Ask HN: How do you deal with overly negative comments?

Internet conversations have no payoff. Your reputation among rude strangers does not matter. You don’t need to be right. If the conversation itself is not pleasant, you can just walk away.

So when I stop enjoying the engagement, I leave. I don’t try to get the last word; I just stop reading halfway through the message and close the tab.

Two things come to mind:

1. Negative or even toxic reactions typically tell much more about the ones stating them, but this is easily overlooked in the midst of a heated communication exchange. It shouldn't be forgotten that such people usually do not know nearly enough about what they are reacting to and their reflex is normally just a reaction to their own prejudice or ignorance without any understanding.

2. The best critiques to be used for sharpening one's own ideas are the negative ones, not the comfy positive ones. Only the negative comments make you think more in depth about your own ideas, while the positive ones only strengthen your own cognitive biases and thus undermine the actual validity of your ideas.

It is very hard to remember these two precepts in the heat of a discussion. But if you learn to slow down and abstain from the illusion of "winning" an argument, then such negativities can be turned into a powerful ally against the intentions of those emitting them.

And remember, experienced competitors typically negate one's creativity to secretely take advantage of thus accidently newfound ideas of others while their adversary is still puzzled by this unexpected negativity.

It's all a (serious) game if you are able to put it into proper perspective.

Nearly every great accomplishment I've ever had in my life was destroyed before it even began. I would share my idea with someone, many someones and 90% of the reaction would always be negative. "That won't work", "It's a dumb idea, here's why", etc... But the 10% that had positive things to say and youthful stupidity and stubbornness often made me pursue them anyway. Often enough, if I really put in 100% effort it ended up working out. Not every time.... but looking back, it was often enough that I could string together a bit of confidence and start ignoring the naysayers.

I don't know if I would have had the confidence to continue if in the beginning I hadn't had some bit of success often enough to keep my hopes alive. I think that a lot of that has to do with the way I was raised. Parents that encouraged you to think and do different things, that gave you positive feedback and encouragement. Schools that did the same. Sports. Different classes. Interaction with different children at different schools. Which as a kid were scary and painful but also they prepared you for unexpected things.

The new world, social media, etc... really doesn't promote that stuff well. We have information at our fingertips but we don't put nearly enough effort into the positive stuff. It seems to be human nature at this point to default to the negative. I fear it will only get worse.

Thick skin, willingness to put yourself out there and fail over and over are necessary. My best advice is to just tell yourself over and over to never stop trying. You haven't failed until you give up... nothing wrong with moving onto another project. But, be like a shark... once you stop swimming, you die.

Free speech doesn't obligate you to give every troll, bigot and moron your time and attention. Block them when and where you can. Where you can't, try to ignore them and not to engage. Even if it means letting them be wrong on the internet, or letting them "win."

Never wrestle with pigs. You both get dirty and the pig likes it.

- George Bernard Shaw

Social media hasn't borne itself out to be a great place for love and companionship. It is pretty good for spreading sensational propaganda but it's counterproductive to useful knowledge exchange. One thing for sure is it's a really bad idea to leverage your self esteem off social media.

What is left? Social media is sports. We're here for the action. It was never worth taking seriously, I don't know what gave people that idea in the first place.

As who? As a user you simply ignore it. No reply (and no vote) also happens to be their sore spot sometimes, but if that’s not your goal, just ignore them in a friendly manner.

As a mod you should probably ask mods, not users. An obvious glimpse of it that I can think of: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=pastYear&page=0&prefix=tru... Many insights there alone, what do, what not do.

I guess you’re asking about the whole internet, not only small communities. Well, I’d advise to stop caring that much about what others say or fall for. It’s not under your control and should not spend too much of your attention on it. Get out of the pot and let them all boil, both trolls/etc and naive prey. Not your direct problem.

https://paulgraham.com/disagree.html

Ever since I've read this, I know which comments to stay away from.

Why are you in a community that tolerates them?

I had to tell someone IRL today I won't be cursed at and walk out of their office... why wouldn't you do the cyber equivalent?

I'm forced to read Reddit and Twitter to keep up on infosec trends, but I don't really engage with the userbase for the reasons you describe.

Just... don't engage at all with them, and remove yourself from the situation.

wanted to thank you all for the amazing advice. I'm studying your thoughts and appreciate it. I think this stuff is useful and the posts here are golden.

Practice ignoring...also useful for ads, noise, in-laws, ...

I leave the negative places entirely. Blacklist sites and redact users, topics, phrases, and words/patterns.

Learning to ignore is a powerful tool.

A few years ago I went down a spiral and wasted a couple of solid hours on a financial sub Reddit with a master troll who just wouldn’t stop gaslighting me despite my attempts to build a rational discussion. I was so incredibly frustrated since it was on a topic I happen to be very qualified on. I remember refreshing the screen every 5 seconds to see if their new reply would finally be acceptable.

Then I snapped out of it, reflected on the silliness of the situation and decided that from that moment on I would allow myself to ignore comments, whenever I wanted. Seems simple, but it has been quite a powerful mental tool.

Even here on HN many times I deliberately choose not to engage (comment negativity is not even a requirement for the ignore, sometimes I just decide I don’t want to reply to even a thoughtful question that someone might ask me, ha!), it’s quite powerful having the ability to just ghost another party, makes me feel I have superpowers (I know it sounds silly).

you mean, like here?

you write a comment only to see people downvote, only because they have different opinion. You don't like democrats? you are stupid. You like democrats? you are stupid too. You claim you avoid politics? you are certainly hidden lover of the other option, the one I hate(without really knowing why).

Level of negativity depends if the corridor you talk to is filled with people like you. And that in my opinion is very dangerous, people convinced of their superiority have no respect to others, who have different opinion on any topic. So they funnel into their corridors where their sense of superiority is reinforced.

I'm also of the opinion world is increasingly filled with egocentric narcisistic people Narcism is very toxic, and unfortunately narcisists will extremely rarely see it in them. Narcists think everything and everyone in the world is lesser than them and hence must submit to their will.

Anyways, the answer might be - less internet in your life is better for you. Talk to real people, in face-to-face setups people are less prone to tell nasty stuff, and by the very virtue of social interactions will have to confront different world views.

Peace.

As per the public areas of the web, it is important to bear in mind that not everyone will appreciate the topic at hand the same way you do, nor have any expectations those interested enough to read the topic / subject at hand and your comments in the first place, are capable to truly grasp (with some depth) all the talking points you had hoped to make. It seems these days it's too easy for comments to be misread, and often people who might voice concerns will miss what was implied - any back and forth might be put down to poor communication but there are those who do the things they do [1] for their own reasons being more inclined to be contrary.

In more social media type areas, read places that use a reward or other points system, negative noise might be more along the lines of attempting to be entertaining, recognition or stroking their own narcissism ... but some I'm sure is just people who've had a really bad day and taking it out on the net. Sometimes it helps to imagine what sort of bad day they've had, like apart from awful day at work where they have to BJ the bosses metaphorically, they got home to find their dog or cat has strategically laid too many to count turd mines or a shredded bed or if they are particularly foul, maybe it was a well knackered water bed or if worse maybe they arrived home to find a bunch of sex toys have chew marks in the front yard, with hubby in tears trying to cope with the neighbours laughing about it - she or he weren't aware of the collection of large dildos - they're just doing the net while they're thinking about what to do about it ... again ...

[1] https://www.politicsforum.org/flame-warriors/

Block them and move on.

I deal with it by spreading hate of my own. When I read a comment that indirectly insults me (by insulting a group I identify with), I pay it forward by crafting something designed to trigger the other group. Often in an altogether different venue. Hope it helps.

This is what happens when people are anonymous. I assume these are all 12-year-old victims of bullying with a lot of pain and no where to get it out. They spit venom wherever they go. I assume they grow out of it.

Frankly, I would recommend you think on why you are so sensitive to random criticism? That is not healthy. I had the privilege of growing up in a rough place where ridicule was the norm, so I was rather immune to insults by around age 14. I mean, it would hurt if it came from someone I respected, but not a drug dealer or bum on the street. That is what internet commenters are, homeless junkies throwing insults out of powerless rage. They do not matter.

I do not know you, so I will not provide the tough love I would give to a friend or relative, but you should not care what unimportant people say about you. Such insecurities are dangerous and counter-productive. If some crack head on the street pointed out your deepest insecurity, it should not bother you. He is a crackhead. He does not matter. You do. You need to let that shit go. It will eat you up inside. If you have legitimate insecurities, fix them. If you are bothered by silly stuff (appearance, ethnicity,...), you need to shake that off. No one should be able to use that against you. That is giving others too much power over you. It is an insane submission for no benefit. Let it go.

So my advice is to let it go. Choose to stop reacting to these comments. You CHOOSE to react. The comments are irrelevant. The problem is that you are letting yourself react negatively. You need to stop that. There exist evil people who will use that weakness to control you. PLEASE fix it before you meet someone of that nature. Insults are like cockroaches. You do not need to fear them, but you should never let them into your home.

Just like 'beauty being in the eye of the beholder'; judging a comment to be 'overly negative', is a subjective measurement. Some people consider any criticism (even the constructive kind) to be overly negative. Others have a very high tolerance to brutal language.

Anytime you post your thoughts online; whether it be a post to your own blog or a comment within a forum like HN; you open yourself up to potential criticism. This is especially true if your comment expresses an opinion about a controversial social or political issue. The anonymous nature of many forums can allow the most vile people to spew forth their linguistic venom.

Anytime I receive negative feedback online or IRL; I try to understand the motivation behind the person giving it. Some people are innately negative and respond critically to almost everything they hear or read. But even if I think the person is being unfair; I often try to see if I can glean something helpful out of their feedback.

If they are just trying to tear you down and diminish your ideas; just do your best to ignore them and move on.

Our interactions online don't happen in a vacuum. They are to a decent degree an outcome of the real world we live in.

Sure, there's effects that are exclusive to the medium, like pseudo/anonymity, or related to the place, occasion and purpose of the interaction. But they are also influenced by our emotional state, personalities and life circumstances and everything that influences that in turn.

When you encounter people like that (they could be bots...) ask yourself what could be going on inside their heads. Are they on a mission? Are they in a bad spot and trying to cope? Are they trying to troll for amusement, fishing for attention?

A lot has been said about the internet becoming shittier and unfriendlier over time. Where it used to be (in my mind) an exuberant place to learn and meet new people or create entirely new culture, a third/fourth place outside the real world, we have seen that there's many more agendas at play. More eyeballs, surveillance, commercial interests, political influence, cheap entertainment and addiction. Too many cooks ruining the stew.

How do I deal with it? Use self-moderation if possible (e.g. I filter submissions by site, user and title on HN), find side alleys like special-purpose communities, save good stuff, so you don't forget what's possible (can't rely on search/recommendation engines or the permanence of anything anyway), and don't take it too seriously. I'm lucky to have been around for some time and know some older communities that are still going.

Online communication can be meaningful, intellectually and/or personally, but it doesn't come as easily as it used to. Everything is in flux. It's a shame, but it is what it is...

P.S.: If you get annoyed by HN comments from time to time, try http://n-gate.com. Doesn't seem to be active any longer, but it's still quite amusing.

Don't read the comments, or don't listen to them.

My first website I posted got laughed out in comments in the forum I posted it in. Almost a year later I got a gig, and then another, and then a third.

Imagine if I had listened to the negative comments and quit.

be kind. do your best. sleep well at night. that seem to work. what some random on the internet, who might have a bad day, or is a bot posts, i could not care less about.

You dont.