# "Cite?" is wearing very thin **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [January 26, 2009, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065 "2009-01-26T16:55:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/half_man_half_wit/32/21766_2.png) [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Half_Man_Half_Wit)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/21 "2009-01-26T18:16:30Z")
Yeah, that cry of ‘cite?’ has rubbed me the wrong way ever since I first got here, too. It’s not that I oppose asking for cites, because that’s a good thing basically, I just can’t stand how it’s done in this dismissive, one size fits all, downputting manner – at least take the time to voice your disagreement, state what you find contentious and why, and then ask for something backing up the other’s assertions, anything else is just a lame example of disrespect under the thin guise of factual accuracy. If you’re not involved enough to take that time, you’re not really interested in the debate anyway and should probably just keep quiet. Even worse is ‘umm, cite?’, and if that’s combined with a raised-eyebrow smilie, it’s usually a guarantee that the rest of the post won’t contain anything of interest, as well. ---
**Author:** ![melodyharmonius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/melodyharmonius/32/21310_2.png) [@melodyharmonius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/melodyharmonius)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/22 "2009-01-26T18:18:48Z")
I’ve had a few times where I’ve asked a question where I was hoping for a reliable source verification and I was given a “my brother’s sister’s aunt’s dog’s babysitter’s father’s friend knew a guy who said that” So when I bumped the thread and asked for an official opinion or cite from the group (just a general call not to this participant specifically) - this person got very bent out of shape because I didn’t accept their post as fact. I haven’t been challenged for cites much - then again, I’m fairly new to the boards (less than a year) and usually stay in MPSIMS too. ---
**Author:** ![MOIDALIZE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@MOIDALIZE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MOIDALIZE)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/23 "2009-01-26T18:22:32Z")
It’s when you provide cites and the per **s** on **a** sk **i** ng for them doesn’t respond to them that you rea **l** ize that some pe **o** ple a **r** e just disingenuous and using the request as a sword to reject any statement that doesn’t jive with their beliefs. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/24 "2009-01-26T18:24:51Z")
> [@Cisco](#): > > You don’t want a cite. You either know it’s something uncitable ("my cousin once told me . . . ", “CITE?!!!”) That type of cite request is very annoying, because as you said it’s an effort to bog the argument down in minutiae. And sometimes it’s dismissive, but other times, that’s totally called for. Usually if I’m this sick of seeing that word I need a break from Great Debates. ---
**Author:** ![Harmonious\_Discord](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/74df32/32.png) [@Harmonious\_Discord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harmonious_Discord)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/25 "2009-01-26T18:29:28Z")
It’s very annoying to have some say cite for a post that is paragraphs long. You need to be responsible if you need a cite and actually point out what you want information on. I agree on the easily searched items, that these people need to do a Google search for themselves. What dog has long hair? Sheep dogs do. Cite. You’re just too lazy to search the term sheep dog, and want links. Do you not believe they have long hair and need it proved? Do it yourself. What dog has long hair? Sheep dogs do. Do you have any good links on sheep dogs? You’re actually asking for links to good sites and being specific in what you want. You’re not being a rude lazy asshole. ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/26 "2009-01-26T18:32:34Z")
> [@Cisco](#): > > or it’s something you could find ridiculously easy on Google. Like, first hit easy. Anything that turns up on the first page of Google using obvious search terms should not be asked for. Find that yourself if you’re truly interested. We’re all capable internet users here. If it’s so easy, the person that asserted it can do the work for me. The last time I asked “cite?” was about parrots speaking English–the poster should be able to back it up, and since it’s a contested topic, they should point to which aspect of it they agree with. It’s not up to me to have to google and decide where they are coming from. And why should tens of people google when one person could do the work and put it there for people to reference? ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/27 "2009-01-26T18:40:31Z")
> [@guizot](#): > > The real problem is that a “cite” is always expected to be something you can click on. Someone once asked me to give a cite, so I mention the title, author and page number of a book I had. The other poster rejected it because it wasn’t on the internet. A poster (and IIRC one I generally respect) once got snippy at me for citing a _scholarly journal article_ rather than a free website. I gave a full citation for the article I was basing my claim on, and this poster demanded a link. So I gave a link to the full text of the article on the journal’s website, but it turns out it wasn’t available to the public for free. I hadn’t even realized this because I had found the article through Google, but I was on campus at the time and the journal happened to be one that my school had an online subscription to. I can understand wanting to be able to check the cite for yourself – I remember another incident where a poster cited a book with a relevant-sounding title, but when I looked up the book up on Amazon it turned out to be about a totally different subject – but all human knowledge cannot be found for free on the Web. If the poster asking “Cite?” isn’t willing to put more than a mouseclick’s worth of effort into obtaining the cited material, that’s their problem. ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/28 "2009-01-26T19:09:55Z")
> [@gigi](#): > > If it’s so easy, the person that asserted it can do the work for me. It’s not up to me to have to google and decide where they are coming from. > > And why should tens of people google when one person could do the work and put it there for people to reference? Absurd. You wouldn’t expect someone to give you citations for every statement they made in conversation. Why? Because it’s rude and unnecessarily provocative, but people do it here because they can get away with it. And it’s not like “cites” are the be-all, end-all of objective fact anyway. Even if we only accepted peer-reviewed papers as cites, there are plenty of peer-reviewed papers out there that directly contradict each other. You accept what you decide to accept, and if something that is important to you is questionable, you look it up yourself. Here you can go the extra step of saying, "hey, I looked into this and what I found contradicts what poster X stated . . . ", or just make a more compelling argument. Expecting the membership to spoon feed you everything you want to know is preposterous. Did you accept everything your teachers told you in school? I know I didn’t, and I trust teachers and professors far more than I trust random annonymous people on the internet. > [@Lamia](#): > > all human knowledge cannot be found for free on the Web. Amen to that. There should be a popup that says that everytime you log on to this website. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/29 "2009-01-26T19:46:24Z")
Just chiming in to affirm my long-standing belief that while asking for a cite is sometimes needed, all too often on this board it’s a bullshit fool’s game meant to shout down or attempt to marginalize the poster. I’ve seen several “my opinion” or “I believe”, followed by someone demanding a cite. It’s been done to me. No one needs to provide citations for their own beliefs or opinions. In this instance, I firmly believe that the Moderators should step in and provide a warning to the offender, informing them that this is not acceptable behavior. The other side of this coin is the firmly entrenched belief in some circles of the power of the printed word. “Cite” is a demand to see it in print, which as we all know doesn’t necessarily mean that it is true. It always reminds me of the narcissistic fools I encountered on some of the old Usenet groups, who thought you were nobody unless you’d had something (_anything_) published. Many of whom had the bizarro idea that merely posting their own crappy poems to Usenet constituted “being published”. :rolleyes: Then too there is the laziness factor. I’ve both seen and recieved some hostile demands for citation that, if the demander had any fucking brains or put out the same amount of effort on google, they could bloody well find it themselves. These piss me off the most. _If you have the energy to be snarky on a message board, you have the energy to google it first._ People who do this are perhaps unaware of how poorly they come off in doing it, but perhaps they don’t care because they’re concentrating on pushing the other person’s face in the sand. ---
**Author:** ![Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/cc9497/32.png) [@Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capt.Ridley_s_Shooting_Party)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/30 "2009-01-26T20:30:41Z")
> [@MOIDALIZE](#): > > It’s when you provide cites and the per **s** on **a** sk **i** ng for them doesn’t respond to them that you rea **l** ize that some pe **o** ple a **r** e just disingenuous and using the request as a sword to reject any statement that doesn’t jive with their beliefs. Very funny. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/31 "2009-01-26T21:00:27Z")
I’m O.K. with giving “Cite?” a rest, in favor of any of a number of other requests, such as: “Do you have evidence to support that claim?” “Mind sharing some references with us?” “Got facts?” I agree about non-Internet-accessible sources being perfectly legitimate, if such (a book, for example) is by a non-obscure author/publisher who is likely to have some authoritative perspective on the matter. “Revelations That Came To Me After Drinking” by Billybob Macatee, Vanity Press Inc. does not count. ---
**Author:** ![Sitnam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Sitnam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sitnam)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/32 "2009-01-26T21:22:56Z")
What would you prefer? “I’ll retort your made up claims with some of my own.” Before you know it we’ll call ourselves Freepers. ---
**Author:** ![Cuckoorex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ad7895/32.png) [@Cuckoorex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cuckoorex)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/33 "2009-01-26T21:25:12Z")
> [@Jack\_Batty](#): > > I always figured “Cite!” was just Great Debate Speak for “bullshit!” Me, too. It’s my opinion that most people who ask “Cite?” have already looked into the topic (or at least feel that they have) and are confident that the person being challenged will not find any supporting cites for their position. As far as asking for a cite to defend one’s opinion…why is that so ridiculous? Some opinions, yes, cannot be decided with facts, like “Is Hillary Swank hot?” but some opinions “The government shouldn’t be trusted, because of things like Area 51 and the Moon Landing Hoax,” should be challenged. ---
**Author:** ![Illuminatiprimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/illuminatiprimus/32/11520_2.png) [@Illuminatiprimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Illuminatiprimus)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/34 "2009-01-26T22:57:35Z")
See this is tricky for me, because I absolutely think that GD and GQ need to have evidence in them unless the issue being discussed is either a) purely speculative or b) completely subjective, in which case evidence/facts are hard to come by or maybe even logically impossible. That said, as others have said in this thread, someone simply saying “Cite?” or even worse “Um, cite?” (FTR “um” and “er” make me want to punch my monitor) is exactly the same as shouting “bullshit!” - they’re completely interchangeable. If you want to dispute a particular fact and/or opinion, you say so. If you’re querying whether there is information available about a referenced statistic/study/factoid/whatever then ask for it. If someone has said something demonstrably spurious then call them on it by challenging what they say, don’t just arch your eyebrows says “Cite?” as if that’s suddenly an end to the discussion. I know that I’ve asked people for a cite before, and sometimes yes even as a way of saying “I find that hard to believe, evidence please” but I’d only ever do it as part a full post making clear why I disagreed or wanted verification on something, because otherwise it’s just fucking rude. As for people who ask cites when people have made clear they’re expressing an opinion, that says more about their own intellectual shortcomings or laziness than it does about the person who expressed the opinion if they can’t even be bothered to say what they think is wrong with it. ---
**Author:** ![Algorithm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/algorithm/32/12204_2.png) [@Algorithm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Algorithm)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/35 "2009-01-26T23:02:03Z")
> [@Cuckoorex](#): > > As far as asking for a cite to defend one’s opinion…why is that so ridiculous? Some opinions, yes, cannot be decided with facts, like “Is Hillary Swank hot?” but some opinions “The government shouldn’t be trusted, because of things like Area 51 and the Moon Landing Hoax,” should be challenged. Right. In most threads about 9/11, a drive by poster comes in and makes a bunch of wild claims with nothing to back up any of them. Typically I request cites because I want to see what website they are copying and pasting from. I can easily find 9/11 conspiracy websites that have the same claims on them as they are making, but the point is to demonstrate that their source material is unsubstantiated garbage. [Cite: me repeatedly using “Cite?”](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=10587385&postcount=20) I don’t think there was anything unacceptable about my cited “Cite?” usage, even though I likely could have found the same sources our conspiracy theorist would have provided, had they returned to the thread. _They_ are making the claim, _they_ have to back it up with some sort of evidence. ---
**Author:** ![Illuminatiprimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/illuminatiprimus/32/11520_2.png) [@Illuminatiprimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Illuminatiprimus)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/36 "2009-01-26T23:08:02Z")
> [@Algorithm](#): > > I don’t think there was anything unacceptable about my cited “Cite?” usage Me neither, but then you were clear what it was you were disputing. Had you just had a load of quotes followed by a lone “cite?” you would have been acting like a dick. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/37 "2009-01-26T23:10:25Z")
> [@gigi](#): > > If it’s so easy, the person that asserted it can do the work for me. The last time I asked “cite?” was about parrots speaking English–the poster should be able to back it up, and since it’s a contested topic, they should point to which aspect of it they agree with. It’s not up to me to have to google and decide where they are coming from. > > And why should tens of people google when one person could do the work and put it there for people to reference? This seems more like a case where you, in what I would think to be the minority of people who doubt that parrots can speak English (assuming we’re just talking about mimicry here\*) could just google it and find video footage aplenty. When I stumble across a topic that everyone else seems to know but me, I consider the responsibility of remedy mine. (\*If you mean about parrots actually conversing intelligently in English, please ignore everything I just said) ---
**Author:** ![PatriotGrrrl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/9dc877/32.png) [@PatriotGrrrl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotGrrrl)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/38 "2009-01-26T23:15:29Z")
I guess I’m the odd one out here, because I think “cite?” is much more polite than “bullshit, you’re just making that up”. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/39 "2009-01-26T23:20:33Z")
But to the thread in general, I think I agree, it sometimes seems to be much more about bullying than a genuine request for information. There are examples (I could cite them, but I’m not going to) where people routinely demand ‘Cite!’, then ignore, misinterpret or dreadfully abuse the cited information when it is provided - or, just as bad - demand citation for every jot and tittle of their opponent’s argument, but seem perfectly happy to make bold, strenuous uncited assertions of their own. Evidence is great, but it’s quite possible for those demanding it to be intellectually dishonest. ---
**Author:** ![MOIDALIZE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@MOIDALIZE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MOIDALIZE)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2009, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065/40 "2009-01-26T23:29:23Z")
> [@PatriotGrrrl](#): > > I guess I’m the odd one out here, because I think “cite?” is much more polite than “bullshit, you’re just making that up”. It’s fine when used as an alternate to “bullshit, you’re just making that up.” When it’s used as an alternate to “you’ve refuted my half-assed response with something more sensible, which challenges my fragile internet ego, therefore I’m going to snottily demand proof of your claim, even though I have no actual interest in the truth, because I know it will either discourage you from challenging me again or keep you busy finding a link while I continue to spout my inane bullshit in this thread” is when I have a problem. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/cite-is-wearing-very-thin/483065.md?page=3)