I'm a little bit aghast at all the comments saying this is normal or no big deal. Maybe it is normal (or at least common), but it shouldn't be. If you believe it's no big deal, I can't agree. I can see this kind of behaviour from adolescents, but adults should understand that words are meaningful and have consequences, and that even if you disagree with someone, they're still a human being who deserves some modicum of respect, or at least decency. Wishing a slow death on someone, even rhetorically, shows neither, to put it mildly.
He's paraphrased 2pac is his alcohol fuelled moment
"Fuck Mobb Deep, fuck Biggie Fuck Bad Boy as a staff, record label and as a motherfuckin' crew And if you want to be down with Bad Bo, then fuck you too Chino XL, fuck you too All you motherfuckers, fuck you too (take money, take money) All of y'all motherfuckers, fuck you, die slow, motherfucker"
It's immature and poor judgement but he's apologised for it so I don't think it's fair to drag him down.
Which is enough to make him unfit for the position at YC and justifies his resignation.
Walmart cashiers are being fired everyday for things like immaturity and poor judgment, why should YC CEO be held under lower behavior standards than blue collar workers?!
To put it in a bit more context: this was out-of-hours, and those Walmart cashiers shouldn't be sacked for immaturity and poor judgement in their personal lives if their work is life is up to scratch.
I know it is more complicated than that when your actions have wider reach, especially for someone as high up as a CEO, but for all of us these days with ubiquitous social media potentially giving us all more reach, as what you do in your off-time can negatively impact the company, and your position can lead to your stupid moments having far more impact on people generally.
Even a grade A class 1 drunken cockup, in personal time, shouldn't result in a firing unless it is part of a larger or repeating pattern.
IMO: he has taken ownership of his actions, accepted that they were stupid, apologies for causing office (and not in the “sorry you found it offensive” non-apology sort of way), etc, so : ridicule him by all means, but sacking seems OTT at this point. And if he does it, or something else similarly foolish, again, then we break out the pitchforks.
There's no out-of-hours for CEO. He was using is official Twitter account to make a public statement, that's a work-related mistake. (It's not like he used some anonymous account to troll on some subreddit)
I don't know if they should, but they definitely are. Musk's obsession with his employees drug use out of work is an example (and also an example of double standards between CEOs and blue collar workers).
> There's no out-of-hours for CEO.
Unless his contract specifically says that, bull.
If his contract foes specifically say that, then I doubt it is legally enforceable anyway.
> He was using is official Twitter account to make a public statement, that's a work-related mistake.
If he used an official work account, then yes that paints a different picture and is a more clear-cut case of abusing resources and directly bringing the company into disrepute. But @GarryTan doesn't sound like a company account to me (I'm assuming the 陈嘉兴 in the account display name “Garry Tan 陈嘉兴” is also personal name information, not company affiliation, please correct me if I'm wrong).
Calling for the bad side of a double-standard to apply to all is not the way I'd choose to fix the situation.
--
Of course the people threatened by the ill-advised quotes, which might indicate overly string views, are well within their rights to pursue legal action against as they see fit, but at this point I'd say it isn't a sacking matter for the company.
He’s right. Source: was executive, CEO adjacent, and id still have been let go for such behaviour. At that level, you’re a very different representation of the org and you’re held to a higher standard in such cases where your actions regardless of when or where they took place reflect upon the org.
I agree that this guy is a tosser. I’m always first in line to give a fatcat tech bro what for. But you’re completely barking up the wrong tree with this tribalist argument. You’re holding him to a standard that you at least in part don’t believe in, but are simply saying “an eye for an eye!” when he wasn’t even the one responsible for taking the first eye. Chill.
They may think that it's reasonable to hold tech CEOs to higher standards in this respect than Walmart cashiers. So I don't think there's necessarily any inconsistency here.
If being immature and showing poor judgement means you can run a VC fund 100% of VC funds would be firing their CEOs.
Thats a ridiculous position to say he’s unfit.
But I get it. He’s threading the political establishment so they’ll make hay with this to tear down an opponent. It’s politics.
From grandparent:
Parent: >> If being immature and showing poor judgement means you can run a VC fund 100% of VC funds would be firing their CEOs.
USA, USA????
Yes it's politics and working with computers and man-children all day is poor training. Stick to your lane tech billionaires you couldn't win an election if you were the last person alive.
Note: This is a general comment and not intended forgive or incriminate anyone.
Perhaps. The thing is, if we only look for leaders who have never erred (read: never fallen and gotten up) we end up with (for example) our "representatives" in Washington DC. That is, generally spineless, middle of the road, etc. The word beige comes to mind. That is, we end up with "leaders" without the toolbox of experiences necessary for effective leadership.
Humans? Humans *by definition* make mistakes. Sure some are worse than others. Some demand some mistakes be paid for (in a number of socially acceptable ways). That said, one (rant) is not a pattern.
The question is: What are our collective priorities? Human leaders capable of leading humans? Or perfection which effectively translates to no edges, risk adverse, and ultimately flacid and unfollowable?
So, the way this works is, he can say whatever he likes, but people shouldn't say mean things about him? How does this work? I'm genuinely curious; this, on the face of it, makes no sense to me at all. Is it because he's rich? I don't get it.
Yes, when people apologize for things we generally move on since the person acknowledge their error.
Let’s be honest, it’s blowing up because the California political machine is threatened by this guy, and tearing him down for a small transgression means they’ll hold onto the reins of power even longer.
A death threat by one of the richest persons = A small transgression when they apologise after the fact
Seriously?
If I say to you "die slow", would you read it as me threatening to murder you?
Why don't you give me your home address and tell me what school your children go to. Then I will tweet at you to "die slow" and we will see exactly how threatened you feel.
Are you implying that it's not a threat of any kind? Regardless of how it's enacted? I would certainly rather be threatened with a nice day.
Especially in this climate, where the tip of a hat causes anonymous people to pile on and send threats via mail, it wouldn't be as simple as brushing it off.
The worst part isn't usually the initial threat, it's the piling on afterwards that can last for months and years afterwards.
For me, it's because I can remember many times when I've done something wrong or stupid and others have forgiven me. Nothing as public as this, but that's frankly more due to lack of an audience than a difference in character.
I can see a part of myself reflected back, the same part that's been a little too honest during a long happy hour, and I can empathize with how he probably feels.
I don't see myself as different at the human level, and I'd rather live in a world where we both deserve forgiveness than neither of us.
He seems genuinely remorseful. He knows he fucked up. He knows he fucked up bad. I don't see the point in beating a dead horse.
He'll probably lose his job. That's fair enough to me, you reap what you sow. Can't have that public or a role with outbursts like that. I don't see a reason to hang this around his neck for forever, though.
Somehow in all my many alcohol fuelled moments, I never said anything like that.
Fuck this odious turd and anyone who would try to excuse him.
"Fuck this odious turd and anyone who would try to excuse him."
I think what you mean to say was:
Fuck Y Combinator as a staff, message board, and as a mother fucking VC group. And if you want to be down with Y Combinator, then fuck you too.
Sam Altman, fuck you too.
The birth of a new musical genre - "VC rap" - is happening right in front of our eyes!
Heinous cringe.
The cringe is the real crime here.
The higher up you are, and the more you represent an organisation, the less immature behavior or poor judgement you cannafford orbare entitled to. USN nuclear sub commanders get replaced for DUIs, because poor judgement is not acceptable. Creating public outrage with drunk rantabon social media falling back on an employer is nothing a normal employee woild get waway woth, let alone a CEO.
But in a world where everyone seems to think they are Elon Musk, and not Steve Jobs anymore, it is no surprise this behavior is shickingly common.
No, CEO and other public figures from a company should be held to even higher standards than the rank and file.
Think about the industry and the people you'd want to be managing an AGI. These people aren't Chuck Forbin.
That he was drunk makes it very likely that he was expressing what he really thinks. It's not a matter of "dragging him down" as much as "when someone shows you who they are, believe them."
Apologizing is great, but it can't make people unlearn something they learned about the person.
What consequences should Gary face?
I am not a lawyer, but if some deranged individual who follows him takes his comment and face value and murders someone, he will face many consequences.
Firstly, he would be involved on murder. That's not a great experience to have, for most people.
He would at least be on trial. I don't exactly know how incitement to murder is treated in the US.
It could even be considered domestic terrorism (an assassination made to intimidate a group based on an ideological agenda/government policy). Then, I don't know what would happen, exactly. The FBI would probably get involved?
Lawyers and judges have already been consulted and concluded that no crime was committed.
https://missionlocal.org/2024/01/y-combinator-ceo-garry-tans...
This would not change ex post facto because of someone else's actions.
In the US, what he did said is disgusting but legally protected free speech. It's conceivable that he could be opened up to a civil lawsuit, but that's about it.
When powerful or influential people use stochastic terrorism to get their way, they should suffer consequences. Trump seems to be normalizing this.
The US has a long history of "stochastic terrorism", which seems to be at a relative low compared to the violence of the early 1900s, the 1960s, and several other periods etc. I have faith in its institutional ability to handle and restrain actual violence.
I am much more concerned about the normalization of the idea that we should restrict free speech. I suppose this isn't too shocking - the Alien and Sedition Acts were passed after what we would now call many instances of "stochastic terrorism" in the newspapers - but I'd hoped we'd learned our lesson and permanently repudiated these ideas.
Because things were worse before doesn't mean we need to stop trying to be better in the future.
After January 6th, I don't share your assessment of the present or recent past. Free speech seems excessively protected today, even for veiled threats; moreso if one is rich or popular.
Unfortunately, discussing this too much more runs the risk of becoming too politicized for HN. I'll point out only that as deadly riots go, January 6 ranks at the near the bottom of American riots (lots tied with one fatality.) As protests or even attacks on or in government buildings go, it is not particularly notable. If that's what we're worried about, I'm not worried. It will be forgotten like the 50s Puerto Rican attack in the Capitol and it will have had less effect. If there'd been a stronger police response/presence as there was during the BLM White House protests or some earlier Capitol protests, you'd not even be hearing about it today. But for that accident (or conspiracy if you're so inclined, or deliberate underestimation of the threat of Trump supporters, or whatever) it would have been forgotten on January 7th.
A good video from an actual lawyer on where the legal lines are when it comes to incitement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwqAInN9HWI
He wouldn’t be prosecuted. Wishing death on political figures is a cherished American tradition, and well protected under the first amendment: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Threatening_the_president_of_t...
It's a strange sort of "cherished American tradition" that is so subtle that I, as a native American more than a half-century old, have never even heard of it being a tradition before.
There’s a link in the comment you’re replying citing a 1969 Supreme Court case about this very type of situation.
Yes Americans have cherished a very liberal/free definition of free speech rights.
That's very clear!
In no way is "die slow motherfucker" incitement to murder, whether or not the person is question is actually murdered.
The main consequence to him so far has been a lot of people thinking less of him. It was also consequential for the subjects of the tweet, and to a much lesser extent, to all of us who've been exposed to it.
Okay sounds like he faced those exact consequences and a bunch of people are acting like victims because they chose to take him too literally. I don't think Gary really cares what you or some others think. He's developed a thick skin for this sort of stuff maybe others should too.
I think more of him though. Sort of like when a polite old woman tells someone to fuck off and they're literally shook. A lot of people could do with hardening up a bit.
How often have I heard that from bullies who shit themselves, whine and go running to mommy as soon as they get a little of what they give?
You actually mean "shut up, roll over and passively accept abuse." Anyone who hardened-up, as in speaking their honest feeling and the truth about this sort of bully would be banned from here in 5 seconds!
We don't have the option to "harden up", because we value civility and intellectual curiosity, and all know it would make this forum a much worse place.
Pursuing intellectual curiosity involves tolerating ideas or language or phrasing you don't like. The world is messy. Gary hasn't bullied or abused anyone. That is where the line is.
The real answer is here is Gary could have phrased his words better and he would have been more effective in communicating his message. That's it.
Let's say he hasn't. So what's at issue? Because this bothers me if I am to continue to participate in HN.
Pursuing intellectual curiosity involves tolerance, yes, and forgiveness. And seeing a little of the other in yourself, and you in them.
You know, I wouldn't presume to say anything about a person I don't know, or to psychologise too much on an individual. There's a parallel universe where I'd meet Mr Tan and enjoy some beers, we'd talk about tech, and maybe after a few we'd get all 'blokey' start comparing our lists of people who should die horribly. That's all human enough. And I come from a background that makes me not ashamed to be in touch with my own disdain, violence, unacceptable sides and masculine toxicity.
We all say cringe things we wish we could take back from time to time. Shame is a good teacher if we don't leave that unexamined etc.
I'm not "outraged" (the only emotion 21st century people feel) at Tan for slipping up and going a bit gangsta, channelling his inner 2Pac or whatever. Who doesn't? I've no doubt some of those Californian politicians are infuriating and cut from the same cloth as the poor shower we have over here.
I'm disappointed because of how that reflects on me, on other hackers and the real tech community - you know, us grunts who actually think up and build all the stuff.
He's not quite young enough to be my son. But if he were, I'd have to say "Gary, why are you hanging out with these losers? People who claim to represent utopian technological ideas, but are massively stunted as human beings? Tech billionaire trash who are actually a lot less smart and well educated than they think. They're insecure, inauthentic, cloistered, frightened of dying, doing far more drugs than is good for anyone, and hell-bent on imposing technological terror upon the world we haven't seen since the Third Reich.
Please find some nicer friends."
And what I'd hope to hear is like; "Yes I'm sorry to let the community down. I feel a lot of anger and frustration at the world. I realise my worldview is parochial. I see that I'm in a group whose ideas are not universal, whatever our "progressive" good intentions. Maybe I can temper myself in a way that's more congruent with the money, power and consequent responsibility to others' I carry."
There's a real leap in the phrasing of "die slow" as "I do not approve of your policies and hope that others are elected to improve the city".
Simply passing that off as "bad wording" is reductive and gives leeway to others who test the waters with extremism and turtle back into the shell of "I didn't mean it that way" when they get pushback.
It's not that Garry literally means he wants them to die, it's that it's irresponsible for a leader to infer that idea and to normalize (unintentionally, as I would give him the benefit of the doubt here) the same type of actions as actual extremists.
A lot of people could do with learning more empathy. People shouldn’t have to be hard. People, especially over-privileged people like this, should learn how to behave like decent humans.
Two fold: Legal consequences if some of the people threatened by him want to sue or have him indicted about it. And whatever YC as his employer sees fit for the resulted harm on the reputation of the company.
So, in the end, it can be everything from nothing to a criminal charge and conviction with loosing his job somewhere in the middle.
There is zero chance he could be indicted for a threat based on that tweet. No responsible prosecutor would try.
Even if you take "die slow motherfucker" literally, it's not a threat. A wish that someone dies is not a threat. "I will kill you" is a threat.
to clarify, in the US, "I will kill you" may or may not be considered a threat. It depends on whether or not it's actionable. If it's a tweet, it's probably not going to be considered actionable.
People talk shit all the time, a lot of people in this post need to calm down and stop being so quick to be offended.
Should have said it? Probably not. Does that make him a danger to anyone? Not by itself it doesn't.
Is there a legal distinction for public figures? If Jodie Foster says, “I will kill you” does that change the calculus at all?
Or of course, “Won’t someone do something about this troublesome priest”
In the US it does but generally that's when it's directed AT a public figure. I doubt there's any specific rules when it comes FROM a public figure.
Good for him I guess. Leaves civil lotigation, or not, IANAL after all. As I said, nothing happening to him is a possible outcome as well.
The consequences are a hit to your reputation (I think they call this "being canceled" nowadays). I guess you can get to a point of wealth where this doesn't really matter. But at least for 99% of people this is really harmful and takes a lot of effort to rectify.
I'd say he should face the consequences that he is facing: heavy social condemnation, maybe with a touch of shunning.
Yeah, apparently it was a pop reference, and that makes it okay?
The problem with references is that not everybody gets the reference, and without that (and possibly even with) this is a death threat. And with today's highly polarized and volatile political situation, you need to be really careful with that.
I've come to expect this sort of behaviour from random internet trolls, but a CEO really should know better. I think this counts as a disqualifying lapse of judgement.
This is not a death threat. I can say that I hope you die slow but not that I will make you die slow. If he had said that his .44 makes sure that their kids don't grow, then yeah, that's a death threat, but he didn't take it that far
Edit: I've been rate limited, so here's my reply to the guy below me
This is a local politics issue. I live 1700 miles away, so I don't know what the local politics is like in San Francisco. What I do know is that if any of the local business owners in my city, like the big real estate developers or the billionaire biotech founders, tweeted something like this nobody here would take it seriously. There would be something on the local news. They'd apologize. And that would probably be about it.
If his rapper persona had tweeted the lyrics to a diss track but clarified the theatrical kayfabe by breaking the fourth wall, that arguably could be less of a threat but still demonstrate questionable judgment, so I agree with you there.
But violent rhetoric certainly increases the likelihood that others will escalate violence against the target, and so the risk (threat) of death and harm very much does increase as seen in many unfortunate cases.
That is how asymmetric information warfare has a chilling effect on democracy and infringes others’ fundamental liberties (life, pursuit of happiness), and is different from “free speech”.
It doesn’t require sophisticated thinking to discern the difference, but X is where discourse goes to die.
https://missionlocal.org/2024/01/y-combinator-ceo-garry-tans...
Your interpretation involves a large change to how free speech has been legally defined in America for a long time.
You may be interested in this case: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandenburg_v._Ohio
Where the Supreme Court clarified that even more disgusting speech tinged with violence-encouraging rhetoric was, in fact, legally free speech. (Please, let's not call rhetoric itself violence.)
"Legally allowed" doesn't mean it's protected from consequences.
Call someone a dick and you're protected under free speech, but you can still get punched in the face. And a judge won't be very amenable to a possible consequent assault case if the victim was goaded.
The grandparent post is centered around the idea that it wasn't free speech, which is what I was responding to, not the idea that there can't be social consequences.
This is incorrect and fairly disturbing. The idea of "fighting words" (which are not protected speech) is extremely circumscribed; it applies basically only to the case of someone standing in front of you and saying something with the intent to provoke an "immediate instinctive reaction." (Ginsburg's words.) It absolutely does not justify punching someone you see in the street for a Tweet they made yesterday and you will go to jail for this. You will not get sympathy from a judge. Unfortunately, this is one of the very sorts of ideas that disintegrates free societies - "freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom from consequences" is true, but it doesn't justify violence legally or morally, and saying so undermines free and fair societies.
Apparently there is plenty of room for debate on this subject, and Brandenburg v Ohio — involving a KKK leader whose conviction under a state law for making threatening and racist remarks was overturned by a divided court — is still being hashed out by constitutional experts to this day.
It doesn’t invalidate the central idea that free speech is different from inflammatory speech “condoning” violence (wink wink) when it is amplified by technology to have an asymmetrical effect on the target of that speech.
And in any case, we are discussing the use of telecommunications systems for harassment and not someone shouting in a park behind a police barricade. I don’t do either of these things, so I’m admittedly not well-informed about the constitutional and case law in the US that might apply.
If I were a C-level executive I would probably aspire to higher level of online citizenry and behavior, perhaps, than a KKK leader, and hire someone else to do the tweeting.
There's always room for debate on anything, but nobody but a tiny minority of legal experts are "hashing out" the case. It's been settled, quiet law for decades. It's also important to note that it came out of a much more restless time in American history, and a time when violence was very regularly politically or racially motivated violence driven by speech and the spread of ideas.
Harassment is another thing that has a specific legal definition. It's become common over time to use stronger words than are justified colloquially because it makes a more persuasive argument. For example, we might describe an accidental death as a "murder". But I don't think it's very productive in coming to understandings or deciding how we should set norms and make laws.
In what sense is it asymmetrical? It's been my observation that many people making arguments like this seem to believe that 21st century social media technology has changed everything. Rather, historically speaking - at least in the modern era - it's more akin to returning to the norm, rather than the closely gatekept broadcast media era. This sort of thing is obviously gross, but it is not beyond the historical pale. It has seemed to me that many people would prefer to return to the brief period we did have asymmetry, where the wrong people saying ugly things were kept out of what was regarded as the place of public discourse, which discourse could then target people not blessed with access and leave them no way to publicly respond or defend themselves.
But in this case we're talking about a tweet made about a politicians and public figures. (It's worth mentioning that in the US, anything related to political speech is given even more leeway.) Twitter is available to both their proponents and their detractors. Any politician has themselves an enormous platform. Nothing about this case is asymmetrical, unless the argument is that the politician(s) has acquired more vitriolic haters than defenders. Well, that's the nature of social life. I would hope that the police would seriously investigate any actual threats and keep a close eye on the neighborhood they live in.
As for inflammatory - well, yes, inflammatory speech has been held to be protected over and over and over again. I also don't think it's fruitful to go down the road of "this speech is secretly condoning violence" (which is also not illegal or the "freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom from consequences folks advocating for the enemy du jour to be assaulted in the streets would be in trouble.) Even if it is secretly condoning violence, it's very obvious that criminalizing "coded" speech is a wide open road to serious abuses of rights.
No argument there. I do not know Gary Tan or anything about him other than what was in this reporting but it's obvious the tweet is trashy and unprofessional and the world would be better off without it. Nothing in my posts should be construed as an endorsement or agreement with it or Gary Tan.
You have thoroughly demolished the straw man here who said the CEO’s tweets should be regulated by the government. I think we agree that what is legal and what is normal are different, which was my original point.
Even a supreme court can be wrong sometimes. In the US that's been happening more often of late.
Can you give an example?
They call judicial output opinions for a reason.
He can dish it out but he can't take it
https://missionloca.s3.amazonaws.com/mission/wp-content/uplo...
Whether it fits any legal definition of a death threat or not is... kind of moot, you can be a dick to someone else without violating the law. Society isn't built on laws, but on decency and respect, and wishing anything negative on someone else isn't it. A few days ago the CoC of an online community was posted, and "slow death" threats wouldn't pass their "be kind" rules either (https://www.improbableisland.com/coc.php, via https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39135779).
It's not uncommon to add a minimal amount of plausible deniability to a toxic comment/threat (by calling it a joke or reference, following it up with "in Minecraft" etc), but imho that's intentional abuse of other people's good will and should be treated as such.
Either way knowing how to communicate responsibly is part of a CEO's job, that's one of the reasons they get paid so much.
Dealing with people in management positions disabuses you of this notion.
I called someone a nerd once, but it turned out they didn't feel it had been "reclaimed" like a lot of people do. I apologized, and we had a nice chat about the paths language takes. It was nice. More situations like this should go like that, but it seems like doubling down, making excuses, or going on the attack is too easy.
Yeah there's too much insensitivity being brushed off as "it's a reference", "it's a joke", "it's a meme", or with things like "you can't say anything anymore without anyone getting offended". That's not accepting responsibility for what you said. As is "I / he was drunk"; again, shifting blame. It's an explanation, not an excuse, and if you "become" an unpleasant person when drunk, you're an unpleasant person full stop. Stop drinking then.
Reading this article by Rebecca Solnit [0] posted on HN here [1] absolutely helped me make sense of the Garry Tan story, and what is going on in Californian politics.
It's well worth reading, but is a long and initially tedious article bemoaning the passing of a gentler, humane culture.
Then about halfway through it grew some balls and teeth, and frankly I found it shocking. I had no idea California was this degenerate. And for those too close to it, no, this isn't just how every country's politics is. It reads like Chicago in the 1920/30's, or perhaps more like Mexico or El Salvator, with billionaires instead of drug lords.
Read alongside "The Californian Ideology" [2] it's eye opening and paints a great picture of the slow trajectory of San Francisco and California from a left-liberal counter-culture to extremist far-right billionaire technofascism.
[0] https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v46/n03/rebecca-solnit/in-th...
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39226296
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Californian_Ideology
- pretty much sums everything we observe today. And it's only getting worse, despite tech advancements. Great article.
I find it interesting that you added "despite tech advancements". I don't see how the level of technological advancement enters into this equation at all.
Maybe the connection dandanua is alluding to is that mythology from the beginning of the "Information Age" (circa 1980) that technology would "bring us all together in a giant conversation of humankind". As if. Now, here we are having this conversation on a platform owned and run by those same "bunker men" who probably bought the laws that destroyed the peered Internet that was our hope. We're still stuck in 1980, holding out that "technology will save us".
tech advancements = improvements of life for the whole humanity, and thus overall happiness. But it seems this naive thinking doesn't work in this world.
The wiki article is incoherent or at least not easy to sustain motivation enough to finish reading. I think the California ideology they seem to be hinting at can be better thought of as “luxury beliefs” the sort of which Ron Henderson writes a lot about. California is resource rich, historically. Historically this leads to growth and what I would call “messy progress.” It’s definitely gotten messier as growth surged in recent decades due largely to selfish policies that result from its very open (for better and surely for worse) political system.
Yes it's a bit undercooked on the Wiki.
FWIW here's a PDF (bitmap scan) I verified [0].
It's also lengthy and hard work, and took me three or four reads to fully grok. Suggest starting at p.61 Cyborg Masters and Robot Slaves for the wrap-up. Thanks for the Henderson tip.
[0] https://monoskop.org/images/d/dc/Barbrook_Richard_Cameron_An...
Isn't it a little harsh to include Sam Bankman-Fried in an article about San Francisco?
But you would say this kinda thing to friends, people joke around all the time, it’s good to show that strength of emotion about something instead of having to PR speak your entire live.
You can be professional and be genuine (distinct from PR speak). Sure, you're not fraternizing with your subordinates as much as you could, but you're doing your job better and your subordinates will be happier.
It maybe isn't on Twitter though! It is a public place, of a sort, which should always be borne in mind.
Mate, no I don't say this to my friends, but even if I take your point: if I say it to my friends there won't be any impact on anyone's life. Gary's rant absolutely has a potential to impact lives. So you chose your words to the occasion, no?
Yikes, talk about normalizing violence in political discourse.
No, I wouldn't. I have never said anything like that to my friends (nor have my friends ever said anything like that to me), and I can't imagine ever doing so.
He was only quoting Tupac…
Not totally sure if this comment is ironic or not but wanted to expand on this thought either way.
Using a reference with threatening language in it that is potentially unknown by the people recieving it, makes a death threat even more sinister as it feels like you're building in plausible deniability and trying to have your cake and eat it.
It's basically admitting "if I just said this it would cross a line, but if I quote it instead then it'll not cross a line for people who know it's a quote, but still cross the line for the people I'm threatening. So I get to make the threat and disclaim any intent at the same time.
There are two related aspects to this that fascinate me the most.
The first is that Tan seems to have thought that people who were upset by the statement were unaware that it was a song lyric.
The second is that some people think that because it's a song lyric, it somehow doesn't count.
And? Was he giving a recital of Tupac's lyrics / reading it out loud, or was it pulled out of that context and aimed at someone specific?
I can call your mother a hamster and that your father smelt of elderberries; just because it's a quote from Monty Python doesn't mean it wouldn't be insulting to you.
We can debate about whether it should be normal, but clearly it is, right? For example we have the Darwin Award, where we mock people who actually died (not just rhetorically). I’m not the least bit edgy as far as millennials go, and I’ve made the joke that “the best thing Trump could do for the GOP is to get assassinated.” It always gets a laugh.
I don't think it's even close to being normal. If it were, then this wouldn't have raised the firestorm it did.
The firestorm is entirely because Tan is rich and Asian. There’s always been a taboo on “punching down,” but in recent years in certain circles politicians have moved positions in the hierarchy.
I thought the firestorm was because some who is ostensibly smart did something objectively not smart.
Are you also aghast about Tupac?
Oh my this rapping is outrageous! Mr. Tupac pull up your pants and clean up your language young man!
And Gary isn’t a rap artist anyway!
Well isn’t he?
Tupac was a gangster who'd been convicted of sexual assault. Personally I try to separate the artist from the human because humans are consistently awful creatures, and otherwise we'd never be able to enjoy any art ever. But I wouldn't be in support of Tupac running Y Combinator, or to be the CEO of pretty much any company, ever.
I like Freddie Gibbs and Danny Brown. Both release music that is extremely misogynistic.
Deeper, Freddie (+ Madlib, ofc)
If I tweet at a woman I disagree with that she should be in the kitchen cooking me a meal clean and then sucking me like a vacuum, that's okay right? Because I'm just aping my favourite popular rapper?
The interesting thing about 2Pac is he grew up intelligent and was taught to respect women. Some of his earliest lyrics were very pro-women.
He changed his tone later in life as he was betrayed many times.
“Since we all came from a women, got our name from a women, and our game from a women. I wonder why we take from women, why we rape our women, do we hate our women? I think its time we killed for our women, be real to our women, try to heal our women, cus if we dont we'll have a race of babies that will hate the ladies, who make the babies. And since a man can't make one he has no right to tell a women when and where to create one”
Nobody quotes art without a reason behind it.
He either quoted Tupac because he agreed with the sentiment or he couldn't act responsibly, and both are not acceptable for a CEO.
I saw a clip from a popular right wing podcaster recently in which he was annoyed that his guests kept wishing death on people.
He was mostly annoyed it seemed because this meant he got demonitized or had to pull some content which cost him money. And that people didn't listen to his specific pre-show instruction to not call for death. And that some of his viewers got angry at him about this (I didn't quite follow why, they weren't angry about the death threats but somehow thought his removal of episodes made him a part of the deep state or something).
edit: link to short version of the clip I saw
https://twitter.com/majorityfm/status/1752833975851049108
Love to see it; free speech absolutionists until it costs them money.
Wishing slow death is indeed extremely disturbing and stupid. Politicians that way have time to do so much more harm.
It isn't normal for anyone else, of course. As for Garry, he is heavily invested in SF politics.
It is a big deal only if Garry was consistently inflammatory. Otherwise, it can be safely relegated to careless jibe by a drunkard.
True, but one is allowed to retract, excuse, apologize. One incident unto drastic consequences will result in heavy-handedness wielded often, a weaponization against anyone standing upto establishment or established norms (which is quite contrary to what either the left or the right would want, in the context of political discourse).
Are we being too sensitive, vindictive, projecting remorse? One look at tech Twitter (and deleted tweets) and we'd want to cancel them all. What good is that going to bring, other than create an inescapable and ever shrinking echo chamber?
Politics gets dirty from time to time.
There is probably a socio-political climate in which such statements could be considered incitement, but in this case, lunatics using Garry's words to threaten and scare their victims is exactly that... a work of an opportunist lunatic who probably thinks highly of themself. That isn't on Garry.
There's a big discussion going on on whether this was good or bad, or whatever, but the point remains that he represents a company, he made a public statement that puts himself in a bad light, which in turn makes the customers of said customer lose trust and respect, which in turn causes the company harm. A lot of harm. And you can't have a CEO that causes the company harm through his public behaviour.