I’ve been banned from HN many times and I’ll get banned again for ban evading (on top of flagged etc). Yes, HN has fallen wayside - not recently, but awhile back. Has nothing to do with election cycles, people just love shitposting, dogpiling and other nonsense.
I’m trying to find a good HN replacement that’s nuts and bolts hackerdom with a bit of edgy posting thrown in so it’s not sterile, but it’s hard to find.