Hacker News Reader

I've read about them... What they believe is just so far out, and crazy, I don't even know how to describe it. Those people have a terminal shortage of marbles, straight out crackpot politics.

View on HN

That generally suggests a lack of empathy on your part. If there are an organised group of people who you don't agree with it should generally be easy enough to state what ideas they believe, why it is wrong and some plausible explanation for why people believe what they do despite being wrong (that goes beyond "well they're just inexplicably stupid").

I can call flat-earther, perpetual motion machine makers, moon landing truther, etc. stupid, and I don't believe I need to explain myself. And there are for sure organised large groups of people of those.

Sure. But the beliefs are easy enough to describe. Eg, the flat earthers believe the earth is flat. And it's obvious why that isn't the case because even with a good telescope I can see stars but not mountains in foreign countries. Case pretty much closed, earth can't be flat.

And that probably isn't exactly correct but it is a big chunk of the way there. It isn't "what they believe is just so far out, and crazy, I don't even know how to describe it". It's easy to describe.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com