If someone were to walk up and say "Mexicans are lazy," most of us would consider that person racist. Nevermind that "lazy" is a culturally relative term, but you go way beyond that when you describe the Saipanese as "the worst fundamentalist christian ignorant half retarded hillbilly sex fiend town straight out of the movie Deliverance...", and you only hedge that toward the end by saying your comments apply to the people in power.
You getting downvoted has nothing to do with people trying to promote political beliefs. (Most of us didn't have any opinion on Saipan until now.) It's about maintaining the otherwise typically high quality of discussion on HN.
Want to point out that Saipan's lack of labor laws led to terribly exploitative behavior up into this decade? Please do. Want to share your personal frustration in dealing with Saipan's corruption? Sure, I'm interested. But please leave the abusive ranting for someplace else.
Be civil. Don't say things you wouldn't say in a face to face conversation.
When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. E.g. "That is an idiotic thing to say; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3" can be shortened to "1 + 1 is 2, not 3."
How do you know why he's being downvoted? I'd guess that he's being downvoted for his ignorant bigotry towards "hillbillies".
> He's outraged at the situation ..., so I think it's understandable.
Sorry, but outrage, legit or not, is not an acceptable excuse for slaming people who have nothing to do with whatever it is you're outraged about.
Bugsy's comment may have included some factually accurate content, but his form of expression is a signal of questionable credibility and a potential conversational rathole (such as this has become) should one choose to engage him further.
What's better is a happy medium, wherein one does not go overboard in either direction.
Ignoring those requirements leads to low-content discussion like, for example, this one.
