The worst part of HN and the ecosystem isn't being mean, its people reverting to a meta discussion about how useless and silly HN is when they don't have a response to valid criticism or argument.
That's what drove me off Daily Kos five years ago. Meta responses to meta responses to petty bullshit. The endless complaining was invariably far worse than the original issue, and it never resolved anything.
You can't change the behavior of a bunch of strangers with simple argument. If that's your goal, you need to actually do something more substantive.
