"Of course the real damage is caused more by the upvoters, not the original comment"

Original comment invited political flaming by throwing in the "great showing" jab at the end.

Except for the word "great" the entirety of that comment is factual, and as many pointed out, the embargo is the main reason why this piece of news is so remarkable. I fail to see the "invitation" to flame honestly. It's more about how the moderator interpreted the comment rather than what it's actually there.

It's possible to state factual things in a way that invites heat instead of light.

> I fail to see the "invitation" to flame honestly.

Many people will end up interpreting "A great showing for a small, socialist island nation under decades of embargo by hostile anti-communist forces." as "A great showing for a nation being oppressed and bullied for decades by the big bad US and its bully friends". And, well, the knee jerk reaction is to defend yourself if you think someone is accusing your country of bullying another country for no reason.

Wow, I think that interpretation says way more about the reader than the OP.

I hear you. Seeing HN threads on fire does that to me sometimes.

> I hear you.

Do you? Agreeing with parent implies that you consider your own comment to be highly inflammatory (and implicitly against HN code of conduct etc.). If that is the case, you can take it down or edit it with an apology.

NOTE: I'm not saying I agree with parent, just pointing what seems to me to be a logical necessity stemming from your agreement with parent.

"I hear you" doesn't mean "I agree with the maximalist interpretation of what you say". It means "we have common ground, and I'm willing to give something".

The problem with your logical inference is that you're applying binary logic and human interactions are profoundly non-binary.

I have just now read the edit of your parent comment. I appreciate your clarifications as well as your willingness to nuance your position.

I can't really imagine the amount of effort you have to put into keeping HN on track. I thank you for that as well.

I do however want to mention that the US cultural context is not always that apparent for a non-American (such as myself). My comments were made taking into account strictly the GP and your comment, not any pre-existing cultural context. Back where I'm from (broadly speaking the EU) simply mentioning that Cuba is socialist or that the embargo is anti-communist doesn't come across as particularly controversial or flame-bating.

I know that's true and I hear you :) - the challenge is to get a large community like this to understand and respect how differently things land among the different subgroups in the community. I mean, an internet forum is in one way an utterly trivial thing and at the same time, if we can really get this right it is actually a contribution to the practice of peace in the world, which is not a trivial thing at all. A strange incongruity.

I wrote about that here if you (or anyone) are interested: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23308098

Thanks for pointing to your extended comment.

I can say that in my case confronting people with wildly different political opinions has pushed me to become more dispassionate/detached in my replies, as well as to focus on the substance of the argument. I have started taking things more literally (which is probably what lead to our present conversation) and providing more precise and detailed rebuttals.

All of this I consider to be intellectual progress on my part, so to me HN has provided challenging and fruitful waters to swim in. For that, again, I am grateful :)