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Comment by ggggtez | Hacker News Reader

Oh please. "19-year-old kids" can sign their life away to the military. They can vote in elections.

To suggest that we shouldn't allow people who are adults by every meaning of the word, voice their opinions publicly and attributed to themselves is ludicrous.

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Likewise, it takes courage to put your name, face and words out there in this manner. As the OP was saying, it can haunt you. Saying they're young a naive for doing this may be true, but it's dismissive of what they've done. What they've done is something I like and respect, I wish more would say that.

It's not an issue of human rights but rather of journalistic ethics. See my other comments on this thread.

It's not unethical to accurately quote 19 year olds. This is an eccentric position you've staked out.

If you had to bet $5 on whether or not the reporter sat these kids down before interviewing them for the record and said something like, "Be advised, what you say in this article is going to be seen by every potential employer for the next 5+ years, are you ready to drop some truth bombs?" how would you bet?

I would bet that she did not...

I mean, most of the people raised on the internet have generally learned by now that anything they say online will probably show up to their potential employers. So I’m pretty sure they do realize that this might hurt their chances of working at Facebook, which is a risk they are willing to make.

I don't think they're saying the students aren't "allowed" to voice their opinions. They're making the point that this is obviously what a college student would say when asked a question like this in the current social climate. No one is saying they are bad for doing so. The point is that it's an easy, ultimately fruitless article that highlights the well-known views of a large population of young adults.

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