How did I start a flamewar? I didn't attack anyone. I made a comment about structural racism and people started calling me names and attacking me personally, saying I was part of some propaganda team.

Seems like your point of view is that anything that goes along with the US-centric point of view is bad and is flamebait.

Am I not allowed to talk about structural racism? Am I not allowed to share my perspective on current and historical actions by the US?

Or am I only allowed to say, "Yes, the US is perfect. We are all good here. We have no problems and have never had any problems."

Might as well not even have a discussion board at that point. Just links with no comments allowed.

You posted massive flamebait: shallow dismissal ("it all boils down to $horrible"), pejorative putdowns of racial/national groups, snark ("can't bear the thought"), complete with downvote baiting—and no actual information to redeem the comment. This was pure provocation and a flamewar was absolutely to be expected.

In fact, it was a textbook example of what the site guidelines ask you not to post. Would you please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html? Note this one, among the many that you broke: "Comments should get more thoughtful and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive." That's there for good reason.

> Or am I only allowed to say

It isn't about your views, it's about comment quality. That has nothing to do with the U.S. or anything else that you mentioned; it has to do with internet forum dynamics. We're trying for thoughtful, curious conversation here. That requires conscious care on all our part or we'll end up with the internet default: a forum that sucks, bursts into flames, and eventually burns to a crisp. The way you and other users perpetuated this flamewar is an example of that outcome—another textbook example actually.

I know it always feels like the mods must be against you when you get moderated (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor...), but if it helps at all, your counterparts on the opposite side feel like we're secretly on your side. This is routinely true on all divisive topics.