideas and creativity are hugely
| influenced by our environment and prevailing social conventions.
| It's strange he doesn't use the term "Overton Window", because
| that's exactly what he's talking about and it seems useful to
| place his thoughts in context with the existing body.
|
| On the other hand, I vehemently disagree with the implicit
| assertion that any truth should be acceptable to give power. It's
| easy to filter, twist, and reassemble the truth to deceive and
| manipulate. Humanity has already paid too steep a price learning
| why some truths and ideas must be rejected. In fact, the ideology
| of "free speech absolutism" is itself an orthodoxy specific to a
| relatively small cultural bubble, and it's objectively quite
| extreme.
| cubefox wrote:
| > Humanity has already paid too steep a price learning why some
| truths and ideas must be rejected.
|
| Honest question: When is it _ever_ advantageous to reject
| truths? I always remind myself of the Litany of Gendlin:
| What is true is already so. Owning up to it
| doesn't make it worse. Not being open about it
| doesn't make it go away. And because it's true, it
| is what is there to be interacted with. Anything
| untrue isn't there to be lived. People can stand
| what is true, for they are already enduring it.
| anonymouskimmer wrote:
| > When is it ever advantageous to reject truths?
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-fulfilling_prophecy
|
| I.e. It becomes problematic when it involves human behavior
| at a stereotypical level. This isn't to say that stereotypes
| don't sometimes exist for preexisting (non-self-fulfilling)
| reasons, but even some people prone to sociopathy can leave
| good lives if properly treated.
| oalae5niMiel7qu wrote:
| Treating sociopaths is not the same as lying about
| sociopaths or sociopathy because you think doing so will
| prevent sociopathy.
| anonymouskimmer wrote:
| Sure. The key is whether a statement is a genuine truth,
| or a policy based on a genuine truth plus various moral
| priors. Moral priors aren't genuine truths, they're
| predilections or rules of thumb.
|
| And even baldly stating a genuine truth enough times will
| have effects outside of its truthfulness. People respond
| to truths, they don't just hear them.
| ebiester wrote:
| I will defend "orthodox privilege."
|
| The problem with unorthodox thinkers, as Graham defines them, is
| that they are often not grounded in expertise. For example, I
| will take an unorthodox opinion of my own: Neither socialism nor
| capitalism are great economic systems and we need novel thought
| on new economic systems that are not based in industrial
| revolution assumptions.
|
| (Another, to give a guttural rather than intellectual reaction
| from some: I believe we should change the culture that gender is
| not presented publicly until the child chooses a gender. They are
| also given provisional names that are unisex and are allowed to
| choose their own name at puberty.)
|
| However, I have not spent the years of deep thought to truly
| develop the arguments. While I have a lot more invested into
| gender studies than the average human, I am not an expert. Expert
| goes far further than reading a few books and watching some
| YouTube videos. The burden on me is far higher than just saying,
| "this is what I believe" because they are unsubstantiated.
|
| The truth is that if you have a plethora of unorthodox views, it
| is likely because you have not performed in-depth research to be
| an expert. You likely do not understand the landscape of the
| arguments, the historical context and critiques, and the nuances
| to the argument because understanding all of that can take months
| of study and interaction with the experts.
|
| That doesn't mean that you need some sort of degree: An
| unorthodox opinion that is well-substantiated, for example, is
| Tim Ferriss's examination of psychedelics. He has obviously put
| in the work and has put money in experts' hands to validate those
| ideas. This is in stark contrast to the work that many put into
| their unorthodox opinions.
|
| But ultimately, most people would do better if they acknowledged
| that their opinions in places outside their expertise are largely
| shallow.
| bambax wrote:
| This is a great point. Not the final answer, maybe, but an
| important observation: that paradox often stems from ignorance.
|
| It could be argued (it is sometimes argued) that ignorance
| fuels creativity ("he did it because he didn't know it was
| impossible", etc.); but more often than not, creativity stems
| from a deep familiarity with a given topic, and the ability to
| detect / invent connections between different subject matters
| that are not obvious, or indeed visible to anyone else.
| cubefox wrote:
| I think the examples you name aren't what pg has in mind. It's
| more like saying "God doesn't exist" in the year 1800. It was
| highly taboo to say something like this, and doing so would
| immediately damage your social standing.
|
| The other point is: he doesn't argue one should ignore expert
| opinions in general. He just says that what is sayable in
| public likely has important blindspots, to which any expert is
| subject to as well.
| exoverito wrote:
| Regarding your unorthodox opinion on gender, I think the net
| effect of such a parenting strategy will simply be more
| confusion and identity crises, and the increased likelihood of
| sterilizing the genetic line. The number of people who have
| suffered gender dysphoria is vanishingly small, especially in
| older generations, so this policy would benefit few children.
| Moreover, we can see that gender dysphoria rates increase
| depending on peer group and culture, suggesting it is not
| simply a genetic idiosyncrasy and can spread as a social
| contagion.
|
| There is also a philosophical assumption that removing all
| social impositions frees someone to be their authentic self,
| but the question is what is authenticity? There are many
| branching paths our lives take that shape how we evolve. If you
| had parents that took great interest in instilling good values
| and education, you would end up authentically different than if
| they had taken a laissez-faire approach and told you to figure
| it out yourself. The left seems to take the contradictory
| perspective that humans are generally blank slates shaped by
| their environment, yet also pushes a kind of genetic
| determinism on gender and sexuality.
| thegrim33 wrote:
| Tangent to this idea, is the idea that if you consume news from
| an extremely biased source, as long as their biases align with
| your biases, it seems like a "neutral" or unbiased source and you
| simply can't believe people who say that your news is biased.
|
| In actuality, if you were actually consuming an unbiased news
| source, you would be exposed to ideas and arguments you disagree
| with, you would be exposed to all sides of issues. You would read
| things you like, and things you don't like. It would make
| arguments for things you believe in, and good faith arguments for
| things you don't.
| cubefox wrote:
| In communist countries there was some sort of limited freedom
| of speech (there is a specific name to it, but I forgot) which
| allowed lively debate, but only within tight boundaries. The
| problem with this is that it creates an illusion that there is
| freedom of speech. Because after all, disagreement is allowed
| to exist. But only as long as the disagreement doesn't touch on
| topics that are forbidden by the censors.
|
| Now the same arguably exists in democratic forums as well.
| Except here it mostly isn't a literal censor, but an invisible
| Overton window, that dictates what is in the realm of being
| debatable, and what must not be questioned by anyone.
| figassis wrote:
| I don't think conventional minded people think there can't be
| things that you can't say that are true. I think they believe
| that you'd be aware of the things that would get you in trouble,
| and that those things were already explored and collectively
| rejected by society (or most of it), and there is no point in you
| pushing it with "...but I really do want to say it". They know
| some people think those things and they're fine with it. They're
| not fine with you chanting it. Basically, get your group if like
| minded people and talk about it in your closed walls.
|
| Especially the things that are or might be true, it's important
| to understand that:
|
| - They might be harmful to others, true or not
|
| - Others may need to be harmed in order for society to find if
| some of those are true, but you might already have figured out
| that they are
|
| - Those true things might be an obstacle for society to remain
| stable and cohesive
|
| - Maybe those true things can bring some progress, but they might
| not be worth the cost
|
| All in all, I think society has a mechanism to self censor and
| some are ok with it, some aren't. I however do not agree that
| unencumbered freedom of speech will lead to a better society. But
| yes, I do think some taboos today are excessive.
| Animats wrote:
| This article is mostly about a nomenclature issue. It's reframing
| "conventional wisdom" as "orthodox privilege". That may or may
| not be useful.
|
| See "Overton window."[1]
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton_window
| notShabu wrote:
| One of the "benefits" of traditional society is that there's a
| stronger gravitational pull towards the orthodox.
|
| e.g. dealing with the majority case deals with 80% of all cases.
| VS in a more diverse group, the biggest pie slice might only be
| 20%
|
| The system has a much higher burden of complexity to deal with
| edge cases.
|
| An argument can be made that Dunbar's number sets a cap on the
| complexity a system can deal with. External scaffolding like a
| legal system increases system capacity which then reduces how
| necessary the orthodox gravity is.
| neilv wrote:
| I wonder whether this line of thought started with particular
| ideas of the writer that are currently taboo.
|
| If so, given that the writer seems wealthy, influential, and
| connected, presumably those taboo ideas might see movement
| towards implementation or acceptance.
| anonymouskimmer wrote:
| Yeah. I know nothing about the author, but do know that there
| are ideas out there that everyone _knows_ you can 't express
| sincere interest in. Even the orthodox know this, and would
| agree that it is unsafe to do so.
|
| You don't praise the community organization ability of MS13 in
| a police bar shortly after a cop has been killed by a gang
| member. If non-black, you don't throw around the N word in
| certain company, under the philosophy that doing so will
| desensitize the word. Certain topics involving sex aren't
| mentioned. Etcetera.
| anonymouskimmer wrote:
| Real-world examples would have been nice.
|
| I don't know how generalizable this is to people in the real
| world. That is to say not that I don't think that many people
| default to this about particular topics, but that at this point
| in time many people have heard anecdotes (if it hasn't happened
| to them) about authority figures or experts disbelieving
| something real, as in physicians saying it's "all in your head"
| to something that turns out to be stage 4 cancer, or whatever.
|
| Thus it should be easy to at least make a crack in the armor of
| anyone with orthodox privilege in one area by reference to these
| modern-day events where people are disbelieved, and even
| abusively so (in the case of medicine).
|
| Sure, politeness might work too, but only in creating a veneer of
| tolerance. An appeal to politeness does not crack the armor the
| way an example of modern orthodox being wrong would.
| vekker wrote:
| I think real-world examples are very dangerous to provide here,
| because they can easily derail the conversation into arguing
| about the validity of those examples, because if they are
| currently unconventional ideas, someone with orthodox privilege
| will see them as simply false, and bad examples. That's the
| blindness referred to.
|
| The Zeitgeist around the date PG wrote this article is probably
| no coincidence; if you really want recent examples of divisive
| topics.
|
| Historical examples are great for that reason, and there are
| plenty in the history of science. One typical example I love,
| is Wegener's theory of continental drift and how long it was
| ridiculed, hindering scientific progress, before it was finally
| accepted many decades later, in the form of the theory of plate
| tectonics.
| anonymouskimmer wrote:
| The Zeitgeist of that time _was_ an example of the reverse of
| orthodox privilege (as discussed in the article). Or so it
| seemed to me. As competing orthodoxies were actively fighting
| out in the open, each with their own powerful champions.
|
| Meanwhile everyone who depends on a job to survive knows that
| there are opinions that you just don't bring up.
|
| So it seems to me orthodox privilege, in the vein brought up
| by Graham, is really a subset of power privilege.
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