- Smeef
- Aug 15, 2003
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I posted my food for USPOL Thanksgiving!
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Pillbug
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MikeC wasn't the OP. Discendo Vox was the OP, and his post could charitably be interpreted as using abuser in the sense of "abuse of control" or "abuse of power", not physical and emotional abuse. I could see it going either way.
Which itself is a suggestion for D&D: use the principle of charity with your fellow posters. Give their posts the benefit of the doubt, or at least be considerate when expressing that doubt. This principle isn't just about word choice, but this exchange is illustrative.
For example, it would have been over far more quickly and smoothly if the response was "Your use of the word 'abuser' is possibly insensitive to people who have been victims of abuse. Can you choose a different word next time?"
Noting that big flaming stink appears to have experienced abuse, their angry response is also understandable. Again, the right thing to do isn't to escalate in response to them, it's something like "Maybe my word choice was poor. Here's what I really meant, using different language."
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Jan 31, 2022 04:13
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May 21, 2024 10:15
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- Smeef
- Aug 15, 2003
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I posted my food for USPOL Thanksgiving!
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Pillbug
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Ok, I’m going to make a bit of an effort post here. I’m not sure if these are specific rules so much as they are suggestions for posters in general to prevent threads from spiraling into poo poo.
First, it can be helpful to be clear about what the purpose of a post is, whether reading it or writing it. Maybe there are some other categories out there, but I see post content falling into a pretty limited number of categories:- Explaining, including arguing for a particular interpretation of something — could be history, current events, political behavior, etc.
- Predicting, usually with some sort of rationale for that prediction
- Making a normative argument — “X is bad. Y should be done.”
- Venting — Sometimes people are just pissed off about poo poo and need to let off some steam. Personally I think it’s fine. But there are cases where I sense that posters are confusing their own venting for making an argument, or it spills over into a discussion that’s not really about what they’re angry about.
- Having a laugh — This is still a comedy forum, and even if it’s not, lack of solemnity doesn’t mean lack of seriousness.
- Sharing something interesting / not sure what to make of it yet — This easily gets into RSS feed for Twitter territory, but I do find that sometimes there are articles that I want to share even though I haven’t formulated a great interpretation yet and thus don’t have much to add to it.
- Posting about posting — Generally annoying
I notice a lot of cases where discussion devolves because posts (during writing them or reading them) aren’t distinguishing between the above.
Second, it’s helpful to understand how you can be wrong or less effective in an argument. I’m basically taking all of this from memory from the book “How to Read a Book,” which everyone in D&D should read. (There are probably a lot of other good ideas to take from that book, too.)
- Under-informed — You’ve got the facts right, but you don’t have enough of them, aren’t going deep enough, etc. This is very easy when discussing complex topics. No one is going to have all the information, so don’t feel be too upset when you learn something new.
- Misinformed (related to the above) — Your facts are, in fact, not factual. This should be easy to correct, but there are occasionally extreme differences in what evidence is legitimate and not. I honestly am not sure what to do when arguments rely on incompatible bases of fact. And don’t be too defensive when you got a fact wrong… this is D&D, not JAMA. (That said, come on, do some Googling, check your sources, and qualify your claims before posting something you aren’t certain about.)
- Illogical — You can have all the facts right and still be connecting them in the wrong way. This is where the logical fallacies that people complain about show up. Whataboutism gets mentioned a lot, but there are many others that are equally prevalent but less frequently identified. Unfortunately, I've met few people in life, much less on these forums, who are willing to admit when they've been illogical.
- Big picture, completeness, and polish — Maybe these are three distinct things or overlap with the above, but they tie all the above together. A post can have all the facts straight and strong logic, but sometimes doesn’t really have an actual focus or argument. Or it doesn’t follow its argument the whole way through. Or it might be poorly written and hard to interpret. That doesn’t make it wrong, but it can undermine the post in some cases.
Finally, try to be good to your fellow goons. - Interpret posts charitably and give people the benefit of the doubt (though don’t be naive and fall for trolls or bad-faith posting).
- Address the post; don’t attack the poster (which is a logical fallacy anyway). Even when the poster is making abhorrent claims, it’s far better for discussion to not resort to calling them a monster, etc. It just puts them in a defensive posture from which you’ll probably never convince them to exit.
- Don’t go overboard when addressing select details in a post / remember the overall argument. So often there is a great post with one lovely sentence thrown in, and then that one lovely sentence become a multi-page derail that loses the original argument. When done in a positive way, though, this contributes to good meandering conversation.
- Be a patient teacher and a patient, open-minded learner. No one is keeping score of the arguments you ‘win’ in D&D. Personally, I think that the most you can hope for here is to improve yours or others’ understanding and maybe have some fun doing it.
- If you really just can’t engage constructively with a poster over and extended period, the Ignore List remains the most underrated feature on the forums.
Thank you, Dr. Hibbert. I rest my case.
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