Yes, of course I read it. And I found the email exchange with Null and them as well, the letter their friend wrote, some other things on Twitter, this HN thread, the other HN thread, skimmed a bit on that KiwiFarms thread.
There was a fairly short thread with a bunch of people not being very nice, but that's about it, then nothing for a year, and then Near came back with "I will give you my life savings if you remove the thread", which then escalated to essentially "I will kill myself if you don't remove the thread", and a day later they did.
And while I every reason to believe it's all genuine, ... that doesn't automatically mean every claim is true. If I were to say "my conversation with hsbauauvhabzb on HN made me commit suicide" then I might be very sincere and genuine in this, but that doesn't mean you did anything wrong, and even if you did, doesn't mean that you singularly caused my suicide.
I've heard all of this before and when I went out to verify and found that a that time much of it wasn't true, and that a lot of things attributed to KiwiFarms were just not related to them at all. And now I can't really find anything either. Distasteful, offensive, and often just outright shitty? Sure. Intentionally driving people to suicide? Not seeing it. Being shitty is not the same as harassment. It's just not. It's just a bunch of losers dramawanking.
Repeated or organised ‘harassment’ is called bullying.
Bullying is a well accepted cause of suicide. It might not occur straight away, maybe the victim becomes mentally or emotionally unstable as a result and terminates their life some time after the actual events occur. I fail to see a distinctive difference between ‘driving somebody to suicide’ and ‘bullying without the intent to cause suicide’.
But sure, downplay it as ‘dramawanking’ because you’re unable to empathise or see perspectives other than your own.
This does not engage with anything I actually I've said, and you are unfairly putting words in my mouth as I never said "bullying without the intent to cause suicide", or implied anything even close to that, not did I claim that harassment is not bullying. I strongly resent this and I think your comment is extremely unfair.
And then...
> you’re unable to empathise or see perspectives other than your own.
... it gets even worse ... "Agree with my take or you're a monster". Sigh...
> that doesn't mean you did anything wrong, and even if you did, doesn't mean that you singularly caused my suicide.
I means, if you kept saying what he did was wrong, that what he did pushed multiple people to suicide in the past, and that you went as far as offering your life saving in hope to make it stop.... and he kept going... I kind of think he did something wrong and he is responsible.
Once you are aware of how you hurt someone, and you keep doing it knowing that... well yeah you are responsible for that damage, even if in other cases it doesn't hurt.
All of this is way beyond that too. Theses kinds of forums dehumanize people, and that's where it goes too far. Sure Near could have avoided KiwiFarms, but once someone has been dehumanized, once he is no longer someone, but just a joke, it's easy to keep going once you are outside of there. Maybe a huge majority of the members keep it on the forum only (doubt it, but possible), but for sure a some use that as fuel to keep going.
What about all the doxing too? I have an hard time seeing how you could justify that.
There was a fairly short thread with a bunch of people not being very nice, but that's about it, then nothing for a year, and then Near came back with "I will give you my life savings if you remove the thread", which then escalated to essentially "I will kill myself if you don't remove the thread", and a day later they did.
And while I every reason to believe it's all genuine, ... that doesn't automatically mean every claim is true. If I were to say "my conversation with hsbauauvhabzb on HN made me commit suicide" then I might be very sincere and genuine in this, but that doesn't mean you did anything wrong, and even if you did, doesn't mean that you singularly caused my suicide.
I've heard all of this before and when I went out to verify and found that a that time much of it wasn't true, and that a lot of things attributed to KiwiFarms were just not related to them at all. And now I can't really find anything either. Distasteful, offensive, and often just outright shitty? Sure. Intentionally driving people to suicide? Not seeing it. Being shitty is not the same as harassment. It's just not. It's just a bunch of losers dramawanking.