I remember when I first heard of the concept that you should not discuss sex, politics or religion in polite company. My thought then, which I still hold now, is that polite company sounds pretty damn boring.

If you can't make interesting conversation without talking about sex, politics, or religion, that sounds like a problem with you.

It isn't a question of whether it is possible to have interesting conversations that do not involve those topics, I enjoy discussing a wide range of things. It is more that having forbidden topics as an indication of correct manners enforces a weird kind of false sterility on human affairs and I feel cheapens and narrows the culture that these manners claim to protect.

"Polite company" is just a polite term for people you don't know very well, but might not want to piss off.

The post I was replying to was about US citizens, not HN.

BTW, who are you to say what is crap and what is not? I mean, I may consider your reply to be crap.

> who are you to say what is crap and what is not

Someone who has seen lots of good forums wrecked by political bullshit. And to be perfectly clear, I do not mean "politics that I happen to disagree with", but politics, in general.

Politics seems to elicit a substantial amount of unwanted behavior from people who otherwise would behave normally.

I like forums that remove it as much as possible.