Anil Dash's analysis of Sam Altman's free speach essay

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/941431220952584196.html

by korethr • 9 years ago

75 172 9 years ago

QAPereo3• 9 years ago

It’s the same old nonsense, with people conflating their right to expression with their right to expression free from judgement, or censure. The latter has never and will never exist at the level of billions of different people.

wildmusings3• 9 years ago

But could it be that tolerance of different opinions is a virtue for a free people? One that can't flow from the power of the state but from the strength of our individual characters.

How are we to solve our problems if we replace the reason of thoughtful discussion with the power of social censure?

dnsco9• 9 years ago

The TL;DR on The Paradox of Tolerance, a much discussed philosophy intro topic, is that for tolerance to exist society must be intolerant of intolerance.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance

alacombe• 9 years ago

Q: What is the difference between the Constitutions of the USA and USSR? Both of them guarantee freedom of speech.

A: Yes, but the Constitution of the USA also guarantees freedom after the speech.[6]

-- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_political_jokes

QAPereo3• 9 years ago

I’m sure Snowden and Manning would be shocked to hear that.

0x00000000• 9 years ago

The whole point is to judge the ideas presented not just attack the person and say "you're a ___ist and I'm going to do everything I can to ruin your life because I feel morally superior"

nv-vn5• 9 years ago

I can see your point but I don't think it's something that can be boiled down to a quick summary and then dismissed. The idea isn't about an inherent right, it's more about a courtesy of respect towards others no matter how much we disagree with them. The first article isn't demanding it, it's pointing out the lack of it and leaving it as an exercise to the reader to decide the right path forward. In my opinion this is something the government should never enforce, but I am happy to allow other people to voice whatever it is they have to say even if I disagree. I think a good example of this idea in practice is /r/Libertarian on Reddit: it's a community that's very protective of the right to free speech and I would say they largely agree with the first article. The courtesy is extended to others (socialists, fascists, communists, etc.) and their comments appear on most posts. There is no strong desire to censor or even ignore these posts, instead they are often met with well thought-out rebuttals or the agreement to disagree. Though the two people may judge each other based on views, it rarely if ever devolves to name-calling, downvote brigades, or censorship.

olivermarks2• 9 years ago

Isn't Altman's argument ultimately about free speech? Surely my right to criticize Altman or Dash is the point Altman is making, and which Dash is exercising in his rebuttal?

kenforthewin• 9 years ago

free speech is much different if you're talking about a human vs a corporation.

tunesmith• 9 years ago

If that's the correct interpretation, then Sam is complaining that there is too much free speech, not too little.

olivermarks2• 9 years ago

@tunesmith How so?

Quoting Altman http://blog.samaltman.com/e-pur-si-muove

'It is bad for all of us when people can’t say that the world is a sphere, that evolution is real, or that the sun is at the center of the solar system.'

It is therefore equally bad for all of us when people can’t say that the world is flat, question evolution, or argue the sun isn't at the center of the solar system...

mandevil5• 9 years ago

Altman's original essay is about how there is too much criticism of ideas in San Francisco right now. That people are saying things and then having other people mock them, or complain about them, so much that they are going silent.

The reason that his essay sucked was that this isn't about free speech. Free speech protects you from the government restricting you from saying something, and he never once cites anything about an American government[1], it's always complaints from other regular old people. Other people judging you and finding you an asshole[2] is totally consistent with free speech.

If someone says something bad about gay people (or women, or black people, or...), then by all means make them feel bad for saying something like that. Try to make sure that they never say something like that again, because they are so socially embarrassed and isolated. One of the lessons I've learned over the past two years is that people feel emboldened when they hear other people say something bad about some minority, and so if you make a big deal about one person doing it, you prevent other people from even trying to say something similar.

1: Other than starting out in China, where the government actually does limit your ability to say things, and does not have free speech.

2: Obligatory XKCD: https://xkcd.com/1357/

ddxxdd• 9 years ago

Freedom of speech is a principle that outdates and transcends the 1st amendment.

sowbug3• 9 years ago

Yes, sigh, there is a constitutional right to freedom of speech. That is not the only meaning of freedom of speech. "Try to make sure that they never say something like that again." Do you agree that this would restrict that person's freedom of speech? Again, we're not talking about whether First Amendment rights are being violated. We're talking about whether you are restricting that person's freedom of speech.

If you're OK with your self-appointed right to restrict others' freedom of speech, then you also have to be OK with me suppressing your speech. And you'd better believe that this will be speech you care about. You have to be OK with the 1950s version of me ostracizing you for saying the positive things you believe about the protected groups you enumerate in your post.

It does you no good to claim that you're one of the good guys. Freedom of speech means everyone is a good guy when it comes to expression of ideas. You don't get to pick which speech is free.

Do you honestly want to live in a society where ideas you disagree with are withheld from expression because those who hold them are "so socially embarrassed and isolated"? Is that really your idea of a free society? Again, assume that the person being ostracized is you because of what you believe today.

If you do want a genuinely free society, don't ostracize the bigots. Instead, respect them. Debate them. Change their minds if you're right. Nobody is saying you have to have them over for dinner or be friends; ignoring them is perfectly fine, as well. The price -- and in the long term the benefit -- of a free society is that people get to live normal, ordinary lives even if they have despicable, reprehensible, even dangerous beliefs.

ThrowawayR24• 9 years ago

Try to make sure that they never say something like that again, because they are so socially embarrassed and isolated.

Except that doesn't work, does it? If it did, right-wing movements wouldn't be burgeoning all across the globe. _You cannot threaten a human into sharing your beliefs._ All your stance does is buy a frightened silence through intimidation and in that silence grow the seeds of resentment and anger.

It's so obviously self-sabotaging, not to mention morally repugnant, that it is nearly beyond belief that people calling themselves liberals would advocate it.

Turing_Machine5• 9 years ago

Free speech protects you from the government restricting you from saying something

No. The First Amendment (in the United States) protects you from the government suppressing your speech. Government suppression is far from the only free speech issue.

Obligatory XKCD: https://xkcd.com/1357/

Yeah, that was when I stopped reading XKCD.

aestetix9• 9 years ago

'First, the rhetoric of some of the most wealthy & powerful people in the history of the world being "unable to say" things is ridiculous.'

I read this first line and already knew I disagreed with this essay. Speech is the one thing that can equalize rich and poor, and has the ability to evaporate decades of work and reputation.

I generally don't like much coming out of the Bay Area right now, and have an especial distate for YC's contributions to this mess, but I am impressed with Sam Altman's essay. He's going to get a lot of backlash for it, but I believe he is correct.

gonehome• 9 years ago

This article is basically case in point for me.

"why it's dangerous and wrong"

"most awful example"

"become actually dangerous, in ways he is unwilling or unable to understand"

The author intentionally (mis)interprets sama's writing in the least charitable way and then spends the rest of it arguing a strawman (with insults sprinkled throughout) ending with a comparison to nazis.

If I wasn't sure I agreed with Sama before, I'm definitely more inclined to now.

rtpg2• 9 years ago

Speech is the one thing that can equalize rich and poor, and has the ability to evaporate decades of work and reputation.

I feel like this is a bit of a passive way of saying this.

If someone says something, _they said it_. It evaporates their reputation because _they did something_.

And when saying things, it's to communicate the idea to others. I don't really think that speech exists in a vacuum. If you know saying something to somebody could offend them, you're kinda signing up to the criticism.

It feels like a lot of the essay is trying to say "we should listen to other people with controversial opinions." We were doing this in another domain for a while, with sexism.

A lot of us have just nodded and grimaced when our coworkers would make "those comments". When we'd see the berating of female colleagues. Even the words already had such an obvious effect.

I'm not saying "ban bad speech", but I do think as society we should be reinforcing the fact that words _are_ important, especially in this political climate. And that people are responsible for what they say. And... you can always apologize and change! And the world will be better for it.

aestetix9• 9 years ago

That's not entirely true. What if you get misquoted in a newspaper? By the time the newspaper prints the correction, the damage has already been done.

nv-vn5• 9 years ago

There's a difference to me between truly abusive comments and offensive opinions. I wouldn't argue in favor of workplace sexism (at least my definition of it), but if someone gives their genuine opinion then it should be tolerated to the extent that we should listen, allow them to speak, and then engage in dialog if we disagree. If they're making abusive comments for the sake of hurting another person, that is an entirely different matter. I don't think that's what the author had in mind either based on the examples given in the first blog post.

Avshalom4• 9 years ago

Money has always been able to amplify or suppress speech, even before the supreme court rule that it was speech. Toilets, death, pant legs: these are among the things that equalize the rich and the poor. Speech is not and has never been one of those things.

kajecounterhack12• 9 years ago

Speech is the one thing that can equalize rich and poor, and has the ability to evaporate decades of work and reputation.

Unconsidered speech from the rich and influential can disproportionately hurt the poor and disadvantaged. For example, the US President is not a shining example of "using influence for good." His behavior and speech has lowered the bar across the board for how we expect our politicians to behave, has given confidence to racists and those who would commit hate crimes, and has claimed all criticism to be invalid with faulty reasoning.

A major fault in @sama's essay is a false dichotomy: that we must choose between some sad world of uncontested ideas (even if they have major faults e.g hurting marginalized groups in society a la "gay people are evil" -- his example not mine) and one where innovation can happen. It paints political correctness (which is a movement couched in concern for peoples' well-being) as being antithetical to being able to make technological / societal progress.

This is just not true. In fact you NEED a world where people give a shit about each other so that people who would otherwise be excluded by jerks and awful behavior can be productive, moving us forward.

And he uses Galileo, who was silenced by religious elements, as a comparison point vs a small group of startup ideas perhaps lambasted by media for being out of touch. It's not an accurate comparison.

"When we move from strenuous debate about ideas to casting the people behind the ideas as heretics, we gradually stop debate on all controversial ideas." I'm curious to hear just which cases comprise his experience of valid ideas being cast as heretical.

Is it unscientific for me to not "strenuously debate" with someone who is a flat earther out of judgement for how well my time is spent? And does it hurt progress for society to brand flat earthers as unscientific (which influences our "worth my time" metric)? I don't think it is. There's a lack of nuance in Sam's argument.

aestetix9• 9 years ago

"A major fault in @sama's essay is a false dichotomy: that we must choose between some sad world of uncontested ideas (even if they have major faults e.g hurting marginalized groups in society a la "gay people are evil" -- his example not mine) and one where innovation can happen. It paints political correctness (which is a movement couched in concern for peoples' well-being) as being antithetical to being able to make technological / societal progress."

But that is precisely what is happening. The aim of political correctness seems to be to make things "safer" for other people. I would argue that safety and freedom are inversely related: a free society is inherently unsafe. But in the same way that we learn and get stronger by making mistakes, I think that erring on the side of freedom helps to strengthen individuals in the long term.

The other issue that comes up with these topics is arbitration. If you're going to cast a safety net across speech, you have to figure out who decides what the standards are, and how they are enforced. And if you disagree with those standards, what recourse do you have?

vonseel• 9 years ago

Speach?

Cyphase• 9 years ago

There's a typo in the title, in case anyone is confused.

pfarnsworth• 9 years ago

Anil Dash’s main point appears to be that allowing hate speech will embolden racists/bigots to commit violence against minorities.

My question to him is: what if a proper study was done and it found that suppression of hate speech actually emboldened racists and bigots to commit more violence against minorities? Would he advocate then Altman’s proposal?

It appears that his entire thesis is based on his own conjecture. I would love to know if there are any studies that support his theory.

nl4• 9 years ago

There are plenty of natural experiments showing how hate speech leads to violence.

Look up the history of the Rwanda genocide for one of the clearest studies.

mr_spothawk8• 9 years ago

hmmm... wikipedia doesn't support your claim, tho [1].

it seems like a lot of folks were encouraged to go out and kill, given machetes and told to kill, and in the end there's one study that suggests 10% of the violence could be attributed to the radio station (which was created to broadcast racist propaganda and obscene jokes).

specifically, I take issue with the notion that "hate speech" is a meaningful descriptor of a way of talking. racism, bigotry, etc... are more specific.

tangentially, I did find this:

On March 20, 2017, Pope Francis acknowledged that while some Catholic nuns and priests in the country were killed during the genocide, others were complicit with it and took part in preparing and executing the genocide.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rwandan_genocide#Preparation_f...

mr_spothawk8• 9 years ago

Dash doesn't address the content of Altman's post.

Dash falsely equates the "lives" of gay people, with "disparaging things" about them.

Link is a wonderful example of exactly the type of conversation suppressing blowharding that the Bay Area is encumbered by.

tedivm8• 9 years ago

Do you see the irony of calling someone a blowhard just because you don't agree with their opinion? You're literally engaging in the exact same behavior you're attempting to call him out over.

Avshalom4• 9 years ago

not equates. connects.

evanlivingston4• 9 years ago

Be very careful equating a blogpost with suppression of speech.

mr_spothawk8• 9 years ago

"conversation suppressing"

it's literally that. if you live in the Bay Area, and find that you can express countervailing opinions without encountering blowhardism, then I challenge you to make the case (in public) that nazi-punching is a bad idea.

mattbierner• 9 years ago

Let’s be honest: both the original post and this rebuttal are basically long form tweets, not intellectually convincing arguments. They are so vague that you can read almost whatever you want into them

mr_spothawk8• 9 years ago

I'll concede the rebuttal is literally a long form tweet.

dnsco9• 9 years ago

The rebuttal is literally "long form tweets" ( https://twitter.com/anildash/status/941431220952584196 ). Sam's post is presumably something he edited and had people check over before he posted it. That's not to negate your essential argument, but the two pieces do have different origins.

panarky• 9 years ago

We're thinkers and makers. We move fast and break things.

We break laws and social conventions to disrupt entire industries.

We dictate how billions of people interact and transact.

But don't dare criticize us, we're so fragile we can't take it.

solipsism• 9 years ago

Surely there's room for people to vehemently disagree without being called fragile and "unable to take it".

nl4• 9 years ago

He said that they are literally leaving because people couldn't take arguments against life extension.

I think life extension is great, but I think leaving because people disagree with that is close to the definition of "unable to take it".

nv-vn5• 9 years ago

It's not about criticism. It's about harassment and smear campaigns. The thing is, most people want criticism because they want to have conversations. Sama is saying that when you have a controversial opinion, you shouldn't feel so threatened and alienated from society that you must relocate. I'm sure he'd like to hear true arguments against his positions, but that's different than labeling him as evil and trying to enrage people so that he can no longer be respected at all.

kajecounterhack12• 9 years ago

What if your "controversial opinion" harasses and alienates other people? According to his logic that pain is collateral damage. And any innovation from the people who would have been productive except for that collateral alienation / harassment is now lost -- and this is a story as old as time in the valley particularly from women and PoC.

But his writing indicates that he's only thought from the perspective of some innovator he's perceived to have been unfairly branded a heretic.

tedivm8• 9 years ago

I had a lot of issues with Sam Altman's post-

* He really doesn't seem to understand the difference between free speech and being free of consequences, and as a result he's in danger of suppressing free speech. He wants people to be able to say controversial things without there being blowback, but the only possible way to accomplish that is by suppressing the free speech of people who disagree. You're either for free speech- which includes the right to criticize ideas- or he's arguing that specific people's speech (the person with the "novel physics idea" for example) are more important than others.

* His example of China, one of the worst human rights violators who has been known for violently suppressing free speech, is just a continuation of that. He's happy because as a privileged person with money China is super excited to hear his ideas, but he's also ignoring the fact that China literally jails and kills people who speak out with ideas that their government doesn't like.

* He completely ignores the damage done by hate speech. Just completely ignores it. If you were to read this blog as is it seems like he thinks people being driven out of companies, schools, education programs, and development communities by bigotry and sexism were never going to contribute or that their losses aren't as important as the ideas being lost to people uncomfortable being called out for bigotry.

* The blog seems to put a higher value on innovation and corporations than it does people.

mr_spothawk8• 9 years ago

do you have the impression that Sama's essay has anything to do with government? why bring up china's government?

mikeyouse• 9 years ago

Because Sam brought it up in the first paragraph of his essay?

Earlier this year, I noticed something in China that really surprised me. I realized I felt more comfortable discussing controversial ideas in Beijing than in San Francisco.

It's entirely relevant that stating the wrong 'controversial ideas' in Beijing can get you killed or imprisoned.

nostromo• 9 years ago

He really doesn't seem to understand the difference between free speech and being free of consequences

This is silly. He's not saying you can't criticize ideas, he's saying don't assume ill-intent.

The examples were clear. If someone wants to extend life, you can't assume they don't care about the environment. If someone wants to send a rocket to Mars, you can't assume they don't care about poverty.

China was used as a counter-example explicitly because of their lack of freedom of speech. The entire point is that when people feel more free to discuss ideas in China than in San Francisco, we have a problem, because China is not an exemplar.

tedivm8• 9 years ago

Please include all of his examples, not just the ones that most people would agree with.

This is uncomfortable, but it’s possible we have to allow people to say disparaging things about gay people if we want them to be able to say novel things about physics. [1] Of course we can and should say that ideas are mistaken, but we can’t just call the person a heretic. We need to debate the actual idea.

Not every idea is worth debating in every setting. Someone who just wants to go to work and program shouldn't have to spend their day debating people who think their lifestyles are a sin- they should be able to focus on their job. If you're building rockets for SpaceX what should it matter whether the dude two seats over knows how much you really dislike gay people?

And again, if you have a bunch of people bashing gay people in your company and you just allow it you are going to push those gay people out. All of their "novel physics ideas" are going to go out the door with them.

As to his entire point about China- it is patently false! It is literally not true. If a bunch of people in the bay area want to talk politics they can do so. If you do it in china and it goes against certain things you go to jail. His example and claim that china has more free speech is a slap in the face to all of the people murdered in china for that speech.

striking3• 9 years ago

1) Restriction of speech, as he put it, is not equal to the ability to criticize ideas.

"When we move from strenuous debate about ideas to casting the people behind the ideas as heretics, we gradually stop debate on all controversial ideas."

It's the ability to even discuss them without being branded a heretic that he desires, rather than a lack of criticism.

2) He's saying that the people he knows in China were more willing to hear about his ideas than the people he knows in SF. He did not mention anything about privilege, nor do I think it is fair to assume that the Chinese are only more willing to accept his ideas based on his money. Many people do that, not just the Chinese. He's mentioning (anecdotally) that the people he spoke with in China were more open-minded than the people of SF. Perhaps we should take it as a wakeup call rather than an indication of Altman's privilege.

3) Hate speech != "driven out of companies, schools, education programs, and development communities by bigotry and sexism". How can you equate what is strictly speech with that of hateful action?

4) Would you like to pick a quote as an example for why you might feel that way? The common refrain in this essay to me seems to be "we can’t just call the person a heretic", which seems very focused on the individual rather than a theoretical corporation.

nv-vn5• 9 years ago

3) Because "hate speech" has come to be a political tactic of censorship, just like "obscene speech"

tedivm8• 9 years ago

1) I don't see people getting arrested for having ideas in the bay area. At worst they don't get funding, but that doesn't seem to be the topic here. Perhaps Sam needs to widen his social and professional circle a bit- there are 7.5 million people here, and I can't imagine I'm the only one who has found open minded ones. If anything he should be encouraging more diversity if he wants to bring in more ideas, not arguing for policies that will drive people away.

2) It is entirely anecdotal, and it completely skips over the fact that China does not have free speech. You know those NFL protests that are happening here? In china that would get you three years in prison[1]. Being an American in China alone is enough to grant privileges that don't exist to the people born there. Shoppinglifting is an offense that carries a minimum sentence of three years, maximum of ten, and the American college students caught there were let go.[2] It's naive to think that his experience was typical in any way.

3) If speech didn't have consequences we wouldn't be having this discussion. If the "anti gay" physicist wasn't hurt by the words directed at him then he would just ignore them and keep doing his thing. If the founders working on life extension weren't upset at being told there are environmental consequences to this then maybe the blog post would never have been written.

If someone who is gay walks into a company and is told by another employee that they are deviants in the eyes of god then the gay person is likely to leave. If a woman is told to "go make us sandwiches", even in a joking way, she's not going to feel respected. Bigots who are given free reign drive away the minorities they target.

4) The simple fact that this blog did not discuss any of the consequences of the hate speech shows that he doesn't think they are legitimate. He argues that we need to be more lenient in allowing bigotry if it means that we also get more innovation.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/04/china-disrespe... [2] https://newsone.com/3757629/china-shoplifting-laws-liangelo-...

mcphage• 9 years ago

How can you equate what is strictly speech with that of hateful action?

How could you not consider speech an action?

bthornbury13• 9 years ago

He wants people to be able to say controversial things without there being blowback

When the blowback is to smear your character, conflate it with other unrelated negativities, and avoid actual discussion on the topic at hand who can disagree?

Edit: several assertions therein, feel free to debate :)

philwelch2• 9 years ago

* “You’re fired” isn’t free speech. “You are not allowed to attend a Python conference because of your political views” isn’t free speech. It’s not guaranteed by the First Amendment that people can’t be fired or blacklisted for their opinions, but when Communists were blacklisted from the film industry, that was seen as a disgrace—despite the fact that, in the 1950’s, the activities of the Communist Party were a much greater threat to American (and, in general, Western) society and values than the kinds of things people get in trouble for saying now.

* The entire point of civil liberties and human rights is that we, as a liberal society, have deemed some freedoms so important that the damage done by allowing them to be restricted almost always outweighs the damage done by their free exercise. There are exceptions, but these tend to be very severe in nature—ones freedom to travel around and associate with others might be restricted if they are infected with Ebola, or one’s freedom to keep the police from breaking down their door might be restricted if the police see and hear someone in the window yelling and screaming for help.

Along that vein, there are some obvious limits to freedom of expression: you can’t literally yell “fire” in a crowded theater, you can’t lie under oath, and so forth. But it stretches things too far when you make up categories like “blasphemy” or “sedition” or “hate speech” to block out actual ideas, regardless of the danger you think their free expression presents to society. The infamous “shouting ‘fire’ in a crowded theater” analogy was used in a Supreme Court case that upheld the conviction of a man who advocated resisting the draft during World War I. That decision was later, and rightly in my view, superseded by a different ruling.

So let’s break that down a bit. If you use your freedom of speech to convince people to resist the draft, you impair the ability of the country to win the war, which only extends the war, which causes real suffering and death for a large number of people. And ultimately, that wasn’t considered enough “damage” to outweigh restricting free speech.

Turing_Machine5• 9 years ago

It’s not guaranteed by the First Amendment that people can’t be fired or blacklisted for their opinions, but when Communists were blacklisted from the film industry, that was seen as a disgrace—despite the fact that, in the 1950’s, the activities of the Communist Party were a much greater threat to American (and, in general, Western) society and values than the kinds of things people get in trouble for saying now.

They still are, for that matter. People today seem to be extremely worried about the so-called "KKK" and "Nazi" groups, most of which consist of about five yokels meeting in somebody's garage. They're nasty pieces of work on an individual basis, certainly, but hardly an existential threat to the country as a whole. There haven't been any real Nazis in close to 70 years, and there hasn't been a real KKK for about a hundred.

Communists, on the other hand, not only racked up a far higher body count than Nazis and the KKK combined, they still control entire countries, with standing armies and nuclear weapons.

If we're going to start ejecting people from the public sphere on the basis of their ideas being dangerous, pragmatism would seem to dictate that we start with Marxists.

strken• 9 years ago

This comment, and the response from Anil Dash, both think of free speech in a very limited way that only takes into account what the government is allowed to do to you. To my eyes, this way of thinking is America-centric. The extremely rigorous protections given by the US constitution make it easy to assume that the constitutionalist view of free speech is the only one that was ever believed in.

I believe something different: that free speech is open discourse between people, and that anything which prevents people from talking to each other openly and honestly stands in the way of free speech, be it bigotry or be it no-platforming. To say something and receive "mean words" or "consequences" can usually means that nobody is engaging your argument.

Sama gives the example of the controversial physicist, where someone has one good idea and some terrible ideas, and asks whether the good idea should be ignored because of the bad ideas. I don't think this means that the physicist has more important ideas as a whole, but rather that the ideas should be engaged in isolation to one another lest we throw the baby out with the bathwater.

coolgeek• 9 years ago

To say something and receive "mean words" or "consequences" can usually means that nobody is engaging your argument.

Advocating genocide (e.g.) is not deserving of engagement.

Anyone attempting to persuade you that genocide is in any way beneficial to humanity is not going to be persuaded by your "open and honest" counterargument. Their intent isn't even to persuade you. Their intent is to persuade other viewers of your argument that "reasonable people can disagree"

refurb• 9 years ago

Maybe there is something wrong with me, but after reading Sam's article, I don't see any of the things you're accusing him of in the article.

bthornbury13• 9 years ago

I have a lot of issues with your post.

He really doesn't seem to understand the difference between free speech and being free of consequences, and as a result he's in danger of suppressing free speech. He wants people to be able to say controversial things without there being blowback, but the only possible way to accomplish that is by suppressing the free speech of people who disagree. You're either for free speech- which includes the right to criticize ideas- or he's arguing that specific people's speech (the person with the "novel physics idea" for example) are more important than others.

Sam's article is a criticism of the form of criticism received when on the "losing" side of a controversial topic. The criticism is not of the opinion (which leads to actual discussion) but of the person. That criticism of the person tends to be over-the-top.

Pushing back against this over-the-top criticism will open up free speech by letting people who are scared to share their opinions for risk of extreme consequences (being fired?).

His example of China, one of the worst human rights violators who has been known for violently suppressing free speech, is just a continuation of that. He's happy because as a privileged person with money China is super excited to hear his ideas, but he's also ignoring the fact that China literally jails and kills people who speak out with ideas that their government doesn't like.

I think you're making Sam's point for him. He feels more comfortable in a place as bad as china for speech than San Francisco. What does that imply? China's treatment may not be equal, but this is not the implication. The implication is in how uncomfortable he feels in SF.

He completely ignores the damage done by hate speech. Just completely ignores it. If you were to read this blog as is it seems like he thinks people being driven out of companies, schools, education programs, and development communities by bigotry and sexism were never going to contribute or that their losses aren't as important as the ideas being lost to people uncomfortable being called out for bigotry.

You are ignoring the damage of calling someone a bigot for sharing their opinion. I think we both have a point here, and a further discussion would be interesting.

The blog seems to put a higher value on innovation and corporations than it does people.

I'd assert it's putting a higher value on the quality of society which he asserts is improved when controversial topics are free to be discussed without risk of extreme personal attack. People make up society (and corporations btw), so it can be assumed that assertion of higher value applies to them as well.

cameldrv• 9 years ago

I think that you're the one who misunderstands free speech. Free speech means precisely the ability to speak freely without negative consequences. In our constitution, it is guaranteed that you can speak freely without any legal consequences. The principle of free speech goes further though. The principle is that society is better if people can discuss things openly and honestly without fear, and that open discussion will lead to a better society than having people afraid to express their true thoughts. Hardly anyone is a true free speech absolutist, where you can say literally anything without any consequence whatsoever. On the other hand, if you're not in jail for your speech -- if you're merely on a universally adhered to employment blacklist, you still don't have free speech.

What this really comes down to is people's ability to compartmentalize. If I'm willing to be on your software team even though I think you're a sinner who is going to hell, I'm compartmentalizing. If you're willing to serve on a school board with me, even if you think I'm evil for eating meat, you're compartmentalizing. This sort of compartmentalizing is how we build a functional society that provides what we all need even though we don't all agree on everything.

RcouF1uZ4gsC3• 9 years ago

The issue is not that people are criticizing people who have certain ideas. That is fine. That is free speech. The issue is that people are taking actions that actively harm those people. Whether by excluding them from events, preventing them from speaking, firing them from their jobs, etc.

If you fight words with words, that is good. If you fight words with actions against the people who said those words, then you are against free speech.

Note: the principle of free speech is much broader than just the Bill of Rights.

solidsnack9000• 9 years ago

It seems weird to turn over responsibility for policing hate speech and intolerance to VCs. They are not public servants by any stretch of the imagination.

bthornbury13• 9 years ago

Disagree with Anil.

(Writing this with an expectation of backlash) (irony?)

Everyone expects the judgement of their peers for their controversial opinions, which is one reason why people tend to have like-minded friends (as much as possible). Or at least friends open to a discussion.

The issue is judgements on controversial opinions turn into all-too-public smears on a person's character and that character is conflated with (over-the-top) negativity, which misrepresents the original context (sliding). Naming any such example bears the risk of the same thing happening to yourself (you know what I mean).

Anil is guilty of it himself, calling Sam's position "actually dangerous". When in fact, that labeling is the exact thing Sam is arguing against. Perhaps Sam isn't dangerous, but just opinionated?

TLDR: Controversial opinions lead to ad hominem attacks that use conflation with extremely negative topics to attack even the possibility that the position is debatable.

haberman• 9 years ago

I don't think Altman is afraid of hearing criticism of his ideas. I think he objects to orthodoxy: political positions that are so sacred that people react with slurs and rhetoric instead of rational rebuttal when they are called into question.

Especially pernicious is the idea that even entertaining rational discussion on these topics is harmful. When some things are too sacred to even discuss rationally, we are really lost in our ability to discern the truth about the world.

insickness• 9 years ago

Dash is equating rational argument with violence. On average, gay people are more creative. Is that hate speech? Obviously not. On average, gay men have more sex than straight men. Hate speech? On average, more sex is worse than less sex. Hate speech? Dash thinks he can draw the line where rational argument becomes unacceptable. It's his line but he gets to draw it for other people. This is not simply criticism. By equating a type of speech with violence, it implies legal consequences, whether those consequences are currently in place. It implies a physical enforcement.

wildermuthn2• 9 years ago

Unfortunately, I am so afraid of the professional and social repercussions of sharing my opinions, that I've decided not to express an opinion about Sam's essay. I hope this reckless act on non-expression doesn't come back to haunt me.

bthornbury13• 9 years ago

So many who agree with you will stay silent.

wildermuthn2• 9 years ago

Maybe the best response is not to stay silent, but rather to craft a non-opinion that looks like an opinion of agreement no matter who comes across it. But maybe not.

creaghpatr3• 9 years ago

They will stay silent, and express their opinion in the voting booth

jdoliner• 9 years ago

It's amazing how quickly this goes from tolerating someone who says disparaging things about gay people, to emboldening those people, to actual violence to the conclusion that Sam's essay is DANGEROUS. It's the thinnest of arguments but this seems to be how a lot of people think about speech today. I find it to be very off kilter with reality, I don't think that anyone is preventing violence by branding someone a heretic, quite the opposite in fact.

bthornbury13• 9 years ago

I don't think that anyone is preventing violence by branding someone a heretic, quite the opposite in fact.

This is very interesting and I believe I tend to agree.

When a person is branded as a "heretic" for their ideas, doesn't it increase the division between those two groups? The winning group (the one doing the branding) begins to dehumanize and rage towards the losing group. The losing group has to find other ways to fight back or remain in insolent silence.

hi-im-mi-ih4• 9 years ago

Remember that a lead dev for Node was attacked not too long ago for discussing the potential downsides of CoC's.

https://twitter.com/rvagg/status/887652116524707841 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15073022

This is the kind of thing Sam is talking about - we should be able to discuss things that are controversial without getting mobbed for it.

meowface• 9 years ago

I agree with you and with the general thrust of Sam's essay. This kind of knee-jerk heretic-branding of anyone who questions the status quo is toxic. But Sam should've used something like the Node dev as an example, rather than the less salient one he provided:

This is uncomfortable, but it’s possible we have to allow people to say disparaging things about gay people if we want them to be able to say novel things about physics. [1] Of course we can and should say that ideas are mistaken, but we can’t just call the person a heretic. We need to debate the actual idea.
[1] I am less worried that letting some people on the internet say things like “gay people are evil” is going to convince reasonable people that such a statement is true than I fear losing the opposite—we needed people to be free to say "gay people are ok" to make the progress we've made, even though it was not a generally acceptable thought several decades ago.

Of course Sam doesn't actually think it's acceptable for people to say these things (he's gay himself, but even if he weren't I'm sure he still wouldn't find it acceptable). But this leaves a lot of questions. If you're gay and in a work environment where your boss incessantly makes disparaging comments gay people and homosexuality - even if none of them are directed at you or anyone else there - you could still feel very uncomfortable and hurt. Does this boss really deserve a debate and an exchange of open ideas? If you tell them you disagree and they just continue mocking gay people, what are you supposed to say or do? In a scenario like this, it kind of makes sense to brand this boss as a heretic.

This kind of situation is far away from your example (discussing potential downsides of CoC). There's a spectrum of hurtful speech and ideas, and while most Americans would agree these things should be legal to say, many would also agree that the worst of them should result in ostracization (in a very extreme example: self-identifying as a neo-Nazi). So should we really "allow" people to make disparaging remarks about gay people beyond physically letting them say it? Do we also need to allow them into our social circles and workplaces?

creaghpatr3• 9 years ago

Consider Chick-fil-a’s policy of being closed on Sundays for explicitly religious reasons. Is that oppressive to atheist employees who lose an extra day of the week to work?

bthornbury13• 9 years ago

But Sam should've used something like the Node dev as an example, rather than the less salient one he provided

In my opinion, Sam wanted to share this with the least possible likelihood that it would blowback (in a big way) on YC.

He did this by picking examples that would stimulate thought without a large possibility of himself being branded in some way regarding a controversial topic.

hi-im-mi-ih4• 9 years ago

First off, I like your example, it embodies the core dynamic that people refer to when discussing hate speech vs. free speech.

  Does this boss really deserve a debate and an exchange of open ideas?

YES. Both the employee and the boss in this situation need to sit down and talk about it. Even if the boss is of the rough, conservative demeanor, he can be very receptive! You must simply approach the boss without a chip on your shoulder, and be very respectful. Any man worth his salt will reconsider their position after this. Express yourself fully, express your existing and continuing respect for the boss, and watch as he becomes reasonable. For this is the core tension between the liberals and the conservatives: There is no respect given to each other before both sides begin to engage.

  If you tell them you disagree and they just continue mocking gay people, what are you supposed to say or do?

Well, that depends on the outcome of the discussion you two had. Did you come out of it friends, with a stronger relationship, and mutual understanding? Then the boss probably is just being careless in his use of homophobic slurs, and dare I say the onus is on the gay person to restrain their disdain - and such restraint should be easy, because you respect and are friends with the man uttering slurs. You know that he is your boss, your provider and guide; you know that you can approach him honestly and be safe from retaliation, so why would you feel fear in this situation? You should feel nothing at all if not slight irritation.

Now, suppose you come out of the discussion about homophobic slurs, and the boss was not at all receptive. Perhaps he uttered a slur to you as you left. Then you must leave the company, and rightfully declare him a homophobe when appropriate.

Let's get to the meat of the issue. Do you pre-judge your slur-uttering boss? Do you assume him to be homophobic, and begin attacking his character in all avenues? Do you never attempt discussion, instead tweeting about how he's committing hate crimes?

Or. Do you approach him honestly with your guard down, to admit both your sexual orientation and your devotion to your job, while requesting that he try and restrict his use of the word ft? Do you listen silently while he riffs against political correctness, nodding and acknowledging, until he comes around and apologizes for making you uncomfortable?

You may take the path of the coward, or the path of the hero.

mr_spothawk8• 9 years ago

surely some of us remember when Brendan Eich was fired from Mozilla for saying controversial things about marriage

Avshalom4• 9 years ago

Brendan Eich was pressured to and then did resign for taking action to remove the ability for homosexuals to marry.

He was not fired, and he didn't "say" controversial things about marriage. Again: he took action to remove (the time line was: gay people can marry in California, prop 8 removes that, prop 8 is ruled unconstitutional) rights from people.

stanfordkid• 9 years ago

I think the heart of the issue Sam is trying to address is that in today's society you can excel at one field and yet be hindered from success in it because you make a generalized statement that the majority of society disagrees with, in a field completely unrelated to the one you participate in.

If a Nobel prize winning physicist speaks about the inferiority of gay people, he is not necessarily a "threat to their safety". You don't have to like him, you don't have to be friends with him -- hell I wouldn't. But he has a right to not be fired as a physics researcher, because he is good at it. If he was a student counselor you can bet he should be fired.

If he actively discriminates against a gay physics student should he be fired? Absolutely. But I don't think he should be fired for simply holding the opinion. But he would be in todays world.

That's the problem I have with the politics of today -- it's that people get fired or disregarded if they make even a statement that makes other people feel bad, and disaligns with the majority opinion.

bthornbury13• 9 years ago

disaligns with the majority opinion

It doesn't even have to be the majority opinion. Just the opinion of someone with a loud enough voice.

But I don't think he should be fired for simply holding the opinion. But he would be in todays world.

Sadly, he would be fired, publicly smeared, and become unemployable.

CalChris3• 9 years ago

Such a physicist would hold tenure and would not summarily be fired for simply holding that opinion. From a random school somewhere on the web:

gross professional misconduct or serious failure of a faculty member to discharge his or her obligations

bthornbury13• 9 years ago

Replace "physicist" with "software engineer"? Or any occupation X where his/her statement holds true?

prepend7• 9 years ago

Tim Hunt, a Nobel winning biochemist with tenure, was fired for making sexist comments. It certainly happens.

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2015/jun/11/nobel-laur...

evangelista• 9 years ago

Sam Altman was headed in the right direction but his point is completely malformed.

He shouldn’t have used the term “Political Correctness.” He also shouldn’t have provided the examples he used because they distracted from what he was trying to say.

I am sad that he took an opportunity to have this conversation (finally) and gave the people who are actually ruining Silicon Valley more ammunition to push their agenda.

What Sam is talking about is the insane level of unidirectional groupthink that has invaded Silicon Valley and turned everyone against one another under the guise of protecting minorities and other victims.

Proponents of this approach - which, frankly, overwhelmingly demonizes and targets white men - will point to the endless list of infractions that keep surfacing in the media.

They have a great point. There is abundant evidence that minorities and women are being unfairly treated in Silicon Valley.

Unfortunately, the constant warring against this unfairness has gutted Silicon Valley and now no one trusts one another. Everyone looks at white people as the enemy and the level of discourse has become so toxic that everyone is fleeing the state.

I have experienced this myself in interacting with my Bay Area colleagues. I feel that every word I say is being policed for content, that I have to walk on eggshells constantly with certain people or risk getting drawn and quartered on Twitter the next day.

So Liberals can have this version of safety. People focused on building things aren’t willing to live in a cultural police state.

The biggest problem in attempting to argue against this trend is that it is an argument of degree. These are the hardest Arguments to have because your opppnent automatically rounds everything up to the “nearest Hitler.”

Example:

You: Hey we shouldn’t focus so much attention on gender diversity.

Them: you hate women.

You: Maybe your theories on diversity and privilege re not entirely true or accurate.

Them: You hate minorities.

You: Maybe we shouldn’t excommunicate this person because he tried to hit on someone at a company party while drunk, men do stupid things and are motivated by sex genetically.

Them: You hate women. Don’t give bad men a pass, you are enabling rape culture.

You: I am really sick of having 80% of conferences focus exclusively on diversity topics, I can’t stand being lectured to constantly.

Them:You are Hitler.

So I don’t see a resolution. It is impossible to push back on what has happened to Silicon Valley’s culture without being labeled a bigot.

Arguments of degree are the hardest to have, and at this point I think only a severe economic downturn and reset is going to fix it.

The culture of the Bay Area is dead, it was caused by having the culture of our educational institutes teach these ways of viewing the world.

I have no hope that will change. We are living in the most privileged country in the world but we have taught all our kids that they are oppressed. It’s a lie.

dnsco9• 9 years ago

I think it's interesting that this post was flagged by the mods but Sam's original essay was not.

sctb• 9 years ago

This post wasn't touched by moderators, and it also wasn't flagged (that has a specific meaning on Hacker News). What makes you think that it was?

andr• 9 years ago

For me, the example of a physicist who dislikes gay people is particularly worrying, because it involves setting very arbitrary lines in the sand of what is acceptable and what is not. What if it was a biologist that dislikes gay people? Or a doctor? Or, say, the person in control of the CDC, as happened today? Those lines, moved once, are as good as gone.

What if Trump was the same Muslim-hating, gay-hating person he is, but also a brilliant physicist? Would he than be OK in Sam's book?

prepend7• 9 years ago

Do you have a link for the CDC thing?

nborwankar• 9 years ago

It is ironic that we are complaining about how polarized our discourse has become, when we created the social networks and the dopamine-drip feedback loops that genrate mutually disjoint echo chambers.

CalChris3• 9 years ago

If SpaceX started in San Francisco in 2017, I assume they would have been attacked for focusing on problems of the 1%, or for doing something the government had already decided was too hard. -- from Sam Altman's essay.

First, SpaceX wasn't founded in SF because SF would have been a lousy place for it to start. It was founded in El Segundo because of the talent base there working for companies like TRW.

Second, if the success or failure of SpaceX or any other company is dependent on the mean things people say when checking their iPhones at morning coffee then that's more a judgment of the weak backbone of the startup founders + employees. Blow it off and get back to work. I personally think the vast majority of BitCoin and Ethereum work ranges from crap to fraud. I doubt that anyone cares about that opinion and it's such an important opinion.

Anil is wrong. That essay wasn't dangerous. It was drivel. If what you do has merit it will come out regardless of what people say. This isn't high school.

apatters• 9 years ago

Anil makes the classic mistake of this cloistered coastal elite which is to paint everyone on the other side as murderers, rapists, Nazis and misogynists -- his own take on Hillary's "basket of deplorables." If the world was everything Anil thinks it is then he would be right: we would be best off limiting speech because everyone is a violent maniac just waiting to be activated.

In reality however, racist murderers rapists and Nazis are a minority, and the majority of people who hold views in opposition to Anil's are not criminals. They're people who support same-sex marriage but don't want any gays living on their block. They're people who don't go to Nazi rallies (yet) but think it's dangerous that no one's talking about how most crime is committed by blacks.

The quickest way to turn these people into real extremists is to bar them from public discourse. Because they value their opinions as much as you value yours, and they're not going to stop talking about these things -- if they're not allowed to discuss their ideas in public, they're going to discuss them with a Nazi instead, which will lead to their radicalization.

When they're part of the public sphere you have the opportunity to engage them, entertain their ideas, present counterpoints, and generally treat them like a human being with whom you merely have differences of opinion -- this is the path to changing hearts and minds, or at least getting them to peacefully coexist.

When they're not their speech goes underground into an echo chamber and being cut off from the rest of society really does foment extremism.

Unless Anil plans on running for governor of CA and seceding from the Union, he needs their hearts and minds -- otherwise they'll keep on voting for guys like Trump, who's President in no small part merely because he was willing to tell sanctimonious guys like Anil to go f*ck themselves.

One of the original long reads on this matter is Federalist No. 10 and it's just as relevant today.

RcouF1uZ4gsC3• 9 years ago

https://medium.com/message/the-tech-diversity-story-thats-no...

I believe Anil Dash is propagating hate speech when he accuses Asian men as a group of being responsible/complicit in the exclusion of minorities and women from tech.

There are many dangerous stereotypes about Asians and he promotes harmful stereotypes. An Indian man was even murdered in Kansas because of Asian stereotypes.

Because of his embracing of hate speech, I urge that he either step down as CEO of FogCreek or he be fired. We cannot tolerate such hate speech.

rhapsodic4• 9 years ago

Wow, I just checked out Dash's twitter feed, and he has a deranged hatred for Trump supporters. I'm going to be calling Fog Creek Monday morning to find out if the company has as low an opinion of me as he obviously does.

rhapsodic4• 9 years ago

Anil Dash thinks that "Trumpists" support terrorist violence against Muslims:

https://twitter.com/anildash/status/942040324645572609

As a Trump supporter, I feel that Anil Dash has placed my life in danger.

rhapsodic4• 9 years ago

Here's a thought experiment: If someone makes a disparaging remark about Christians, as a monolithic group, it the workplace, should they be fired for it?

rhapsodic4• 9 years ago

Quoting Anil Dash's tweet:

"Maybe not today, but sometime we’re gonna have that conversation about Christian supremacy in this country, too."

https://twitter.com/anildash/status/928800919810117632

Kind of reminds me of a drunk in the neighborhood where I grew up who always wanted to have "that conversation" about Jewish control of the banking system.

Anil Dash is the CEO of Fog Creek Software, BTW.

Anil Dash's analysis of Sam Altman's free speach essay

Related Stories