On the contrary, discussing institutional dogma has a major place on HN because the hacker ethos is to question authority and the official narratives of the dominant system we are embedded in. Or at least it used to be… now a larger number of people on HN support centralized power in the form of corporations, state governments, CBDCs, etc. while also bitterly complaining about the downstream results of their exercise of that power.

Just because people are being systematically squelched for questioning gangsta rap or giving amphetamines to kids doesn’t mean they are “bigots”. They may care more about individuals than the people who view the kids as just a cog in a machine, and the administrators who cover their butt and barely know anything about the kid.

I believe that water-carrying is being done in the other direction far more — the capitalist industries that make a profit.

Check out the following issues and ask yourself whether all they have in common is “conspiracy nuts”, or whether on the other side they have a highly organized cooperation to push a change through, and to deplatform and delegitimize anyone — even previously respected experts or people whose job it is to deal with these issues - who dares to make too much noise or criticize whatever agenda is pushed:

Weapons industry / military industrial complex — the latest being the war in Ukraine, but previously in Iraq etc.

Plastic - recycling (later revealed to be a scam)

Depression - I saw lots of pushback right here on HN when questioning SSRIs and imbalance theory, but since the 2022 meta-study that died down

Vaccines - we are all aware of how pervasive the push for censorship was, just look at the latest revelations out of FB, Twitter

(CBDCs and National IDs - coming soon)

Gangsta Rap - anyone speaking against it or its misogyny is attacked

Trans activism - anyone voicing any concern for overdiagnosis, or the economic system that separates kids from both their parents, or even continues to use the psychiatric perspective of a disorder or dysphoria out of a concern for children, is shamed as “on the wrong side of history”.

BLM - Anyone discussing any other killings other than by cops of unarmed Black men was systematically attacked

MeToo - Men told to be quiet, listen and not be part of the conversation. Once again rape is very important topic, but the concept got “overdiagnosed” and stretched to the point where someone like Matt Damon making a nuanced distinction becomes persona non grata

To be clear, a man disagreeing with the following tweet is not the same as normalizing rape, but look how quick one side (the water-carrying one, in my opinion) is to paint the other as an “antisemitic/racist/white supremacist/misogynist/putin-supporting/bigot” for merely speaking up and voicing different opinion: https://twitter.com/driverminnie/status/941905518284566528?s...

There are groups who pounce on anyone attributing disparities in economic outcomes to any other factors than the one-dimensional explanation of systemic sexism, racism, etc. It is like when some Zionists explain criticism of Israel purely in terms of systemic antisemitism, or some anti-Zionists navel-gaze at Israel call it the world’s worst violator of human rights and hurl epithets at anyone who mildly disgrees. When you have an agenda you tend to do lots of adhominems. It shuts down the conversation and prevents real discussion exploring other factors. Because institutions have an agenda and they co-opt people into enforcing it. Whether it’s regular Han Chinese in China supporting the locking up of Uyghurs for the “greater good”. Or Sunni/Shiite proxy wars in Yemen. Their “solutions” are invariably worse than the problem, which in any case is upstream and probably due to the very institution and government working together to create it.

The well-meaning activists who carry water for these industries and agendas do not engage in good faith. They are so convinced they are morally superior that they simply insinuate you’re a bad person and then respond in passive-aggressive one-liners!