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Comment by lisp_enthusiast | Hacker News Reader

You're not arguing in good faith here.

You'd have to be completely insane to conflate "Linux is bad" with "Arabs are inferior," and I don't believe that you ever did.

Supporting a democratically elected candidate, especially outside of the conference in question, can not be conflated with claiming "Arabs are inferior" at a fucking talk at the conference.

You people are so swept up in ideology that you are willing to immediately jump to completely unrealistic positions, that nobody on the opposite side holds, and sidetrack the original discussion into arguing about the position you imagine that your opponents hold.

You're fighting ghosts to feel self-righteous.

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I am answering to someone who conflates hate speech equals to "stating opinions I disagree with". I am glad my example was clear enough to show you how absurd this equivalence was.

> Supporting a democratically elected candidate, especially outside of the conference in question, can not be conflated with claiming "Arabs are inferior" at a fucking talk at the conference.

How about "African countries are shitholes"? "Mexicans are rapists"? You wear a person's symbol, you claim ownership over their ideology. And I know historical comparisons are tired, but there are a few racist and genocidal leaders who were democratically elected.

As a European friend, I am sad you are at that point in the US, but yes, one side of your politics is really fucked up to the point of being toxic. It is racist and misogynistic. A community has to choose between being inclusive of women and minorities and being inclusive of people who reject them.

> You're fighting ghosts to feel self-righteous.

When you grew up in some parts of Europe, you learn to fight when some ghosts rise. More than half of the people I work with could not contribute in a world where sexism and racism would reign.

Why did you assume I'm from the US? I'm from a progressive Scandinavian country and would be considered slightly left of center here (which is far-left in the US.)

Trump never said "Mexicans are rapists," he said something along the lines of "They're not bringing their best people... their rapists" which could be misconstrued as "they're."

He did say that African countries are shitholes, while complimenting my country, which wasn't great for our public image worldwide, but I did chuckle at it. It's the sort of off-hand stupid wording you'd hear at a bar late at night, which I figure is part of his appeal to the people that actually like him. Not a good look for a president to be sure.

Trump is not the ghost of Hitler, it can be fun to argue in that kind of hyperbole but he really isn't. And ~50% of the American voting public chose him over Hillary, because it was a shit sandwich vs giant douche race, you can't reasonably suggest banning all those people from Linux conferences.

> And ~50% of the American voting public chose him over Hillary, because it was a shit sandwich vs giant douche race, you can't reasonably suggest banning all those people from Linux conferences.

That is a very different situation to choosing to wear a MAGA hat. Choosing to wear a MAGA hat at a large event is a conscious decision to broadcast your endorsement of Trump's policies, ideology, and everything else. It means you want people to know you agree with Trump's stance on immigrants, women, and all the other shit.

Maybe such people still shouldn't be banned from a Linux conference, but they absolutely should be considered as racists and misogynists.

If he wore the MAGA hat at the conference, I would actually be somewhat with you on this, in such a case I think staff should initially politely tell the person to take the hat off and escalate from there. My reasoning for this would be that someone walking around with such a hat at a conference is probably just begging for reactions, and US politics doesn't really fit into a conference environment.

However, you're being disingenuous. He didn't wear it at a large event, he thought it would be a fun idea to put it on in front of Trump Tower and share a picture of it with his friends on social media. That's something I might even do as a fun tourist picture, and I really don't like Trump.

This conference is not banning him for conduct at the event, they are banning him for an innocuous social media post on his personal twitter account, a week before the event has even begun. They are just policing the political views of attendees. That's what people have a problem with.

That’s absurd. Should someone walking around wearing a “Black lived matter” hat be banned as well because it’s potentially controversial?

When did it no longer be okay to express unpopular political views?

I find such reasoning absolutely ridiculous. Personally it brings me great sadness that the ideals of free speech - the ideals, not the legal meaning - have been so happily stomped on.

Yeah, I agree that it's a sad state of affairs. But the US political landscape is currently so torn and people are ravenously defending their own team in a fight away from the center, so much that I can just imagine the shitstorm you'd unleash by wearing a maga hat at a primarily left leaning conference like the Linux foundation conference.

It's not good, it's not healthy for anyone, and I'm wondering how long its going to go on for.

You have to keep in mind, that for the most staunch Trump opponents, any mention of him is likened to a personal attack, they honestly believe that supporting him is on the level of full blown white supremacy and fascism.

And in that climate, even thought it goes against my principles, I would advocate for everyone to just keep their political leanings to themselves at all times in these "professional" gatherings where it shouldn't matter where you stand politically. At least until things calm down.

Man I have to sympathize with you here. It seems no matter the opinion you express people are jumping down your throat. I just want to say that, to me, it appears you’re doing a good job of expressing your opinion in a kind way.

I would love to see hostile tensions like these die out online very soon.

You should really watch the clip again before you get behind Trump on this one. He definitely refers to mexican immigrants as rapists, although of course "some, I assume, are good people". I'm surprised by the amount of people trying to play semantic games with what Trump is saying in general, the sentiment is clear to everyone. Trying to deconstruct it in hindsight to his favor is.. pointless.

Argue however you want about that you should be able to express your opinions, but please stop trying to sugar-coat Trump. His rethoric is toxic, it's marginalizing minorities and it's affecting how it is to live as a part of a minority and it shows, not only, from the hate crimes rates.

You yourself are interpreting it the worst possible way, out of context.

What's the context? He was talking about people coming here illegally.

Basic common sense would dictate that many gang members, drug runners, criminals in general that we know are coming here, are doing so illegally. As he said, I'm sure some Mexicans that come here illegally are good people, but pretty much all of the influx of criminals from outside our country come here illegally (including people regularly facilitating illegal travel).

You can choose to lie (to yourself and others) about the context of his statements, as if he was referring to ALL Mexicans, but anyone interested in knowing the truth should indeed find his statements for themselves, completely in context.

He's said enough things to criticize that one shouldn't need to stretch the truth to do so, but the desperation of ideologues knows no bounds.

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