To clarify, this was intended to imply that YC is more stressful and intense than any schooling I have ever seen. So, it seemed more akin to training for "life and death" situations. And, since you're training with the best of the best young founders, it's simply a compliment to the Marines. Take it or leave it.
I don't want to keep piling on but it seems like you still don't get it. One of the reasons your post got such a negative response is because you are comparing yourself to people who put themselves in harms way for your benefit.
There is a difference between having your startup fail and actually being shot in the f'ing face by a high powered rifle. And you even ripped on the Marines that may have joined as a way to pay for college, as if they are beneath you and your peers.
Do not compare yourself to real soldiers (or sailors), there is no comparison. Just accept it and move on.
Not to keep piling it on, but when someone says "this is the Cadillac of sandwiches," do you say "Cadillac was founded in 1902 and employs tens of thousands of hard working Americans. How dare you?!"
People call YC a school for startups. I used a metaphor that implied it's far harder than school, and that the people in it are among the best you can hope to be working alongside. It's a metaphor and meant to be both a compliment to YC, and to the Marines. It doesn't make me comparable to a Marine, just like it doesn't make tuna on rye a car.
Ok...we can keep going. If you would have said "YC is like the Marines of startup incubators" and left it at that, it would have been fine. But you didn't say that. You went a lot further than that. You made very specific comparisons including a condescending remark that you and your peers aren't here to just pay their college tuition, etc...
I am quite sure that your intentions were not malicious, but the response to your post is the response to your post.
Did YC teach you and your "best of the best" peers to know when you made a mistake, how to fix it and then move on? If so, now would be a good time to put it into practice, imo.
I see...this is all a misunderstanding based on you not having read this correctly.
"...it could easily be the Air Force, or the Navy, right? Wrong. YC is the Marine Corp...[like the Marines] You are not serving next to people who are in it for the college money."
Yet again a metaphor intended to describe similarities...a compliment to the Marines, specifically. I have met plenty of people who went into other branches of the military just to earn money for college. Nobody goes into the Marines just to earn money for college. I can't see how you turned that into an issue.
It's really unfortunate. I have had the great opportunity to go through a world class program designed to turn the most dedicated professionals from a field into some of its strongest leaders. It is not for the weak-willed and my post was intended to convey that to people interested in the program. I thought I could relay that message by comparing it to a world class training organization of another kind, in which only people of the highest dedication should consider joining. It was my way of saying that what PG has put together is the best of the best, just like the US Marines. I am sorry that you had to nitpick it and turn it into a semantic argument. I'm happy to move on, but my compliment to the Marines and to the program PG has put together is nothing to apologize for.
I bet you're the kind of guy that would fuck a person in the ass and not even have the goddamn common courtesy to give him a reach-around. I'll be watching you.
