Quote:
Originally Posted by bowerbird
so here's my choice. i can either use a little bit of sarcasm, ... or i can instead go for the "explain everything to them like they were a bunch of second-graders, and let the fact that they've ignored some basic reality give the solid impression that they're not just second-graders, but kinda stupid ones, even though that ain't the impression i _want_ to leave...".
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There's another choice, bowerbird. Talk to people like they're actually functionally intelligent, and point out the point you feel they're missing, without sarcasm or abrasive phrasing, and describe the implications of that point as you see the in a similarly non-sarcastic, non-abrasive manner.
Sarcasm is indeed used humorously on the forum a great deal, but it has to be well telegraphed as humor, because things like tone of voice don't come through in text without a good deal of effort, and they can easily be taken the wrong way. Because of that it also requires a willingness to step back from it and clarify what was meant when it doesn't come across as funny, even to the point of apologizing for giving offense that was never intended.
You come across as seeming to consider anyone who doesn't see things your way to be an imbecile, and people are starting to assume that you mean to be abrasive even when you don't. I've noticed this, but if you have, you have given no sign of it.
You have managed to get more folks to put you on ignore in a week than I've seen happen in the preceding almost two years that I've been around MR.
These are the results of the absence of the respect for which you have expressed such scorn: you are driving folks away even as you claim to wish to persuade them.
I, and several others have put significant amounts of effort in attempting to communicate this to you, but you seem to regard those efforts as aimed at getting you to shut up -- if the moderators here wanted to stifle you as you seem to believe we do, we wouldn't have resorted to talking to you to do so. The fact that we have
ought to tell you something all by itself.
I've reached the point where I simply don't know what else to say to you.