Oh honey, no. Even stuff like All Your Base and Mike Tyson Ate My Balls were at least the iron age. The stone age was Usenet lore like the SPISPOPD FAQ.
Literally nobody has suggested any better way to say anything, despite direct questions throughout, asking exactly that.
The entire problem in the root thread was someone going ‘what did you want?!’ when I said: yes, thanks. And everyone saying that was terribly rude also thinks it was disagreement. So the question of ‘what else was I supposed to do’ goes unanswered, and everybody piling on to say ‘well not that’ is making the same error that is highlighted and corrects in the root thead.
And you in particular have nothing to add but increasingly shallow name-calling and ‘well, don’t.’ Don’t fucking talk down to me about reading my own words when you just got done declaring me unworthy of human interaction, after being shocked, shocked!, that someone would remain confused by a dozen people repeating the same mistake.
I am genuinely disappointed in this community’s moderators for not already showing you the door over the worst of your hypocritical abuse. Did you have anything more you wanted to spit before going on my blocklist and out of my sight?
‘How am I suppose to make this comparison without an invitation being labeled as hostile?’
‘Don’t.’
Less helpful than you might think.
People: the comparison is the point of the comment. And even if that was somehow the worst possible way to make it, I’m still left wondering how the fuck to de-escalate confusion, if direct agreement is enough to launch monocles from faces. If “thanks” is hostile, what the hell are we doing.
My favorite part of this haranguing is how y’all don’t hesitate to declare I’m subhuman and due for getting bones broken, but I’m the rude and hostile one for saying please and thanks.
This is the rudest thing you could think to say to someone, and it’s over nothing.
I can’t demean your character worse than you’ve just done, yourself.
Same where? You had one comment and it’s just the same tutting. That’s not comparable to the variety of ways I tried de-escalating with the initial guy.
Now you want to claim you agree with me - about the widespread misreading of anything I write in the worst possible way - and you’re threatening violence over that same misreading. What the fuck is this conversation?
‘You were very rude disagreeing with that guy.’ I said I agree with them and thanked them.
‘Well you were aggressive toward people critiquing your rude disagreement.’ I told them there was no such thing, because I said I agree with them and thanked them.
‘It’s plainly these specific turns of phrase.’ I have invited half a dozen people to suggest what I was supposed to do besides agree and thank them.
‘Hey buddy, I agree with you, but I wanna kick your head in for explaining how you’re unhappy with all this condemnation.’ This topic has been the most compelling argument I’ve ever experienced, against trying to be nice to people online.
I don’t expend effort trying to be rude, but I rarely bend over backwards to reign in my default blunt tone. Not that gentle honesty seems to matter. I will argue the ethics and efficacy of well-meaning censorship with randos and moderators alike. Some of them are definitely Nazis in disguise. Some of them are not in disguise.
But most simply do not know what trolling is.
It’s like the Twitter generation thinks it means harassment, or vulgarity, or just being mean to people. No: trolling is fucking with people to get an emotional reaction. Sometimes that emotional reaction is extremely justified. Think of any “just a prank, bro” bullshit. That is trolling. That is violating the social contract to laugh at people for having sane responses to your inexcusable behavior. It is being an asshole, as bait, so you can pretend to be shocked, shocked!, and then play the victim while continuing to be an infuriating asshole.
Any moderator who expects polite discourse, and does not create an environment where words matter, is actively making the internet worse. You want an easy time pruning a worthwhile forum? Aim for a cocktail-party atmosphere. Screaming rants no, casual banter yes, tell people to take five if they’re starting shit. But if someone lays out why another user is completely full of shit - you had damn well better come down against being full of shit.
Over and over and over. None of you are listening.
And it’s NOT condescension, it’s building a fucking comparison! It’s a sixth-grade-reading-comprehension rhetorical device. It’s getting ahead of an obvious yeah-but someone might make… and then someone made that yeah-but anyway. And then got mad that I told them: I agree, thank you.
The fuck was I supposed to tell them? If there was no right answer - none of this criticism means anything.