Deadly internet bullying, OR ways in which the FF is like police brutality

[erimir]

So mick apparently thinks that the ":ff: mob" engages in "bullying" like that of the police officer in London.

I was wondering if he could explain how this is so. For example, if he could provide any examples where the ":ff: mob" engaged in bullying that could be reasonably expected to result in serious harm.

Or he could show us the parallels between ":ff: mob" behavior and known examples of internet bullying that led to serious harm.

[Farren]

So mick apparently thinks that the ":ff: mob" engages in "bullying" like that of the police officer in London.

I was wondering if he could explain how this is so. For example, if he could provide any examples where the ":FF: mob" engaged in bullying that could be reasonably expected to result in serious harm.

Or he could show us the parallels between ":ff: mob" behavior and known examples of internet bullying that led to serious harm.

I can (http://www.icann.org/). Serious though, because thiis is sirius busines. You harmed my pussy erimir. My pussy hurts. WTF to do, pls?

[Watser?]

I thought :ff:'s bullying was like slavery.

[Ensign Steve]

I thought it was like child rape.

[Dingfod]

Down with fascism!!!

[Farren]

n/m should not post when drunk, rly.

[ChuckF]

It's like Farren posting drunk!

[beyelzu]

slobbery and overly emotional

:tmgrin:

?

[JamesBannon]

Actually, although no-one takes Mick especially seriously, he does make some good points about the way :ff: works. Even though only one person has been banned from :ff:, the infamous latinjral IIRC, think about how the members deal with trolls. This place is almost unique in that respect.

Internet bullying is a phenomenon that should be taken seriously. It can hurt emotionally, and, occasionally, physically. People have been driven to suicidal behaviour before now. Admittedly, this phenomenon is not all that common, but it can, and does, happen.

[beyelzu]

yeah, we tell dipshits to shut the fuck up, that isnt bullying thats self defense.

though if you need a razor blade,

might i suggest occams razor, its not just for superfluous gods, it does a damn fine job on wrists.

[wildernesse]

Actually, although no-one takes Mick especially seriously, he does make some good points about the way :ff: works. Even though only one person has been banned from :ff:, the infamous latinjral IIRC, think about how the members deal with trolls. This place is almost unique in that respect.

Internet bullying is a phenomenon that should be taken seriously. It can hurt emotionally, and, occasionally, physically. People have been driven to suicidal behaviour before now. Admittedly, this phenomenon is not all that common, but it can, and does, happen.

I agree that internet bullying is a problem, but I just don't see it rising to the level of emotional and physical harm here. Do you have examples of people being bullied here that couldn't be solved by them deleting FF from their favorites and finding a new place to hang out? Or using the ignore button?

[Dingfod]

Actually, although no-one takes Mick especially seriously, he does make some good points about the way :ff: works. Even though only one person has been banned from :ff:, the infamous latinjral IIRC, think about how the members deal with trolls. This place is almost unique in that respect.

Internet bullying is a phenomenon that should be taken seriously. It can hurt emotionally, and, occasionally, physically. People have been driven to suicidal behaviour before now. Admittedly, this phenomenon is not all that common, but it can, and does, happen.Oh, piss off, punk.


Just kidding.

[JoeP]

I thought it was like child rape.

Starring ES as the child?

[Doctor X]

There is this thing called an Ignore feature. . . .

--J.D.

[Plant Woman]

Who's mickthinks?

[JamesBannon]

Actually, although no-one takes Mick especially seriously, he does make some good points about the way :ff: works. Even though only one person has been banned from :ff:, the infamous latinjral IIRC, think about how the members deal with trolls. This place is almost unique in that respect.

Internet bullying is a phenomenon that should be taken seriously. It can hurt emotionally, and, occasionally, physically. People have been driven to suicidal behaviour before now. Admittedly, this phenomenon is not all that common, but it can, and does, happen.

I agree that internet bullying is a problem, but I just don't see it rising to the level of emotional and physical harm here. Do you have examples of people being bullied here that couldn't be solved by them deleting FF from their favorites and finding a new place to hang out? Or using the ignore button?

I personally haven't seen anything on FF that I would say was real bullying or harassment. There have been attempts at it, by Sovereign towards Shelli & CC, for instance, but those have been quickly squashed. In part, what makes this community effective is the fact that most people like each other and are reasonably tolerant of each others' "foibles".

On the use of ignore: It is a bad use of ignore to stop bullying. This simply enables the offenders. There is only one effective way to deal with bullies - kick them hard. If that means banning them, then so be it. As I say, it hasn't been necessary here because the community is pretty close-knit.

[Master Taran]

Although no-one takes Mick especially seriously.^^^^^QFTFT^^^^^

That's why I have it on ignore.

[JamesBannon]

I did too at one point, MT, but I've since taken Mick off ignore. In fact, I've taken everyone off ignore, even the real jerks like Sovereign.

[Ensign Steve]

I thought it was like child rape.

Starring ES as the child?

:lolwut:

[JoeP]

C'mon JD, I can think of at least two interpretations of that

[JoeP]

Who's mickthinks?

Mine doesn't, that's for sure.

[seebs]

FF has a large population of people who have been through much worse places, could hold their own pretty much anywhere, and mostly just want to hang around and chat pleasantly.

What this means is that a garden-variety bully here ends up in the position of someone who decided to start stuff in a "retirement community" full of former commandoes who decided to retire to the same place so they could have people to spar with just to keep in shape.

There's a secondary level to the analogy; it's not just that this place has a surprising density of extremely skilled flame warriors. It's that they're skilled enough not to use force they don't mean to, and not to feel any need to harm anyone seriously, because they know themselves not to be in any danger.

Net result, would-be bullies get their asses handed to them, after which everyone goes back to drinking tea with pinkies out.

[JoeP]

:teaparty:

[mickthinks]

Net result, would-be bullies get their asses handed to them, after which everyone goes back to drinking tea with pinkies out.

So :ff: is different from other forums because here the in-crowd genuinely are all heroes. LOL seebs, do you ever listen to yourself?

Mick

:lol:@incrowd's.thx

[ChuckF]

Is anybody else's tea oddly amethyst-colored?

[But]

people who have been through much worse places

former commandoesextremely skilled flame warriorsskilled enough not to use force they don't mean toand not to feel any need to harm anyone seriouslywould-be bullies get their asses handed to them:lol:

Get real, you're a collection of people typing words into the internets.

[ChuckF]

Get real, you're a collection of people fucking ninjas typing words into the internets.
fify :ninjaing:

[Adam]

Is anybody else's tea oddly amethyst-colored?

No, but mine has what appears to be a ruby in it. WTF?

[ChuckF]

Damn, a ruby. This place really is classy. :aristea:

[seebs]

So :ff: is different from other forums because here the in-crowd genuinely are all heroes.

Another cool example of you massively misreading something.

Nowhere did I say "heroes".

Nowhere did I say anything about the "in-crowd".

Those are your interpretations, not anything I said. I didn't say anyone was a hero, and I don't really think there's necessarily a well-defined, or even loosely-defined, "in crowd".

LOL seebs, do you ever listen to yourself?

Not usually.

[Qingdai]

An alternate idea is that people here already have thick skins and the knowledge that they are here because they want to be and it is just "sig on a page" to quote JoeP.

My tea is, "delicious popcorn tea." As per Qingdai jr.

[viscousmemories]

On the use of ignore: It is a bad use of ignore to stop bullying. This simply enables the offenders.
It depends how broadly you choose to define "stop bullying". True, the ignore feature isn't going to stop any from engaging in bullying behavior, but I don't think anyone has suggested otherwise. What it does is make such behavior (mostly and usually) invisible to anyone who feels bullied, effectively eliminating it. To that extent I would say that the ignore feature is a very good way to stop bullying.

[JamesBannon]

On the use of ignore: It is a bad use of ignore to stop bullying. This simply enables the offenders.
It depends how broadly you choose to define "stop bullying". True, the ignore feature isn't going to stop any from engaging in bullying behavior, but I don't think anyone has suggested otherwise. What it does is make such behavior (mostly and usually) invisible to anyone who feels bullied, effectively eliminating it. To that extent I would say that the ignore feature is a very good way to stop bullying.
The reason it's bad is because it puts the onus of behavioural control on the victim, not the perpetrator. It should always be the case that the demand is on the perpertrator to modify his / her behaviour.

[seebs]

The reason it's bad is because it puts the onus of behavioural control on the victim, not the perpetrator. It should always be the case that the demand is on the perpertrator to modify his / her behaviour.

In the abstract, sure. But in practice, I don't think it's useful to be dogmatic about it. If you know that a neighborhood is overrun by bigots who will hassle you if they see you because they don't like the color of your skin, and you go there specifically because you are in the habit of being harassed and then complaining about it, that's just dumb.

[viscousmemories]

The reason it's bad is because it puts the onus of behavioural control on the victim, not the perpetrator. It should always be the case that the demand is on the perpertrator to modify his / her behaviour.
I think 'victim' and 'perpetrator' imply a legal (or at least formal) context and interaction that simply isn't analogous to posting messages to one another on a free, public, largely unmoderated discussion forum. That said, we have had many long discussions and debates on the subject of 'bullying' and 'harassment' here over the years, and the one thing I can say with certainty is that there is no broad agreement on what constitutes either or what can or should be done about it.

With consideration of our founding principles, recognizing our own limitations and considering the stated wishes of our members over the years, we have opted for the least controlling forum management approach. So I will have to disagree with what follows from your assertion: that we should be judging the behavior of our members and demanding that they conform to our view of what is proper.

It is quite enough, in our opinion, to implore visitors here to ignore content that offends them or seriously consider whether visiting here at all is a good choice for them. As much as I hate to say it, the :ff: really isn't for everyone. There are any number of heavily moderated forums for people who prefer to put control of what they read into someone else's hands.

[Angakuk]

It seems to me that there are basically two positive ways of dealing with a bully, whether online or in real life. The first is to force the bully to change his behavior, if you can manage to accomplish that. The second is to prevent yourself from being the victim of that bully. Most of us have more control over our own behavior than we have over the behavior of others. So, it would seem to me that I am much more likely to succeed at preventing myself from being the victim of bullying by making a change in my behavior so that the situation is altered in such a way that I am no longer the victim. Yes, this does put the onus on the victim. However, I think it is nearly always the case that the responsibility to effect change is on the person who wants to see change happen.

With regard to mickthinks, he thinks that he sees evidence of a significant degree of bullying at :ff: and he wants to see it stopped. His approach to changing this situation seems to be one of trying, first of all, to convince others to see the problem in the same way he sees it and, secondly, to convince them join him in a program designed to force the alleged bullies to stop their bullying behavior. If he can achieve the first objective, then the second objective is probably doable. Personally, I think that the first objective is probably out of reach. For the simple reasons that his perception of the problem is counter-factual and he doesn't have the personal charisma that it would take to convince others to adopt his counter-factual perception.

[Angakuk]

There are any number of heavily moderated forums for people who prefer to put control of what they read into someone else's hands.

The thing about mickthinks' agenda is that he is not advocating more formal moderation. He wants the members of :ff: to take control of the content at :ff:, if, and only if, he can persuade most of them to see things his way. What he fails to realize is that :ff:, as it is currently constituted, is under the control of its membership. :ff: is the way it is (whatever that is), largely because most of the regular posters here like it that way.

mickthinks' efforts remind me of an experience from my teenage years. I was actively involved in a church youth group, not because I was a Christian, but because it was one of the few social activities I was allowed while I was grounded by my parents (and I was grounded much of the time). Anyway, I made a serious effort to change the character of the group so that it would be more social and less religious. I will leave you to make your own guesses about how successful I was in that endeavor.

[Dingfod]

I'm sure pointing out the bullying behavior reduced the bullying behavior, other than that little bit of mocking the pointer-outer with some bullying behavior bit.

Okay, not so much.

[erimir]

Net result, would-be bullies get their asses handed to them, after which everyone goes back to drinking tea with pinkies out.

So :ff: is different from other forums because here the in-crowd genuinely are all heroes. LOL seebs, do you ever listen to yourself?

Mick

:lol:@incrowd's.thxI made this thread to ask you a specific question, and you ignored it.

Is there any particular reason for that?

[MonCapitan2002]

On the use of ignore: It is a bad use of ignore to stop bullying. This simply enables the offenders.
It depends how broadly you choose to define "stop bullying". True, the ignore feature isn't going to stop any from engaging in bullying behavior, but I don't think anyone has suggested otherwise. What it does is make such behavior (mostly and usually) invisible to anyone who feels bullied, effectively eliminating it. To that extent I would say that the ignore feature is a very good way to stop bullying.
The reason it's bad is because it puts the onus of behavioural control on the victim, not the perpetrator. It should always be the case that the demand is on the perpertrator to modify his / her behaviour.
I understand your point here, however bear in mind that this forum was designed from the outset to be largely unmoderated. The way the :ff: was designed was to leave the moderation of content largely to the members using the ignore features. These tools were made so extensive that the ignore features I see here can't be found anywhere else.

Here you can ignore a specific users avatar or signature. You can ignore specific threads. You used to be able to ignore specific posts as well (a feature we need to get back, by the way). The forum was designed in such a way that minimal moderation would be needed since members would be given tools to completely ignore objectionable posters if they so wished.

If the :ff: were designed to be more heavily moderated then you would have a stronger case here. I am sure that if this forum were designed with more extensive moderation in mind, then some of the more objectionable members here would have been expunged long ago. However, if that were to happen, the :ff: would lose one of its most identifying traits. The only other lightly moderated board I know of is the RPGFan message boards (http://www.rpgfan.com/boards/index.php), but its content is too narrowly focused and membership too small to be as much fun.

[mickthinks]

I made this thread to ask you a specific question, and you ignored it.
Yes, erimir, there are a number of reasons for that, I guess. One, you addressed me in third person, which helped me feel that we weren't in the same room, and two, the hyperbole of your choice of title didn't fill me with confidence that you were willing to take the issue seriously. Sorry, I guess I've just added another to the unresolved issues.

Mick

[seebs]

I don't see how this is any more hyperbolic than your claim of some kind of essential similarity between Chuck's "lulz" and potentially-fatal attacks intended to cause real harm.

[erimir]

I prefer not to call someone out directly in an OP because obviously as a public thread other people can participate, not just you.

I don't think you're correct in saying that there is any behavior on FF akin to police brutality (even if it was only inadvertently deadly) - you were the one engaging in hyperbole, imo. I'd be willing to take the issue seriously, if I saw you actually support your, imo, highly exaggerated claims.

But because I don't want to frame the debate on your terms, you don't want to respond at all? It's funny how whenever I ask you a question, you almost always find some reason not to answer it.

[mickthinks]

seebs: I don't see how this is any more hyperbolic than your claim ...
erimir: ...you were the one engaging in hyperbole, imo.

Tu quoque is not a denial, so I guess we are agreed on the point I was making about your hyperbole, erimir, and you understand my reason for not responding to your OP.

I promise I will come back to your unresolved issue when all mine have been resolved.

Mick

[Angakuk]

I promise I will come back to your unresolved issue when all mine have been resolved.

Mick

"I'll gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today". - J. Wellington Wimpy

[seebs]

seebs: I don't see how this is any more hyperbolic than your claim ...
erimir: ...you were the one engaging in hyperbole, imo.

Tu quoque is not a denial, so I guess we are agreed on the point I was making about your hyperbole, erimir, and you understand my reason for not responding to your OP.

This is at best disingenuous. Do you genuinely believe that you and erimir are agreed?

That said, I think again you're not understanding a linguistic convention. The thread title is a sarcastic reference to comments you've made -- he's incorporating the "police brutality" comparison specifically because you yourself said, in your own words, that you thought there was a similarity. It's a reference to your hyperbole; obviously he doesn't mean it.

I promise I will come back to your unresolved issue when all mine have been resolved.

I do not think your issues will be resolved while you habitually put words in other peoples' mouths. You would do better to phrase your interactions as questions about what other people mean than assertions about what you've concluded they mean -- especially given your long history of being told that you guessed wrong.

[erimir]

seebs: I don't see how this is any more hyperbolic than your claim ...
erimir: ...you were the one engaging in hyperbole, imo.

Tu quoque is not a denial,I was obviously denying that I was engaging in hyperbole. If I was agreeing with you that I was engaging in hyperbole, I would've said "You were also engaging in hyperbole" - "You were the one doing X" implies that the speaker was not doing X, and you were. Are you unfamiliar with this idiom?

The thread title is comment on your hyperbole, and I don't think it's particularly exaggerated. That is essentially the comparison you made - the FF mob engages in behavior like that of a police bully who pushes someone over and inadvertently causes that person's death.

I left out the word "mob", that's the only difference I can see.
I promise I will come back to your unresolved issue when all mine have been resolved.That's interesting, because you are almost never satisfied that any of your issues have been resolved, and you always find a way to claim that you have some other unresolved issue.

It's a simple question, why don't you answer it for once, instead of picking irrelevant details to complain about?

[seebs]

Mick, pragmatic consideration: Once you've established (whether justly or unjustly) a reputation for not being cooperative or sincere in your engagements, you are in a poor position to go around setting terms.

In particular, "resolution" is not a usable standard. Think more in terms of "spending some real time". If someone spends an hour or two of time writing responses to you on an issue, and you end up feeling it's not resolved, that doesn't mean that person hasn't put substantial time into trying to address one of your concerns. Refusing to spend five minutes answering a question for someone who's spent an hour trying to help you makes you look pretty arrogant and rude.

Furthermore, you seem to have a collective responsibility view of this, which makes no sense. The people here are individuals. You should deal with them individually. If you have issues that are not specifically and personally with erimir, that should not factor into how you address erimir.

[mickthinks]

Once you've established (whether justly or unjustly) a reputation for not being cooperative or sincere in your engagements, you are in a poor position to go around setting terms.
er ... okay.

Refusing to spend five minutes answering a question for someone who's spent an hour trying to help you makes you look pretty arrogant and rude.
erimir spent an hour trying to help me?

... you seem to have a collective responsibility view of this, which makes no sense.
So maybe I don't?

[erimir]

Do you have any intention of answering my inquiry?

[mickthinks]

Do you think we :ff:ers have an obligation to each other to resolve issues if it is within our power to do so?

[seebs]

Refusing to spend five minutes answering a question for someone who's spent an hour trying to help you makes you look pretty arrogant and rude.
erimir spent an hour trying to help me?

Just about anyone here who's tried to engage with you at all has put more time into trying to understand and possibly address your issues than you have ever put into substantive responses to anything I've yet seen.

You asked for clear examples of misinterpretation on your part. I gave you extremely detailed analysis of several specific cases where you clearly misunderstood something that was genuinely obvious to pretty much anyone else. I've explained why people keep accusing you of lying. I've explained for your benefit why your statements give people justified confidence that you are lying (even if you are not), and explained for other peoples' benefit how you could genuinely believe these things. I convinced Chuck to stop trolling you.

Your responses so far have never exceeded a single sentence in length, and have been consistently dismissive if not outright hostile. You've simply not responded at all to large chunks of the information I provided specifically because you requested it. If I were working on the clock, you'd be sitting on a few hundred bucks' worth of analysis and reporting, and ... ignoring it. That ain't an encouraging kind of response.

... you seem to have a collective responsibility view of this, which makes no sense.
So maybe I don't?

I have no other explanation available. Here's a place where you've communicated hostility and lack of sincerity. See, ordinarily, if you want people to understand your position, you say what it is. Someone trying to communicate that he does not hold such a view would typically follow up with his alternative explanation. For instance, you could explain why an answer to erimir's question ought to be in any way contingent on resolution of your concerns. Is erimir responsible for those existing concerns? If not, what is the reason for which they ought to be resolved first? Chronological order doesn't cut it -- that works only within a single personal relationship, not among several.

If you and someone else both owe each other money, it could be reasonable to say "I do not plan to pay you back until you pay me back." However, if Bob owes you money, and you owe Jim money, it is not so sensible to tell Jim "I won't pay you back until Bob pays me back." (It could make sense if you're simply flat broke -- however, "explanations" are not a resource which you can be out of until someone gives you an explanation for something unrelated.)

[mickthinks]

Just about anyone here who's tried to engage with you at all has put more time into trying to understand and possibly address your issues than you have ever put into substantive responses to anything I've yet seen.
That is not true, seebs. I'm not going to reply to the rest of your post.

[seebs]

Do you think we :ff:ers have an obligation to each other to resolve issues if it is within our power to do so?

That's a definite maybe!

The way communities tend to work is that people contribute effort or resources to other community members, based on the expectation that other community members will do likewise.

People who habitually fail to contribute tend to be treated as outside the scope of this; most people cease to view them as part of the community.

Your responses consistently communicate a lack of effort or engagement on your part. This may not be intentional, and you may feel you are providing effort, but your posts don't show any kind of contribution of effort, or any engagement. So people are unwilling to expend a lot of effort trying to "help" you. This is amplified because it's simply not entirely clear in some cases what it is that you want... Again, communications problems.

[seebs]

Just about anyone here who's tried to engage with you at all has put more time into trying to understand and possibly address your issues than you have ever put into substantive responses to anything I've yet seen.
That is not true, seebs.

Yes, it is.

I can't name a single post from you in which you offered substantive engagement rather than dismissive one-liners. However, I've seen many people engage with you at some length on one or two occasions over the past few years.

Your post here is a sterling example. You say that something isn't true -- but you don't offer any kind of supporting evidence, examples, or even a narrative of how you've put time into substantive responses. Since I can't find any examples of you providing substantive responses, your time put into substantive responses is conservatively estimated at zero.

If you want us to think you're actually trying to communicate, try actually doing the work. Don't just deny things; give explanations of your position. If you think you've put time into substantive responses, show us -- or at least tell us about them.

You produce a flood of trivial posts with one-liner responses and very little content, often referring back to previous posts. You never provide anything self-contained that we could read and respond to without familiarity with a huge amount of material many of us have never read.

[Demimonde]

I, for one, have tried to engage you and the sum total of all of the responses you have returned is about six sentences. I invested my time into those posts in the hope that you would consider their content, and it appears to me that you really didn't take any time to respond.

It reminds me of a coworker I had who would always ask questions in meetings, and then talk while the manager was anwering her question. Drove me crazy. But you will probablly misconstrue this analogy, which will drive me crazy.

[mickthinks]

Yes, it is.
No it's not, and until you accept that you might be wrong about it I haven't really anything else to say to you, seebs.

[mickthinks]

I, for one, have tried to engage you and the sum total of all of the responses you have returned is about six sentences.
Sorry lady, I'm a bit busy right now. Get back to me when it's a bit quieter?

[seebs]

Yes, it is.
No it's not, and until you accept that you might be wrong about it I haven't really anything else to say to you, seebs.

You've never said anything substantive to me to begin with; how will anything change?

How about this.

I accept that I might be wrong.

Let's try pretending you actually want to communicate. Here's what you need to know:

1. I currently believe it to be true. Note, by the way, the qualifier at the end of that sentence: to anything I've yet seen. I am very carefully qualifying the statement. I have not seen this effort, or evidence thereof.
2. I don't have complete information. I've never read 90% of your posts. I have never read 90% of the posts in response to you, or directed at you, either.

Imagine that I'm wrong about this -- should be easy for you to do, since you believe it. Now, how can I be wrong, and not know that I'm wrong? Well, the obvious explanation would be that I lack information. What information? Well, it'd be the effort you've put in. But how could you show me that effort? Effort itself is not a thing I can observe.

What you could do would be, for instance, to show me examples of posts in which you've offered substantial engagement and effort. Posts where you've responded with explanations and support, rather than dismissive one-liners. Show me some paragraphs you've written with more than one or two sentences in them. Show me some long paragraphs full of statements about yourself and your internal state, rather than statements about other people. You are not the arbiter of other people, but you should be a good witness as to your own state, yes?

So show me something. Tell me why I should believe that my observations so far have been insufficient. What kind of effort do you put into posts? Can you show me some posts that took a lot of effort, rather than just containing a couple of dismissive one-liners? Can you tell me about a time you've put a your heart and soul into some communication, instead of just rattling off form letters?

If you can do that, then I could be persuaded that I'm wrong. If you respond with dismissive one-liners and "yes it is" comments, I'm not going to be persuaded of anything.

But again, I've always accepted that I might be wrong. On this, on every other issue. Your personal effort in posts is a territory of curiousity and speculation to me, same as the question of whether gravity is a constant factor even in other galactic clusters.

[Chris Porter]

Do you think we :ff:ers have an obligation to each other to resolve issues if it is within our power to do so?

No. This, from someone who has made an effort to resolve issues with you.

[erimir]

Do you think we :ff:ers have an obligation to each other to resolve issues if it is within our power to do so?Considering that was simply a yes or no question (Do you intend to ever answer the question in my OP?), and you couldn't even muster the courtesy to just say yes or no, I guess that must be a no.

While I will admit to disliking you, aside from a snarky thread title, I think I've been pretty polite in this exchange and made an honest attempt. But you clearly don't have any intention of justifying anything you say and will continue to divert the topic to trivial details about how something was said, rather than addressing the actual content of my question.

In my opinion, your suggestion that the FF "mob" is like a policeman who attacks bystanders for no reason is laughable. And, in my opinion, the reason you won't back it up is either because you're too busy playing games, or because (as I suspect) you put no thought into the analogy. Or both.

[mickthinks]

... you couldn't even muster the courtesy to just say yes or no
Yeah, that happens to me all the time, too. I'm not sure that it is considered a discourtesy here, though.

[seebs]

... you couldn't even muster the courtesy to just say yes or no
Yeah, that happens to me all the time, too. I'm not sure that it is considered a discourtesy here, though.

I haven't seen it happen to you in cases where the question asked was genuinely a yes-or-no question, not a complex question with additional disputed presuppositions.

"Have you stopped beating your wife yet?" is not a question most people will answer "yes" or "no".

[erimir]

:rolleyes:

Ok, whatever, I don't have the patience that seebs does, so I give up. I've tried this before, and it didn't work then. Obviously it's pointless.

If you really are autistic, then hopefully you'll get help and learn how to interact more fruitfully with others; if you're not, then go fuck yourself.

[viscousmemories]

Hey seebs, I agree that your time would be better spent on the clear and recent examples you found, but curiosity got the better of me so I dug through the archives a bit to refresh my memory as to how this all began. It started with a thread about Bush doing something many of us considered to be assholish. Very early in the thread, mickthinks jumped in (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/showthread.php?p=395653#post395653) with an implication that our criticisms were prejudiced by our dislike of Bush. Or something.

He actually sparred with several others before I came into the thread with this post (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/showthread.php?p=395954#post395954), where I waged the now infamous assault upon mickthink's seriousness by suggesting that he was BEING SILLY. We went back and forth at least a few times in that thread, and if I got nastier than that I don't remember (and didn't re-read that far on this go around).

Soon after, mickthinks started this thread (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=13424) to expose my nastiness, as revealed by my saying "don't be silly", to the community at large. I plonked him on page two but I see now that it went on for six pages. In fact it appears (at a glance) that mickthinks has written hudreds, if not thousands of words both to and about me since I put him and his threads on ignore TWO YEARS AGO, apparently consumed by the many and varied emotions generated by my posting "Don't be silly." I don't know much about austism, but if he isn't some kind of mentally defective I don't know anyone who is.

[seebs]

Thanks for the link. I've currently decided to hold my ground -- I'm not gonna go write up an analysis of that one until I see some evidence that he reads this stuff. (As in, some kind of response that indicates comprehension of the material, not stuff you could do just by skimming and playing Eliza.)

[viscousmemories]

Good luck!

[JoeP]

Hey seebs, I agree that your time would be better spent on the clear and recent examples you found, but curiosity got the better of me so I dug through the archives a bit to refresh my memory as to how this all began. It started with a thread about Bush doing something many of us considered to be assholish. Very early in the thread, mickthinks jumped in (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/showthread.php?p=395653#post395653) with an implication that our criticisms were prejudiced by our dislike of Bush. Or something.

He actually sparred with several others before I came into the thread with this post (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/showthread.php?p=395954#post395954), where I waged the now infamous assault upon mickthink's seriousness by suggesting that he was BEING SILLY. We went back and forth at least a few times in that thread, and if I got nastier than that I don't remember (and didn't re-read that far on this go around).

Soon after, mickthinks started this thread (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=13424) to expose my nastiness, as revealed by my saying "don't be silly", to the community at large. I plonked him on page two but I see now that it went on for six pages. In fact it appears (at a glance) that mickthinks has written hudreds, if not thousands of words both to and about me since I put him and his threads on ignore TWO YEARS AGO, apparently consumed by the many and varied emotions generated by my posting "Don't be silly." I don't know much about austism, but if he isn't some kind of mentally defective I don't know anyone who is.

Don't be silly, vm.

[mickthinks]

Soon after, mickthinks started this thread (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=13424) to expose my nastiness, as revealed by my saying "don't be silly", to the community at large.

I don't think your attempts to hold me responsible for a conflict that was started by you is "nastiness". I was just calling you out for it, which you handled rather badly.

Mick

[Petra]

...which you handled rather badly.

Mick

So did you, Mick. And continue to handle badly, over and over and over again. :doh:

[mickthinks]

Yes, Petra, I realise the correct behaviour for noobs at :ff: is to suck it up when the team dishes it out. That would maintain the illusion that nothing was going wrong with the free-thought model and that seebs's flattering portrait of the old warriors (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/showpost.php?p=688977&postcount=22) was a plain truth and not a pure fantasy.

[Petra]

No, Mick, you don't realise as much as you may think you do. But I'm not going to get into it with you, because it's just too pointless. Damned shame.

I can only hope that your real life is happier and friendlier than your online life. Good luck, take care, and be well.


Over and out. :flyaway:

[mickthinks]

No, Mick, you don't realise as much as you may think you do.
Like many :ff:ers, you choose to underestimate how much I realise, because otherwise you'd have to deal with me more honestly, Petra. Of course, you are not going to "get into it" with me. So far, no one has.

[Dingfod]

Thanks for the link. I've currently decided to hold my ground -- I'm not gonna go write up an analysis of that one until I see some evidence that he reads this stuff. (As in, some kind of response that indicates comprehension of the material, not stuff you could do just by skimming and playing Eliza.)Good luck with that.

[Adam]

It started with a thread about Bush doing something many of us considered to be assholish. Very early in the thread, mickthinks jumped in (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/showthread.php?p=395653#post395653) with an implication that our criticisms were prejudiced by our dislike of Bush. Or something.

"Something", in this case apparently being feminism. Recall, the original reason mick met with disagreement in that thread was not actually his belief that criticisms of Bush were motivated by prejudice but his belief that feminism had something to do with it, and his characterization of the incident as "A frail woman bursts into tears and that's automatically a bad thing the man has done. "

[Watser?]

Oh yeah, hehehe a 'frail woman'. Not of course a child (of whatever sex)...

That was an early episode of mickthinks and his adventures in cognitive dissonance land.

[mickthinks]

Recall, the original reason mick met with disagreement in that thread was not actually his belief that criticisms of Bush were motivated by prejudice but his belief that feminism had something to do with it, and his characterization of the incident as "A frail woman bursts into tears and that's automatically a bad thing the man has done."
The protective role of man over woman is a feminist issue, and the disagreement about it was not serious and didn't last. But the hostility continued to escalate.

[Sock Puppet]

Seebs, earlier in the Pittsburgh cop shooter thread, you mentioned that an unwillingness to admit one is wrong is also a trait found in the autistic. I wanted to ask you about that, but just made a mental note and couldn't find it again. I was wondering because it's also found in narcissistic personality disorder. I have previously called mickthinks narcissistic because in his avalanche of posts, I have never seen him admit being mistaken about anything whatsoever. I've seen a couple others in online post-wars exhibit this that were a better fit for NPD than autism, but the case you make is pretty convincing regarding mick. Unless he's both autistic and narcissistic, which is not impossible.

So I was wondering, how prevalent is that in the autistic? Is it common to be so impenetrable? I'm honestly not just trying to poke mick here (I have him on ignore anyway, and in fact would be far less insulting if he's not a narcissist); I'm genuinely wondering.

[Smilin]

The protective role of man over woman [I]is a feminist issue, and the disagreement about it was not serious and didn't last. But the hostility continued to escalate.

Wrong, ole' chap....

It's a biological and evolutionary issue...feminism has squat to do with it....

[JamesBannon]

The reason it's bad is because it puts the onus of behavioural control on the victim, not the perpetrator. It should always be the case that the demand is on the perpertrator to modify his / her behaviour.
I think 'victim' and 'perpetrator' imply a legal (or at least formal) context and interaction that simply isn't analogous to posting messages to one another on a free, public, largely unmoderated discussion forum. That said, we have had many long discussions and debates on the subject of 'bullying' and 'harassment' here over the years, and the one thing I can say with certainty is that there is no broad agreement on what constitutes either or what can or should be done about it.

With consideration of our founding principles, recognizing our own limitations and considering the stated wishes of our members over the years, we have opted for the least controlling forum management approach. So I will have to disagree with what follows from your assertion: that we should be judging the behavior of our members and demanding that they conform to our view of what is proper.

It is quite enough, in our opinion, to implore visitors here to ignore content that offends them or seriously consider whether visiting here at all is a good choice for them. As much as I hate to say it, the :ff: really isn't for everyone. There are any number of heavily moderated forums for people who prefer to put control of what they read into someone else's hands.

I have no problem with the way FF works. If I did, I wouldn't be here. I have always been treated well here in spite of my shortcomings and have made good friends. This was evident from my very first post. You won't see me going anywhere any time soon.

I don't see the problems that Mick sees, I was merely suggesting that he may have a point about the way in which FF works. Sure, it's not formally moderated, but that doesn't change the fact that moderation does indeed happen. Look at the way we treat members like Sovereign for example.

[Dingfod]

Bullies, the lot of us.

[seebs]

Seebs, earlier in the Pittsburgh cop shooter thread, you mentioned that an unwillingness to admit one is wrong is also a trait found in the autistic. I wanted to ask you about that, but just made a mental note and couldn't find it again. I was wondering because it's also found in narcissistic personality disorder. I have previously called mickthinks narcissistic because in his avalanche of posts, I have never seen him admit being mistaken about anything whatsoever. I've seen a couple others in online post-wars exhibit this that were a better fit for NPD than autism, but the case you make is pretty convincing regarding mick. Unless he's both autistic and narcissistic, which is not impossible.

So I was wondering, how prevalent is that in the autistic? Is it common to be so impenetrable? I'm honestly not just trying to poke mick here (I have him on ignore anyway, and in fact would be far less insulting if he's not a narcissist); I'm genuinely wondering.

It's moderately common to be very hard to persuade. However, mick's total refusal to engage substantively does have sort of that NPD quality.

Here's the background. For a long time, researchers believed that autism meant simply not being able to conceive of other people. In the case of high-functioning autism (think "able to use grammatical sentences and dress self"), though, it seems pretty clear that autistic people do perceive other people. However, they tend to do it sort of poorly, which can result in failure to model other peoples' thoughts or beliefs.

I tend to be utterly implacable when convinced, but I'm also always open to being convinced. There's a tendency for reasonably stable autistic people to be unusually open to being persuaded -- they usually have less emotional involvement in whether they're right or wrong, and mostly just a strong interest in finding out what's right.

This is very hard to reconcile with Mick's tendency to dismiss other peoples' posts. His pattern of reasons for which other peoples' posts don't deserve an investment of his time or concern is... weird, frankly. Could just be really bad empathy failures, but even then, most of the HFAs I've known have been able to do better at that.

[Adam]

Recall, the original reason mick met with disagreement in that thread was not actually his belief that criticisms of Bush were motivated by prejudice but his belief that feminism had something to do with it, and his characterization of the incident as "A frail woman bursts into tears and that's automatically a bad thing the man has done."
The protective role of man over woman is a feminist issue, and the disagreement about it was not serious and didn't last. But the hostility continued to escalate.

I'm not going to rehash the argument here. The salient point is that no one but you framed the issue as one of a man's response to a woman, rather than an adult in a position of authority's response to a child, so it's difficult to see what you were objecting to when you summoned the specter of feminism in your initial post. Whatever you may have had in mind, you entered the thread attacking a strawman by way of a vaguely hostile, and seemingly uninformed, reference to feminism, so it's not surprising that you encountered hostility.

[Chris Porter]

Bullies, the lot of us.


Bully-verb: use superior strength or influence to intimidate (someone), typically to force him or her to do what one wants


Yes we are. I would be wrong to say I'm not a bully, it's pretty obvious in my dissing of Sovereign and ChuckF. There, I used verbal bullying to tell them I think they are so wrong they need to clean up their acts. I did so because I make the assumption I'm standing in a powerful place, one that is part of my moral center, and thus justifying my bullying by that moral code.*

In this same way, mickthinks is also a bully. Whether he perceives it as bullying or not, it works for him because he also thinks of himself as occupying a position of power, moral superior power, that is. And so his attempts to get us to do what he wants derives from the same place I get my reason to bully, that we think we are right, and right is might.

* and you can diss and bully me right back, but if I think I'm supporting my moral code, you ain't getting nowhere.

[Dingfod]

So which is better, confrontation or retreating using the Ignore feature?

[Chris Porter]

Surely that would depend on what you value most, your time, or the society you are in, perhaps.

[mickthinks]

The salient point is that no one but you framed the issue as one of a man's response to a woman, rather than an adult in a position of authority's response to a child,
I think the journalists framed it like that.

... so it's difficult to see what you were objecting to when you summoned the specter of feminism in your initial post.
I was objecting to spin and prejudice, and the leading players here decided to deny my objection a fair hearing.

... you entered the thread attacking a strawman by way of a vaguely hostile, and seemingly uninformed, reference to feminism...
There was no hostility to feminism, Adam. Do you reckon vm thought that there was?

Mick

[Dingfod]

Surely that would depend on what you value most, your time, or the society you are in, perhaps.I can see where there would be overlap in those values.

[mickthinks]

Thanks Chris

Bully verb: use superior strength or influence to intimidate (someone), typically to force him or her to do what one wants

... we think we are right, and right is might.

You make some very important points, but I disagree with you in several minor respects; yes I think right is on my side, but I don't claim to be morally superior to anyone and I accept I may be wrong. Also, moral strength does not provide any coercive power, and therefore cannot make you a bully. The power of the cyber-bully can only be either administrative power (to edit, delete, and bar access) or social power (which usually looks like charisma and popularity).

Surely that would depend on what you value most, your time, or the society you are in, perhaps.
Thank-you for being the first here to recognise that my motive might be pro- rather than anti-community. I am very grateful.

Mick

[seebs]

All you need is the power to have an effect. If you can follow someone around posting, you can bully them -- if only into putting you on ignore.

Anyway, you've got an open offer of a real discussion on that "don't be silly" comment if you want it. I posted the offer, I posted the terms, next step is up to you. I would point out, though, that if you DON'T take me up on that offer, you're going to be nailing the lid on the coffin of the chance of anyone ever taking your complaints seriously again. If the moment you get offered real progress towards a resolution, you suddenly lose interest, that will cause people to reasonably infer that you are more interested in having a problem than in solving it.

[mickthinks]

All you need is the power to have an effect. If you can follow someone around posting, you can bully them -- if only into putting you on ignore.
Unless it is coercive power it isn't bullying power, it is merely the power to be annoying. Anyone who has been the victim of serious bullying knows that the option to ignore isn't an answer, usually because it isn't even available.

seebs, I'm getting the distinct impression that you don't care as much as I do about the subtle shades of meaning in the words people use. That's okay, I suppose, but it probably means that we can't communicate successfully at all.

Shall we give up?
:sadcheer:

[Adam]

I think the journalists framed it like that.

What part of the article led you to believe that? Did you notice that no one here but you understood the author of the linked article to be framing the issue in those terms? While you may believe the journalist framed the issue as one of a man making a "frail woman" cry, that interpretation appears to be idiosyncratic.

I just reread the article in question (http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Bushs_sarcastic_response_sends_girl_into_0711.html), by the way, to see if I could find any indication that the journalist thought this was a gender issue. The questioner is identified seven times in the story, four times by name, once as "a 13-year-old girl ", once as "The 13-year-old", and once as "the young girl." If you count the headline, there is an eighth identification, as simply a "girl". Of the four instances in question, she is once identified by a noun solely referencing her youth, and three times by a noun referencing both her youth and her sex. In two of the latter cases, the noun "girl" is modified by an adjective that stresses her youth. At one point, it is specifically noted that she attended with her parents and younger sister, further emphasizing her youth. Note that while you referred to her as a "frail woman", the author never uses the term "woman" with respect to her. When he uses a gendered noun to identify her, it is always "girl".

Bush is identified either by name or as "the president", and there is never any emphasis of his sex or his age. If not for the near unavoidable use of male pronouns, a reader unfamiliar with him would not even know that he is a man.

While I can accept that you interpreted the article the way that you claim to have done, I'm having quite a bit of difficulty figuring out why you would do so. Help me out here, mick? Seebs, is this possibly another case where I'm unconsciously filtering for context, etc.?

I was objecting to spin and prejudice, and the leading players here decided to deny my objection a fair hearing.

No one denied whatever point you had about prejudice or spin a fair hearing. Numerous people disagreed with your premises, but you wouldn't hear it. Let me see if I have your argument, as it relates to feminism, down:

P1 A newspaper reported a story about the president, framed as a man making a woman cry.

P2 Feminism has taught us that women are not frail creatures who need to be protected by men.

P2.1 We should not reflexively blame men when their utterances lead to a woman crying.

C1 (from P1 and P2.1) Therefore, the president was not necessarily to blame for the woman's tears.

P3 The newspaper implied that the president was responsible for the woman's tears.

C2 (from C1 and P3) Therefore, the journalist who wrote the article had some ulterior motive for assigning blame to the president. Hence, prejudice and/or spin.

No one here but you agrees with P1, so the rest of the argument falls apart. The rest of us read an article about an adult in a position of authority carelessly, if unintentionally, humiliating a child in public. Since no one else read the gendered story that you appear to have read, your introduction of feminism to the thread appeared to reflect a misunderstanding of feminism, so the early responses to you focused on drawing out what you think "feminism" means.

You responded, in part, by claiming that 13 years old girls are not easily distinguishable from adult women, and implying that manipulation-by-tears in an effort to "turn the crowd" might have been at play, neither of which endeared you to anyone.

There was no hostility to feminism, Adam. Do you reckon vm thought that there was?

I can't speak for vm but, between the apparently non sequitor introduction of feminism in your opening post, the oddly turned phrase "educated us out of", the frankly creepy claim that 13 year old girls and adult women are not always distinguishable, and the insinuation about women using tears as a manipulative device is a common problem, I certainly read some hostility to feminism on your part in that thread.

[seebs]

Unless it is coercive power it isn't bullying power,

Untrue.

it is merely the power to be annoying. Anyone who has been the victim of serious bullying knows that the option to ignore isn't an answer, usually because it isn't even available.

Again, untrue. In a great deal of bullying, the option to ignore would be a perfectly good answer if it were available -- and sometimes it is.

Bullying, in many cases, relies not on the victim's categorical inabilities, but on the victim's personality or vulnerabilities.

seebs, I'm getting the distinct impression that you don't care as much as I do about the subtle shades of meaning in the words people use.

I think that's extremely unlikely. I'm a professional writer. I study the use of shades of meaning actively. Now, it's possible that you "care more about them" in some way other than studying them or understanding them -- in which case, I'd suggest that you'd do better to study them than to care about them in the abstract.

That's okay, I suppose, but it probably means that we can't communicate successfully at all.

Shall we give up?

You can give up if you want to. The only barrier I see to successful communication is that you assign shades of meaning to things other people write in ways inconsistent with what they write. You seem to act as though a word's connotations are consistent, fixed, and invariant across context and speakers -- this is not reasonable.

But I will point out, again: I consistently correctly interpret what people have said, such that they agree that I understood them correctly and correctly paraphrased their points. You consistently get told that you are misinterpreting things.

So:

* I have made a living writing and editing.
* My writing gets positive reviews both as to clarity and as to voice and style.
* People consistently report that I am correctly interpreting their writing.
* People consistently report that I have identified components of communications which they had missed, but which make sense of apparent contradictions.
* You have had consistent trouble with people disagreeing with you about what they meant by something they wrote.
* Many people in this and related threads have told you that you misinterpreted them, or commented on difficulty understanding you.

I think the most parsimonious explanation is that I'm better at discerning which shades of meaning to use than you are. Conveniently, I've offered a great deal of information to you on the topic. One of your options might be to put some time into reading that.

I don't know how old you are, what your education level is, how smart you are, how autistic or non-autistic you are, or any of that. I just have the available data that your communications skills are demonstrably failing you in ways that are not reasonably explained by an appeal to some kind of mob action. Of particular note, while people here generally despise Sovereign, no one seems to have trouble communicating with him or understanding his communications. If this behavior were some kind of mob tactic for enforcing separation, I'm sure he would have been the recipient of a great deal of it. It's more reasonable to assume that the problem is specific to communications with you.

And, as always, if one person is having a great deal of communications difficulty with many, the pragmatic reality is that the one person should learn the new set of communications skills.

[Naru]

the frankly creepy claim that 13 year old girls and adult women are not always distinguishable

micksovereign

[mickthinks]

Note that while you referred to her as a "frail woman", the author never uses the term "woman" with respect to her.
I didn't intend to say she was a woman and not a girl. It was her role in the story that I cast as the frail woman to make it generic, like all other images of vulnerable, defenceless, weak women being patronised and abused by powerful men.

No one denied whatever point you had about prejudice or spin a fair hearing.
The fair hearing began to be denied as denied a fair hearing when erimir posted this (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/showpost.php?p=395920&postcount=42). Two posts later vm posted his "Don't be silly" comment, and from there on in, he and most others else seemed more intent on attacking me for what they thought I was saying than trying to understand what I was actually saying. Three days later, the mob starts forming; first, Sock, then with the encouragement of vm's explicit approval, erimir returns with Chuck not far behind and the thread is about me, not the issue, and people like JoeP are ostentatiously putting the thread and me on <Ignore>. That's <Ignore> as in "no more hearing, fair or otherwise".

I certainly read some hostility to feminism on your part in that thread.
It was imagined, I assure you. Why did you not tackle me on it if this was a major concern?

Mick

[seebs]

I'll come back to that with more detail in a bit.

One key thing: The headline is obviously a primary focus, and that just says "girl". But then, "girl" implies youth.

I do think the story is different than it would have been if it had been a boy; our culture views girls as more needing of protection than boys, moreso than it does women as more needing of protection than men. However, I think the emphasis remains on the fact that she was a child, not that she was a female.

I don't see why mick would cast her as "the frail woman", because this had nothing to do with men and women, and everything to do with people in power and children. When politicians are kissing babies, we don't ask whether it's boy babies or girl babies, because it doesn't matter. What matters is being harsh or dismissive towards a child, when in a clear position of authority and respect. That is the point of the story.

[mickthinks]

I believe a word's connotations are more consistent and invariant across context and speakers than people sometimes make out. If they weren't, dictionaries would be useless. I know you write computing textbooks. Any other kinds?

You have had consistent trouble with people disagreeing with you about what they meant by something they wrote.
I have a lot of people disagreeing with me vehemently like vm did. I think their desire to head off my arguments may lead them to use "it's you're mental abnormalities that make you wrong and me right" as a pretext.

I don't know how old you are, what your education level is, how smart you are, how autistic or non-autistic you are, or any of that.
And that is my deliberate choice. I know how well-qualified I am to dispute your analyses and arguments, but you and everyone else here must judge me by what you read. My belief is that just maybe, some people are beginning to see for themselves that I know what I'm doing.

Mick

[seebs]

I believe a word's connotations are more consistent and invariant across context and speakers than people sometimes make out.

There is often some consistency, but it's not all that great. Learning to spot the exceptions -- especially the contextual ones -- changes things.

If they weren't, dictionaries would be useless.

No, they wouldn't.

But the belief that something that only does 90% of its job is "useless" would be another stereotypical autistic response. I tend to do that too.

I know you write computing textbooks. Any other kinds?

I've done sales pitches. There is probably no field more contingent on connotation and voice.

I have a lot of people disagreeing with me vehemently like vm did. I think their desire to head off my arguments may lead them to use "it's you're mental abnormalities that make you wrong and me right" as a pretext.

Obviously not. First off, no one here seems to be much into "heading off" arguments. Secondly, it's been two years, and most of these people completely ignored the possibility of mental abnormality until someone came in and offered it as a persuasive alternative to their previous belief. Thirdly, it's not a pretext for claiming someone is wrong. It's a post facto explanation. Clearly, they believed you were wrong all along; what they couldn't figure out is how you could possibly be wrong in such exotic ways.

I don't know how old you are, what your education level is, how smart you are, how autistic or non-autistic you are, or any of that.
And that is my deliberate choice. I know how well-qualified I am to dispute your analyses and arguments, but you and everyone else here must judge me by what you read. My belief is that just maybe, some people are beginning to see for themselves that I know what I'm doing.

That is an interesting belief. Do you have some kind of evidentiary basis for it? So far, all I've seen is people coming to believe with greater certainty that you are genuinely wrong -- the only big change I see is that they're starting to suspect that you actually believe the things you're wrong about, and aren't just lying to start trouble.

[The Lone Ranger]

I have a lot of people disagreeing with me vehemently like vm did. I think their desire to head off my arguments may lead them to use "it's you're mental abnormalities that make you wrong and me right" as a pretext.

That's a remarkably uncharitable interpretation.

[mickthinks]

It's untrusting, and in that sense it is uncharitable. Why do you call it remarkable though, Michael?

[Watser?]

It's your mental abnormalities that may account for being the creepy stalker alien robot asshole that you are.

Or maybe they don't and it's all just what you choose to be, if that's what you prefer.

[seebs]

I have a lot of people disagreeing with me vehemently like vm did. I think their desire to head off my arguments may lead them to use "it's you're mental abnormalities that make you wrong and me right" as a pretext.

That's a remarkably uncharitable interpretation.

It is. It's also an implausible one, which is perhaps more disconcerting.

The pattern seems to be that mick can't accept the notion that other people might not be persuaded by things which he found persuasive. Therefore, their failure to be persuaded must be ascribed to some other thing -- such as intent on their part to resist persuasion.

You can tell it's moderately dysfunctional just because it subverts even the most basic analysis of causality; he's describing things happening in 2009 as causing things which happened in 2007. That's fairly atypical for just-plain-autism, but not necessarily totally unheard of. Basically, he's got huge cognitive dissonance problems somewhere and you can tell because his described reality is full of cracks and patches. If we're sticking with a simple model, then presumably the underlying dissonance is just other people genuinely not believing what he does. However, most adult autistic people can handle that better. (Autistic kids often have a really rough time with it; one of the people at TR has a ten-year-old autistic kid who is really stuck on the idea of different people believing different and mutually-exclusive things.)

[seebs]

It's your mental abnormalities that may account for being the creepy stalker alien robot asshole that you are.

Well, yeah, duh.

I already pointed that out in the other thread.

[Watser?]

It's your mental abnormalities that may account for being the creepy stalker alien robot asshole that you are.

Well, yeah, duh.

I already pointed that out in the other thread.

Yeah, but it seems mick prefers to be thought of as a creepy stalker alien robot asshole rather than someone who just can't help communicating like he does.

[mickthinks]

So far, all I've seen is people coming to believe with greater certainty that you are genuinely wrong -- the only big change I see is that they're starting to suspect that you actually believe the things you're wrong about, and aren't just lying to start trouble.
Yes, I've seen them too. I think of them mostly as the usual suspects. LOL No, I've no firm evidence that anyone here is taking me seriously. It's a hunch and it may be hokum; we'll see.

[seebs]

It's untrusting, and in that sense it is uncharitable. Why do you call it remarkable though, Michael?

I would guess he does so because it is far beyond the normal scope of merely-uncharitable remarks. It's not just that it ascribes a dishonest motive to people; it's that it describes an exceptional amount of effort for people to go to in order to achieve a result of no particular value to them.

Believing that someone is only doing something for money might be uncharitable. Believing that they are only doing something because they think you might own a Yorkshire Terrier, and they like to find people who have Yorkshire Terriers and hide zucchini in their houses later is remarkably uncharitable.

[seebs]

So far, all I've seen is people coming to believe with greater certainty that you are genuinely wrong -- the only big change I see is that they're starting to suspect that you actually believe the things you're wrong about, and aren't just lying to start trouble.
Yes, I've seen them too. I think of them mostly as the usual suspects. LOL No, I've no firm evidence that anyone much here is taking me seriously. It's a hunch and it may be hokum; we'll see.

Can you describe anything other than someone you've categorized as "the usual suspects" becoming totally convinced of your claims that would lead you to consider that perhaps your evaluation is inaccurate?

It seems to me you've carefully constructed a set of ways of dismissing anything anyone says to you which makes it quite literally impossible for any set of events to convince you that you have made any kind of mistake in your analysis or evaluations. The "usual suspects" are categorically dismissed, and anyone who shows signs of arguing against your positions is declared a Usual Suspect.

This doesn't sound healthy.

[The Lone Ranger]

It's untrusting, and in that sense it is uncharitable. Why do you call it remarkable though, Michael?

Because it depends on the extraordinary assumption that "a lot of people" are more inclined to accuse you of mental abnormalities than engage in meaningful dialog. It also has the unstated assumption that you actually have convincing arguments that people are trying to quash, rather than giving them a fair hearing.

This has not been demonstrated in any way.

More to the point, even the most perfunctory familiarity with the forum will demonstrate that its denizens are, as a rule, more than willing to engage in serious debate -- even with people whose opinions they find despicable.


Surely, you aren't so arrogant as to think that your arguments are so devastating that people will try to squash them, rather than seriously engage them? There are several people here who practically live for the chance to engage in debate.

Again, there have been quite a few posters here who have made arguments that most people found odious. No one reacted to those posters by suggesting they might have ASD. In other words, even if you're making arguments, and even if most people disagree, that will not cause people to attempt to head your arguments off by accusations of "mental abnormalities."


On the other hand, showing a spectacularly-poor comprehension of normal human interactions will.



I would guess he does so because it is far beyond the normal scope of merely-uncharitable remarks. It's not just that it ascribes a dishonest motive to people; it's that it describes an exceptional amount of effort for people to go to in order to achieve a result of no particular value to them.

Believing that someone is only doing something for money might be uncharitable. Believing that they are only doing something because they think you might own a Yorkshire Terrier, and they like to find people who have Yorkshire Terriers and hide zucchini in their houses later is remarkably uncharitable.

Exactly so.

[seebs]

For that matter, again, I've been using the theory of "mickthinks is autistic" as a way to support his arguments -- showing that he's making claims which could be sincere, honest, and supported by data. Even though they look, when interpreted more normally, to be totally disingenuous.

[mickthinks]

it's that it describes an exceptional amount of effort for people to go to in order to achieve a result of no particular value to them.
Saving face by silencing one's critics can be valued quite highly by people with a lot of face to lose.

[The Lone Ranger]

It seems to me you've carefully constructed a set of ways of dismissing anything anyone says to you which makes it quite literally impossible for any set of events to convince you that you have made any kind of mistake in your analysis or evaluations. The "usual suspects" are categorically dismissed, and anyone who shows signs of arguing against your positions is declared a Usual Suspect.

This doesn't sound healthy.

Again, exactly so.

[seebs]

it's that it describes an exceptional amount of effort for people to go to in order to achieve a result of no particular value to them.
Saving face by silencing one's critics can be valued quite highly by people with a lot of face to lose.

Again, that could be true but:
1. It doesn't silence you.
2. Hell, it doesn't even slow you down.
3. No one appears to be in any danger at all of losing face.
4. Every newcomer who comes to this tries to engage you a bit, gets turned off by painfully obvious misinterpretations, and writes you off as a kook.

So there's no risk of losing face to begin with. Furthermore, the argument that you're autistic doesn't silence you -- or even lead towards silencing. Instead it gives people a way to read your posts which makes you look less like a lying idiot. Several of us are now finding actual substance to posts we previously thought were purely trolling.

So your argument comes down to the idea that we would carefully seek out a new paradigm for interpreting your posts allowing us to give credence to them and find substance worth considering and responding to, in order to silence you... Which is implausible. And furthermore, you're accusing someone with a clinical diagnosis of autism of being concerned about saving face, which is just dumb.

[The Lone Ranger]

Furthermore, the argument that you're autistic doesn't silence you -- or even lead towards silencing. Instead it gives people a way to read your posts which makes you look less like a lying idiot. Several of us are now finding actual substance to posts we previously thought were purely trolling.

This is indeed the case. If mickthinks is indeed autistic, his posting style makes a lot more sense, and I'm inclined to look upon him in a far more positive light. The alternative interpretations of his behavior are far less palatable.

[mickthinks]

Because it depends on the extraordinary assumption that "a lot of people" are more inclined to accuse you of mental abnormalities than engage in meaningful dialog.
I don't think that is an extraordinary assumption. I think vm has admitted to it, and I see no reason to assume he is on his own.

It also has the unstated assumption that you actually have convincing arguments that people are trying to quash, rather than giving them a fair hearing. This has not been demonstrated in any way.
I disagree on both counts; that I believe in the soundness of my arguments is unremarkable to the point of being completely expected, and I think I have demonstrated the soundness to all with ears to hear and wit enough to follow.

Surely, you aren't so arrogant as to think that your arguments are so devastating that people will try to squash them, rather than seriously engage them?
I wouldn't call them devastating, but I do think that there are a couple of people here who would go to great lengths not to be seen climbing down from position they regret taking up. I don't think it is arrogant to believe in yourself.

[The Lone Ranger]

I disagree on both counts; that I believe in the soundness of my arguments is unremarkable to the point of being completely expected, and I think I have demonstrated the soundness to all with ears to hear and wit enough to follow.

Riiiiight.


Am I assume that this is not meant to be arrogant and insulting? Because I assure you that it most-definitely is.

[erimir]

I think I have demonstrated the soundness to all with ears to hear and wit enough to follow.How?

When I ask you to even back up one single, simple claim, you focus instead on how I asked it rather than making the slightest attempt to justify your claim.

[mickthinks]

No one appears to be in any danger at all of losing face.
Maybe.

Every newcomer who comes to this tries to engage you a bit, gets turned off by painfully obvious misinterpretations, and writes you off as a kook.
LOL That's "every" in the sense of "by no means all"? I'll work with the few that aren't misled by the group-think.

And furthermore, you're accusing someone with a clinical diagnosis of autism of being concerned about saving face, which is just dumb.
No, I'm not, seebs. How did you get to that conclusion?

Mick

[mickthinks]

Am I assume that this is not meant to be arrogant and insulting? Because I assure you that it most-definitely is.
Yes, it is not meant to be arrogant or insulting, Michael. How come you are insulted by it?

[The Lone Ranger]

I didn't say that I felt insulted; I said that it was an arrogant and insulting claim. And it most-definitely is. If you truly can't understand that, then I see no point in continuing.

[seebs]

Because it depends on the extraordinary assumption that "a lot of people" are more inclined to accuse you of mental abnormalities than engage in meaningful dialog.
I don't think that is an extraordinary assumption. I think vm has admitted to it, and I see no reason to assume he is on his own.

Even if we granted that there existed such people (and I don't, for various reasons), there's nothing to suggest that I'm one of them. I'm actively pursuing the question of detangling your arguments.

It also has the unstated assumption that you actually have convincing arguments that people are trying to quash, rather than giving them a fair hearing. This has not been demonstrated in any way.
I disagree on both counts; that I believe in the soundness of my arguments is unremarkable to the point of being completely expected, and I think I have demonstrated the soundness to all with ears to hear and wit enough to follow.

Again, this appears to be nothing more than a perfectly-circular defense mechanism. I'm outlandishly smart in every way we have tests to measure, and I have no objection to the notion that you might have good arguments. I just don't see you advancing any.

Surely, you aren't so arrogant as to think that your arguments are so devastating that people will try to squash them, rather than seriously engage them?
I wouldn't call them devastating, but I do think that there are a couple of people here who would go to great lengths not to be seen climbing down from position they regret taking up. I don't think it is arrogant to believe in yourself.

I can't think of anyone here that I haven't seen back down from positions that they've been persuaded away from. Except you, Michali, and Sovereign. I've seen everyone else concede points willingly and easily.

Furthermore, I haven't taken any position in the underlying issues.

Keep in mind, I'm the primary advocate for the position that you're autistic -- and I don't care about the underlying issue, because it's boring to me. I'm just interested in this because I am fascinated by the ways in which my brain fails to perform according to nominal spec. Since I have learned a lot of coping skills, one of the most useful ways for me to explore this is to study how other people think.

You're very interesting to me precisely because I can make some sense of your posts when other people visibly can't. But that's not at all consistent with your theory.

I think it is not generically arrogant to believe in yourself. It is arrogant to do so contrary to all available evidence. It is dysfunctional to do so when you have to create whole categories of disqualified observers and rely only on your own observations, never anyone else's... Unless, of course, you're autistic. In which case it's normal... In context.

[seebs]

Every newcomer who comes to this tries to engage you a bit, gets turned off by painfully obvious misinterpretations, and writes you off as a kook.
LOL That's "every" in the sense of "by no means all"? I'll work with the few that aren't mislead by the group-think.

Again, no case for groupthink here. Remember, I have paperwork showing that I don't do groupthink. So you have to come up with some other explanation...

And again, groupthink doesn't usually work that way -- least of all across a large group of people many of whom personally dislike each other. If people all had the same arguments for why they dislike you, you could make a case for groupthink. If different people dislike you for different reasons, you're probably just a jerk.

And furthermore, you're accusing someone with a clinical diagnosis of autism of being concerned about saving face, which is just dumb.
No, I'm not, seebs. How did you get to that conclusion?

I am the advocate of the "mickthinks is autistic" position. Your stated argument is that the theory that you are autistic exists to allow people to "silence you" to save face. For that to be true, it has to be true that I'm trying to promote the view that you're autistic in order to silence you in order to save face. And yet, I have a clinical diagnosis of autism, and no real history of trying to save face.

[mickthinks]

I didn't say that I felt insulted;
No you didn't say it. I assumed you were, but if you aren't I am glad to hear it.

I said that it was an arrogant and insulting claim. And it most-definitely is.
Okay, if you are taking offence in theory, and you are unwilling to explain why, Michael, I think it best we end it here.

Blessings - Mick

[seebs]

Yes, it is not meant to be arrogant or insulting, Michael. How come you are insulted by it?

He's probably not.

But it's certainly an arrogant and insulting claim. Any claim of the form "anyone who disagrees with me is insufficiently intelligent or unwilling to accept the truth" is arrogant and insulting. Especially when, as in this case, the "arguments" you've provided have been little beyond bald assertions.

Interestingly, there's a known pattern where some people present their conclusions and assume that the arguments are patently obvious, or skim through arguments that are crystal clear to them, expecting other people to follow along without effort. It has to do with difficulty correctly modeling other peoples' cognition. It's called autism.

[seebs]

Okay, if you are taking offence in theory, and you are unwilling to explain why, Michael, I think it best we end it here.

You act as though it is a problem that he doesn't explain his positions.

And yet, you rarely explain yours; I've yet to see you write more than a couple of short sentences on any given topic. I've certainly never seen a real analysis of your interpretation of a post; you sometimes get as far as claiming that a particular word means something, but you never seem to really provide any explanation.

Hmm. You know, it's odd, but you act just like someone who expects his views and positions to be self-evident to others.

You seem to think it suboptimal for other people to think you autistic. Might I recommend that you consider acting in ways that aren't completely stereotypically autistic?

[mickthinks]

I'm outlandishly smart in every way we have tests to measure, and I have no objection to the notion that you might have good arguments. I just don't see you advancing any.
Okay.

I've seen everyone else concede points willingly and easily.
Okay.

I think it is not generically arrogant to believe in yourself.
Cool.

It is arrogant to do so contrary to all available evidence.
Not just arrogant. I'd call that dishonest and stupid.

It is dysfunctional to do so when you have to create whole categories of disqualified observers and rely only on your own observations, never anyone else's...
Agreed.

[seebs]

The problem, mick, is that you have no evidence to suggest that you have presented arguments in a way persuasive to anyone but yourself. Your use of the "usual suspects" category to dismiss people is precisely the sort of aggressive filtering which leads people to think that you're being dishonest; you're preemptively ruling out the possibility of receiving evidence that you've made a mistake. That ain't healthy.

[mickthinks]

I have paperwork showing that I don't do groupthink. So you have to come up with some other explanation...
You aren't the only one under consideration here, seebs.

Your stated argument is that the theory that you are autistic exists to allow people to "silence you" to save face.
No, my argument is that your theory could be supported by people who are anxious to to 'silence' me and save face.

Mick

[Adam]

It was her role in the story that I cast as the frail woman to make it generic, like all other images of vulnerable, defenceless, weak women being patronised and abused by powerful men.

Well, yes, precisely. It was her role, cast by you, in a story, written by you. You took the specific situation presented in the article and generalized it based on certain details to fit a larger archetype, and then presented an argument based on that archetype, heedless of the fact that the details you chose to base your generalization on were not the details that anyone else recognized as being most salient, even after that was pointed out (by Sock Puppet and livius, among others). You could argue that the details you focused on were, in some sense, the truly salient ones, and the rest of us were focused on trivialities, but that doesn't support your claims about spin. The journalist in question is a pretty poor spin doctor if he spins his writing in such a way that no one but you picks up on it.

Again, what in that article made you think that it was framed as a gender issue?

The fair hearing began to be denied...

No, you were given a fair hearing. Your premises (should I assume from your failure to dispute my analysis that I have at least the rough outline of your argument correct, btw?) were heard and disputed (again, see Sock and liv's posts).The fact that the thread later degenerated does not mean that you were not initially heard fairly.

I'm not particularly interested in dissecting who said what to whom when, so I'm not addressing the rest of your post except to note, again, that no one but you thought that "Don't be silly" was "a rather aggressive put-down" or, really, any kind of put down at all.

[mickthinks]

Any claim of the form "anyone who disagrees with me is insufficiently intelligent or unwilling to accept the truth" is arrogant and insulting.
Okay, but you do realise that isn't my claim?

[Adam]

I don't think it is arrogant to believe in yourself.

Er...unless you're believing in your capacity to make others laugh, apparently?

[seebs]

I have paperwork showing that I don't do groupthink. So you have to come up with some other explanation...
You aren't the only one under consideration here, seebs.

But I'm the counterexample which disproves the theory.

Your stated argument is that the theory that you are autistic exists to allow people to "silence you" to save face.
No, my argument is that your theory could be supported by people who are anxious to to 'silence' me and save face.


So fucking what? My theory stands or falls on its merits, not based on who supports it.

[seebs]

Any claim of the form "anyone who disagrees with me is insufficiently intelligent or unwilling to accept the truth" is arrogant and insulting.
Okay, but you do realise that isn't my claim?

Okay, let's try this again.

Your claim:

I think I have demonstrated the soundness to all with ears to hear and wit enough to follow.

Again, the "I think" is taken-as-read; it has no semantic content. Your underlying claim is:

I have demonstrated the soundness to all with ears to hear and wit enough to follow.

From this, we can conclude only that people to whom the soundness has not been demonstrated lacks either "ears to hear" or "wit enough to follow". In short, anyone who disagrees with you as to whether or not you have demonstrated soundness must lack one of these traits. Which is to say, they're not smart enough or they're willfully resisting your truth...

But that's insulting and arrogant, especially when people who are almost certainly smarter than you (statistics FTW; there are too many smart people here for you to be the smartest) have repeatedly said that they would be interested in seeing your arguments.

There is no way to interpret this one that doesn't make it insulting and arrogant.

Unless, of course, you simply lack the capacity to comprehend that you've never done jack shit to support your points...

[mickthinks]

Okay, if you are taking offence in theory, and you are unwilling to explain why, Michael, I think it best we end it here.
You act as though it is a problem that he doesn't explain his positions.
It is a problem that he doesn't explain that particular one.

I've yet to see you write more than a couple of short sentences on any given topic.
Then I have to assume you haven't been paying attention, seebs. It is true I prefer to be brief if I can—I think that's a virtue in a forum like this. And I would reject the implication I see here; I think a couple of short sentences can be an explanation of a position.

Be that as it may, I have written at greater length, but I guess you've always missed it. Here's an example:
Thanks viscousmemories!

I said that the President being unabashedly rude to a young girl is evidence of his moral repugnance. It may not be very strong evidence, but like I also said I didn't really need any more evidence for that conclusion - I drew it years ago.
In other words, your previous observations have led you to a final judgement that you now apply to all reports of Bush's actions, and you aren't that concerned about the quality of the evidence. That amounts to prejudice, in my view, which is precisely what I am on about.

Prejudice leads us to lower our standards of truth and honesty, of justice and mercy, and of liberty and honour. Of course, we can justify these lowered standards on the grounds that it is only those who are 'on our side' who are excused from the full requirements of truthfulness etc. and we have nothing to fear from our own people.

But if all parties make the same excuse for their own people (and, naturally, they usually do) then truth is sacrificed at the first hint of social conflict. We start to demand that our journalists match the dishonesty of their journalists and, before you know it, the entire press corp is lying to us with every word they write and every frame they shoot. (But it is OK, because we're not fooled by the lies of the opposition, and we actually like being told the lies of our own side!)

But the problem is this; the media provide the only window through which the voters can observe their leaders in action. So if the window is full of distortions, then our politicians are obliged to present themselves in a distorted way. And when the newscorps have all been bought up by the barons, this means selling out to some vested interest in exchange for the necessary protection of some friendly coverage. It becomes a requirement for anyone who seeks political office to cultivate a conspiracy to manipulate the truth.

In this way, the corruption of our democratic system is a direct consequence of the corrupt influence of our media. I think the corrupt media is a direct consequence of insufficently high standards of honesty and integrity imposed by us citizens, because we lowered our standards for reasons like those you have presented here.

"We don't need to be as upright as they do" is the new mantra, and in my view, just like it's twin "The end justifies the means", it is a false and dangerous one.

Thanks for giving me the chance to talk this through! :)

Mick
the President being unabashedly rude to a young girl is evidence... ... except there is no evidence in the reports I've read that the President was unabahedly rude to the girl. I concede that it takes an open mind to see this, and that many Americans' minds have long been understandably closed on this issue.
Mick

[seebs]

Thanks, that's a very good example. If more of your posts were like that, you probably wouldn't need to make nearly so many.

That said, I don't think your arguments there are sound. However, I do concede that you've offered something more like evidence.

By the way: The rudeness to the girl is patently obvious. Unless, say, you show the scenario to someone who's autistic, who will then have trouble perceiving some kinds of rudeness...

[mickthinks]

So fucking what?
Now now, seebs!

My theory stands or falls on its merits, not based on who supports it.
Yes, provided others' support for it is not included in its merits.

[mickthinks]

:dddp:

[mickthinks]

Again, the "I think" is taken-as-read; it has no semantic content.
Arrogance isn't a matter of the semantic content.

... anyone who disagrees with you as to whether or not you have demonstrated soundness must lack one of these traits.
No, but anyone with those traits has some work to do to persuade me that I haven't demonstrated the soundness.

There is no way to interpret this one that doesn't make it insulting and arrogant.
Hmmm. It would have appeared less arrogant if you had said that you think there is no way to interpret this one that doesn't make it insulting and arrogant.

Mick

[mickthinks]

However, I do concede that you've offered something more like evidence.
Thanks. Can I put it to you that many of your negative opinions of me have a similarly mythical basis?

The rudeness to the girl is patently obvious.
I think that is the case only if you make the assumptions that Bush was sarcastic and the girl was his target. Neither assumption is justified, I reckon.

Mick

[seebs]

However, I do concede that you've offered something more like evidence.
Thanks. Can I put it to you that many of your negative opinions of me have a similarly mythical basis?

Sure, but you'd have to provide evidence. I've still never seen a decent argument -- all I'm conceding is that there exists one post from you containing an argument.

The rudeness to the girl is patently obvious.
I think that is the case only if you make the assumptions that Bush was sarcastic and the girl was his target. Neither assumption is justified, I reckon.

Neither is an assumption -- both are derived using provided evidence and argumentation.

Sarcasm is very easy for non-autistic people to detect in voice -- and this was a voice exchange. The protocol that a response to a question is directed to the person who asked it is pretty much safe, especially given his followup behavior.

Again, you're treating things as "assumptions" and uncertain conclusions which are absolutely clear to ordinary people.

In the end, it comes down to this: No one has any reason to prove to you that your arguments were sound, because you've offered specific arguments showing that you would disregard such argumentation by categorizing them as "usual suspects" or otherwise dismissing them. You haven't offered anyone else a reason to believe that your arguments have hidden soundness, and it's firmly established that any soundness they have is too subtle for the room. Given the breadth of the set of people who have concluded that your arguments are nonsense, it seems reasonable for people to assume there's no soundness there.

I guess I just don't see any further point. You've asked questions and apparently ignored the answers on many occasions. I guess I've lost interest. I've seen enough of your claims and posts to be convinced that you're autistic and that you're not interested in learning how to process language more effectively. Given that, it's just too much work to communicate -- I can switch to that mode, but it's not very useful, and it's incredibly inefficient for communications. Worse, even granting compatible communications styles, you are consistently uncharitable in communications, you make bad assumptions, and it just isn't worth the time.

[mickthinks]

Sarcasm is very easy for non-autistic people to detect in voice -- and this was a voice exchange.
Ah, you have heard an audio clip! I haven't and I didn't know there was one. Do you have a link?

[erimir]

:golfclap:

I knew you could do it mick! There's nobody you can't eventually get to realize that dialog with you will go nowhere.

[mickthinks]

I could have told seebs his uncharitable idea that I don't understand my native tongue was going nowhere. What I want to know is whether he has heard a recording of Bush's voice saying "yeah thanks". He kind of implied he had.

Mick

[Petra]

It's on YouTube, Mick. Not so hard to find.

That said, it wasn't that bad, considering all the things that Bush did to get the 21st Century off to a fucked up start. After he said "yeah, thanks", he went on to be quite reassuring to the girl that she had asked a very good question. Of all the things that Bush could be called an arsehole for, this is among the weakest.

It's all a big ol' yawn, really.

[mickthinks]

It's on YouTube, Mick. Not so hard to find.
I didn't know that, and I've just looked and not found it. Any chance of a link, Petra?

[mickthinks]

It was her role, cast by you, in a story, written by you.

I didn't write the story as aggressive male and vulnerable female, Adam.

The fact that the thread later degenerated does not mean that you were not initially heard fairly.
I think the hearing was disrupted and abandoned before it reached its conclusion.

... note, again, that no one but you thought that "Don't be silly" was "a rather aggressive put-down" or, really, any kind of put down at all.
No one but me has expressed that opinion, I agree. To do so would be to take my side against one the admins here on a critical issue, and I don't expect anyone to do that. I still stand by that opinion though.

Try this: "I disagree" is not any kind of put down. I reckon any phrase which is equally free of disdain has to pass the test of being switched with "I disagree" in a conversation with the people to whom you show most respect.
Let's imagine you disagree with an idea your manager's manager has just put forward. Would "I disagree" and "Don't be silly" really appear to you to be equally good ways to get your point across?

Mick

[mickthinks]

Finally found the youtube clip here.
YouTube - Bush Makes Girl Cry?

seebs, I agree that sarcasm is very easy for non-autistic people to detect in voice. I'm just not hearing any directed at the questioner in that clip, and I think you'd have to be very uncharitable toward the guy with the microphone to insist that it was his fault that she burst into tears.

Petra says it wasn't that bad, just a big ol' yawn really, but I think that misses the point. Though it fits the fact as Watser?'s original story gave them, it bears no resemblance to the impression that the story seemed to make on vm, livius and many others here.

No actual lies, but very clever, very effective and, I think, dishonest and despicable spin.

Mick

[wildernesse]

... note, again, that no one but you thought that "Don't be silly" was "a rather aggressive put-down" or, really, any kind of put down at all.
No one but me has expressed that opinion, I agree. To do so would be to take my side against one the admins here on a critical issue, and I don't expect anyone to do that. I still stand by that opinion though.

Lord. Number one, to frame any of this as a critical issue is taking yourself too seriously and blowing one interaction all out of proportion. Two, vm and liv have set up an entire message board where being admin means mostly that you have to deal with us all boohooing about missing quote generators and bugs, instead of arbitrating the substance and quality of posts and posters. If you HAD a side worth taking, then people would probably take it. You seem to think that the main reason we wouldn't agree with you is so we won't face the wrath of vm or the mob. Ha, a million times. Most people on here have argued with vm--here and in half a dozen other places online over the years. For a great number of us, the idea that we wouldn't agree with you only so we can stay on vm's good side is, dare I say it, silly.

Try this: "I disagree" is not any kind of put down. I reckon any phrase which is equally free of disdain has to pass the test of being switched with "I disagree" in a conversation with the people to whom you show most respect.
Let's imagine you disagree with an idea your manager's manager has just put forward. Would "I disagree" and "Don't be silly" really appear to you to be equally good ways to get your point across?

Mick

In any event, that phrase can be dripping with disdain or pretty airy, depending on the tone of voice--which of course we can't see here, but why automatically think the worst? I'm pretty sure that I could say "I disagree." in a way that implies that you are a little scumbucket with no thoughts in your head and I am a brilliant person. You're a member of a message board that is filled with irreverent people, why would you expect to be treated with the same respect as someone's boss's boss?

[mickthinks]

Number one, to frame any of this as a critical issue is taking yourself too seriously and blowing one interaction all out of proportion.
I'm not the one blowing me out of all proportion at :ff:, wildy. But I accept that the issues here are more important to me than they may be to you and others.

If you HAD a side worth taking, then people would probably take it.
I think my side is the right one, but whether it's worth being on the right side is a different question.

You seem to think that the main reason we wouldn't agree with you is so we won't face the wrath of vm or the mob.
Nope, didn't say anything about wrath, but I do think people unconsciously avoid exposing themselves to the risk of ridicule, and courting vm's and liv's favour is a way to do that.

You're a member of a message board that is filled with irreverent people, why would you expect to be treated with the same respect as someone's boss's boss?
I don't. All I ask that people recognise the difference.

Mick

[Adam]

I didn't write the story as aggressive male and vulnerable female, Adam.

Well, yes, you clearly did. You yourself admitted that you chose the term "frail woman" to describe the situation in order to "make it generic, like all other images" of aggressive men and vulnerable women. That's not something that's inherent to the text, that's something you brought to it when you interpreted it. Likewise, as I've already pointed out that when I and, all evidence indicates, others who commented in that thread "ma[d]e it generic", we used different archetypes, primarily careless adults and vulnerable children, although callous authority figures also appear to have figured into some of the interpretations I saw on that thread. We all cast the characters in different roles in our own stories as a matter of course when we interpeted the text. It's a normal part of interpreting a story, but it's not obvious that it's happening until two or more people with drastically different interpretations begin discussing it.

Is there anything in the above paragraph that you disagree with? Are we at least agreed that you interpreted the way the story was framed differently that other commenters in the original thread?

I'm going to ask this for a third time: what about the story made you think that "aggressive male and vulnerable female" was the most appropriate framing for it? I'm genuinely curious, because I've reread it a dozen times, and the only gendered signifier I see in there is the word "girl" which, in context, pushes my "youth" button far more readily than my "female" button, particularly as it's more often than not modified by an adjective that stresses her youth. Obviously, you're reading it differently, and I'd like some idea of how you're reading it.

Try this: "I disagree" is not any kind of put down. I reckon any phrase which is equally free of disdain has to pass the test of being switched with "I disagree" in a conversation with the people to whom you show most respect.
Let's imagine you disagree with an idea your manager's manager has just put forward. Would "I disagree" and "Don't be silly" really appear to you to be equally good ways to get your point across?

There is a broad middle ground between "put down" and "appropriate language for a business setting", as is there between "some yahoo on the internet" and "the people to whom you show the most respect". We have different words and phrases because they have different connotations. Expecting one phrase to be universally substitutable for another irrelevant of context is silly. Note that I'm using the word "silly" here to (accurately, IMO) describe a behavior. If I were putting you down, I have a wide selection of stronger and less accurate adjectives I could have chosen.

As it so happens, I'm on pretty friendly terms with my boss's boss, so I'd probably say something like "Are you on crack?", especially if the context was one in which she was wildly misconstruing apparently plain facts.

[Adam]

I think that is the case only if you make the assumptions that Bush was sarcastic and the girl was his target. Neither assumption is justified, I reckon.

Why are those assumptions required for him to be rude? It seems that he made a joke that he thought the adults in the room would find amusing without taking into consideration its likely effect on the child who had asked the question. He was pretty clearly being sarcastic, but I don't believe that his response was targeted at the girl. Even so, adults are normally expected to avoid gratuitously doing things that can reasonably expected to make children cry, even if the child is not the "target" of their actions.

[mickthinks]

I didn't write the story as aggressive male and vulnerable female
Well, yes, you clearly did.

No, that's how I described the way it was written. I think you need to show that this description is at odds with the story as written in order to make me an author rather than a describer.

The story concerns the interaction between a male and a female. I've not invented that, and there's no way to dispute it I think. All I have done is add a few more details that are also clearly present in the story as it came to us, such as the male being powerful and attacking, and the female being vulnerable and upset.

Try this: "I disagree" is not any kind of put down. I reckon any phrase which is equally free of disdain has to pass the test of being switched with "I disagree" in a conversation with the people to whom you show most respect.
Let's imagine you disagree with an idea your manager's manager has just put forward. Would "I disagree" and "Don't be silly" really appear to you to be equally good ways to get your point across?

I'm afraid I don't understand what it is you are saying in the second part of your post. Your point about the licence for flippancy you enjoy in your relationship to your boss's boss does defeat my scenario, and goes to show how difficult it is to discuss politeness/rudeness issues in abstract. In other circles I might use a bishop as the respect figure in the test, but I'm pretty sure that'd be no use at all here. Would your mother-in-law work as a better example of someone you would treat with the highest degree of politeness?

[mickthinks]

Even so, adults are normally expected to avoid gratuitously doing things that can reasonably expected to make children cry, even if the child is not the "target" of their actions.
I disagree, but in any case, "doing something that might make a child cry" and "being rude to a child" are quite a way apart, I think.

[erimir]

Nope, didn't say anything about wrath, but I do think people unconsciously avoid exposing themselves to the risk of ridicule, and courting vm's and liv's favour is a way to do that.I see no reason to believe this, at all.

If you want to avoid ridicule at FF, it's not vm and liv's favor that you have to worry about.

You might have a point if you were saying that gaining, say, Chuck's favor is a way to avoid ridicule. I'd be much more worried about becoming his target of choice than vm or liv's.

But even then, plenty of the people here who disagree with you have disagreed with Chuck in the past.

[seebs]

FEAR THE POOP-TALKING SLATTERN!

I mean, come on. That's... That's just DUMB.

Mick... Don't be silly.

Really.

(p.s.: I would find it absolutely hilarious if Chuck mocked me. In general, people mocking me make me laugh. If the mockery is accurate, it's funny because it's true; if it's inaccurate, it's funny because it's not. I'm easy.)

[Adam]

I think you need to show that this description is at odds with the story as written in order to make me an author rather than a describer.

Author, describer, the author of a description, whatever term you want to use, my point is that your interpretation (just like mine) is, in fact, an interpretation, not an inherent part of the text. My position is not that your interpretation is at odds with the story, necessarily, so much that it is not the interpretation arrived at by most people. I think this should be fairly uncontroversial, given that no one here but you appears to have arrived at that interpretation. Do you dispute that your framing of the issue in terms of sex is idiosyncratic, at least among people who have offered an opinion here?

I'm not interested in demonstrating, or even convinced that it's possible, or even meaningful, to demonstrate, that your framing is incorrect. I'm trying to demonstrate that your framing, which is also one of the premises of your argument (my understanding of which is outlined in a previous post and, thus far, not disputed by you), is not one that's shared with the general population here.

The story concerns the interaction between a male and a female. I've not invented that, and there's no way to dispute it I think. All I have done is add a few more details that are also clearly present in the story as it came to us, such as the male being powerful and attacking, and the female being vulnerable and upset.

The story also concerns the interaction between an adult and a child. Why do you consider the sexes of the participants to be more significant than their ages?

I'm afraid I don't understand what it is you are saying in the second part of your post.

1) There is a broad middle ground between a put down and appropriate address in a formal setting. The fact that one might not find it appropriate to say X to their company's CEO does not imply that X is a put down.

2) There is a broad middle ground between the respect that is generally assumed due to a random yahoo on the internet (i.e. you or me) and that due to "the people to whom you show most respect". The fact that I might be shown less deference than, say, the Queen of England (rest assured, no one would have a conniption about breach of protocol if Michelle Obama were to touch my arm) does not imply that I am not being shown the respect I am due.

You ignore both of these middle grounds when you argue that, since vm might not say "Don't be silly" in a meeting with an authority figure, it is insulting for him to say it to you.

The reason I pointed out that I am, indeed, comfortable using informal language with my boss's boss was to provide an example of the fact that, for many of us, there are very few contexts in which we feel it necessary to observe strict rules of formality. Posting on an internet forum is certainly not one of them. Perhaps there are a wider range of contexts in which you feel that strict formality is required.

[Adam]

I disagree, but in any case, "doing something that might make a child cry" and "being rude to a child" are quite a way apart, I think.

Fine, you disagree. You apparently have a different understanding of social expectations than I do, or perhaps you inhabit social circles that actually have different expectations.

Note also that your paraphrased "doing something that might make a child cry" is quite a different beast from my original "gratuitously doing things that can * [b]reasonably expected to make children cry"

* - The worst part about quoting myself is finding all my embarrassing mistakes...stupid missing verb.

[seebs]

It matters a bit that my boss's boss's boss is a prankster and very informal. My whole work environment is informal. We have an IRC bot which says something like "Baaaa means baaa!" whenever my boss logs in. (He runs a sheep farm in his spare time.)

[mickthinks]

Note also that your paraphrased "doing something that might make a child cry" is quite a different beast from my original "gratuitously doing things that can * [b]reasonably expected to make children cry"

And if you aren't nitpicking for the sake of argument, Adam, you'll explain the difference and why it's important in this context.
:chin:

[Petra]

And if you aren't nitpicking for the sake of argument, Adam...


Oh, ffs! :ironymeter:


Mick, just to sing a different song for a bit, are you able to get outside for a wee while and take some pics of whatever cool thing you notice for my FF Google Earth Photo Project thread? :meditate:

[Dragar]

This thread is hilarious.

livius, I love you!! Please don't hurt me!!

[Petra]

This thread is hilarious.

livius, I love you!! Please don't hurt me!!

Waddaya mean, "please don't hurt me!"?


...or am I thinking of someone else? :chin: :D

[nvexio]

:hb:

XING?
:elk:

[seebs]

This thread is hilarious.

livius, I love you!! Please don't hurt me!!

NOooo! Don't hurt me! Please! Spare me! It was some other guy that called you a poop-talking slattern! I only thanked the post because it was so funny, because it was so true.

[seebs]

What the FUCK?

That post has been there nearly an hour. No THANKS?

Folks, we got a MOB to run here. GROUPTHINK MORE!

[Qingdai]

OK!

I've always wanted to be a mob of one. It's right up there with an anti-protest demonstrator, or gang of loners.

[seebs]

OK!

I've always wanted to be a mob of one. It's right up there with an anti-protest demonstrator, or gang of loners.

Argh. Now I can't remember where I saw the phrase "gang of loners" originally.

[ChuckF]

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v317/ChuckF/tea_bag_02.jpg

[livius drusus]

:superliv:
...:eatshit:

[ChuckF]

Haha, my teabag is right above liv's head. Again.

[seebs]

... What bothers me is wondering how long you've had that smiley waiting around.

[Qingdai]

I originally saw, "gang of loners" in a talk a policeman was giving on gangs to other police departments, approximately 1990. We had some of their "informational" material. One described a "gang of loners," teenagers, who wear black, maybe with pentagrams, wrote in their journals a lot, didn't hang out with other kids.

Basically they described Ymir.
:laugh:

[livius drusus]

That's an extemporaneous two-smiley composition, actually.

[seebs]

OHhhhh! Yeah, that. I think it was a popular description in columbine days.

Silly me, I didn't realize that was two smileys. That takes some of the magic way.

I kid you not, I half expected to right-click on it and discover that it was :pooptalkingslattern:.

[Ymir's blood]

I originally saw, "gang of loners" in a talk a policeman was giving on gangs to other police departments, approximately 1990. We had some of their "informational" material. One described a "gang of loners," teenagers, who wear black, maybe with pentagrams, wrote in their journals a lot, didn't hang out with other kids.

Basically they described Ymir.
:laugh::glare:

I was past my teens for the most part by the time that the nineties rolled around.

[Qingdai]

Dude, also wasn't exactly up to date on his youth culture either... he could have been talking about you!

Gang of loner!

[Ymir's blood]

I actually didn't wear that much black back then, more punk looking. I did wear a black raincoat and engineer boots at times, but otherwise it was mostly hiking boots and denim.

Still have the engineer boots, they don't make em like that anymore.

[Crumb]

seebs, you've convinced me that I am autistic. :unnod:

[chunksmediocrites]

Argh. Now I can't remember where I saw the phrase "gang of loners" originally.

That's because those gangs of loners are renowned for their discretion. They sometimes splinter off to become anarchist leaders.

[seebs]

seebs, you've convinced me that I am autistic. :unnod:

Huh.

Is that good or bad?

(note to readers: "Yes" and "No" are both useful answers here. Sometimes the information that something is "good or bad" is useful even if you're not sure which...)

[Stormlight]

This thread deserves an award.


http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3634/3445609887_e56fe1c720_o.jpg

[Chris Porter]

seebs, you've convinced me that I am autistic. :unnod:

Ha.

While I have no diagnosis on me other than anti-social personality disorder, I (and my parents) now think it's more likely mild autism, not something that was diagnosed back when I was growing up and behaving oddly enough to require that I see a school psychologist for 5 years. I have no problem with it at this time, considering that I believe it's just a different way of perceiving the world, and not a poor, bad, inappropriate way of perceiving the world, unless it leads to great frustration and disappointment, or is so severe it incapacitates the person who's brain is affected.

Of course, I grew up with very supportive parents who, while often utterly perplexed at my behaviors, nevertheless succeeded in doing a pretty bang-up job of raising me. And I've been through a lot of depression because I saw how very different I was from most kids; no matter how supportive one's parent's are, being ostracized by your peers from grade school on is difficult.

[Adam]

Note also that your paraphrased "doing something that might make a child cry" is quite a different beast from my original "gratuitously doing things that can * [b]reasonably expected to make children cry"

And if you aren't nitpicking for the sake of argument, Adam, you'll explain the difference and why it's important in this context.
:chin:

I assure you that I am not nitpicking for the sake of argument. Your paraphrase completely changed the essential meaning of what I typed, and if that's truly what you understood me to say, then there's no point in proceeding further until you understand what I actually meant.

There is a meaningful difference between something that might happen and something that can be reasonably expected to happen. Is this controversial?

There is a meaningful difference between doing something and doing that thing gratuitously. Is this controversial?

[mickthinks]

If by "meaningful difference" you mean a difference which would be substantive in some contexts, I agree. I don't think this was such a context, and if I am right about that then you were nit-picking.

I am happy to add the words you want back in, because I don't think it changes the substance of the point I was making;

"Gratuitously doing something that can be resonably expected to make a child cry" and "being rude to a child" are quite a way apart, I think.

[Adam]

What do you mean by "quite a way apart"? "Gratuitously doing something that can be resonably expected to make a child cry" is not synonymous with "being rude to a child". However, "Gratuitously doing something that can be resonably expected to make a child cry" is something that I, and apparently others here, do consider to be rude/inconsiderate/what have you. Whether or not is actually is rude isn't the sort of objective truth I can prove to you, though. It's a matter of social expectations and intrasubjective agreement.

[mickthinks]

However, "Gratuitously doing something that can be resonably expected to make a child cry" is something that I, and apparently others here, do consider to be rude/inconsiderate/what have you.

Putting a child in front of a large audience can reasonably be expected to make them cry. Isn't that what the girl's parents did? I see what you are doing there as finding the right words to cast the bare narrative into something where it appears that Bush's action can justly be condemned. Recasting a narrative in order to make it tell the story you want it to tell— that's called spinning.

[seebs]

Under normal circumstances, we encourage children to gain experience in talking to large groups; we structure events, sometimes, so that we can have children ask adults questions, giving them a chance to develop confidence and comfort in dealing with such situations. The social protocol is that the adults are supposed to be respectful and supportive of the kids. Sarcasm is generally not a way to communicate respect or support; it undermines the purpose of the event.

This isn't any kind of special "spin"; this is just ordinary, basic, human social analysis. I have not seen any other person dispute the obvious rudeness of Bush's treatment of this kid, even people who like and defend Bush. I've seen people claim it was understandable, or point to his recovery.

Indeed, his communications after the initial sarcastic response make it clear that he thought he had been rude. He understood himself to have wrongly acted in a way which hurt a child, and he tried to make up for it and communicate the message that her contribution had been valuable. Why? Because socially, that's how adults are supposed to treat children in cases like this.

[Adam]

Putting a child in front of a large audience can reasonably be expected to make them cry. Isn't that what the girl's parents did?

Well, two things.

First, I can't judge the actions of the parents because I lack the necessary background information about the circumstances that led to her asking that question and so, presumably, do you. If they are reasonably attentive parents, I would assume that they knew their own daughter well enough to determine whether or not asking a question in front of a crowd was something she could handle. If they had reason to suspect that it was not something she was prepared for, and encouraged her to do it anyway then, yes, they bear some blame here. The facts are not in evidence one way or the other, though.

Second, and more importantly, they're her parents and they should know what she, specifically, is prepared to handle without reliance on the generic concept of what one might reasonably expect of any random child. Bush, on the other hand, is not her parent, does not know her specifically, and does need to rely on the generic concept of what one might reasonably expect of any random child, so the two situations are not really analogous.

I see what you are doing there as finding forms of words in which to cast the bare narrative into something where it appears that Bush's action can justly be vilified. Recasting a narrative in order to make it tell the story you want it to tell— that's called spinning.

As, for example, when you cast the bare narrative into an anti-feminist tale of a man making a frail woman cry?

How have I interpreted the story in a way that is at odds with the facts, or in any sense dishonest?

[Adam]

Under normal circumstances, we encourage children to gain experience in talking to large groups; we structure events, sometimes, so that we can have children ask adults questions, giving them a chance to develop confidence and comfort in dealing with such situations. The social protocol is that the adults are supposed to be respectful and supportive of the kids. Sarcasm is generally not a way to communicate respect or support; it undermines the purpose of the event.

This isn't any kind of special "spin"; this is just ordinary, basic, human social analysis. I have not seen any other person dispute the obvious rudeness of Bush's treatment of this kid, even people who like and defend Bush. I've seen people claim it was understandable, or point to his recovery.

Indeed, his communications after the initial sarcastic response make it clear that he thought he had been rude. He understood himself to have wrongly acted in a way which hurt a child, and he tried to make up for it and communicate the message that her contribution had been valuable. Why? Because socially, that's how adults are supposed to treat children in cases like this.

Excellent post.

[mickthinks]

Sorry seebs, I am afraid you missed the point here, which is whether "Gratuitously doing something that can be reasonably expected to make a child cry" and "being rude to a child" are two ways of saying the same thing. I think they aren't.

[mickthinks]

I've not asked you to judge the parents, Adam. I am just indicating how "Gratuitously doing something that can be reasonably expected to make a child cry" is quite a way from "being rude to a child".

How have I interpreted the story in a way that is at odds with the facts, or in any sense dishonest?
I think you have tried to cast the girl's tears as proof of Bush's rudeness to her. I'm not saying that is dishonest because I don't know why you did it.

[Adam]

By the way, mick, these are the currently open questions that I've posed to you, for which I would appreciate answers;

1) Do you agree or disagree that your framing of the story in terms of sex is idiosyncratic, at least among people who have commented here?

2) On a related note, do you agree or disagree that your belief that the journalist who wrote the story framed it in those terms is also idiosyncratic, again, among those who have commented here?

3) Is there a reason that you believe that sex (as opposed to, for example, age or authority) is the most appropriate way to frame the story? The closest you've come to answering this is "The story concerns the interaction between a male and a female" but, presumably, you don't believe that every story involving members of both sexes should be framed in those terms, so there must be some other reason.

4) Is my interpretation of your argument with respect to feminism correct or incorrect? If it is incorrect, can you state it more clearly for me?

[seebs]

Sorry seebs, I am afraid you missed the point here,

No, I didn't.

which is whether "Gratuitously doing something that can be resonably expected to make a child cry" and "being rude to a child" are two ways of saying the same thing. I think they aren't.

No one said they were, so that is not "the point". That is you objecting to something no one said because you didn't correctly understand what they did say. As in previous cases, the analysis could be provided, but since you steadfastly refuse to actually respond to the analysis, why would anyone bother? You claim you want to see examples of your misreadings, but then you cover your ears and shout "LA LA LA I'M NOT LISTENING" when clear examples with detailed explanations are provided. (It's not even a question of disagreeing with the analysis; that could be conceivably part of a productive discussion. It's that you completely avoid any kind of acknowledgement or response.)

They are clearly distinct but overlapping categories.

The assertion is that the former is typically an instance of the latter; establishing that someone gratuitously did something that can reasonably be expected to make a child cry nearly always leads to the conclusion that the person was rude to a child. That doesn't make them "two ways of saying the same thing"; obviously, there are many ways to be rude to a child that are not gratuitously doing something that can be reasonably expected to make a child cry.

It is true that every townhome is a domicile. That doesn't mean that "townhome" and "domicile" are two ways of saying the same thing.

Furthermore, just to complete the example space, raping a child is almost certainly "gratuitously doing something that can reasonably be expected to make a child cry", but is probably not going to get filed by most people as "being rude to a child". (Actually, it probably is "rude", but most people don't use the term rude unless stronger condemnations don't apply. While rape and murder do violate social norms, they're not normally viewed as "rudeness" except by pedants.)

[mickthinks]

Adam, I sympathise. I too have a string of questions I don't believe I have seen answers to. I was told in no uncertain terms to suck it up. For you, I'll see what I can do.

[mickthinks]

Sorry seebs, I am afraid you missed the point here,
No, I didn't.
Yes, seebs, you did.

which is whether "Gratuitously doing something that can be resonably expected to make a child cry" and "being rude to a child" are two ways of saying the same thing. I think they aren't.
No one said they were,
I think Adam implied it here (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/showpost.php?p=690847&postcount=150).

so that is not "the point".
No, that is why it is.

Mick

[Adam]

Sorry seebs, I am afraid you missed the point here, which is whether "Gratuitously doing something that can be resonably expected to make a child cry" and "being rude to a child" are two ways of saying the same thing. I think they aren't.

No, that is not the point. I explicitly pointed this out already:

Gratuitously doing something that can be resonably expected to make a child cry" is not synonymous with "being rude to a child". However, "Gratuitously doing something that can be resonably expected to make a child cry" is something that I, and apparently others here, do consider to be rude/inconsiderate/what have you.

No one claims that they are two different ways of saying the same thing, and no one is making any other claim that relies on them being two different ways of saying the same thing.

"Doing 70 in a school zone" and "breaking the law" are not two different ways of saying the same thing, but the former is an example of the latter.

I've not asked you to judge the parents, Adam. I am just indicating how "Gratuitously doing something that can be reasonably expected to make a child cry" is quite a way from "being rude to a child".

"Gratuitously doing something that can be reasonably expected to make a child cry" is not a valid interpretation of the parents' actions unless they had reasons to suspect that their daughter, specifically, was not prepared to handle the experience of asking a question in that particular setting, and lacked a compelling reason to encourage her to do so anyway. This was the point of my previous response.

I think you have tried to cast the girl's tears as proof of Bush's rudeness to her. I'm not saying that is dishonest because I don't know why you did it.

No, even had she not cried, I would disapprove of an adult authority figure making a flippant response to a child in that situation, for all the reasons seebs noted. The fact that she did cry, of course, makes for a better news story, much as "Building collapses" is a better story than "Building is not up to code and can be reasonably expected to collapse at some point", but it's not so much evidence of anything as it is a reminder of why we disapprove of that sort of behavior.

[Adam]

Adam, I sympathise. I too have a string of questions I don't believe I have seen answers to. I was told in no uncertain terms to suck it up. For you, I'll see what I can do.

I'd like to point out a key difference here. You, to all appearances, have an interest in continuing this discussion. In order for me to do so, the answers to those questions will be helpful. If you do not wish to continue this discussion, then I'm fine with that, and in that case those questions can be ignored.

When you were told to "suck it up", the persons telling you this no longer had an interest in continuing the discussion, and you were perceived as being unwilling to drop a subject everyone else had tired of by continuing to bring up unanswered questions after your interlocutors had thrown in the towel.

[Adam]

Furthermore, just to complete the example space, raping a child is almost certainly "gratuitously doing something that can reasonably be expected to make a child cry", but is probably not going to get filed by most people as "being rude to a child". (Actually, it probably is "rude", but most people don't use the term rude unless stronger condemnations don't apply. While rape and murder do violate social norms, they're not normally viewed as "rudeness" except by pedants.)

I almost said something like this when talking about the parents. Even if they were gratuitously, etc., rudeness would be a secondary concern to shitty parenting.

[mickthinks]

When you were told to "suck it up", the persons telling you this no longer had an interest in continuing the discussion, and you were perceived as being unwilling to drop a subject everyone else had tired of by continuing to bring up unanswered questions after your interlocutors had thrown in the towel.


Yes I agree, the message was delivered under different circumstances. I don't see how that changes the message.

I don't remember the people in question conceding any of the arguments, though.

[seebs]

Sorry seebs, I am afraid you missed the point here,
No, I didn't.
Yes, seebs, you did.

Only if your next claim is correct...

which is whether "Gratuitously doing something that can be resonably expected to make a child cry" and "being rude to a child" are two ways of saying the same thing. I think they aren't.
No one said they were,
I think Adam implied it here (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/showpost.php?p=690847&postcount=150).

Which you aren't.

Adam said:

Why are those assumptions required for him to be rude? It seems that he made a joke that he thought the adults in the room would find amusing without taking into consideration its likely effect on the child who had asked the question. He was pretty clearly being sarcastic, but I don't believe that his response was targeted at the girl. Even so, adults are normally expected to avoid gratuitously doing things that can [be] reasonably expected to make children cry, even if the child is not the "target" of their actions.

This does not imply, suggest, hint, or lead to the conclusion that "doing things that can be reasonably expected to make children cry" and "being rude" are "two ways of saying the same thing".

"Two ways of saying the same thing" means that the overlap of two categories is total -- no instance of one is not an instance of the other.

All Adam suggested is that, in general, instances of "gratuitously doing things that can be reasonably expected to make children cry" are instances of "being rude".

That doesn't make them two ways of saying the same thing, as I just explained in full detail before. It makes one of them fairly close to a subset of the other.

The key is in Adam's use of the word "expected". The reason that doing such a thing is generally rude is that there is a social expectation that adults won't do it. An adult is assumed to be sufficiently aware and socially capable to avoid such outcomes, and failure to do so suggests lack of consideration for the emotional wellbeing of others -- which is the essence of rudeness.

I can see two possibilities here.

One is that you are not aware that the reason people are rejecting your "two ways of saying the same thing" characterization has to do with the reflexive nature of identity -- that if these are two ways of saying the same thing, then all being rude to children is "gratuitously doing things which can be reasonably expected to make children cry". But that's not really the case -- some rudeness to children is very unlikely to make them cry. In that case, you're using the phrase "two ways of saying the same thing" in a very unusual way, leading to a communications problem; rephrasing your observation might lead to clearer communication.

The other is that you genuinely think that Adam's quoted text above asserts total identity between these two things, in which case, you probably need to go back to basics and start learning about words like "some" and "all", and understanding how categories can overlap without being identical.

[seebs]

Furthermore, just to complete the example space, raping a child is almost certainly "gratuitously doing something that can reasonably be expected to make a child cry", but is probably not going to get filed by most people as "being rude to a child". (Actually, it probably is "rude", but most people don't use the term rude unless stronger condemnations don't apply. While rape and murder do violate social norms, they're not normally viewed as "rudeness" except by pedants.)

I almost said something like this when talking about the parents. Even if they were gratuitously, etc., rudeness would be a secondary concern to shitty parenting.

Yeah. I think the parents clearly did something dumb. (Extra dumb because Bush in particular is not famed for his social graciousness towards people who ask questions he doesn't like.)

... Well, dumb, or really, really, shitty parenting. They could have done this because they expected Bush to do something that would make their kid cry. In which case, that's really, really, fucking cold. But... Not rude, I don't think. Just nasty.

[Adam]

Yes I agree, the message was delivered under different circumstances. I don't see how that changes the message.

I'm asking for more information to help me continue a discussion that you (as far as I can tell) have an interest in continuing. This is a normal part of how discussions work. I don't entirely understand your position, so I'm asking for clarification, so we we can proceed without my putting words in your mouth.

You were, at the time, asking for more information to help you continue a discussion that others had no interest in continuing. This is not a normal part of how discussions work. Ordinarily, when one person indicates that they do not wish to continue, it is considered rude for the other to keep requesting more participation.

I don't remember the people in question conceding any of the arguments, though.

Nor do I. All arguments do not end with a concession. Agreeing to disagree is a perfectly valid way to end a discussion or an argument. In fact, given that we appear to be starting from different assumptions which, naturally, lead us to different conclusions, I fully expect (or, at least, hope) that the current discussion will end in such a manner.

[mickthinks]

seebs: That doesn't make them "two ways of saying the same thing"; obviously, there are many ways to be rude to a child that are not gratuitously doing something that can be reasonably expected to make a child cry.
Adam: "Doing 70 in a school zone" and "breaking the law" are not two different ways of saying the same thing, but the former is an example of the latter.

You are quite right guys, my mistake. I avoided saying "synonymous" because that isn't what Adam was claiming, and I tried to use "saying the same thing" instead, but it is no better. What I take Adam to have been saying is that an event which can be described as "someone gratuitously doing something that can reasonably be expected to make a child cry", is an event which can also be described as "being rude to that child".

I think that is what Adam implied and I disagree and have cited a counter-example.

[Adam]

Btw, upon rereading some of my posts here, they sound really pompous and condescending. That's not intentional, it's the result of my trying (and probably failing) to strip unnecessarily idiomatic language and my usual smartassery out of what I post.

[mickthinks]

I think you have tried to cast the girl's tears as proof of Bush's rudeness to her.
No, even had she not cried, I would disapprove of an adult authority figure making a flippant response to a child in that situation, for all the reasons seebs noted.

You realise that doesn't address what I said? The question whether this particular action could reasonably be expected to make the child cry might appear to be settled by the fact that she cried and people didn't say "How weird! No one would have expected that".

[Adam]

Yeah. I think the parents clearly did something dumb.

This is a tangent, but I don't think we have enough information to say that. For all we know, the girl is in her school debate club and loves speaking in front of an audience.

(Extra dumb because Bush in particular is not famed for his social graciousness towards people who ask questions he doesn't like.)

:lol:

OK, maybe they're dumb for not taking that into account.

[Adam]

You realise that doesn't address what I said? The question whether this particular action could reasonably be expected to make the child cry might appear to be settled by the fact that she cried and people didn't say "How weird! No one would have expected that".

Perhaps I don't understand what you meant then. I understood you to be saying that I used the girl's tears as evidence of rudeness, rather than come to that conclusion based on my own social assumptions about what sort of responses would be appropriate in that situation. Now, it looks like you are suggesting that I am using the fact that the girl cried to determine, ex post facto, that a flippant response could reasonably be expected to hurt her feelings. Is that what you're saying?

[seebs]

You are quite right guys, my mistake. I avoided saying "synonymous" because that isn't what Adam was claiming, and I tried to use "saying the same thing" instead, but it is no better. What I take Adam to have been saying is that an event which can be described as "someone gratuitously doing something that can reasonably be expected to make a child cry", is an event which can also be described as "being rude to that child".

Thank you, that helps clarify.

I think what he's been saying is that it is usually a good example of rudeness -- the exceptions are usually things that are way worse. If you see an adult gratuitously do something that could be reasonably expected to make a child cry, the usual assumption is that it's rude. There are exceptions -- but nearly all of them are cases where the behavior is sufficiently heinous that it would not usually be called rude.

Even if it had been an adult reporter asking the question, a sarcastic or dismissive response might well be seen as rude. The social protocol for such circumstances is that you're expected to try to answer questions respectfully. However, doing that to a child tends to come across more rudely.

There are questions I can't answer about the circumstances -- for instance, at the time that Bush responded, could he clearly see the person he was responding to? He might not have realized he was talking to a child. That might be a mitigating factor.

Also, I do think that the parents were being pretty dumb.

[seebs]

You realise that doesn't address what I said? The question whether this particular action could reasonably be expected to make the child cry might appear to be settled by the fact that she cried and people didn't say "How weird! No one would have expected that".

I don't think this analysis flies, for the simple reason that teenagers are famed for unpredictable emotional outbursts.

Thus, even if no one would have expected a teenager to cry under a given circumstance, they might not comment on it directly.

You raise an interesting point here. Imagine that we had only the information that:

* At some sort of event where people were asking questions of the President, a teenaged child asked the President a question.
* The president responded with a sarcastic and dismissive "yeah, thanks."

Would people generally consider that rude? I certainly would. If you take out "teenaged child" and replace it with "person", it is a little more ambiguous -- adults are usually expected to handle some amount of good-natured ribbing, and one could argue that Bush's comment was intended to be commentary on the unpleasant circumstance he was in (the question related to something that had not gone his way, and most politicians hate answering questions on that topic).

However, when dealing with a kid, you might reasonably be more careful. The authority-figure to child relationship is one which creates a much greater duty of care; children are, by default, much more likely to be impressionable, much less likely to perform more abstract or detached analysis of social rules, and so on.

This raises an interesting point, which is that there is a way in which gender is relevant here: It is quite possible to, upon hearing a thirteen-year-old girl speak, not know that you're hearing a child talking. Young boys nearly always sound very distinct from adult men, but early-teens girls can have substantially the same vocal production range as adult women.

In which case, we might argue that Bush mistakenly believed he'd been asked a question by an adult woman, whom he thought would perceive that his sarcastic remark was directed to his circumstances, not to her.

But, if he knew she was a child, then I think his behavior was rude. A child who has worked up the courage to ask a hard question of the President of the United States should not be discouraged or dismissed.

[mickthinks]

Here's answers to some of your outstanding questions, Adam

1) I disagree that my framing of the story in terms of sex is idiosyncratic.

2) I think the journalist who wrote the story emphasised those terms in order to exploit the feelings they generate.

3) I believe the story works well for the anti-Bush agenda if Bush is drawn as aggressive and the questioner as vulnerable. I think it wouldn't have played as well for them if the kid had been a strapping football player.

4) Your schema for my feminism angle is pretty close but I'm unhappy with it in a few, maybe quite trivial, ways. It's going to take me a little time to get my head around that though, so I'll come back to you.

Mick

[seebs]

Here's answers to some of your outstanding questions, Adam

1) I disagree that my framing of the story in terms of sex is idiosyncratic.

I'm confused by this.

The question was specifically whether it was idiosyncratic among people posting here.

Who else here has framed it that way?

If you're the only person here framing it that way, how is that not idiosyncratic?

2) I think the journalist who wrote the story emphasised those terms in order to exploit the feelings they generate.

Why do you think this?

Perhaps more interestingly: Do you think that the journalist placed any emphasis on terms showing the person's age? Do you think there was more or less emphasis on age, or on gender? Why?

3) I believe the story works well for the anti-Bush agenda if Bush is drawn as aggressive and the questioner as vulnerable. I think it wouldn't have played as well for them if the kid had been a strapping football player.

Perhaps not.

But even granting that... In general, do you think that it would normally be appropriate for a public figure, upon being asked a question by a child, to respond in a dismissive or sarcastic way? Do you have examples where people did that and it was well-regarded? I can't think of any.

[Adam]

You are quite right guys, my mistake. I avoided saying "synonymous" because that isn't what Adam was claiming, and I tried to use "saying the same thing" instead, but it is no better. What I take Adam to have been saying is that an event which can be described as "someone gratuitously doing something that can reasonably be expected to make a child cry", is an event which can also be described as "being rude to that child".

Thank you, that helps clarify.

I think what he's been saying is that it is usually a good example of rudeness -- the exceptions are usually things that are way worse. If you see an adult gratuitously do something that could be reasonably expected to make a child cry, the usual assumption is that it's rude. There are exceptions -- but nearly all of them are cases where the behavior is sufficiently heinous that it would not usually be called rude.

That is a fair account of what I was saying.

I'm not hung up on the specific term "rude", by the way. If it simplifies things, and gets us beyond hair splitting over a definition, my point can also (perhaps more accurately?) be stated as "an adult who gratuitously does something that can reasonably be expected to make a child cry is failing to meet social expectations".

[Adam]

Here's answers to some of your outstanding questions, Adam

Thank you.

1) I disagree that my framing of the story in terms of sex is idiosyncratic.

Of the set of people who have remarked on the story here, you are alone in framing it in terms of male and female. Do you have some evidence that others share that framing?

2) I think the journalist who wrote the story emphasised those terms in order to exploit the feelings they generate.

Understood, but I was asking if you thought that others shared your belief that the journalist framed it as such.

3) I believe the story works well for the anti-Bush agenda if Bush is drawn as aggressive and the questioner as vulnerable. I think it wouldn't have played as well for them if the kid had been a strapping football player.

I'm not sure I understand. It appears that you're saying that the framing of the issue as male versus female is appropriate because it furthers the anti-Bush agenda you believe to exist. Is this correct?

4) Your schema for my feminism angle is pretty close but I'm unhappy with it in a few, maybe quite trivial, ways. It's going to take me a little time to get my head around that though, so I'll come back to you.

Cool, thanks.

[seebs]

I think the argument is like this:

People who want to portray Bush as bad can do so most effectively if they can portray the issue as a strong person attacking a vulnerable person.

He interpreted the coverage of the story as framing the issue in man-hurts-woman terms.

He believes the coverage to have been written with intent to make Bush look bad.

From this, the conclusion is that the people who wrote the story in that way did so under the impression that framing it as male-vs-female would be an effective way to portray it as strong-vs-vulnerable, and that this implies that they think of women as weak or defenesless.

My disagreement with the above assessment is that I thought the story was focused much more strongly on the adult-vs-child thing, in which I think the leap to strong-vs-vulnerable is a very small and fairly well-supported leap.

I do grant that I think the term "girl" tends to have stronger connotations of emotional vulnerability than the term "boy" -- I just think both have stronger connotations of emotional vulnerability than the term "woman" would, which leads me to view the reporting primarily in terms of age rather than gender.

[Dingfod]

Dude, she was 8.



Kidding.

[erimir]

Upon rethinking it (when I saw the video, I wasn't sure if I'd call it rude...), I think Bush was inconsiderate but not intentionally rude. He obviously realized that he shouldn't have said what he did at first, because he reassured her that it was a good question. It wasn't that bad. I'm not sure how rude people are claiming that it was.

If it were an adult, it wouldn't really be a problem, I don't think, since it's obvious that it is self-deprecating in a way, and an adult wouldn't take it to be dismissive of their question, but an indication that it's not a question Bush would like to hear because it's a sore spot, rather than because it's a bad question.

Incidentally, I agree that the story wouldn't be seen as negatively had it been a 13 year old boy. 13 year old boys are at the age that they are expected to be well on their way to suppressing outbursts of such emotion, so people would be less sympathetic to a crying teenaged boy simply because of that. The boy would have to be younger for his crying to receive as sympathetic a response. Yet it would still be rude because even if a 13 year old boy did not cry, he would still quite likely be upset.

So I'd agree that there is some gender stuff going on in the story - but I think that framing it as "If this had been a boy, people wouldn't be upset, so we shouldn't be bothered by what Bush did to a girl" is the wrong way to frame it. I prefer "If this had been a boy, people wouldn't be as upset, even tho it would be just as rude."

[Crumb]

seebs, you've convinced me that I am autistic. :unnod:

Huh.

Is that good or bad?

(note to readers: "Yes" and "No" are both useful answers here. Sometimes the information that something is "good or bad" is useful even if you're not sure which...)
Well I was going for a laugh there so "convinced" was an exaggeration, but you do have me thinking it is a possibility.

I would say it is a good thing. :yup:

[mickthinks]

Adam - I think this is how I would schematise my original feminism angle:

P1 A newspaper reported a story about the president, framed as a man making a young woman cry.
P2 Feminism has taught us that women are not delicate creatures who need to be protected from distress by men.
C An automatic assumption that the president ill-treated the woman, such as I thought I observed being made in the Bush's inner asshole thread, would be anti-feminist.

I'm no longer sure that the leap from "she's upset" to "he did it" was being made from an old-fashioned patriarchal viewpoint, but it seemed to me the most likely explanation at the time I entered the thread.

Mick

[mickthinks]

The question whether this particular action could reasonably be expected to make the child cry might appear to be settled by the fact that she cried and people didn't say "How weird! No one would have expected that".
I don't think this analysis flies, for the simple reason that teenagers are famed for unpredictable emotional outbursts.
I agree and that's why I used the word "might", seebs. So you and I wouldn't buy it, but are you confident that no one would think that way?

[seebs]

Adam - I think this is how I would schematise my original feminism angle:

P1 A newspaper reported a story about the president, framed as a man making a young woman cry.
P2 Feminism has taught us that women are not delicate creatures who need to be protected from distress by men.
C An automatic assumption that the president ill-treated the woman, such as I thought I observed being made in the Bush's inner asshole thread, would be anti-feminist.

I'm no longer sure that the leap from "she's upset" to "he did it" was being made from an old-fashioned patriarchal viewpoint, but it seemed to me the most likely explanation at the time I entered the thread.

I would not agree with P1. I do not think "woman" was a significant component of the evaluation in the article. The issue that people were responding to was that the behavior was in general not particularly appropriate, and in particular very ill-considered when dealing with a child. Basically, C follows from P1, but it doesn't follow from "P1': A newspaper reported a story about the President, framed as an authority figure making a child cry." Since most of us seem to have had P1', not P1, in mind...

[seebs]

The question whether this particular action could reasonably be expected to make the child cry might appear to be settled by the fact that she cried and people didn't say "How weird! No one would have expected that".
I don't think this analysis flies, for the simple reason that teenagers are famed for unpredictable emotional outbursts.
I agree and that's why I used the word "might", seebs. So you and I wouldn't buy it, but are you confident that no one would think that way?

No, but I don't think I have to be -- I just have to be confident that it wouldn't be a dominant or commonplace interpretation.

[mickthinks]

I much prefer the term 'woman' to 'female', but it looks as if I can't avoid recasting the schema using the latter term.

P1 A newspaper reported a story about the president, framed as a male making a young female cry.
P2 Feminism has taught us that females are not delicate creatures who need to be protected from distress by males.
C An automatic assumption that the president ill-treated the female, such as I thought I observed being made in the Bush's inner asshole thread, would be anti-feminist.

I don't think you can say that a female was not a significant component in the article.

[mickthinks]

I just have to be confident that it wouldn't be a dominant or commonplace interpretation.
I don't see how you can be so confident that it wouldn't be commonplace, seebs. On what grounds?

Mick

[seebs]

I much prefer the term 'woman' to 'female', but it looks as if I can't avoid recasting the schema using the latter term.

P1 A newspaper reported a story about the president, framed as a male making a young female cry.
P2 Feminism has taught us that females are not delicate creatures who need to be protected from distress by males.
C An automatic assumption that the president ill-treated the female, such as I thought I observed being made in the Bush's inner asshole thread, would be anti-feminist.

I don't think you can say that a female was not a significant component in the article.

I can.

Here's how. Let's imagine two articles:

In one, Bush makes that remark to a young-teens or preteen boy.
In another, Bush makes that remark to a woman in her thirties.

Which article is changed more? I think absolutely the latter. I think the latter article would be a wildly different one; people would be confused and shocked by a grown woman bursting into tears over a single off-handed remark which was open to interpretation.

The former, though, is basically unchanged. It's a kid, and he asked a question that he thought was important, and he got a dismissive brush-off response.

So I don't think "female" is very significant. Does it have some impact? Sure. But not much.

[seebs]

I just have to be confident that it wouldn't be a dominant or commonplace interpretation.
I don't see how you can be so confident that it wouldn't be commonplace, seebs. On what grounds?

Because normally people don't need to wait to see how other people respond to a story to know whether an action was rude or not.

[Adam]

Thanks for making your reasoning explicit.

I much prefer the term 'woman' to 'female', but it looks as if I can't avoid recasting the schema using the latter term.

P1 A newspaper reported a story about the president, framed as a male making a young female cry.
P2 Feminism has taught us that females are not delicate creatures who need to be protected from distress by males.
C An automatic assumption that the president ill-treated the female, such as I thought I observed being made in the Bush's inner asshole thread, would be anti-feminist.

I don't think you can say that a female was not a significant component in the article.

It's definitely there, don't think I'm disputing that. As for significant, I suppose it depends on exactly what you mean by "significant". It could, of course, be significant in some contexts but, for purposes of judging Bush's behavior*, and relative to other factors in evidence**, I did not find it to be so.

* Swapping the sex of the child in the story would not significantly affect my opinion that Bush's response was inconsiderate/rude/whatever.

** For the reasons I described somewhere upthread, among others***, I found the fact that the questioner was female to be less important than the fact that she was a child.

*** One of those reasons is exactly what you state in P2. I do not believe that female persons need to be protected in particular, so I did not detect "failure to protect a female" in the article. I do beleive that children should be protected, so I did detect "failure to protect a child", or something very like it.

Sorry about the *'s...as originally written, this post was a maze of parentheticals which I broke out into * notes.

I'm no longer sure that the leap from "she's upset" to "he did it" was being made from an old-fashioned patriarchal viewpoint, but it seemed to me the most likely explanation at the time I entered the thread.

So, to clarify a bit, did you think that viewpoint was held by the author of the article, the posters in the thread, or both?

I would not agree with P1. I do not think "woman" was a significant component of the evaluation in the article. The issue that people were responding to was that the behavior was in general not particularly appropriate, and in particular very ill-considered when dealing with a child. Basically, C follows from P1, but it doesn't follow from "P1': A newspaper reported a story about the President, framed as an authority figure making a child cry." Since most of us seem to have had P1', not P1, in mind...

:yeahthat:

This is why I was asking you, mick, if you agree that your viewpoint is idiosyncratic among people who have commented here. The early responses to you focused on disputing P1, because everyone else (who bothered to respond) held P1'.

[mickthinks]

Which article is changed more?
That's a different question from the one I challenged you with, seebs, Why the switch?

Because normally people don't need to wait to see how other people respond to a story to know whether an action was rude or not.
That isn't an answer to the question I asked either, seebs.

[mickthinks]

This is why I was asking you, mick, if you agree that your viewpoint is idiosyncratic among people who have commented here. The early responses to you focused on disputing P1, because everyone else (who bothered to respond) held P1'.

I think the early responses were looking for something to argue about. As soon as it was clear there was no major dispute about the feminism angle, everybody switched.

Mick
Idiosyncratic—you keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

[seebs]

I apparently misread your post.

Here's the thing. Your premises and conclusion are contingent, not on whether or not a female was present in the article, but whether her femaleness was central to the story.

No one disputes that there was at least one female in the story. What's disputed is whether it matters whether that person is female or not. Your P1 isn't just that the person in question is female; it's that the story is framed as "a male making a female cry".

For that to be true, it has to be true that the story would have to be reframed if the child in question had been a boy rather than a girl. Otherwise, "a female" is not part of the framing, but one of the non-framing facts.

[mickthinks]

:scratch:
We've been over all that, seebs, Why are you going over it again?

If the story is about a vulnerable girl crying and making a man look bad, then I think there's a feminist angle. If on the other hand, the story is about a small child being frightened by a grown-up then there isn't a feminist angle. It depends how the story is spun.

... being appalled at a grown man making a kid cry?
I've seen that happen when a grown man refuses to buy a kid an ice cream. I wasn't appalled then and I am still waiting to be appalled now.

Please understand; I am not defending Bush against any of the justified charges against him. I am making a plea for a little more discrimination in response to manipulative journalism.

Mick

[seebs]

I think the point of dispute is that you seem to be indicating that you think the story itself was spun primarily in terms of a vulnerable girl (as opposed to a vulnerable boy). Not just that this was a possible angle, but that this was the primary angle.

So I guess let's step back a bit.

Is your argument that:

* There exists a feminist angle to the story
or
* The feminist angle is the most significant aspect of the story

I can't tell. I've been interpreting you as arguing #2, while most of the other people here seem to have been viewing it mostly as #1.

[mickthinks]

I am not here arguing anything. I believe there may be a feminist angle to the story. I think the journalists have exploited the child's sex to push the reader's buttons and get the result they want—"Bush lets out his inner asshole" vehemence rather than "Youngster overcome by pressure of the occasion" indifference. If you want to argue that didn't happen, be my guest.

[Adam]

I think the early responses were looking for something to argue about. As soon as it was clear there was no major dispute about the feminism angle, everybody switched.

Wait, why do you think there was no major dispute about the feminist angle? Everyone (who has commented) but you agrees that there is no feminist angle or, at best, that any feminist angle that may exist is secondary to the age issue and/or the authority issue.

Why do you think the early responders (I'm specifically thinking about livius and Sock Puppet here) were looking for something to argue about?

Idiosyncratic—you keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

I am using it to mean "unique to an individual". Your belief that the story is best framed in feminist terms is indisputably unique to you among the people who have so far commented on it here and, to the degree that what we see here is a representative sample of readers, appears to be rare in general.

My reason for pointing this out is that at least a portion of your position appears to hang on the idea that the journalist is using the sex of the questioner to manipulate readers' emotions. If the number of readers who interpret the story in such a way that the child's sex is important is relatively small, then the effectiveness of this purported strategy is called into question. Why, assuming he is not simply incompetent, would he choose this framing, and not the apparently far more common adult/child framing for his spin?

I am not here arguing anything. I believe there may be a feminist angle to the story. I think the journalists have exploited the child's sex to push the reader's buttons and get the result they want—"Bush lets out his inner asshole" vehemence rather than "Youngster overcome by pressure of the occasion" indifference. If you want to argue that didn't happen, be my guest.

To clarify, to you believe that the journalist acted with intent to push buttons because you see this exploitation in the story as written, or do you see this exploitation in the story as written because you believe that the journalist acted with intent to push buttons? I think I asked this once before, because I was assuming the former, but a couple of your responses seem to indicate the latter.

Do you believe that "Youngster overcome by pressure of the occasion" is the proper reading of the facts, or are you just throwing that out there as another route the author could have taken? How would you write the story so as to get all the salient facts in there without pushing buttons?

[mickthinks]

Everyone (who has commented) but you agrees that there is no feminist angle or, at best, that any feminist angle that may exist is secondary to the age issue and/or the authority issue.
Okay, so tell me where's the big dispute?

Why do you think the early responders (I'm specifically thinking about livius and Sock Puppet here) were looking for something to argue about?
Because the feminism issue was pretty much forgotten about as soon as vm turned it into a thread about me:

I am saying that it doesn't justify making moral judgements that are not supported by the evidence. The dispute here between us is whether this story of the girl in tears is an example of Bush being morally repugnant. It may be so in your opinion, but that opinion, as in "he used to cover up his fratboy churlishness better than this" isn't proof. It isn't even evidence. Sorry! :(
Don't be silly. If you're going to hold forth on what qualifies as proof (nay, evidence) of "moral repugnance", then at least let us know what objective standard you're measuring the President's behavior against. So far all your comments have "proven" is that the President of the United States being callous and flippant in response to the enquiry of a young girl isn't evidence of moral repugnance to you. On the contrary, you're inclined to blame the media and/or the young girl herself for her reaction to his comment. This may be evidence of a lot of things, but only proves that your moral standards are different from mine.

Mick
I am using it to mean "unique to an individual".
Okay, I have no idea whether I am unique in that interpretation, though it seems I am the only one here who's put it in words. I don't believe it is idiosyncratic in the usual sense of "peculiar to" me
To clarify, to you believe that the journalist acted with intent to push buttons because you see this exploitation in the story as written ...
I believe journalists often write in a way which deliberately pushes buttons. I don't believe that just because I see it happening here.
Do you believe that "Youngster overcome by pressure of the occasion" is the proper reading of the facts, or are you just throwing that out there as another route the author could have taken?
I think that is a much better description of the events, yes, and I think the journalists deliberately obscured it.

[seebs]

I am not here arguing anything. I believe there may be a feminist angle to the story. I think the journalists have exploited the child's sex to push the reader's buttons and get the result they want—"Bush lets out his inner asshole" vehemence rather than "Youngster overcome by pressure of the occasion" indifference. If you want to argue that didn't happen, be my guest.

Most people wouldn't be indifferent to an adult in a position of authority treating a "child" that way, regardless of the child's gender. Children need protection.

I honestly see nothing to support the theory that journalists "exploited" the child's sex. Can you give some kind of examples to show how you think the story would have been different had they not been trying to "exploit" the child's sex?

[mickthinks]

I honestly see nothing to support the theory that journalists "exploited" the child's sex.
Okay, you don't see it.

Can you give some kind of examples to show how you think the story would have been different had they not been trying to "exploit" the child's sex?
Yes, telling it as a story of a child overcome by self-consciousness in front of a live audience.

[seebs]

I honestly see nothing to support the theory that journalists "exploited" the child's sex.
Okay, you don't see it.

That, I suspect, is because it's not there.

Can you give some kind of examples to show how you think the story would have been different had they not been trying to "exploit" the child's sex?
Yes, telling it as a story of a child overcome by self-consciousness in front of a live audience.

Okay, let me try again.

Imagine that journalists were still portraying the story as "Bush is mean to child", but weren't exploiting the child's sex to do so. What would the story be like?

My question is specifically on how the sex difference enters into the story. I want to know how you think they would have written the same story, including the interpretation that the President was rude to a child, if it had been a boy child.

If you can show that the story would have been significantly different in that case, then you have made some kind of argument that the child's sex was significant. If you can't show that the story would have been significantly different, then the child's sex isn't demonstrably significant.

[Adam]

Suppose that Bush had responded to the question with "That's a good question..." or "Well, let me see if I can answer that..." instead of opening with a sarcastic (I know you don't see this, and I'm not disputing your report of your own mind, but everyone else who has commented believes Bush was being sarcastic) "Yeah, thanks...", and that the audience had not laughed. Do you think it likely that the girl still would have cried? Would this change your opinion?


Even given that you apparently do not believe he was being sarcastic, imagine that he was being sarcastic, since so many other people did detect sarcasm. Does that change your opinion?

[seebs]

I thought mick's point-of-dispute was whether the sarcasm was targeted at the child or not.

To which I answer, it doesn't matter; a child of that age is unlikely to interpret the sarcasm as being directed at the speaker or the circumstance, and is likely to go with the simpler "he is responding to me, therefore his response is directed to me".

[Adam]

That may be the case. I originally thought that was well, but somewhere that I can no longer find he said something like "I don't see any sarcasm", which I may therefore be hallucinating.

Mick, if your point truly is that the sarcasm is not directed at the questioner, then disregard the part of that post that refers to pretending that you do see sarcasm. I'm still interested to know if you think your opinion would be different if he had used a non-sarcastic opener for his answer.

[LadyShea]

There seems to be three threads with this discussion.

My previous exchanges with Mick on this particular issue are here (http://www.freethought-forum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=19685&page=3) should anyone want to see my previous remarks

[Angakuk]

I think it is worthwhile to go back to the original Raw Story (http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Bushs_sarcastic_response_sends_girl_into_0711.html) article and see what the girl in question had to say about why she was crying.

The Washington Times reports Jessica Hackerd was left in tears after Bush gave her a wry "yeah, thanks" in response to her query, drawing laughter from the crowd of 400 in Brecksville, Ohio Tuesday. Bush immediately began to backpedal when he saw the reaction from Hackerd, who told the Times she was crying because she is very shy and was nervous questioning the president.

Was the author, Nick Juliano, trying to spin the story in such a way as to make Bush look bad. His use of the term 'backpedal' would tend to suggest that such was case. However, if he were seriously trying to make Bush look bad why would he include Miss Hackerd's own explanation for her tears. An explanation in which Miss Hackerd appears to be accepting full responsibility for her tears and, just incidentally, taking the onus off the president. "[S]he was crying because she is very shy and was nervous questioning the president" implies, it seems to me, that Miss Hackerd would have very likely broken out in tears regardless of how the president had responded to her question. Does it matter whether or not Bush was actually responsible for her tears, or is it sufficiently condemnatory that his response could have been responsible for her tears?

[seebs]

The President, Miss Hackerd, and the journalist all seem to have a roughly compatible view:

The President's sarcasm threw someone off who was already close to the edge; it might have been better if he'd not done that, because a tension-breaking witticism isn't the best way to handle a shy kid.

Nothing here suggests any kind of male/female framing.

[LadyShea]

Well, I for one think his flippancy and sarcasm was out of place. The President used a question asked by a US citizen, in a formal setting, to get a cheap laugh...to me that laugh was at the questioners expense.

Whether she cried or not is not the point, for me. I never even read the original story. My opinion was based only on the video, which doesn't show her crying or show her face at all.

[Angakuk]

While it does not speak to the appropriateness of Bush's reply, I do think that Miss Hackerd's explanation for why she cried is relevant as a response to the claim that Bush made her cry. Would there have been any op-eds critical of Bush's comment if no one had cried? Maybe if Lady Shea was doing the write-up, but I doubt it otherwise. In which case, it is the fact that the girl cried that made this particular story newsworthy. If, however, it was not Bush's comment that caused her to cry, where is the newsworthiness in this event?

[mickthinks]

To which I answer, it doesn't matter [whether the sarcasm was targeted at the child or not]...
I think it's crucial to the central issue for which Bush is in the dock here; whether or not it is fair to condemn his behaviour toward the child.

... a child of that age is unlikely to interpret the sarcasm as being directed at the speaker or the circumstance, and is likely to go with the simpler "he is responding to me, therefore his response is directed to me".
Have you any evidence to support this suggestion? It seems to me most likely that she would not see any sarcasm being directed at anyone.

[mickthinks]

So, it would seem to me that I am much more likely to succeed at preventing myself from being the victim of bullying by making a change in my behavior so that the situation is altered in such a way that I am no longer the victim.

Ang, you are assuming that each of us is left to cope on our own. But we aren't alone. What happens if we start to post in support of each other when the bullying starts?

Are you saying that the :ff: community is collectively powerless, because I don't believe that. My approach is not to get people to see it my way, as you suggest. It is to get people to recognise that :ff: is not powerless in the face of its own mob.

Mick

[LadyShea]

... a child of that age is unlikely to interpret the sarcasm as being directed at the speaker or the circumstance, and is likely to go with the simpler "he is responding to me, therefore his response is directed to me".
Have you any evidence to support this suggestion? It seems to me most likely that she would not see any sarcasm being directed at anyone.

The whole audience laughed when he said "Yeah, thanks". They got the sarcasm. Why would the girl not get it, or not register the fact that everyone laughed at his response to her?

[mickthinks]

The whole audience laughed because they thought what Bush said was funny. If they had thought that Bush was sarcastically laying into one of their local girls, frosty silence or even booing would have been in order. The crowd's enjoyment of the joke is a significant and important testimony against your perception of the event, I reckon.

[LadyShea]

Sarcasm is a form of humor, people often find it funny, regardless of whose expense it is made at.

[mickthinks]

Are you arguing that laughter implies humour and humour implies sarcasm, and hence that the crowd's laughter shows they thought Bush was being sarcastic, LS?

I hope not because that just doesn't stand up to the slightest scrutiny.

... people often find [sarcasm] funny, regardless of whose expense it is made at.
That isn't my experience.