[nicpottier]

I understand the idea here of course. I have been posting and commenting on HN for the better part of two decades. I don't want to see HN descend into a complete chaos of political news, I agree with that. But it also feels not so right to have absolutely zero response or reflection on current events within this community given how close this democracy seems to be teetering on the edge.

This community DOES generally have a higher level of discourse than other parts of the internet and I don't believe that is wholly because we avoid contentious topics. (thus my vim vs emacs example)

[AlecSchueler]

This is my feeling exactly. I also don't want to be discussing politics here and have used the "hide" function many times since 2009. But this is bigger than everything we'be been discussing here in all that time, and if we don't fight back soon everything we have will be lost.

[infecto]

Tenure of two decades has little to do with these stories having low signal. These news stories are everywhere, the comments have low to no value and the article itself has no nuance or insight.