Making guesses about poster's age, occupation, etc.

In this thread, the OP asks about the usefulness of studying history.

And one of the replies:

Ok, this comment was said in a tongue-in-cheek manner, so I won’t take it too seriously. But other cases are quite annoying.

For example, on another thread I made a comment on house rules for teenagers (my position was against some rule). One of the replies I got was along the lines “Oh, I get it. You are a teenager living with his parents”.
I am 24 and currently living two time zones away from my parents, so this comment couldn’t be more far off.

Anyway, I find such comments quite rude. I believe it is also a mild form of an Ad Hominem attack.

Nothing mild about it, it’s a straight-up ad hominem attack.

Ah yes, but nobody expects the ad hominem attack…our chief weapon is surprise! Surprise and fear!.. wait…Our chief weapons are… I’ll come in again.

It’s not necessarily an ad hominem attack, it all depends on how it’s done. For instance, if you’re discussing parent-teenager relationships, and one poster is obviously under the impression parents are just old fuddy duddies who want to spoil fun for the teens, it strikes me as legitimate for someone to acknowledge that your perspective is that of a teen, and not of a parent.

I have a few stalkers (mehitabel and gum come to mind) who follow me around and disrupt ongoing discussions just to post the most idiotic comments on “who” I am or “what” I am and “where” I live and “what” I do.

So doing this is actually against the board rules? That is a fun thing to know.
I never saw any moderator make a comment on such posts though.
Salaam. A

Hi Aldebaran And how are you, this fine Monday? :smiley:

A, I don’t believe there’s any *specific * rule regarding that. But if done enough, I’d imagine it could very well spill into “Being A Jerk” territory. I’d e-mail a mod for clarification (and don’t expect a quick response - they get a LOT of e-mail (I know you’ve had poor/non-responses in the past)). Or post a non-specific question (i.e. not calling out any specific Dopers) in ATMB.

Rumor has it that John Carter of Mars has the wisdom of a forty year old in the body of a twenty-five year old. He does Calvin Klein billboard ads just for fun, but in real life is a professor of philosophical linguistics and linguistic philosophy at Cornell. (He cross trained.)

There is a reason that Zoe is very, very wise. It is because Zoe is very, very, very ancient.

Still ad hominem. The message is, “You’re a teen, I’m a parent, I know better.” It may or may not be true, but it’s DEFINITELY ad hominen AND an appeal to authority.

That’s not what I said, but whatever. Your response is exactly what I’d exepect from a 43 year old African American banker.

No, it is NOT an “ad hominem,” in that it’s not attacking the speaker, but the speaker’s perspective. Sorry, but as wise as some teens can be and as immature as some older folks can be, there are some areas of expertise that a teen cannot possibly know–how to deal with marital problems, home ownership, how to manage one’s career, what it was like to live through the 70s. It is fatuous in the extreme to pretend that some 16-year-old kid has anything useful to contribute to the discussion.

“I’m the grownup and you’re the kid,” I agree, is a fallacious appeal to authority, but refusing to acknowledge that teens lack experience in many of the stages of life is equally wrong.

I had some trouble a few days after buying a new car earlier this year. I was talking to the sales manager and I told him I didn’t like the way he handled his team of employees (they had been incredibly rude to me, and I caught them in several deliberate lies), he said “I don’t think you’re old enough or have a good enough job to be telling me how to do mine.”

I seriously almost punched him.

Well, seeing as how it was my comment that inspired this little pitting…

A. I answered his question.

B. My comment was directed at the tone of his post, which anyone can see is that of a whiny schoolboy (Why do we have to study this? It’s booooooring! )

This is hardly an ad hominem attack.

The biggest problem with making guesses about a poster’s age, occupation, etc. is that sooner or later you’re going to be wrong, and end up looking like a big jerk. I laughed myself silly in this thread, in which a poster advised David Simmons to “realize that you are young and haven’t spent decades thinking about the subject [being discussed].”

Better to attack the substance of the argument and not make assumptions about the poster.

Now that I’ve had all day to consider this: Zoe, ya’ shouldn’t have ratted me out. Giving away my secret life as a Kalvin Cline model was the last straw!

Hear ye, hear ye, to wit:

I have it on the very best authority that Zoe’s recent trip to Paris was not the innocent foreign tour she would have us believe. Oh no, friends. There was much more to it than that.

One of Shodan’s spies followed our heroine through the slums of Paris and down the steps of many different cellars into dens of absinthe and iniquity. There, seated at scarred tables and slugging down water-glasses of that foul beverage, absinthe, amid clouds of hashish smoke so thick they could be cut with a knife, Zoe plotted the downfall of civilization as we know it.

Indeed, our lithe Mistress of Mayhem[sup]TM[/sup] fit into these surroundings so well that the only things to indicate that she was an American were her peace-symbol earrings fashioned from Viet Nam War era 50 cal. bullet casings and her faded Levi’s jacket with the delicately embroidered inscription: “Dick Nixon before he dicks us”.

And now I suppose you dear friends of the SDMB want to know of the evil plot that’s being hatched by the Siren of McTyeire Hall[sup]TM[/sup]. Her plan is diabolical in its simplicity:

She plans to aid and abet the importation of thousands of bottles of French wine, and then serve such French wine to the unsuspecting delegates to the Republican Convention in New York August 30th through September 2nd. Yes, dear friends: * French* wine at the ‘Pubbie’s convention! Can you believe that a Charter Member here would stoop so low?

Zoe, ya’ could have made us proud. Instead we’ve got this… this…ABOMINATION to deal with!

John Carter your attempts to flatter me in your second post have failed miserably. And let’s keep Monsieur Mayhem out of this.

BTW, you are uncanny on some things that you could not know about. The oldest possession that I have in a small treasure box is a bullet casing. I’ve had it 55 years.[/size]

Ahem!

Someone’s coming…Behave…It’s Lynn…

(Cough) As I was saying, there are times when it might be appropriate to point out that age differences are having an obvious effect on perspective. But it can be done tactfully. I see it accusations about age used to ridicule posters; I’ve done it myself when someone was deliberately trying to mislead others about his age.

We ancient :rolleyes: ones realize, I think, that we don’t have a monopoly on wisdom and that the youngsters haven’t cornered the market on boorish behavior.

Nice shot re: Monsieur Mayhem!

Um, [sub]Lynne’s coming?[/sub]

Present company excepted, of course, some of the most enjoyable and informative posts I’ve read here have been by teenagers. Conversely, some of the most tiresome have been by alleged adults.

I don’t agree with the OP that poster’s comments are automatically discounted because of age. I have found that boorishness has not been patented by any particular age group.

Hi, Lynne! :wink:

T be fair, you always take the first drink from that well.

To be perfectly boorish about it, and ad hominem attack is an ad hominem attack even when there may be some substance to the attack. Frex, “It’s a black thing, you wouldn’t understand” is an ad hominem attack on white debaters, implying there are some elements of black culture white people can’t grasp. While it may well be true that some elements of black culture are hard for white people to understand, making such claims still amounts to an ad hominem attack – the proper thing to do is to examine the specific “thing” under discussion. It’s just the same with “You’re a teen, you wouldn’t understand.”