I wish Lib were as nice on the board as Polycarp and others have intimated he is in the real world. On the board, he comes across as sanctimonous, overly sensitive, and attention-starved. And down right mean, too. I’m glad he has friends who are coming to his defense, but I hope they (and lurkers) don’t think the rest of us are talking out of our asses.
I usually don’t join the Pit pile-ons, but I think this one is justified.
Thanks for all the useful criticisms as well as voices of affirmation. This is quite a lot to digest. Suppose I made a list of ways to improve in your eyes — what one criticism would you tell me to put at the top?
Please keep in mind that sometimes suggestions can cause a Catch-22. For example, in '00 or thereabouts, Gaudere suggested (I don’t think she was yet a moderator) that I take my particular viewpoints to separate threads, since they often have either a philosophical, political, or spiritual approach, owing to my worldview. A similar suggestion was made here. But what happened back then is that there arose complaints that I was opening a separate thread called, say, “The Ethics of Public Schools” when I could simply have expressed my view in the original thread. What am I to do when either way, someone doesn’t like it? Not post at all? While I’m sure that my not posting would be a great solution for some people, it doesn’t really work for me.
My complaint is that he replies to threads with concepts, many of which are throw-away one liners, that many can’t understand. Now, this is wonderful, for polycarp and tris and many others. If you understand where he’s coming from, then you appreciate him.
But, if you are the average poster, of which I count myself, then you are bewildered and feel that he is making fun of you, that he is in an ivory tower.
And, while I do that myself sometimes, it isn’t the way to convince people that your idea is correct. It’s satisfying on an intellectual level to me and Lib, but it is wasted as a method of teaching someone why you are right and they are wrong.
Does that make sense?
What about when he asked the mods to suspend his account so he could take a break…and he went racing over to Fathom screaming about how they banned him?
Or his fellating of Bobby Fisher, despite the fact that the man is a raving anti-Semite loon?
More threads ruined by Lib, ones where he purposely acts obtuse:
The fight against ignorance gets violent!
Why can’t you control your damn tumors?
Bobby Fischer is being deported from Japan to US for 92’ match in Yugoslavia.
My problem with Lib is that I think that, underneath the veneer of great knowledge, I really don’t think he debates all that well. The two times I most clearly remember arguing precise points with him, once concerning the validity of the ontological proof, and once concerning My Pet Goat, I felt like he evaded answering tough questions, responded with meaningless analogies, and basically seemed more intent on Not Losing The Argument than either covincing anyone of his point or being intellectually honest.
One other thing that really bugged me: There was a thread about "what political figures would make good dopers?’, and (not surprisingly) many members of the Bush administration were mentioned as NOT being good potential dopers. Lib showed up and said something like “so, are there any conservatives that you liberals DO think would make good dopers”. And then, various such conservatives were listed. But did he then say “ahh, I see” or “I withdraw my snide implication” or anything of that sort?
He did not.
Have you considered branching out of the Pit? Of your 545 posts in the last month :eek:, fully 375 have been in pit threads. I realize the Pit is a nice safe place for you, because you can flame when someone pisses you off, but you might win more friends, and influence more people if you made an effort in a somewhat more civilized atmosphere.
Lib?
I pity his wife as I have never pitied another woman.
In this thread alone, he has earned the title of “condescending asshole”, “deliberately obtuse”, “batshit crazy”, “smug”, “thick-headed”, “not very bright”, “sanctimonious”, and “[an](oh no square brackets!) attention whore”.
Just imagine what he’s like in real life. :eek:
If I had one criticism above all others, Lib (and remember this is supposed to be constructive criticism, otherwise I wouldn’t essay it), it’s that you’re a man of great erudition with a rather unique worldview (how many libertarian objectivist Christians with training in formal logic and the extensive reading you’ve clearly done are you acquainted with?) – and you seem to assume that everyone else is going to quickly grasp what’s obvious to you. Well, I don’t happen to know what Berkowitz said to Kilroy, or what E(A) → {n}X U /E(A) suggests. (Neither of which are actual things you’ve said, but arbitrarily chosen examples of an allusion and a formal-logic proposition you might throw into the midst of a discussion.) And that they may shed light on the discussion, from your perspective, I can accept – but for the rest of us they seem as much a trainwreck on its way to happen, or a complete non sequitur, as the goofiest thing ever said by any of the One Trick Pony Marching and Chowder Society. To reiterate something that you reminded me of a long time ago: Consider your audience.
In hopes that’s of value to you,
your friend
Polycarp
With all due respect, I think you are giving bad advice Polycarp. You are playing into his own delusions of grandeur. The problem is not that he is just to darn brainy- it’s that he gets wacky over-involved in minutae and his own slowly evolving personal hot-button list.
You really want an answer, Max?
While I’m sure Lib can speak for himself, I would imagine it’s because he felt that those conservatives who were listed never would have been had it not been for his “snide implication.” And Lib’s not even a conservative.
The overwhelming and unrelenting liberal bias here (not that there’s anything wrong with that; there are plenty of conservative-biased boards too) can try the patience of those of us who don’t share that point of view. It’s easy to let an unintended tone of impatience or condescention creep into your posts when you feel like what you’re reading is so predictably biased on a board that is supposed to be enlightened and fighting ignorance.
Well, I hesitate to Pit anyone, being fairly new here myself and all. But I will add that the few times I have come across Lib, he has appeared to me to be both condescending and harsh. It’s funny-on another bb I post on, my moniker includes the word “liberal”, so I felt more than taken aback when the poster here struck me as neither progressive or liberal. Pedantic, picayune, and patronizing, yes. Sorry, Lib, but like the other poster, you have tainted my world view of Libertarianism–no, thank you.
Then again, Lib strikes me as someone who may not pick up on humor real easily and so comes across as pedantic and picayune, only b/c he is trying to establish meaning–maybe he can’t see a joke or a witty allusion. If so, he needs some slack cut him.
As to your dilemma re: starting new threads etc. My suggestion is to ask yourself–do you really want to go there? Is this topic one that you feel so strongly about that you can support a whole 'nother thread on it? Just my 2 cents…
I can’t think of anything specific, so I’ll just list some of the milder things you can work on.
1)Relax. You get entirely too defensive over a simple question. You tend to assume that posters are being snarky when they just want an answer. I’ve run into this a couple of times. You could also learn to read through the snark and try to get to the point contained therein. It’s how I learned to read your posts, and that ain’t easy.
2)Listen, or rather read since this is a message board. If you’re hearing voices in your head, it may be time to lay off the message board for a while.
A good example of this would be the Polar Express GD thread. You gave a list of cites that you believed showed that kids/teenagers etc were incapable of rational thought. The cites didn’t back it up. The only claim that all of them made was that the study may show why teenagers were less likely to be rational, and they weren’t even concrete in that claim. I tried to explain this to you. I am not an expert, but I have the brains to read. Hentor tried to explain this to you and he is an expert. Sometimes people other than you have a point but not the patience to ram skulls with you for eight pages to do it.
3)If you think you are right, lay off the friggin insults. At least give it a reply or two before you fire back.
4)Stop assigning political parties to those who do not want them. In fact, just stop judging people by their political views.
5)You are being pitted here. Your next post had better contain at least eight expletives.
I know, you asked for the top problem, but I thought I’d be extra helpfull. And I’m sorry if this was wordy. My voice has just bottomed out on me, so I have a bit of a surplus.
I’d expand that to: consider the overall context of the discussion.
Sometimes I think I kind of understand Lib’s unified theory of, well, everything but most times he leaves me more confused than anything. His Objectivist/Christian (forgive me if I got that wrong) stance knits together distinct viewpoints in a distinctly unusual way. It usually appears hopelessly tangled to me, but hey, it seems to work for him. He just doesn’t do such a great job of conveying it comprehensibly to others. Occassionally playing devil’s advocate for the pure buzz of debate just compounds the fracture–and he’s never less than passionate about anything. I’m often left scratching my head, wondering, “Where in the hell is he coming from now?”
Playing devil’s advocate can be fine but it needs to be clearly identified as such, and extend to the actual heart of the discussion. The Ann Coulter thread is an example. There were a lot of meaty directions that thread could have taken: journalistic standards and responsiblities, media as opinion shapers, etc. Lib had some valid points about exact wordings, but the semantic nitpicking ended up obscuring more than it illluminated. It was a spoken interview, not a written piece where every word could be weighed carefully in advance, so the overall context was disregarded.
I’d suggest a quick litmus test: “what will this post add to the discussion?” If it’s likely to add confusion, requiring extended explanations to supply a reasonable context, then it needs to be re-thought.
FWIW.
Veb
I like Lib. He enjoys playing the devil’s advocate, and I think this sometimes affects his analysis of a topic, but he is a good guy to have around. The majority of his posts are not comprised of misguided quibbling about square brackets; most are thought-provoking responses which say something that had been missing.
Personally, I think you give him too much credit to call him a “devil’s advocate”. An effective devil’s advocate could argue a contrary position and not just follow the line of:
Poster 1: Premise
Poster 2: Agreement
Liberal: Hairsplitting objection
Poster 1: Analysis of objection, slight modification of Premise to eliminate objection
Poster 2: Further analysis
Liberal: Repetition of hairsplitting objection
Poster 1: Clarification of modification
Poster 2: Questioning of Liberal’s motive
Liberal(1): Repetition of hairsplitting objection
Liberal(2): Attack on Poster 2, questioning Poster 2’s intelligence
Poster 1: Statement of evidence that objection is baseless
Poster 2: Return attack on Liberal
Poster 3: Analysis and support of premise, including modification
Liberal(1): Repetition of hairsplitting objection
Liberal(2): Pithy comment on Poster 2’s probable status as a simian, mention of minor typographical/spelling error in Poster 2’s comment
Liberal(3): Scrambled philosophical jargon vaguely dismissing modification
Liberal(4): General comment on democrats/leftists/liberals. Appeal to pity as a lone set-upon conservative voice.
Repeat as necessary, with Liberal’s forays into the thread quickly approaching blocks of seven to ten consecutive messages, each directed at a different poster, but all in support of the hairsplitting modification.
Devil’s advocate? I daresay the Devil can afford better representation.
I used to feel that way-but anymore, I cringe when he comes in. I want to like Lib, and give him a fair chance, but he’s so damned snooty and he often ruins perfectly good discussions that I want to shake him.
If there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s when people hijack discussions to talk about their own pet issues. Or people who can’t admit when they’re wrong, and nitpick the hell out of something until the whole subject is destroyed.
I tend to believe that the posts on this message board fully reflect the personality in of the poster in real life. I know mine do. I find it doubtful that the real life Liberal is as wonderful as some paint him to be, or as nasty as others paint him to be. My two cents? I just don’t like him.
I do not like thee, Dr. Fell
The reason why I cannot tell
But this I know and know full well
I do not like thee, Dr. Fell
Consider my post amended and this one ratified. Thanks, Veb! Great clarification.
He’ll stab you in the back, too.
The past 2 centuries of Western culture have been effective at erasing the culture and in many cases the presence of indigenous peoples.
Those that survive, generate individuals who uncomfortably inhabit the periphery of the dominating culture. Amongst dominating cultures, the North American is one of the most unforgiving.
There’s less access to education and employment opportunities and a correspondingly greater effort each and every day to have meaningful interaction in that dominating culture. Religion is one way in but it is far from the main game.
So I understand when Liberal doesn’t really want to talk about what is on his mind, except in the most oblique terms. As per polycarp, truth and pain are not far removed.