&gt; The hacker label is, as Foucault might say, a “dubious unity.”<p>There&#x27;s no such thing as &quot;a unity&quot;. That doesn&#x27;t make sense, perhaps you&#x27;ve translated poorly from the French?<p>&gt; The single phrase can barely contain its constituent multitude.<p>You seem to be having problems with singular vs plural here.<p>&gt; Are hackers fundamentally conservative if not in intention, then in deed?<p>That doesn&#x27;t seem like a sensible question.<p>&gt; Such a question requires a working definition of hackers<p>True. It also, more importantly, requires a working definition of &quot;conservative&quot;, and this seems to be missing.<p>I shan&#x27;t bother to go on.