Anyone who recognizes my name will know I can be pretty surly. I’m even much worse in other places, and enjoy little back and worth pissy wars. So I’m not a delicate daisy when it comes to rhetoric.
But this is the most mean spirited comment I’ve seen in a long time. This is just unpleasant.
EDIT: Interesting that it is currently 45% positive, which I’m guessing is 11 negative to 9 positive. 9 positive, huh? Okey dokey.
But this is the most mean spirited comment I’ve seen in a long time. This is just unpleasant.
Why is it unpleasant? If you’ve been online for a long time, you’ve seen a lot of random verbal assault, dishonesty, and products of probably mental illness (eg. LoseThos); you can go on 4chan and see any of this at any time. What makes my comment particularly unpleasant and turns your stomach?
I’d say you were making an on topic and in bounds comment until “boot”. Harsh, debatable, but in bounds by my standards of smacking people around for what they say and how they behave.
You went on to dredge up problems in past employment that you perceive Phil had. Maybe he had a divorce you’d like to dredge up too? Do his kids hate him? Any sexual dysfunction you’d like to mention? Employment history is a high stakes, high status impact area of life. That’s making sure you hit an organ when you give him the shiv.
But you weren’t done there. Let’s liken Phil to every hated, low status behavior and low status loser that has ever appeared on the list. Phil is the hated, low status Them, that We all despise. And what should we do about the hated, low status Them? We should get our popcorn, and sneer and jeer at Them, looking down on Them from the balcony seats of the theatre. Them aren’t really people to address; they’re objects to observe in amusement, contempt, and disdain. What fun!
Why so ugly? It’s a generalized personal attack, aimed at vital organs, dehumanizing and depersonalizing, seeking to rally hatred and loathing from the group. In HPMoR terms, it showed rhetorical intent to kill. Not to win, not to make a point, but to harm, and rally others to the stoning.
Beyond you personally, this is the second time I’ve seen completely out of bounds comments on the list. In the first case, they were being roundly applauded, and then defended when I pushed back. Eventually, the original commenter came around. In this case, there at least seems to be some initial pushback, and I don’t see the same kind of enthusiastic defense. Progress, of a sort, but I’m still getting a big Ick about the karma support you’ve received.
You went on to dredge up problems in past employment that you perceive Phil had.
I didn’t dredge them up. Phil brought them up on LW to prove some points. My point is that what he’s voluntarily told us about his life, combined with multiple posts he’s done here, his emails to SL4, another post that Carl brought up I didn’t even remember, and his memorable comments and posts over the last year, all paint a very specific picture which has nothing to do with LW’s rationality and critical thinking skills, and everything to do with him.
Maybe he had a divorce you’d like to dredge up too? Do his kids hate him? Any sexual dysfunction you’d like to mention?
I don’t believe he’s discussed any of those.
But you weren’t done there. Let’s liken Phil to every hated, low status behavior and low status loser that has ever appeared on the list. Phil is the hated, low status Them, that We all despise.
Have you ever spent much time on Wikipedia, enough time to see intelligent productive contributors ‘burn out’? Or with engineers or programmers? The escalating pattern of problems, the fixation on specific issues, going from disaster to disaster, the shrillness and increasing anger, the brusqueness, the marking of enemies—all of these are instantly familiar to anyone who has seen them before. I saw them with multiple Wikipedia contributors, including myself (ever wonder how I lost my adminship there?), and I’ve seen them on LW too (XiXiDu). The downward spiral can’t go on forever. So it won’t.
The question is, how does it end? Does it end cleanly with them coming to their senses and mending their ways, or taking a break to regain perspective, or will it end ugly with them finally going beyond the pale and a possibly permanent punishment handed down? Since I do not run LW and otherwise have no influence with Goetz, I cannot lance the boil or make the fever break.
And what should we do about the hated, low status Them? We should get our popcorn, and sneer and jeer at Them, looking down on Them from the balcony seats of the theatre. Them aren’t really people to address; they’re objects to observe in amusement, contempt, and disdain. What fun!
Unfortunately, we’re all objects to one another. This would be useful, but we cannot break out of our own perspective. (“O wad some Pow’r / the giftie gie us / To see oursels as ithers see us! / It wad frae mony a blunder free us, / An’ foolish notion...”)
Why so ugly? It’s a generalized personal attack, aimed at vital organs, dehumanizing and depersonalizing, seeking to rally hatred and loathing from the group. In HPMoR terms, it showed rhetorical intent to kill. Not to win, not to make a point, but to harm, and rally others to the stoning.
So it’s both generalized and personal? It’s depersonalizing and personal? It’s an ad hominem which is dehumanizing?
I don’t think your replies are an honest engagement to anything I said, just games with language to score points. I didn’t post to score points, I posted to honestly answer what I took to be an honest question. I thought you deserved an answer, given my criticism. I wasn’t interested in scoring points then, and I’m not interested in scoring points now.
Your comment is not unpleasant because I can find worse ones on 4chan? You just made that argument. I know it seems incredible, but really, you did. Look up above, there it is.
Incredulity is not an argument. Feel free to try to understand my point sometime instead of feeling superior. It’d be good practice for your next medical statistics article.
To clarify: You literally asked why it is unpleasant. Are you also implying that you don’t understand why it is unpleasant? That’s the default assumption when someone asks “Why X?” Because that is literally in-credible, I do not believe you don’t understand why it’s unpleasant.
Anyone who recognizes my name will know I can be pretty surly. I’m even much worse in other places, and enjoy little back and worth pissy wars. So I’m not a delicate daisy when it comes to rhetoric.
But this is the most mean spirited comment I’ve seen in a long time. This is just unpleasant.
EDIT: Interesting that it is currently 45% positive, which I’m guessing is 11 negative to 9 positive. 9 positive, huh? Okey dokey.
Why is it unpleasant? If you’ve been online for a long time, you’ve seen a lot of random verbal assault, dishonesty, and products of probably mental illness (eg. LoseThos); you can go on 4chan and see any of this at any time. What makes my comment particularly unpleasant and turns your stomach?
I’d say you were making an on topic and in bounds comment until “boot”. Harsh, debatable, but in bounds by my standards of smacking people around for what they say and how they behave.
You went on to dredge up problems in past employment that you perceive Phil had. Maybe he had a divorce you’d like to dredge up too? Do his kids hate him? Any sexual dysfunction you’d like to mention? Employment history is a high stakes, high status impact area of life. That’s making sure you hit an organ when you give him the shiv.
But you weren’t done there. Let’s liken Phil to every hated, low status behavior and low status loser that has ever appeared on the list. Phil is the hated, low status Them, that We all despise. And what should we do about the hated, low status Them? We should get our popcorn, and sneer and jeer at Them, looking down on Them from the balcony seats of the theatre. Them aren’t really people to address; they’re objects to observe in amusement, contempt, and disdain. What fun!
Why so ugly? It’s a generalized personal attack, aimed at vital organs, dehumanizing and depersonalizing, seeking to rally hatred and loathing from the group. In HPMoR terms, it showed rhetorical intent to kill. Not to win, not to make a point, but to harm, and rally others to the stoning.
Beyond you personally, this is the second time I’ve seen completely out of bounds comments on the list. In the first case, they were being roundly applauded, and then defended when I pushed back. Eventually, the original commenter came around. In this case, there at least seems to be some initial pushback, and I don’t see the same kind of enthusiastic defense. Progress, of a sort, but I’m still getting a big Ick about the karma support you’ve received.
I didn’t dredge them up. Phil brought them up on LW to prove some points. My point is that what he’s voluntarily told us about his life, combined with multiple posts he’s done here, his emails to SL4, another post that Carl brought up I didn’t even remember, and his memorable comments and posts over the last year, all paint a very specific picture which has nothing to do with LW’s rationality and critical thinking skills, and everything to do with him.
I don’t believe he’s discussed any of those.
Have you ever spent much time on Wikipedia, enough time to see intelligent productive contributors ‘burn out’? Or with engineers or programmers? The escalating pattern of problems, the fixation on specific issues, going from disaster to disaster, the shrillness and increasing anger, the brusqueness, the marking of enemies—all of these are instantly familiar to anyone who has seen them before. I saw them with multiple Wikipedia contributors, including myself (ever wonder how I lost my adminship there?), and I’ve seen them on LW too (XiXiDu). The downward spiral can’t go on forever. So it won’t.
The question is, how does it end? Does it end cleanly with them coming to their senses and mending their ways, or taking a break to regain perspective, or will it end ugly with them finally going beyond the pale and a possibly permanent punishment handed down? Since I do not run LW and otherwise have no influence with Goetz, I cannot lance the boil or make the fever break.
Unfortunately, we’re all objects to one another. This would be useful, but we cannot break out of our own perspective. (“O wad some Pow’r / the giftie gie us / To see oursels as ithers see us! / It wad frae mony a blunder free us, / An’ foolish notion...”)
So it’s both generalized and personal? It’s depersonalizing and personal? It’s an ad hominem which is dehumanizing?
I don’t think your replies are an honest engagement to anything I said, just games with language to score points. I didn’t post to score points, I posted to honestly answer what I took to be an honest question. I thought you deserved an answer, given my criticism. I wasn’t interested in scoring points then, and I’m not interested in scoring points now.
Your comment is not unpleasant because I can find worse ones on 4chan?
You just made that argument. I know it seems incredible, but really, you did. Look up above, there it is.
Incredulity is not an argument. Feel free to try to understand my point sometime instead of feeling superior. It’d be good practice for your next medical statistics article.
To clarify: You literally asked why it is unpleasant. Are you also implying that you don’t understand why it is unpleasant? That’s the default assumption when someone asks “Why X?” Because that is literally in-credible, I do not believe you don’t understand why it’s unpleasant.
I have my own beliefs on why it might be perceived as ‘unpleasant’; the question was Socratic.
Why don’t you just say what it is you’re trying to say?