When the Genius Men of Silicon Valley Suddenly Don't Seem So Smart (opens in new tab)

I rarely comment on the internet, but HN is one of the few sites that I frequent during micro-breaks at work, and this sort of content is making me feel like HN is becoming a NSFW site to visit. My concern has nothing to do with your stated opinion in the article, but rather that the article doesn't provide enough technical value to warrant being safe for me to read while on the job. Articles that, for instance, inform me about a root key update, or a critical vulnerability in the Linux kernel, provide immediate value to me and my employer. Opinion pieces like these though, not only lack technical value, but are a time (money) drain on my company. Please keep HN safe for work for those of us who care about things like that.

>Trump is an ideological figure with very few actual political views. His popularity is due almost entirely to his cultivation of American hate.

I think this is spot on. If someone says something hateful, and I retweet it, am I not also saying something hateful? Say I don't retweet the actual comment, but instead respond w/ "Have some money." Is that not still an endorsement of the hateful speech?

Ultimately, I think we can view hatred as a kind of ignorance and fearfulness of the unknown, and therefore as a kind of stupidity.

It logically follows that endorsing a stupid candidate is itself a form of stupidity.

> Ellen Pao, the former CEO of Reddit who was effectively ousted by the site’s users because she’s an Asian American woman

Sorry what?

I am usually far more civil, but this article is idiotic. The idea of having political litmus tests as a condition of employment, is the kind of idiotic lunacy I would expect from Trump, not his detractors.

Advocating firing and industry shunning over political opinion seems way more dangerous to me than offensive speech. What are we becoming?

I've never seen so much question begging in my life. Maybe, just maybe, Thiel doesn't believe the charges against Trump. Additionally, the hypocrisy is appalling. People gladly write checks to Hillary Clinton who over the past 30+ years has defended, provided cover and attacked the accusers of her husband who is in the exact same league as Donald Trump.

it isn't about smartness in the sense of IQ. It is just completely different view on where society/economy and the whole civilization should go. Thiel vs. Musk. Conservative collapse vs. progressive expansion. Ant/termite colony (like those that have been at the same place for 1000+ years) vs. interplanetary civilization. Conformal uniformity vs. diversity in the widest sense of the word. Succumbing to the fear of change vs. embracing and riding that fear like a wave, converting the fear into the source of energy.

So, up front, I think there is more than a little schadenfreude to be enjoyed here. I'll skip that, though.

The main thing here is that we chose this future. We built platforms for 140 sniping, and we built censorship tools that helped enable filter bubbles. We built ad tools to monetize rage and not journalism.

We bent over prostrate at the ideas of "equality", diversity, and freedom--all with the best of intentions! We ousted Brendan Eich, we gave Thiel a pass because he was outed by Gawker, and now?

Now they're going against the guys that sign our checks and cheerlead our endeavors.

If this is finally a step too far, if this is a gross misrepresentation of reality or a hit piece, we're late to the party. The time to have avoided this was years ago.

Bunch of hypocrites.

Voting for the lesser of two evils is a tactical voting maneuver and you don't necessarily believe anything at all about what a candidate affirmatively supports. This is as applicable to one side as the other. Almost all of my friends are supporting the same candidate, and none of them are doing so because of her positions.

In this election, the only people who don't seem so smart(besides the candidates) are people who insist on being oblivious to their own candidates severe faults. There is plenty wrong with either candidate and the only people who look foolish are those who insist on trying to shine a shit and sell it as gold.

I'm getting sick of seeing SV expose how many stupid people are among its ranks (on both sides). The whole world used to think we were smart people.

Yay, election year ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

For the author, "smart" means "do as I say, now".

I would be upset if any company fired a developer or even manager for having the wrong political opinions. But if a company broke ties with a part time partner, who was a public representative of the company, because the partner publicly, actively, and materially support a presidential candidate who the company publicly believe "represents a real threat to the safety of women, minorities, and immigrants ... the Constitution, the Republic, ... human decency ... [and] national security" then I don't think that's a problem.

Isn't SiliconnValley just the wall Street of techbro snowflakes and startup culture? Who cares what they say.

These billionaires don't matter. They don't fund the core advancements that matter, they're just data traders. Even if they pooled all their money it would be dwarfed by real technologists. Not political hucksters and new wall Street aka SV.

Surely, SV is just a cliquey jock and yacht club. Bunch of grandfathered aristocratic rich kids. What a joke.

Is there a reason this post got removed from the HN index?