Ask HN: YC please talk about Immigration Order | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: YC please talk about Immigration Order

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YC (Sam Altman) you did a great post recently on Affordable Care and the direct impact on YC company employees. Thank you for that, truly. Can you do the same for YC employees from: Syria, Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Yemen and Libya

some background: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-28/google-recalls-some-staff-to-u-s-after-trump-immigration-order

View on HN

A year ago America was a country I admired. My girlfriend and I were even planning a vacation to Washington DC and Boston this summer. We're white registered Christians from Scandinavia by the way, so the ban isn't affecting us legally, but we won't visit America under Trump. We won't buy American products under Trump, and I've recently moved all my mail/whatever accounts away from American companies and closed or heavily censored my social media accounts on American networks.

This is completely anecdotal but our reaction has been more norm than strange in our circle of friends and coworkers.

The immigration order was the last straw.

It's good to hear that you're standing up for your principals. What's the status of the right-wing movement in the Scandinavian countries? It's really getting a grip in many countries in Europe, and that's been very discouraging to hear.

The OP is just virtue-signaling. He presumably still buys products from third-world dictatorships. Let's ask him. OP, how can you justify boycotting America and not China or a myriad of other countries that are ruled under a far more oppressive regime.

Which products these might be?

Btw a number of vendors mark third world products as "ethically sourced", so it's possible to avoid products from dictatorships.

What's there to justify? Even if 'eksemplar is a hypocrite, but is accurately representing the opinions of a large number of Scandinavians, we, the US, have an economic problem, and saying "You're all hypocrites" isn't going to solve the problem.

(Also, go back to Reddit with your "OP" business.)

> (Also, go back to Reddit with your "OP" business.)

OP is short for original post(er). It's much older than both Reddit and HN.

The difference is that places like China have very little influence over "us". We trade, that's it. Whereas the US, through Hollywood, Nato, SV and general industry, has humongous cultural and economic influence. When my Prime Minister goes hand-in-hand with your President and licks his gold-plated boots, we feel it. When you "help" our neighbors fall into civil war and we get millions of refugees, we feel it. And so on and so forth. This why we feel a duty to resist and condemn trends in American politics that we see as destructive: because you are our Rome and we can't afford you to take your imperial duties this lightly.

So you were fine with Obama's bombing of said countries, but Trump's prohibition on immigration is unacceptable?

The immigration policy of the previous administration would also have rejected the people targeted with the bombs.

It's a great rhetorical strategy to conflate the attacks on various militant groups (that many people did oppose) with a blanket policy based on country of origin, but it's pretty weak sauce.

I don't see where anybody said that.

It's possible to think that bombing is wrong, while still holding the opinion that the immigration order is worse.

If he's going to stop purchasing and using American good and cancel plans to come to America after the immigration policy was implemented, but not after Obama's targeted killings in Yemen and elsewhere, then clearly the former crossed a line while the latter didn't.

You're replying to a poster who is trying to divert discussion. Please don't engage, because the post is not trying to have a discussion, it's trying to divert the rest of us from talking about the current administration.

You're seeing the conservative social media strategy in action -- repeat talking points to divert discussion whenever "their side" is criticized.

If we want real discussion we have to ignore efforts to change the subject!

An awfully good point – thanks.

Why are you trying to change the subject away from immigration policy? I could also talk about how the president is trying to subvert the media to sell his immigration policies, but that would not be relevant in this thread. If you want to talk about that subject, post a new article.

I enjoy pointing out what I percieve as great hypocrisy. Somehow, disallowing foreigners from entering your country is suddenly better than starting wars and extrajudicial executions. It appears as if many people are protesting because of ideology (republican == bad), not because of their actual moral beliefs.

I think you're incorrect (and perhaps a little paranoid) about this being, as you say,

'...the conservative social media strategy in action -- repeat talking points to divert discussion whenever "their side" is criticized.'

tomp isn't trying to change the subject. Instead he asks a valid moral question: why would someone refuse to visit the USA because of Trump's (comparatively insignificant) executive order, yet the same person not be put off by a far more morally repugnant act: Obama's killing of thousands with drone attacks.

tomp also has a strong argument in his comment below about hypocrisy. I'd want him on my team in a debate - he sounds like an honest man.

No, but why would Trump being terrible make me ok with that?

I mean, I'm not happy that America has been at war since 9/11. I simply don't think I can attack America for being in wars, that my own country is participating in, at least not without being a hypocrite.

As an American this makes me sad. I understand your feelings and actions, but it still makes me sad. I don't think my feeling this way is your fault though.

The only thing I can think of to say is that Trump and Trump's actions are "not in my name". Because I believe in kindness it is hard for me to condemn those who voted for him without realizing the extent of what he would actually do, but I personally did not vote for the man nor support his policy or administration. In some ways it is quite strange that we are told that "we have to support the president" because he won the election. I will say I wasn't super happy with our choices this time around in general.

So I'm living in a country doing what I can not to allow one president and one administration's policies to tarnish our relationships with other countries and each other, but it still makes me sad to see you feel the way you do. Again, I understand though.

Just remember, like good people in the US recognize that there are good people in every other country (all the time, even during tough times), we still have good people too.

I'm not giving up hope in America. When you get rid of Trump without ruining your democracy we'll be right over!

I was thinking of search for jobs in America in order to work in companies that use bleeding edge technologies. (Comparatively the open source scene, tech innovation scene in India is not that good).

Trump and his policies have generated similar reactions in me. What about scandanavia? Where to start looking for tech jobs there?

> but we won't visit America under Trump

I don't think putting all Americans in the same bag because you don't like an elected politician is fair. I'm European and have been to America. It's a country that is extremely diverse. Maine doesn't look like Florida which doesn't look like Texas which doesn't look like California.

It would be like boycotting all Europe because some guy you don't like got elected at the European level and took a decision you didn't like. The whole TSA thing is a pain in the arse but I got there by car from Canada and I will always remember the fog descending on the hills on the early morning when I entered Maine, it was just magic. You're missing a lot.

A very sincere question to you - do you also boycott things made in China/Russia? Do you think those countries are "better" (whatever that word means to you) than USA under Trump? If yes, I applaud your integrity even though I may not agree with your actions. If no, why do you have different standards?

I don't think not going to the US is the same thing as boycotting goods from nations you have some ideological problem with. I think it is more about the uneasy feeling you get from visiting a country that makes you feel like you have no rights. (And indeed, at the border crossings you really do not have any rights to speak of).

As for boycotting goods from China: that's not really possible anymore, so it would be a futile exercise. But that's a different discussion.

It seems like the parent is responding to

>We won't buy American products under Trump

in the grandparent, not the bit about cancelling his vacation.

I've never bought a product out of Russia and I've avoided products from other human rights violating countries for years as well. Countries that suck are kind of hard to boycott when you make a living in the tech industry though. The majority of my hardware was made in the west, but I do have an iPhone which was build in China.

Our boycott of America is more of a protest than an anti-American sentiment though. I mean, non-US citizens don't have a say in US politics, and rightfully so, but US policies do affect us. So how else would we protest Trump?

The reason for avoiding the American cloud, however, has less to do with protesting and more to do with privacy concerns. Especially now that Trump has spoken out against the Privacy Shield.

From the Iraq invasion, torture, black sites, rendition, Guantanamo, Libya/Syria/Yemen, 26,000 drone bombs dropped on mainly Muslims in 2016 alone, providing UN/economic/military help to Israel's apartheid state, crony capitalism exported around the world through trade deals while criminal bank CEOs walk free after scamming millions of people and nonviolent drug offenders sit in jail for years if not life.

And this is just since 2000! If a year ago America was a country you admired, here's some advice: do visit, and don't just go to NYC and SF like most tourists, but rent a car and drive through the country. See what there is to admire about how the leaders of the US have run the country for decades vs. home your Scandinavian countries are run. Go to places that voted for Trump whose jobs are gone, whose infrastructure is falling apart, who have no health care and little opportunities for education, whose life expectancy has declined down to 3rd world levels under the America you admired. Perhaps you will then understand better why many Americans found themselves desperate enough to vote for a madman.

We should be careful about reading too much into this election. There are many well off republicans.

Based on the statistics I've seen, Trump had _fewer_ low income voters than Hillary. In addition Trump has similar percentages of male and white votes to GW Bush Senior [0].

While the disenfranchised poor Trump voter paints a pretty narrative, it leaves out a large volume of voters who turned out that dont fit that mold.

[0] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/11/08/us/politics/e...

This. When people say "working class voter" or "working poor voter", the inevitably implicity define it as a white voter. When you examine an ethnic breakdown of these voters, it becomes evident that this isn't an economic group but rather a racial-economic group. Poor blacks didn't vote for Trump any more than they did for Romney[0]

[0] http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/11/09/behind-trump...

I think even that is more complicated than a lot of people are saying. There used to be a solid bloc of white working class northerners who were solid democrats in places like Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Trump was able to flip those states. I personally wonder how long that will hold before they flip back, or if it will be more permanent.

I can understand the sentiment but I'm not sure if further separation really helps. As a European with strong ties to the US I'm more than saddened by what is happening but also see that Europe is fighting its own daemons. I feel that those of us who believe in an open society (and there are plenty both in the US and Europe) should resist the temptation to cut ourselves off and rather continue to strengthen our ties across the pond. Our friendship built over decades is too important to be lost to what has been happening over the last few years.

> A year ago America was a country I admired.

This is very childish and shows that you never really knew much about America in the first place. Love it or hate it, our nation was never a Scandinavian hug box. Even under Obama.

Personally I drew the line at the USG demanding to know your social media identities in the ESTA forms. But that was the Obama administration. It is nice to pretend that all problems started with Trump, but in fact the situation of crossing the border and immigration already got worse and worse under Obama.

I know two persons who while born in Iran, didn't live there for quite a few years and haven't been able to visit the US for conferences in the last few years.

Old man got angry on the village and cut off his dic...

I just don't get this obsession with Trump. So what if he is the president of the US? It doesn't change US one bit. You will still find the same people, the same cities, the same landscape as half year ago when Trump was not president yet. Why would you deprive yourself of broadening your horizons just because a guy who you don't like is in charge?

Trumps election is a symptom of the effects of perpetual war, associated propaganda and globalization in markets and jobs in the US. He is symbolic of peoples frustration with politics, taught jingoism, and nostalgia for a less complicated world.

His selection is also a backlash against a culture too-far: the emphasis on PC thinking and behavior,the new religion of inclusion which older|traditional personalities find to be decadent and repulsive.

You can boycott what is 'American' because of Trump but Trump doesn't care about America.

The United States are an extremely large and diverse country. Trump received 4% of the vote in DC [1] 16% of the vote in Boston [2]. For a Scandinavian comparison, these numbers are both significantly lower than recent national-level polling of the Sweden Democrats at 22% [3].

I really hope you change your mind and visit us, it may help you see through the national stereotype to the subtleties of the situation on the ground. You're welcome to my couch in Boston :).

[1] http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?year=2016&f=0&o...

[2] http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/datagraph.php?year=2016&f... (Suffolk County)

[3] https://www.rt.com/news/367187-sweden-democrats-second-popul...

That is BS. China is easily one of the most oppressive regimes you must be buying from, you probably use Gas from Russia.

Society != Nation. Trump!=America. Trump is an asshole politician (just like Hillary) who has grabbed power.

When you refuse to engage in Trade you are not hurting Trump you are hurting average American and yourself. Trump will simply tax Americans more to keep is Airforce One flying.

This executive order is very bad and it's not about muslim-majority or no muslim-majority.

The order applies to existing visa and green card holders. Many of these people have build there lives here. Some of them are key employees in American companies.

If they are on vacation abroad right now they can't come back to their home and families. If they are in the US, they can't leave the country - even if their jobs might require them to travel abroad.

Even worse than that is the uncertainty. I think many are now afraid this order might be extended indefinitely.

One of the most disturbing things is that one of T's closest advisers actually thinks that there are too many Asian tech CEOs: http://www.theverge.com/2016/11/16/13653490/steve-bannon-tru...

This is ridiculous. What's the argumentation? Are non-asian people withheld from positions or unable to start startups because of Asian people? Or, are people from less privileged societies/economies more driven towards success/entrepreneurship? Is there space for lucid and argumented discussion when these kind of statements are being made at all?

edit: ok. I get it. Not all that thinly-veiled "not white people hurr durr" talk/racism. No point of discussion.

He's talking about Steve Bannon, Trump's main advisor, who ran Brietbart, which hosts plenty of White Supremacists. That's basically the argument- Asians aren't Americans, we need more of 'us' at the top. That's why Bannon will complain about too many Asian CEOs but won't talk about a lack of Black CEOs. He's not concerned with diversity of any kind, he wants homogeneity.

Well, Bannon (Trump's Chief Strategist) is part of what's called the "alt-right" movement. Quoting from a ProPublica article[1]: "The alt-right believes in racially separate nation-states."

They are okay with immigrant founders like Peter Thiel and Elon Musk, since they are white. It seems like it's non-white immigrants they want to keep out.

They also don't seem concerned with the economic impact of excluding non-white immigrants, as Bannon said "A country is more than an economy."

[1] https://www.propublica.org/article/right-wing-extremism-whit...

FWIW, there is no single definition for "alt-right". You're free to choose the definition that best advances your political leanings, but implying specificity to one description seems a bit disingenuous to me.

I think it's pretty obvious that "alt-right" is an alias of "white supremacist". Neo-Nazis wanted a less loaded term so they came up with a new one, but it's the same people, same ideas.

It's not that you're "wrong", but there are plenty of people who consider (or refer to themselves) as being alt-right, who are not white supremacists.

Your response doesn't add anything to the discussion. What are these other definitions you speak of? Please tell us and cite them, so we can make up our own minds which is more credible. Throwing in adhominems like "advances your political leanings", etc. is irrelevant. It's not like there's some alternate definition of "alt-right" that implies they're leftists!

> Your response doesn't add anything to the discussion. What are these other definitions you speak of? Please tell us and cite them

Be honest: are you being open minded?

Here are a variety of definitions:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alt-right

What "alt-right" definition are you referring to that does not include racists?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alt-right

Some people have (perhaps unwittingly) chosen to identify as alt-right to distance themselves from mainstream Republican conservatives.

We should not forget that the alt-right is part of the neo-reactionary / dark enlightenment / Mencius Moldbug crowd. These people explicitly want to destroy liberal democracy and initiate the rule of hereditary strong men ruling ethnostates. This may sound like an exaggeration, but I encourage those that think this to actually read their writings. This is an explicit goal. These ideas are 21st century fascism as defined by Umberto Eco.

Sadly, these people are on this very forum now.

Edit: Yeah, mod me down to oblivion because i hurt your feelz.

It is the left who is now telling us what thoughts and ideas are acceptable. It's amazing how the tides have turned in just 30 or so years.

There is no single definition for, say, "hacker" either, and there might be plenty of hackers who don't use computers, but if you're portraying yourself as a hacker you have to be at least okay with computers. Same with the alt-right: there might be plenty of people who call themselves alt-right who aren't white nationalists, but the're okay with white nationalism.

The /r/altright subreddit says on its sidebar: "Another core principle of the Alt-Right is Identitarianism. Identitarianism is the prioritization of social identity, regardless of political persuasion. Thus, the Alt-Right promotes White Identity and White Nationalism."

Breitbart's 2016 article, "An Establishment Conservative's guide to the Alt Right" says: "The alt-right do not hold a utopian view of the human condition: just as they are inclined to prioritise the interests of their tribe, they recognise that other groups – Mexicans, African-Americans or Muslims – are likely to do the same. ... The alt-right’s intellectuals would also argue that culture is inseparable from race. The alt-right believe that some degree of separation between peoples is necessary for a culture to be preserved. A Mosque next to an English street full of houses bearing the flag of St. George, according to alt-righters, is neither an English street nor a Muslim street — separation is necessary for distinctiveness."

If you have a problem with the "alt-right" being identified with a belief in racially-separate nation-states, take it up with the alt-right themselves.

Thanks for an actual substantive comment.

> The /r/altright subreddit says on its sidebar: "Another core principle of the Alt-Right is Identitarianism. Identitarianism is the prioritization of social identity, regardless of political persuasion. Thus, the Alt-Right promotes White Identity and White Nationalism."

This was actually surprising news to me. One issue I have with the term "white nationalism" is: can you be white and a nationalist (putting your countrymen's needs first, regardless of skin color), without being a "white nationalist" (aka racist)?

If you don't mind, I'd really appreciate your opinion on that question.

Regardless, if a subreddit with 16,000+ subscribers self-proclaims it is white nationalist (rather than just nationalist), then I have no problem conceding that it seems that it is kind of gelling into an at least partially racist organization, which would lose my support.

> The alt-right’s intellectuals would also argue that culture is inseparable from race.

That is full-on mentally retarded, there is absolutely no scientific evidence to support that assertion, and plenty suggesting the exact opposite. Jesus Christ. (EDIT: Just to be crystal clear, I realize that was not your statement, it was Breitbart's. I'm going to go look that up because I find it extremely hard to believe they would actually be stupid enough to say that.)

EDIT 2: Curious to see how long until my mystery downvoter shows up and downvotes my last set of comments. :)

EDIT 3: After a skim of the article, I feel quite confident that "The alt-right’s intellectuals would also argue that culture is inseparable from race" was an unintentional mistake, and replacing "race" with "nationality" or "community" would better express the writer's actual thoughts.

This whole phenomenon is very interesting to me. I don't think many people would deny that your environment has a significant effect on your character development (nature vs nurture), would they? Yet, when you extend this idea to the national level, these very same people will now say it is literally impossible for your environment to influence a person's character. Or, people will gladly visit a foreign country and come back extolling the virtues of the culture, but if the topic of conversation change from tourism to immigration, the same people would passionately proclaim that it is a delusion to think that there is such a thing as "culture" of a nation.

Steve Bannon is simply a White Supremacist, there isn't really any argumentation to speak of.

> Steve Bannon is simply a White Supremacist

No, I don't think he is, in that he doesn't want whites to lord it over non-whites. What he wants, as I understand it, is for different races and cultures to live in different societies/countries.

So he believes in racial segregation but is not racist?

I didn't say he isn't a racist.

That kind of segregation within nations is a recipe for wars and conflict. It didn't work out well for the Nazis and the neo-Nazis wanting the same thing also seems like a bad idea.

Then he's welcome to be the senior counselor to the president of an all-white country. America, though, is distinctly not an all-white country. Does he want to make it one? Am I, as an American-born child of Indian immigrants, expected to move somewhere else?

Sadly, I believe the answer is yes.

Richard B. Spencer is a leading figure in the American Alt-Right (he even created the name). Here's a section from the beginning of his Wikipedia article:

Richard Bertrand Spencer (born May 11, 1978) is a noted American white supremacist. He is president of the National Policy Institute, a white nationalist think tank, and Washington Summit Publishers, an independent publishing firm. Spencer has stated that he rejects the description of white supremacist, and describes himself as an identitarian. He advocates for a white homeland for a "dispossessed white race" and calls for "peaceful ethnic cleansing" to halt the "deconstruction" of European culture.

I'm not sure what a "peaceful ethnic cleansing" would look like, and I don't think I want to find out.

> I'm not sure what a "peaceful ethnic cleansing" would look like

Peaceful for himself I suppose. He'd like to be nice and cozy, miles from the action, while it's being carried out.

The more that lad get's slapped about the place, the better I feel.

> I'm not sure what a "peaceful ethnic cleansing" would look like

It's clearly impossible.

White supremacist crowd has been evolving the the last 20 years, but at it's core is still "whites are the best." The biggest change I've seen since their adoption of scientific racism (now known as "human biodiversity") came with the publication of the Bell Curve back in 1994. They had to reconcile their views that whites were the best in all things with the stereotype of the smart asian kid and black professional athlete. So now the whites are in the best all around race. The most inventive, the most adaptive, blah blah blah. Seriously, it sounds like someone took the alien races from space opera, or D&D and made white the humans.

Then of course they bring up "white genocide" and are staunch antimiscegenationists.

You'll need to discuss with Bannon what "our culture" means and who "we" are. When you say lucid and argumented, I'm guessing you've already excluded such nebulous thoughts from what arguments are acceptable. Or you could try to convince him that the idea of culture is too vague too be useful and we should only discuss policy with more concrete things.

Edit/Clarification: I disagree with Bannon. More specifically, he would probably consider me "them" instead of "us".

This seems to be one of my least popular comments. Care to explain why?

Ah Steve Bannon of infamous fake-news site "Broadbeard"

I'm a white, male from Norway. A country that has pretty close ties to the US and which is probably very unlikely to end up on any list of countries whose citizens will experience much of a hassle in immigration.

Over the last couple of months the US has developed from a country that I'd rather not visit to a country I really, really don't want to visit. At least not while its political system appears to be under duress and the situation appears to be extremely volatile.

I do travel quite a bit, so this is an actual choice I make several times per year. Just in the last month I've been offered free airline tickets to the US twice, and I declined both offers. One of them was to give a talk (which I really would have liked to), the other was some form of bonus ticket from an airline I fly frequently.

Over the last year I've also experienced an increased interest in working here in Norway from people in the tech industry. Mostly white people with US citizenships or green cards working in the bay area.

If this goes on for much longer it will hurt the US because right now I don't think many of my peers (people in the tech sector) would want to go there, and due to some of the other executive orders, we don't know if we can safely use cloud providers in the US in the future (it'll be great for local cloud providers though).

Considering how immigration has in large part made the tech industry what it is today, and considering the CEOs of both Google and Microsoft are immigrants- not from the countries Trump banned today but nevertheless a country with hundreds of millions of Muslims - this is certainly in YCs ballpark.

Not only is this order terrible, but this sets a dangerous precedent for the future.

Also note that christians from these countries are allowed to apply for refugee status; it's essentially a Muslim ban, a religious ban.

Because Christians are actually persecuted.

Many are persecuted for other reasons too.

Yeah it's almost like people don't even do any diligence but emotionally attack Trump in every turn. Do research how christians are persecuted or whats happening to gays and women in Muslim countries.

We're talking about America persecuting people, not other countries. Don't be trying to divert the conversation.

I like how Trump supporters in synch stated to care about LGBT and women rights in Muslim countries. Probably some popular thread on a Klan forum.

>whats happening to gays and women in Muslim countries.

Does he allow gay men or muslim women to enter then? I would applaud such an initiative. Why doesn't he do that? Muslim women far outnumber christians in these countries, if you cared so much about them you'd be against this ban.

If you care about persecuted people, what about persecuted muslims? Asghar Farhadi, the director of A Separation, cannot attend the Oscars because of the bizarre ban on Iranians. He has a long history of being persecuted by his government. That is not even talking about the millions of muslim doctors, engineers, actually skilled people being bombed out of their homes by all kinds of forces.

And it's not like the US gleefully accepts all refugees from Syria. They go though an extensive process that takes years. The ones that get through - are far less likely to commit any kind of crime than the average American citizen.

It's been said that the best thing to do is to call your senators' and representatives' local offices and leave a sober, polite voicemail message. That assumes that the voice mailboxes aren't full, as I just learned is the case with my two senators. I used the online contact form instead (which supposedly isn't nearly as effective as a phone call) and will try a phone call again on Monday.

The Indivisible Guide, written by former Congressional staffers, supports your comment but goes on to add a lot more context and tips. Highly recommended:

https://www.indivisibleguide.com/

I really get a feeling that the discrimination against Muslims will just upset existing muslims in America and elsewhere around the world. Almost 1/10 of the world population identifies with being a muslim.

I hope this doesn't backfire on trump that it creates more havoc. America is seen as the Nation of progress. It seems that is no longer the case.

How many muslims did the US kill last year vs other countries?

Not discounting the US role in civilian death toll, but wouldn't the Syrian government be in the lead for killing Muslims?

Obama has ordered drone strikes that killed at least over 100 innocent victims in the Middle East. Not to mention the "terrorists" that he blew up. He also executed American citizens without a trial in the Middle East: he ordered a drone strike to kill a suspected terrorist leader who was an American citizen.

> Almost 1/10 of the world population identifies with being a muslim

According to Wikipedia, 23% of people are Muslims, somewhat higher than 1/10.

My bad. I took a wild conservative guess. I guess it's 2/10. TIL.

It's amazing that as a president you can openly criticise and be racist against Muslims.

I somewhat predict a recession coming because trump pisses off some major nations.

The real danger is that Trump's Muslim hating is not a statement of fact but a declaration of intent.

Arendt wrote about this on 1930s Germany. https://storify.com/AndrewHickey/lusztig-arendt-and-trump

This could become an existential problem for YC (and the US tech industry) if these policies are extended, because the much of their intake is immigrants (not sure what percentage, but it must be close to half). Here is Paul Graham's take on it:

https://twitter.com/paulg/status/825319115548147713

Sometimes you have to deal with politics, whether you want to or not.

Wow, the chaos of the Trump administration has now fallen on Hacker News and heated political discussion has ensued. I didn't think there were ever discussions here about US foreign policy, except for how they relate to things with some connection to the industry. How curious!

This relates to the industry—a large part of the tech industry in the U.S. involves people with work visas and green cards who will be excluded from reentry if they come from the countries covered by this order and are currently out of the country or travel internationally.

After spending thousands of dollars on H1 visas for Iranian nationals, now we are expected to pay state and federal tax for them while they are not allowed to come back to work

1935: let's turn away those Jewish refugees

https://twitter.com/Stl_Manifest

Article is flagged?

Trump is trying to manipulate the media to suppress discussion of bad things he does. His trolls have succeeded in suppressing this discussion on HN. A win for Trump and bad for the rest of us.

The HN guidelines specifically ask not to use HN to submit posts like this.

Please don't post on HN to ask or tell us something (e.g. to ask us questions about Y Combinator, or to ask or complain about moderation). If you want to say something to us, please send it to hn@ycombinator.com.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

On this topic in particular, the discussion is doing little to actually advance conversation and understanding. Your comment itself "His trolls have succeeded in suppressing this discussion on HN" is evidence of that, regardless of what other people are posting. This isn't constructive, civil, or substantive.

Edit to add: In the hopes of better communication, if you'd like to down vote this comment, will you also take the time to add a brief reply? I appreciate it.

Awareness is constructive. Hearing views from abroad is constructive. There are voices here from tech workers in Scandinavia that I couldn't find in traditional news outlets.

HN is poorer if it focuses on tech only and not on how society is influenced. Probably I should post some on Feynman's writing on this topic.

Have a good day

Awareness is constructive. Hearing views from abroad is constructive. There are voices here from tech workers in Scandinavia that I couldn't find in traditional news outlets.

Yes, awareness is constructive. Is there anything in this thread that isn't elsewhere on HN (and likely in spades)?

I'm not at all arguing against being able to discuss constructively how society is influenced. Tech in and of itself may be interesting, but it's ultimately empty if it's not used to benefit society.

That said, the comments in this thread are not people talking to each other to reach any kind of understanding (even if not agreement). Can you point to any three exchanges where that's happening?

Even our exchange, I feel like you've reacted to my comment as only an argument for the submission to be flagged while ignoring why I thought it has been. It has nothing to do with it being non-tech. It has to do with (a) Ask HN's aren't for addressing YC or YC companies, and (b) whether the discussion is actually accomplishing anything. Flamewars do little to advanced anything constructive, even awareness.

HN is for civil and substantive discussion. There are plenty of places elsewhere where people can post micro-rants at each other. HN isn't supposed to be one of them.

We can circumvent the rules against political discourse as long as we do it under the veil of listing all the negative things that Republican policies will do for YC.

There is no rule against politics. The guideline says stories about politics are usually off-topic, unless:

>"...they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon."

Going by this thread, it's obviously up for debate whether the submission fits the spirit of the guideline.

Aside: If the guidelines count as rules, your comment is definitely against them.

Bad news for all STEM field including high-tech and sciences. US may severely suffer in the long run.

And almost definitely in the short run as even current green card holders are covered in this order. Means that folks who went overseas for (vacation/conference/etc) before the order was signed will not be able to return to work.

Yup. Already many such reported cases emerged. Many students & academics...

Ask and ye shall receive:

http://blog.samaltman.com/time-to-take-a-stand

nationality is segregation

It's not time to bury heads in the sand. This issue directly affects most everyone here in one way or another. It would be irresponsible to bury our heads in the sand on this one.

Michael Eisen, http://www.nature.com/news/geneticist-launches-bid-for-us-se... Tim Cook, Sundar Pichai, Mark Zuckerberg and others are taking a stand. We must unite to do this.

We know where sticking our heads in the sand got us the last time...

From the article:

"Trump signed an executive order Friday prohibiting entry by people from seven majority-Muslim nations for 90 days. Citizens of Syria, Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Somalia, Yemen and Libya would be banned from entering the U.S. for the period, while the government determines what information it needs to safely admit visitors."

I... have a hard time finding this to be that outrageous. I noticed the article mentions that they are muslim-majority, but they are also war zones, which I think matters much more. If it was an anti-islam thing then why wouldn't they ban people from places like Indonesia?

For our firm this won't really make a difference right now, and we'll figure out what to do in the coming months. I don't really have a problem with better vetting procedures for people from these countries.

Can you talk about what the existing procedures are for refugees from these countries, and why they're not sufficient?

I would Also be interested in knowing how many terrorist acts have been committed in the US by refugees.

It takes two years of vetting before a refugee is granted entry to the United States, and even then most applicants are denied. The process includes multiple interviews, background checks, and biometric searches.[1]

Why isn't this sufficient? Well, it is sufficient. Your chances of being killed by a refugee turned terrorist is 1 in 3.6 billion according to the Cato Institute.[2] So why isn't considered sufficient? Quite frankly it a political ploy to gain support by stoking unfounded fears of others.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/11/20/us/why-it-tak...

[2] https://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/truth-about-for...

Germany had a massive amount of sexual assaults perpetrated over NYE last year, mainly from Middle Eastern immigrants/refugees. Things like this tend to leave lasting bad impressions on refugees in general, regardless of how true it is, and look at how that issue blew up in Merkel's face since then.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/07/10...

Perception and reality are two different things, and only the former is relevant to politics.

The offenders were mostly from northern Africa (so not from Syria, where most immigrants in 2015 came from). That Washington Post article is clearly biased. Better read the source article: http://www.sueddeutsche.de/politik/uebergriffe-in-koeln-frau...

Iran is a war zone?

Besides, there are people from these countries who have green cards. People living in the US for years. They could have gone on a business trip to Canada last week, and now are stuck outside the country.

If we don't let people who are already living here come back, do you think we should kick them out?

What about the Iraqis that worked with the military and got visa status before? Do we kick them out?

I believe this does not affect green card holders. My understanding is that green card holders are entitled to enter the U.S. in a similar way that U.S. are entitled to enter the U.S.

the order seems to be vague on this and, since it was executed with little planning, leaves it up to immigration officers to make ad hoc decisions, saying things like "call the president" when questioned

Unfortunately, it does: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-immigration-gree...

Homeland security thinks different: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-immigration-gree...

As a soft Trump supporter, this infuriates me. I hope he walks this back quickly.

That's not much of a source. Not even a full sentence from the supposed email. Color me dubious.

I don't think anyone would expect this to affect green card holders, and if this isn't an outright fabrication, which frankly wouldn't surprise me at this point, I'm sure Trump will clarify the matter shortly. No one wants these policies to affect established, permanent residents.

Remember, this is a very hard transition and the teams are still in the process of exchanging. It's absolutely plausible that there are anti-Trump people in the government doing everything they can to throw a wrench in the works. The media has certainly made it clear that they're basically willing to self-immolate to try to stop Trump, and I think there are a lot of Obama-era workers of similar mind.

I know this thread is old now, but I wanted to update with a follow-up.

Reuters has edited the story linked above [0] to state that the spokeswoman had improperly stated the effect and that, per a "senior administration official", permanent residents will be allowed to enter the United States after a "routine rescreening". [Permanent residents, or "green card holders", are non-citizens who have been granted a permanent right to reside in the United States.]

As expected, this is just another case of the media heavily misrepresenting an action by Trump because they want to destroy him at any cost.

[0] See http://archive.is/JViXa for a snapshot of the Reuters article at Sun Jan 29 01:52:21 EST 2017. The old snapshot is accessible by clicking the "history" link on that page, or going directly to http://archive.is/ZwEBt .

> As expected, this is just another case of the media heavily misrepresenting an action by Trump because they want to destroy him at any cost.

Or it is the result of an amateurish group in power, which seem not to understand the consequences of their actions.

As the administration itself implements and interprets its own policies (at least until judicial intervention corrects that interpretation), thus creating the consequences of enforcement, that doesn't seem likely.

The administration wrote the policy then the DHS interpreted it. Then the administration overruled that interpretation. And then about a day later the administration changed its mind. It's almost as if they should've thought about this proposal for another 48 hours before signing it.

Source: http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/28/politics/donald-trump-travel-b...

For those downvoting, why? It is my belief from talking to green card holders that they have a right to entry in the U.S. I'm not a lawyer and I suspect those downvoting aren't either. I phrased my comment in terms of what I thought to be true and as a fact.

> they are also war zones

Yeah, because that's where refugees tend to come from.

> If it was an anti-islam thing

You know that if and when the ban is lifted, it also prioritizes Christian refugees over Muslims, right?

> For our firm this won't really make a difference right now

Your humanity is a shining example to all.

Banning people trying to escape war zones makes it worse not more acceptable. Stop watching so much TV news and reading articles by cowardly hate mongers. Most people are just like you and me and only want to provide a nice life for their families.

That's true, but it's not about "most people". Most people from those nations never had a chance of ending up in the United States anyway. Even for first-world migrants, getting access to another first-world country costs tens of thousands of dollars and months or years of time.

If we're seriously interested in helping, we should stop pretending like we can absorb all the refugees in existence and focus instead on practical, tangible ways to improve the lives of the people who are suffering. There is also a degree of isolationism, which is important. There is no need for America to get involved in everyone else's fight. There are always going to be problems in the world, and it shouldn't be our concern to try to fix all of them.

Because the wars in the Middle East are often blamed on the U.S. (because of support for Israel, or American involvement in regime change, or something else), segments of the population grow to hate us, and segments of that population radicalize and believe they can derive meaning from attacking their perceived enemy in the only way they can (terrorism). This has happened numerous times in the US already. Since foreign nationals have no inherent right to access the U.S., it's perfectly logical to tighten procedures for prospective entrants from terror-prone nations.

It's not an either or. We can absorb a lot more refugees than we are taking now (which is basically none) and we can also have better foreign policy than we have had for the last 20 years.

But why would we? Because it's the polite thing to do? That's fine to an extent, but when there are active state-sponsored terrorist populations trying to sneak in operatives from the very region affected, why is that a risk that's wise for us to take? The "state-sponsored terrorism" boogeyman used to be a mostly-imaginary thing with reference to Iran, but who can argue now that ISIS, a literal terrorist state, controls large sections of Iraq and Afghanistan?

Culturally, we have very little in common with Middle Eastern refugees, and I don't just mean "they go to a weird looking church". We don't share similar cultural values. It's a big culture shock in both directions. There are other nations nearby that are much more similar and that the majority would be much more comfortable in.

Geographically, we're nowhere near the affected areas, and we already have a burgeoning refugee crisis on our southern border. Why do we need to import Syrian or other Middle Eastern refugees, specifically? We have taken them in some limited quantities, and that alone is risky enough, is it not?

I sympathize with wanting to be nice, but we need to be smart about it. There's more to life than tingly feelings, and there are plenty of opportunists out there who'd be happy to exploit our kindness. I love being nice, but I also love being smart. We should do both.

Because it's the morally right thing to do and immigrants enrich our country. Read some history.

OK, so you're suggesting that we discard practicalities due to the purity of your ideology.

I don't believe that giving refuge to anyone who asks/wants it is automatically the right thing to do. In an ideal world, that would work fine, as would a lot of other naive solutions to social ills. But we don't live in an ideal world.

Immigrants enrich our country under the right circumstances. This is typically accepted as an implicit truth and it's the theory that underpins all immigration policy and visa restrictions; it's hardly anything new, and such restrictions are so self-evidently necessary that they're universal. Every country has entry requirements, and many of them are quite significant; not something that your average Joe could qualify for without years of work.

If we let in anyone who asks or anyone who poses as a refugee, we are being reckless with our own resources and safety. Not everyone in the world is acting in good faith.

> OK, so you're suggesting that we discard practicalities due to the purity of your ideology.

No, I'm not. I'm suggesting we abandon your unfounded fears in the face of historical evidence that bringing in immigrants has only ever done good things for our country and the reality of what is right (helping to relieve human suffering) and wrong (refusing to help when you are able to do so at no real cost to yourself.)

This will be my last reply to you since you are just clinging to right wing xenophobia.

Again you're casting this in hard ideological terms. I'm not a hard ideologue. It's possible for someone to disagree with you without "clinging to right-wing xenophobia", and, also again, stringent migration restrictions are not only normal but universal.

"Bringing in immigrants has only ever done good things" is an inherently subjective statement, so pretending like we can just open a history textbook and have the virtue of unlimited immigration smack us in the face is easy to dismiss without further argument. Even if someone does subjectively agree with this conclusion (and the topic is far too wide for such a broad generalization to hold), they'd point out that the stringent immigration restrictions that have always existed have played a large role in that success.

It's disappointing that rather than discussing the issue, you've chosen to apply a derisive and incorrect label, which you feel enables you to dismiss the argument without analyzing or discussing it. We're never going to get anywhere if, after two polite statements from someone, you're ready to label them with [what you feel] is a mean label and state that their opinion is invalid in light of the label you've just assigned. This is, simply and frankly, an extremely immature level of discourse, and sadly, many of us lack the moral backbone to stand up to it and we just comply with whoever is bullying the hardest/loudest. Many of our contemporary problems have this lack of moral backbone at their root.

Personally, I have great respect for Islam and Muslims in general. I think they're a net force for good, especially in modern secular nations that seriously need more influence from religious people. Though I haven't had the opportunity to travel abroad extensively, I'd like to some day, and I've seriously considered relocating outside of the United States to countries with very different cultural perspectives, including Muslim nations. My grandparents are immigrants who arrived at Ellis Island in the aftermath of World War 2, and they speak non-English at home, which I don't find at all upsetting or threatening.

By any objective measure, I'm not a "xenophobe" ("a person unduly fearful of what is foreign and especially of people of foreign origin"), but because you don't like my conclusion that some restrictions on refugee immigration from terror-prone regions are reasonable, you've chosen to label, shame, and ignore instead of politely agreeing to disagree.

Such dismissive ignorance and self-righteousness is exactly why the blue-collar hoi polloi are rejecting this tyranny of the rising nerd bourgeoisie.

Do you offer a room to every homeless guy you've ever met? I'm sure you could fit a lot of them in sleeping bags in your living room if you were so inclined. Why don't you do that? Hasn't history proven that people are good, and that "relieving human suffering" is good, and that it comes at "no real cost to yourself"?

Perhaps we just disagree about the costs and risks involved in accepting refugees from nations with substantial terrorist activity. That's fine, and it doesn't warrant petty labeling from either side. That's just called a "disagreement" and they happen all the time. Maybe we can work on learning how to disagree better?

There is nothing wrong with considering either the safety of American nationals or the cultural compatibility and willingness/likelihood of assimilation of foreign nationals into the American mainstream before we admit them to our country. Every country has a responsibility to make these determinations when accepting new migrants, which is why every country has nation-of-origin-based visa rules and other universal immigration controls. In fact, the rules for the US are much less stringent than those of many of our first-world peers.

The fact is that your shame-based suicide cult is simply not sticking. Please come out of the bubble. Is Trump's win not enough to wake you from the echo chamber?

Unfortunately, it is about the fact that they are Muslims.

"Mr. Trump also established a religious test for refugees from Muslim nations: He ordered that Christians and others from minority religions be granted priority over Muslims."

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/27/us/politics/trump-syrian-...

This statement alarmed me, so I looked into it and I find it's a tad misleading. The executive order itself neither explicitly prioritizes Christians over Muslims nor mentions either religion by name. It directs authorities to give priorities to applicants who practice a minority religion in their country of origin.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/27/us/politics/refugee-musli...

That's not a religious test? It's clear what its intent is.

The President made it clear that it is about prioritizing Christians:

“if you were a Muslim you could come in, but if you were a Christian, it was almost impossible."

"I thought it was very, very unfair. So we are going to help them,” the president said.

Sadly, even his logic is factually incorrect.

Not that facts matter. Anger does, right? And fear.

i gather you're saying that Trump has his facts wrong here, which unfortunately seems to be a common problem for him.

that said, what are the facts about refugee counts by religion from Syria?

Perhaps that was what he meant with the order, but the text of the order does not indicate a preference for any one religion over the other.

I'm really getting tired of reporters (or journalists, or bloggers, or whoever it is that writes news these days) describing Trump's actions as they understand them rather than how they actually are. It's unnecessary and doesn't help. It just means I have to go digging around for explanations to things that should have been fully explained in the article itself.

The purported anti-terror rationale seems pretty disingenuous when you look at the nationalities of the people who have previously committed acts of terror on US soil. San Bernadino was someone from Pakistan and someone from the US. 9/11 was people from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Lebanon and UAE. Oklahoma City was an American. And every school, church, theater, etc mass shooting that has taken place over the past decade was either committed by an American or national of a country not on his list.

So what's the point of it then? It can't be about "safely allowing immigration" if we're not blocking people from countries that have historically threatened our safety in the past.

yeah, this is very suspicious.

immigrants from Saudi Arabia and Egypt are not scrutinized the way immigrants from Iran are, under this policy. we really must look at Trump's motivations.

Just considering the case of Saudi Arabia, we have this:

[Trump] emphasized that he has a good relationship with Saudi Arabia. On the same day, he said: “They are buying apartments and properties from me,” adding, “They spend $40-50 million, I am supposed to hate them? I love them very much.”

http://english.alarabiya.net/en/business/economy/2016/11/22/...

Point out an American politician who doesn't do business / takes donations from the Saudis. I'm waiting.

but that's the beauty of it. i don't have to name such a politician in order to justify my comment.

even if every single US politician takes donations from the Saudis, it still makes sense to scrutinize the motivations behind any policies that appear to unfairly favor Saudi Arabia.

I'm sad to see that muninn_'s comment is being downvoted, since he's expressing a view that I'm sure is held by a majority of the US public. It's actually already common for J1 visa holders to be vetted for months before they are allowed to return to the United States. This is a policy that existed long before Trump became president.

Racist!! jk

It's refreshing to see a rational response to theses EO's instead of the over the top virtue signaling that is now common place on HN.

I have always supported ban to Refugees. But I do not understand why a person who has already got his/her greencard should be denied entry into USA because he/she belong to one of the 7 nations. Pakistand and Saudi Arabia are conveniently not included.

I hope these nations respond by confiscating any/all American assets around their territory and expelling American ambassadors.

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