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Comment by Areading314 | Hacker News Reader

This is also what people do in autocratic regimes. Effectively we have created a "democratic autocracy" by means of allowing mobs of people to steamroll people online and destroy their reputations.

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Fwiw, 'autocracy' means "a country, state, or society governed by one person with absolute power," and has nothing to do with any of this. There's no 'auto' here, no governing, and any power involved is far from absolute...

Freedom of speech doors not mean freedom from consequences for what one says. If someone says shitheel things, their 'reputation' is allowed to suffer...

Well just think about all the times in history where religious culture has the upper hand, or anti-communism, or communism. To me it doesn’t matter what the dogma of the day is, the behavior of loud elements in society shouting down free expression, or unorthodox thought, is pretty repugnant. It’s not as simple as saying society is just expressing displeasure. That’s fine, but I think we can all see a different beast rising up here in the US lately that is historically recognizable. Read the opening of The Three Body Problem - that shit was real, and those social movements are a liability for any culture as it’s part of human behavior. There’s nothing exceptional about the US that prevents our society from falling victim to political cults.

The old political cults are still there? And still causing problems? They've just learned to be slightly less visible about it. Brigham Young university will still "cancel" you for not being straight: https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/traumatic-whiplash-b...

> Read the opening of The Three Body Problem

Yes, the cultural revolution was bad. Revolutions tend to be massive over corrections which arise because there's no peaceful way of resolving a situation and they know that in the event of a counter revolution they will all be executed. This is why Fabianism is a good idea.

Well, no, I absolutely don't see it. The cultural revolution was launched and enforced by Mao, who had absolute control over a very violent regime, about twenty years into the era of Chinese communism.

You know, basically a Twitter mob run amok, rite?

There's aspects of an oligarch here too. Relatively few have the money to successfully sue for genuine damage to reputation should false accusations also be made.

Maybe their reputations weren’t all that impressive to begin with. In any case, “allowing” is doing some heavy lifting there. No one is allowing anything. This is just how a society with mostly free expression works. Are people not supposed to express their dissatisfaction with other people? If I don’t like something, and enough other people don’t like it, such that an organization responds in a way to appease us, should there be a law to prevent that? What are you suggesting exactly, that no one should complain about another person? That organizations shouldn’t appease people? Or should they just appease you when you disagree with a “mob”?

> If I don’t like something, and enough other people don’t like it, such that an organization responds in a way to appease us, should there be a law to prevent that?

Like when certain people didn't like other people sitting at the front of buses?

Ignoring context is a thing I guess. But can you imagine if being an asshole was a protected class? The world would be a terrible place if the loudest, most obnoxious people never faced consequences.

For now... How long will it be until this form of authoritarianism consolidates? The road to hell is paved with good intentions...

And as others have alluded to, which I’ll state more bluntly, I’m sick and tired of people feeling like they need to comment on my morals/lifestyle. Especially at work. I literally had someone tell me I shouldn’t have pictures on my phone of me taking my kids fishing the other day, because someone might see them and get offended and report it HR. Pics taken on my phone... wit my family... during the weekend.... and I need to be worried about HR? W.T. everloving F?!

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