Denial of a positive

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So, I had this odd thought after struggling to find the right words to be honest with someone without breaking the rules by making a personal attack; calling someone stupid is clearly an attack, but is saying that they're not smart also considered to be an attack? I mean it kind of is a semantics issue, but to me there is a difference between calling someone something negative and saying that they're not something positive, like 'you're a jerk' vs 'you're not very nice'. I ask because I believe in being as honest as possible with people regarding how I feel and my opinions, and I do often find it a challenge finding the proper wording to tell someone something they're not going to like without crossing the ToS, and would be curious to hear what others think about this.

Pointing out that someone is not very nice might be necessary because that can have a negative affect on the people they engage with- on the boards, in this community. It can effect how a conversation evolves.

It's not necessary to point out that you think someone isn't smart. Even if it were a fairly objective thing [if someone says "you suck, jackass"- probably they are "not nice"], being not smart doesn't really harm people in and of itself. The attitude of the person is what affects their engagements and the conversations they participate in as well as their behavior.

In general, addressing current and specific actions [state] rather than trying to address and assess a person's overall character [trait] would probably make more sense in this particular arena if you find it necessary to do anything at all.
But I would think that should be resorted to if it's truly getting in the way of communicating, not just because it's two different individuals who communicate differently.

There is a difference between being honest and offering unnecessary and offensive information: even if you say "you are not smart" you are still telling someone they are stupid [in your opinion], no matter how nicely you think you are wording it.

"What you said was disingenuous" is more acceptable than "You're not very smart".

Address the idea, not the person.

^^^ written much more succinctly than I will ever be able to write anything ever, pretty much.
But yeah, what Fnord said. That. Ha.

Eh, I'm really talking about long term interactions here, like multiple years of having the same arguments with the same people where it's become abundantly clear that it's not a disagreement, but an actual deficiency on the part of the other party to even understand what is being discussed. This is particularly tricky on an AS board, where a certain amount of obtuseness is to be expected and I don't want to act harshly towards someone who may have an actual learning delay or something, but when that same person is rude and unpleasant, it becomes much more difficult to be sympathetic. At a certain point, I feel like I've run out of rhetorical room to dance around the fact that the person I'm arguing with simply isn't very bright, and have actually had such people ask if I think they're stupid, which I may do, but I don't want to just come out and say that for a variety of reasons. I mean yes, I could simply hold my tongue and walk away, but as someone I've seen snap at other posters a time or two, I'm sure you understand why that isn't always a realistic expectation.

Very true, and my usual SOP, but as I mentioned to SoL, I'm talking about exceptional and ongoing interactions where something about the other person is like the elephant in the room, and it's difficult to continuously tip-toe around it. Take a certain poster who likes to troll feminists all over the board, I think you know who I'm talking about; at what point does it become acceptable to label him an immature anti-feminist troll rather than referring to individual posts as trollish or juvenile? Or our America and Israel bashing friend in PPR? Again, I'm not just talking about smarts here, and I'm not talking about one-offs either, but longstanding behaviors that color every interaction with that person.

There's also this big grey area that I've swam in for years in PPR regarding certain unflattering but factual terms, such as ignorant, misinformed, mendacious, fallacious, etc, words that can be objectively factual but have insulting overtones, that are also damned near impossible to debate without using. I mean I've always understood the hard line to be name-calling, but it's possible to get pretty heated without ever actually crossing that line, where it really comes down to a judgment call regarding intent.

I'd say that once you've made a strong argument for your position – and the other party does not refute your logic, yet continues to assert the opposite stance – there's no need to point out that he is being illogical or evading reality. He is demonstrating that, with every word, for everybody to see who's paying attention.

But I suppose that reflects a personal preference on my part. I dislike repeating myself, so I rarely get drawn into lengthy discussions here or elsewhere; I'll state my reasoning in one or two posts and move on. I figure my real audience isn't my interlocutor but any intelligent others who may be reading.

Instead of calling someone performing tiollish action a troll; I click Report Post & let the mods deal with it.

Actually, I understand quite a bit more clearly what you are talking about now. And yeah, I have snapped at people- when I do that it's frequently because of the "right vs wrong" "justice vs injustice" thing going on. It's not ok, I feel badly about it. I also know that if I feel someone is wrong in an unjust way and spreading that... "wrong" it's hard for me to disengage. Outside looking in, and also when I feel a bit better I tend to ask questions of a person to really get at the root of why they think what they do. This has actually helped in the past but this requires patience. Admittedly I have little of that lately.


If someone has that behavior continuously, have they already been called something like that [and more]? If so, what is the benefit there in continuing to point it out to them? I would think that if this behavior has gone on for a long time and they have continued to demonstrate it they probably just don't care and simply think everyone else is wrong- so in continuing their behavior they are simply affirming for themselves their rightness and everyone else's wrongness when they get pushback? ...just theories though really.

Maybe you could get a different perspective by consulting with one of the staff who have been here longest- staff tend to have a different perspective in a lot of ways than users [though not always]. Not that they know "better". But they may have a different perspective that could be helpful in how to engage [or not engage] with this person.





"It seems that in [doing this, writing this, using this example, etc] you are [intending to be/coming off as/appearing as] [ignorant/misinformed]..." something like that might help. On the other hand someone used "seems" to me the other day but I interpreted it as completely disregarding things I said and making a bunch of assumptions about me even given the "seems". I kind of flipped out because it still wasn't supergreat. I can't really say the "seems" makes up for that but that could just be my inability to be reasonable lately and not representative of a usual response.

I mean, it sounds like a weird reference- but in girlscouts we use "when you.... I feel...." statements [which is what I base the above on].
But the problem is? People can still use those statements not as a way to communicate in a more temperate way but as a way to be more devious about trying to poke at people. I guess it depends what you actually fill in the blanks with and why.

I think it also, as you suggest, depends on why you are going to PPR in the first place- and many people don't understand the true difference between a debate and an argument.

At some point if you consider these individuals your issue- something you should address- you may not be able to continue to engage with them without eventually addressing the issues that most bother you without addressing these issues directly. If you make a decision for yourself that it's not something you can actually change about them or change about PPR yourself, it may be easier to navigate that board and engage with those people on the threads.

Deciding these things and "letting it go" isn't all that easy though- I understand that well. In terms of how you might actually deal with informing these individuals of the fact that they don't understand the issues, I'm not sure- the way you describe it sounds like it wouldn't matter because there's no way to let them know in a manner they'd accept.

I used a lot of personal point of view here because it's really all I have to go on. I hope something in there was helpful though.

It's better to just insult their intelligence by showing them they're wrong, why they're wrong, and in how many ways they're wrong rather than to just flat out tell them they're stupid because they won't respond to the latter. They won't learn anything from it, either. But on that note, some people just don't learn. I know you post often in the PPR forum, some people are just so bent on their personal beliefs and refuse to stray away from them regardless of what evidence you throw at them. It's not always worth the effort to be right or win an argument, some people you genuinely just can't reason with.

what has someone's intelligence got to do with any discussion? or any other personal characteristic.

the forum rules are clear - address the subject, not the person.

usually when people resort to playing with semantics of this kind, it means they ran out of counter arguments

Well I think the issues the individuals might be creating are more than just problematic or difficult debate/conversation confined to an individual thread, so that ends up being frustrating in the long term. But it is hard to avoid whoever the individuals are if they frequent the same spaces. [That is what I gather]

This is actually kind of proving to be a helpful conversation for me, as a sidenote.

Well I think if anyone is annoying anyone to the point of wanting to resort to addressing their personal characteristics, it's time to step away from the screen and rather do something more constructive with their energy and time.

I highly doubt that addressing anyone's intelligence or any other characteristics will positively affect any debate.

How far do you want to take that? For example, numerous people over the years have seen my avatar of me at the shooting range and accused me of bias without actually refuting any of the facts that I'm bringing to bear, and I've had feminists accuse me of bias based on my sex; how is that any different than taking note of someone intellect, or lack thereof, when arguing? Can I report people who unjustly accuse me of bias and expect an official response? If not, what is an is not off limits, and where is the line drawn?

I'm not trying to be difficult, just pointing out that it's actually a more complex question than it may appear on the face of it.

well if they have bias because of your avatar, then what should they think of me? that I'm a laughing hyena?

I'd ignore such people if I were you. Or, feel free to report anyone who crosses the line, and who takes anyone's gender, avatar, nail polish, colour of their socks or the size of their eyeballs into account when arguing, since it is a fallacious argument. Person can be dumb as hell and still be right about a certain thing.