Shodan has brought considerable enlightenment to your lowly correspondent from the conservative wing of the extreme left. Until he pointed it out, I had no idea that friend Gaudere had enlisted in the ranks of the Great Unpatriotic Conspiracy. This is welcome news to those of us who labor every day to undermine and corrupt all that is good and worthy in America, as embodied in the sublime presence of The Leader.
It is thus with considerable regret that I note that our current stockpile of toaster ovens is depleted, due to the recent upsurge of new recruits. We beg friend Gaudere to understand our predicament, and hope that the much esteemed Gaudere will permit us to substitute a copy of The Wit and Wisdom of “Fightin’ Joe” Lieberman.
What Uncle Beer said. Nomenclature should have to abide by standardized rules which are not content-specific, not flexible – although I do see Gaudere’s point that context makes a significant difference in whether something is to be construed as a generic statement of opinion or a insult of specific poster(s).
Besides, as a wild hijack, would “Saddamite” be acceptable under the Marquis of Queensbury’s Rules?
As a sort of reply to the thread in general, although I am still hoping Manny will answer my specific question above, let’s imagine a hypothetical situation.
There’s this guy, we’ll call him Bob. Bob is a very bad man. There’s these two other guys, let’s call them Sam and Dave. Sam wants to kick Bob in the nuts. Dave wants to put a bullet in Bob’s head. People are invited to line up behind Sam and Dave to show their support for the two courses of action each represent. Would it be fair for the people in line behind Dave to deride the people in line behind Sam as being pro-Bob?
No, as in “Bush thinks homos are going to hurt him”. It is in Evil Captor’s thread about how all Republicans support torture.
About specific, particular Dopers? I thought that was part of what you objected to in manhattan’s post.
Perhaps the other posters could simply have asked manhattan to prove that they supported torture. Thus no warning was needed.
I’ve lost track of the times spectrum has accused me (and others) of wanting to kill gays because we don’t bark “Yes sir!” whenever the idea of gay marriage is discussed.
But no. That particular word structure is original to manhattan, AFAIK.
No, he started a thread where he called me a torture-lover, and an earlier one where I was a racist. Because I am a Republican and a Bush supporter.
First it was OK if EC explained his insult. Now it is not OK even though manhattan explained his.
We aren’t getting anywhere on this, are we? We (or at least I) keep hitting up against this -
“Republicans support torture” - OK.
“Bush-bashers support torture” - not OK.
Thanks for the explanation, although it didn’t really help.
You do understand the difference between a false accusation and a name, right? GD couldn’t exist if people didn’t make accusations and claims, even insulting ones, because it works to debunk and criticize those claims. But GD can exist just fine without name calling.
Because EC is an idiot, he gets a pass on posting something idiotic. Because manny is pretty smart, he doesn’t get a pass on posting something idiotic.
I believe this standard needs to be completely revised if this board is to maintain its current mission statement.
This is a total hijack, but when blinding flashes of insight strike they must be shared.
Message for the Conservative Dopers: You know that feeling that you have of being outnumbered here, and that there is unequal treatment going on and that your voice is simply not being heard? That is how your Liberal counterparts feel every single day in the real world
Message for the Liberal Dopers: You know how you feel that the whole world has gone crazy around you and that you are outnumbered and that your opinions don’t matter? That is how your Conservative counterparts feel here.
I bring this up partially as a call for empathy for one another and also as a call for a whole lot more deliberation and thought in our actions and how fairly we treat one another. It seems to me that we all want the same things for our country, more or less, and that we simply differ in how we think that we should get there. Would it hurt us so much (all of us!) to attempt a higher level of mutual respect?
On your first point: I am using “taking them lower” to mean “lower than we want them to be” not “lower than **Evil Captor ** has already taken them.” My apologies for being unclear. Even if the two are equivalent (on which we may differ), I still object to supporting his behavior… which (your second point) is a distinction you did not make in your original post.
Some may well be. It’s my impression, however, that most of the participants are not oblivious – they (we) simply think he’s wrong. Popping into a thread to call a group of fellow Dopers “Saddamites” with intent to offend (as admitted by manhattan) is obnoxious. I have repeatedly said that the behavior of others is no excuse for lowering one’s own standards. If manhattan (or you, or anyone else) has a problem with a post, report it. You certainly know how.
As for spiraling down into personal attacks, I see much less of that in this Pit thread than there have been in others, on less divisive topics (widescreen DVD vs. fullscreen, anyone?).
I am disappointed that you would choose to take a parting shot and leave.
To repeat, I am with manhattan on the issue being pitted. But, while both UncleBeer and Shodan have termed the word “Saddamite” an offensive logical fallacy or at the very least an insult, why is manhattan continuing to defend its use?
Well, I don’t really come into the pit much, but thought I’d put in my two cents on this thread as I was sort of involved in the thread in question in GD. Basically, I have to say that I thought manhattan’s remarks were off the wall as I had no idea even who he was targetting with that (I assumed it was me, as it closely followed one of my long ass posts).
However, reading through Gaudere’s explaination I don’t see the rational in spanking him over it. To me, his post was pretty stupid and off the wall because it made no sense in the context of the discussion. There was no clear target for it because of this. You say that you will spank someone on the board for specific targetted insults (which I agree with btw), but who did YOU think it was targetted at? My impression was A) It was targetted at me, which is insane if you think about it, as I get accused by the Bush bashing side constantly for supporting him and the war, or B) It was targeted in frustration at the anti-war crowd in general.
If B, then it meets your criteria for general insults. Doesn’t matter if its stupid or inaccurate, as so are general insults directed at political parties IMO.
If it was targetted at me, hey, no worries…its to ridiculous of a claim to take seriously. Not only am I NOT a Saddam supporter, I couldn’t stand the guy…and the only one I would soddomize would be my wife. Even if I WERE gay, I wouldn’t be offended by that, as it was an obvious attempt to be witty…and I’ve heard the term before in any case.
As to what I consider the main thrust of the OP, that of general rules in GD, I’ve noticed a lot more venom in GD lately than I remember from the past. For years I’ve come to this forum because of the intersting people who post here. Recently I was comfortable enough with my English to start trying to join in. But I’ve noticed even before I started posting that things were heating up as far as the language and insults went.
I suppose I can see why threads like Republicans like torture or are racist are allowed, but such threads invite the very thing you are trying to avoid. I think a review of policy for such idiotic threads should be done to determine if its appropriate for them to be in GD or whether they should be summarily moved to The Pit or to MPSIMS. Not saying its a banning offense, but threads are moved all the time from forum to forum…maybe a policy should be put in place to move such controversial (and stupid) threads to more appropriate forums?
Surely you can see the difference between someone saying “I hate homos” (using a derogatory and hateful term) and someone saying “Bush thinks homos are going to hurt him”, which is, due to the context, effecitvely putting the word into Bush’s mouth?
Suppose that it was agreed that the word “fundie” was so hateful and loaded with emotional content that it should be treated like “nigger” and “fag”. It would be unacceptable to call another doper a “fundie” or to refer to Christians in general as “fundies”. But it would be acceptable to say “John Kerry hates fundies”. (It would be implying that Kerry was bigotedly anti-Christian which, true or false, is a claim that one is allowed to make).
I agree that spectrum is pretty inflamed about that particular issue and often completely goes off the deep end of reason. But can you link to an example of a personal insult directed at dopers? Ideally, one in GD? If we’re trying to discuss a hypothetical double standard (and I don’t prima facie deny the possibility of its existence) we need some examples…
Gaudere explained this quite clearly… it’s OK to insult groups. That doesn’t count as insulting members of that group. It’s not OK to insult dopers, or (presumably) small groups of dopers. If you wish to post an OP saying “all liberals and democrats are traitors and cowards”, feel free to. If you’re given a warning for that, then you’ve definitely got some evidence of your claimed double standard. (It may, however, be the case that if you start such a thread and the mods believe that you are doing so simply to prove a point, or simply to be a jerk, and not because you truly believe your own OP, that you’ll get in trouble… I’m a bit unclear on this point.)
I can see the distinction Gaudere is making. Saying “Republicans are evil” is OK, as it’s an attack on a broad group. Saying “the Republicans that are posting in this thread are evil” isn’t, as it’s an attack on fellow posters. I’m fine with that distinction, personally. So I’d like to bring up a post from the same thread as manhattan’s by Mr. Svinlesha:
Too me, all three quoted portions are insulting, though the latter two are not direct, personal insults. I’m not sure that they’re against the rules, although I think that ideally they should be, at least in GD. Comments of that type are cheap snipes intended to imply that the other person is dumb, and they serve no purpose in debating.
But it’s really the first quote that I’m interested in. It seems to me that it directly insults a group of posters: “conservatives on this board”. I don’t think the fact that he qualifies it with “many” changes that. And “hateful” and “snide” are insults, in my opinion, because unlike “liar” (which is allowed) these qualities are mostly subjective. If a poster is caught in a lie, then he’s a liar. But what qualifies someone as being hateful? That their posts frequently contain hate? But there’s no easy way to determine that, except possibly for really extreme cases (such as white supremicists). If I read a poster’s posts and think that they are frequently dumb, then I might honestly say that, in my experience, the poster is dumb. But that (rightly) wouldn’t be allowed in GD. I see “hateful” as being similar.
