When we share an interview, book a speaker, repost someone’s work, or call them an inspiration, we are giving them more than attention for one technical idea. We are giving them a little more credibility and a slightly bigger audience.
That is why I do not want to platform people who use their own audiences for racist, authoritarian, or fascist politics. I am not arguing that disagreement should be intolerable, or that every asshole must be cast out of public life, but I am saying that we get to choose whose reputation we help build.
It is easy to separate the “interesting technical bits” from the person saying them. I get it - a talk can be useful, an open source project can matter, and a founder may have built something genuinely good. But their politics do not disappear when we focus on the work, and we are not obliged to help them reach more people.
The platform is the point
A speaker who is booked for a conference or praised in a community gets more than an audience for one narrow topic. They get status and their credibility carries over. Someone who comes for a technical opinion may meet the rest of that person’s worldview later, with the reassurance that serious people have already vouched for them.
This is why “I only care about their work” does not quite land for me. You may only be sharing the work, but they get the benefit. Their audience grows. Their other ideas travel further. I do not think that makes anyone malicious. It is just how public influence works.
The example that sent me down this path was David Heinemeier Hansson. Jake Lazaroff’s account of his writing about London and the far right documents his rhetoric about “native Brits,” demographic replacement, and a march organized by Tommy Robinson. I do not think somebody needs to pass a purity test before they are allowed to write software. But these are not incidental bad opinions. They are ideas about who belongs, whose presence is a threat, and what politics should be treated as normal.
I cannot pretend that is unrelated to the person whose technical work I might otherwise celebrate.
Context is not a demand
When I see a recommendation for someone with a public record like this, I want to add the missing context. I am not trying to tell people what they must think, watch, build, or share. I want them to have enough information to make their own choice.
I have a lot of freedom in this area. In many parts of my life, I can decide whether I want to work with, collaborate with, or give my attention to people whose values clash with mine. That is a privilege. Other people share a workplace, field, community, or dependency with people they would never choose to elevate. Context can give them a clearer picture without assuming that everyone can simply opt out, or insisting that they respond in one particular way.
The responses to that context can be clarifying, and sometimes disappointing. They show what people are prepared to excuse or hold alongside the things they admire. I do not think that calls for a public trial, and I do not expect agreement. But it does tell me something about a space and the people in it.
Silence tells us something too, especially when the recommendation is already public. Politics are already part of the decision about who gets a microphone, who becomes an inspiration, and which harms get set aside. Adding context does not turn a technical conversation political. It acknowledges that the politics were already there.
For some people, ignoring that context is easy. For others, it says that a community will overlook rhetoric that treats people like them as a problem to be solved, provided the speaker is clever or productive enough.
Labels matter, but so do facts
I understand why people hesitate around the word fascist. It has a specific, horrifying history. It should not mean “someone I dislike.”
Still, a fear of getting the label wrong can become a way to avoid the facts. When someone romanticizes ethno-nationalism, treats demographic change as a catastrophe, amplifies calls for mass removal, or treats a multi-ethnic society as a loss because fewer people are white, I think we can say that those ideas are racist and dangerous. We can see their relationship to fascist traditions without waiting for a uniform or a historical slogan.
I do not need unanimous agreement on the strongest possible label before asking: what has this person said and supported, what does it do in the world, and do I want to help it reach more people?
This is not censorship
Not platforming someone does not stop them publishing, speaking, building, or finding an audience. It means I am not donating mine, or my community’s, to the cause.
Nobody is owed a conference invitation, a friendly recommendation, a community spotlight, or an uncritical share. Those are choices. We make them all the time.
Of course, the world is compromised. We use products made by people and companies whose politics we reject. We sometimes learn from people we would not otherwise elevate. I am not trying to claim moral purity. I cannot control every dependency in my life. I can decide whom I recommend, invite, celebrate, and amplify.
What I want from my communities
I do not expect everyone to share my threshold or use my language. I do hope people will be curious when someone says that an apparently apolitical recommendation has a harmful context. Read the sources. Think about who pays the price for treating it as irrelevant.
You might still decide that the technical contribution outweighs the harm. That is your choice. I only ask that we do not call it neutral.
For me, the answer is becoming clearer. I do not want to help build a bigger stage for people whose public politics make other people’s dignity, safety, or belonging negotiable. Their work may be clever, and may even be useful, but that still is not enough.