Open Mic Thread (Mod Sponsored): Discussion on Insults, Personal Attacks, and Flaming

[Corn]

Name-calling is sometimes the only rational response to a poster who clearly has no interest in engaging in a constructive discussion. Calling someone a name can be the analog to vomiting.

Um, no. To the weak minded and easily frustrated, I could see how that opinion could take root......but the rational response would be to simply ignore the troll. Trolls don't give a shit if you insult them, thats exactly the reaction they are looking for. 10 years of P&N database bears this out.

I may have just violated example 1, heh.......

 

[Corn]

What about example 4?

That is merely a restatement of example 2. Weak, really weak.

 

[shira]

That is merely a restatement of example 2. Weak, really weak.

Okay. Okay. Then how about?

I think Rick Santorum is awesome

I absolutely do not believe you're a fucking idiot.

 

[Bowfinger]

This'll never work.

Take for instance the "voter identification laws" are they for election integrity, or are they for fostering racism? There are some here who support election integrity, and then there are others on this board calling it racism, purposefully calling the first person a racist but in an indirect "fact-based" way.

Is that allowed? Is any response allowed?

Sure. On can respond by pointing out you're using a logical fallacy, a straw man argument. The issue isn't racism per se, though statistically it disproportionately impacts blacks. The actual issue is that it demonstrably and materially suppresses the votes of certain segments of the population who tend to vote Democratic. This includes the elderly, the poor, students, and yes, blacks.

That is the actual argument against such photo voter ID drives, not that the people behind it are racist. Well that and the fact that such laws do virtually nothing to actually improve election integrity. Anyone willing to commit in-person voter fraud can do so more easily and more safely by submitting an absentee ballot instead.


So ... that's how one can respond to your example, without insults or personal attacks.

 

[Corn]

Okay. Okay. Then how about?

Allow me to quote the rule regarding example 2 again:

Indirectly attacking the poster, not the post.

Do you really not comprehend those 7 easy to read words?

 

[cybrsage]

Insults should be allowed if the poster can and will adequately support his belief upon being challenged..

You mixed up the intelligent human being and the atheist fundie in your example. You reversed them.

 

[cybrsage]

It seems the majority view so far is that the rule shouldn't be. I'm still trying to figure out what's going on since the approach being taken is completely at odds with how discourse works in the real world.

In the real world, when you (generic you, not personal you) insult someone like many here feel is fine to do, you get beaten down. The anonymity of the Internet makes people turn into screaming doofuses.

 

[shira]

Allow me to quote the rule regarding example 2 again:

Indirectly attacking the poster, not the post.

Do you really not comprehend those 7 easy to read words?

Ah, everything is becoming clearer now. So THIS would be okay?

I think Rick Santorum is awesome

Without a First Amendment, posts like this one would be suicide.

 

[cybrsage]

1 and 2 should not be allowed, 3 should be. Having any other position on it is stupid.

 

[cybrsage]

No need to go Off Topic just to show a point.

 

[shira]

shira, why would you kill yourself if you posted and there was no First Amendment?

Once again, your apparent limited understanding of the English language has caused you to misunderstand clear English prose.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/suicide

suicide: 2. destruction of one's own interests or prospects: Buying that house was financial suicide.

 

[cybrsage]

No need to go Off Topic just to show a point.

 

[Bowfinger]

Once again, your apparent limited understanding of the English language has caused you to misunderstand clear English prose.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/suicide

He is deliberately misrepresenting your comment again so he can play his cutesy -- and childish -- games. It is a variant of his intentional misquoting, though he now thinks he knows where the line is so he's hoping to stay just within it. Personally, I'd like to see such intentional misrepresentation dealt with just like misquoting since it has much the same disruptive effect.

 

[shira]

Why would you destroy your own interests or prospects if there was not a First Amendment? Seems a rather silly thing to do to yourself. But hey, if it makes you happy to destroy your own interests or prospects, go for it.

Once again, your limited understanding of the English language has caused you to misunderstand clear English prose. For example, you might note that "Poster XYZ" is not "Shira."

You might further note that when a post is quoted and a comment is attached that uses the phrase "posts like this one," that reference is to the quoted post.

Or is it your position that a comment attached to a quoted post doesn't refer to the quoted post? And is that position representative of the quality of your other positions?

 

[cybrsage]

No need to go Off Topic just to show a point.

 

[cybrsage]

No need to go Off Topic just to show a point.


I edited the other posts. A few of us were dragging this off topic. Suffice it to say that I support 1 and 2 being not allowed, 3 being allowed.

We should be allowed to delete posts.

 

[shira]

He is deliberately misrepresenting your comment again so he can play his cutesy -- and childish -- games. It is a variant of his intentional misquoting, though he now thinks he knows where the line is so he's hoping to stay just within it. Personally, I'd like to see such intentional misrepresentation dealt with just like misquoting since it has much the same disruptive effect.

And now he's retroactively deleting his posts in an attempt to cover his tracks. Unfortunately (for him), I quoted a few of his (now-deleted) posts when I responded to them.

 

[DominionSeraph]

Um, no. To the weak minded and easily frustrated, I could see how that opinion could take root......but the rational response would be to simply ignore the troll. Trolls don't give a shit if you insult them, thats exactly the reaction they are looking for. 10 years of P&N database bears this out.

First they talked about going after the communists,
and I didn't speak out because, "They're just trolling!"
Then they came for the communists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.

Then they talked about going after the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak out because, "They're just trolling!"
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.

Then they talked about going after the Jews,
and I didn't speak out because, "They're just trolling!"
Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.

Then they talked about going after me.
I now said, "Hey, wait a minute!" But somewhere along the line they seem to have picked up the habit of only listening to themselves. Hmmm... I wonder how that could've happened?

 

[shira]

shira View Post
Name-calling is sometimes the only rational response to a poster who clearly has no interest in engaging in a constructive discussion. Calling someone a name can be the analog to vomiting.

Um, no. To the weak minded and easily frustrated, I could see how that opinion could take root......but the rational response would be to simply ignore the troll. Trolls don't give a shit if you insult them, thats exactly the reaction they are looking for. 10 years of P&N database bears this out.

I may have just violated example 1, heh.......

Except that vomiting is not - nor should it be - a "rational response" to a noxious influence. Vomiting is about getting it out of your system. And I think that a noxious troll is sometimes deserving of the verbal equivalent of vomit. If well constructed, a troll vomit-response will give the troll no pleasure.

 

[piasabird]

So what happens if you think a moderator is a left-leaning person who has views not in favor of Isreal and when you post something in favor of a post about Isreal, he accuses you of violating the forum rules?

Should such moderator be banned?

 

[EagleKeeper]

So what happens if you think a moderator is a left-leaning person who has views not in favor of Isreal and when you post something in favor of a post about Isreal, he accuses you of violating the forum rules?

Should such moderator be banned?

Case by case

I do not think you will find such a situation.

this seems to be more a trolling attempt than anything else.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Case by case

I do not think you will find such a situation.

this seems to be more a trolling attempt than anything else.

I agree. My concern isn't with intent, but the rule of unintended consequences. Politics is by nature a contentious business which has an intellectual and emotional component. Often there are outrageous propositions and responses put forward and like art and pornography we may not be able to define it, but recognize it when we see it. Back in the day when you and I made calls we recognized much which was wrong but for my part I erred on the side of freedom of expression, which has the unfortunate downside of allowing things of questionable or no merit in itself, but if one steps away and examines not only what is said, but thinks on why another thinks or believes as he does, how he expresses himself, what skills he brings to the debate, then the process itself has value. Discourse goes beyond an algorithmic processing of topics to be presented in some semi-formal matter. That removes the soul from the body as it were. Yes we suffer from foolishness but I would suffer fools to preserve the process of dialogue.

 

[dmcowen674]

So what happens if you think a moderator is a left-leaning person

Should such moderator be banned?

What?

There is only one left leaning Mod and you want him banned?

 

[JSt0rm]

Actually I think Hayabusa, you did a good job policing these forums. We had our run ins over uhc but you were always fair to me.

BUT

CC, you deliberately pushed all those threads about the Israeli Palestine conflict into 1 thread. There by killing discussion on it as none of it made sense anymore and it was just 1 giant cacophony. I think this was done intentionally and as a moderator with such a hard stance on Israel you should not of been making that call.

During the next war or truly big event (9/11 type shit) we should have rules in place to deal with it.

My proposition is a new thread can be made as long as there is a news article from a reputable source (not a blog hit piece). After all this is still the news forum and during a really big event its nice to look thru the forum and see different news articles related to this big topic.

We can have a "super thread" for discussion outside of each of those articles but I thought it was a mistake to not allow new articles to have their own thread.

 

[Idontcare]

Actually I think Hayabusa, you did a good job policing these forums. We had our run ins over uhc but you were always fair to me.

BUT

CC, you deliberately pushed all those threads about the Israeli Palestine conflict into 1 thread. There by killing discussion on it as none of it made sense anymore and it was just 1 giant cacophony. I think this was done intentionally and as a moderator with such a hard stance on Israel you should not of been making that call.

During the next war or truly big event (9/11 type shit) we should have rules in place to deal with it.

My proposition is a new thread can be made as long as there is a news article from a reputable source (not a blog hit piece). After all this is still the news forum and during a really big event its nice to look thru the forum and see different news articles related to this big topic.

We can have a "super thread" for discussion outside of each of those articles but I thought it was a mistake to not allow new articles to have their own thread.

FWIW we had a conversation on this very topic in VC&G and we held a poll.

The outcome of that poll was to leave it to the members of the community to decide to make as many threads on any given topic as it liked provided they weren't identical reposts.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2110969

There's no reason to not hold a mod-sponsored P&N community thread on the same topic if it is on people's mind here.