# Pitting Mr. Green Bean
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200
**Category:** The BBQ Pit
**Created:** [June 2, 2004, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200 "2004-06-02T03:47:52Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 3
### Author:  [@Lord\_Ashtar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Ashtar)
#### Post date: [June 3, 2004, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/41 "2004-06-03T16:23:37Z")
> [@Olentzero](#):
>
> Here’s one for you, asshole. Why try to make an explicit connection between political beliefs and behavior you find objectionable?
My fault. I should have linked to [this](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=4921094#post4921094) when I said that.
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### Author:  [@Profane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Profane)
#### Post date: [June 3, 2004, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/42 "2004-06-03T16:29:58Z")
> [@Olentzero](#):
>
> Here’s one for you, asshole. Why try to make an explicit connection between political beliefs and behavior you find objectionable?
**Lord Ashtar** ’s comment about leftists was to do with **Liberal** ’s comment in [this](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=259341) thread, second post down.
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### Author:  [@Profane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Profane)
#### Post date: [June 3, 2004, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/43 "2004-06-03T16:32:17Z")
:smack: The board is running slow for me today.
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### Author:  [@Olentzero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Olentzero)
#### Post date: [June 3, 2004, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/44 "2004-06-03T16:47:00Z")
> [@Lord Ashtar](#):
>
> My fault. I should have linked to [this](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=4921094#post4921094) when I said that.
Ah, now all is clear. I retract my previous statements.
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### Author:  [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)
#### Post date: [June 3, 2004, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/45 "2004-06-03T20:24:32Z")
> [@Lord Ashtar](#):
>
> Why can’t we just say that he was an asshole and leave it at that? Why do we have to invent excuses for him?
It’s not an excuse. Saying that OCD is an excuse for behavior is like saying that cancer is an excuse for dying.
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### Author:  [@Ogre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ogre)
#### Post date: [June 3, 2004, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/46 "2004-06-03T21:00:50Z")
> [@](#):
>
> Oh, that’s rich. Three, no wait, four, no wait, five of you gang up on me and call me a bully. In the first place, Incubus obviously was exaggerating (as in “I was starving” — no non-homeless American is ever starving), but the clue that the man was Melancholy was that having to wait three minutes was a disaster to him. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see it, but it takes a dickhead to ignore it. Incidentally, I’m the one who started the Melancholy thread in MPSIMS, not Maeglin. And the fact that you think it’s a joke just proves how fucking clueless you really are.
Uh huh. Right.
“_Pluralitas non est ponenda sine neccesitate_.” I’ll bet I don’t have to tell you who wrote that, since a version of it is in your sig.
You’re assuming an entity for which there is no direct evidence, and unnecessarily introducing it as an explanation, when there is no need for it, given the posted information. Even the more precise version, including Chatton’s anti-razor, makes no provision for the argumentative tactic you’re using.
There’s no direct evidence that Mr. Green Bean has any form of OCD. It’s certainly a _possibility_, but it’s simpler, given the evidence, to assume that he’s simply an impatient ass, or that his behavior is being influenced by some ordinary externality (bad day at the office, wife trouble, bad traffic, etc.)
Speaking of which, I really have no idea why you seem to want to equate Platonic melancholia with OCD. In the first place, even according to Plato, there are nearly zero pure Melancholics. Most people fall under the “Eight Compound Temperaments.” In the second place, **Plato was wrong**. He based an analysis of human behavioral tendencies on spurious, incorrect assumptions. Psychology has nothing to do with the regulation of the Four Humours. Black bile, yellow bile, blood, and phlegm have no impact at all on human behavior. It was a nice try for the time, but ultimately it holds as much water as Lamarckism, aether, or Cold Fusion. Utter fallacy. You’d do well to abandon it as such.
I assumed it was a joke based on the above. I mean, if you seriously adhere to a provably fallacious version of biology, then it really means I am “fucking clueless” about your particular brand of crazy, and boy, am I ever glad of that.
I certainly don’t mind giving someone the benefit of the doubt, if deserved, but according to the information we have, he was being (possibly dangerously) aggressive toward an innocent person. This is inexcusable.
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### Author:  [@alice\_in\_wonderland](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alice_in_wonderland)
#### Post date: [June 3, 2004, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/47 "2004-06-03T21:22:56Z")
> [@Liberal](#):
>
> It’s not an excuse. Saying that OCD is an excuse for behavior is like saying that cancer is an excuse for dying.
“My assholishness is a disability.” is lame no matter who says it. Frankly, it’s rather insulting to people with things like OCD that _actually_ manage to conduct themselves in an appropriate, polite manner when dealing with others. :rolleyes:
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### Author:  [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)
#### Post date: [June 3, 2004, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/48 "2004-06-03T21:26:15Z")
I hate people like Mr. Green Bean guy. You can tell those people have never had to work in retail.
I did a stint at Six Flags when I was a teenager. On one of the hottest days of the year, I was working in an isolated concession stand all by my lonesome, and I had a giant line. Inevitably, I ran out of syrup for the diet Coke. Being all by myself and overwhelmed by customers (oops, I mean “guests”), I could not alert a manager to the problem. So the diet Coke was out of order for awhile.
Big buffalo of a man asks for a large diet Coke.
Me: “I’m sorry, sir. We’re all out of diet Coke.”
He explodes. He cusses me out for a good minute and then storms away.
Against my will, I burst into tears.
And my nose began to bleed because of the exhaustion and heat.
Fortunately, the rest of the customers were nice and kept telling me not to worry about that man. Their assurances that I was doing a good job made up for my humiliation.
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### Author:  [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)
#### Post date: [June 3, 2004, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/49 "2004-06-03T21:39:36Z")
> [@Ogre](#):
>
> In the first place, even according to Plato, there are nearly zero pure Melancholics. Most people fall under the “Eight Compound Temperaments.” In the second place, Plato was wrong.
In the third place, it wasn’t Plato. It was Hippocrates.
> [@Alice](#):
>
> Frankly, it’s rather insulting to people with things like OCD that actually manage to conduct themselves in an appropriate, polite manner when dealing with others.
It’s nice when that happens. It’s also nice when people don’t say stupid shit like OCD is just an excuse for assholish behavior.
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### Author:  [@Ogre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ogre)
#### Post date: [June 3, 2004, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/50 "2004-06-03T21:59:30Z")
> [@](#):
>
> In the third place, it wasn’t Plato. It was Hippocrates.
My mistake, but your correction is immaterial to the argument. Hippocrates was still wrong, and the fact that you are “not joking” about basing your understanding of the biological aspects of psychology on something as demonstrably false as the Four Humours is rather pathetic. Tell me, is it elephants all the way down too?
And there is still no evidence that Mr. Green Bean has OCD. Unnecessarily multiplied assumptions, thy name is **Liberal**.
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### Author:  [@Ogre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ogre)
#### Post date: [June 3, 2004, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/51 "2004-06-03T22:02:24Z")
> [@](#):
>
> Tell me, is it elephants all the way down too?
Errr, turtles, that is.
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### Author:  [@Meatros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meatros)
#### Post date: [June 3, 2004, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/52 "2004-06-03T22:54:07Z")
> [@Ogre](#):
>
> Errr, turtles, that is.
😃
I was about to say something too…I thought to myself, “elephants? Is that the lady said? Man, my memory is going…” 😃
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### Author:  [@Ogre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ogre)
#### Post date: [June 3, 2004, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/53 "2004-06-03T22:58:36Z")
I blame Pratchett. Ever since reading a few Discworld novels, I keep confusing my world-supporting turtles with my world-supporting elephants. 🙂
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### Author:  [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)
#### Post date: [June 4, 2004, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/54 "2004-06-04T00:10:52Z")
> [@Liberal](#):
>
> It’s nice when that happens. It’s also nice when people don’t say stupid shit like OCD is just an excuse for assholish behavior.
I’m sorry, isn’t that what _you’re_ saying?
On the other hand, **Lib** ’s quaint view of biology does have one upside. You could have stuck a knife in Mr. Green Bean, and gotten away with it on the grounds that you were bleeding him of his excess bodily humours.
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### Author:  [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)
#### Post date: [June 4, 2004, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/55 "2004-06-04T00:27:02Z")
What the hell has **Lib** been snorting and where can I get some?
Jesus Christ, **Lib** , I have OCD. So do a few others on this board. We don’t act like that.
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### Author:  [@CanvasShoes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CanvasShoes)
#### Post date: [June 4, 2004, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/56 "2004-06-04T00:49:21Z")
> [@](#):
>
> And sweaty. Don’t forget sweaty.
>
> I almost forgot the time when my husband and I went to the first Harry Potter movie. The couple in front of us at the concessions (all of my stories seem to come back to junk food. Hmm) were trying to use expired coupons. The man ended up flinging the money in the popcorn girl’s face and screaming at her.
>
> We went into the theater and deliberately sat behind them. Then the conversation went like this:
>
> me: Did you see those horrible jerks in the popcorn line?
> him: I saw them. What was their problem?
> me: I don’t know. They were trying to cheat the girl behind the counter.
> him: What idiots.
> me: Complete jerks.
> him: God, I hope they aren’t in this theater.
> me: Yeah, think of how obnoxious they’d be during the movie.
> him: Probably throw some tantrum.
> me: Idiots.
> him: Jerks.
>
> The man kept turning around and giving us the evil eye. But we chattered “obliviously” on and, with any luck, hurt his widdle feelings.
>
> They left halfway through. 😃
HEHE!!! I thought my little sister and I invented that technique. Works every time doesn’t it?
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### Author:  [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)
#### Post date: [June 4, 2004, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/57 "2004-06-04T01:06:28Z")
> [@CanvasShoes](#):
>
> HEHE!!! I thought my little sister and I invented that technique. Works every time doesn’t it?
I am 1-for-1 in my attempts. 😃
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### Author:  [@CanvasShoes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CanvasShoes)
#### Post date: [June 4, 2004, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/58 "2004-06-04T01:46:12Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#):
>
> I am 1-for-1 in my attempts. 😃
Our latest success
was regarding a rude drunk at a hockey game (a drunk at a hockey game??? NO!!!).
We talked about how “some people who behave like that in front of their kids”.
And “we should call the cops, and describe this guy before he leaves, and let them know how inebriated he is”.
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### Author:  [@dnooman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dnooman)
#### Post date: [June 4, 2004, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/59 "2004-06-04T04:57:04Z")
> [@Liberal](#):
>
> In the third place, it wasn’t Plato. It was Hippocrates.
> It’s nice when that happens. It’s also nice when people don’t say stupid shit like OCD is just an excuse for assholish behavior.
Well then **Lib** out with it. Are you speaking for a group that you’re not a part of, or are you upset that people don’t pay enough attention to your plight?
Take a solid position, then defend it. Unless you’re unable to, in which case, we’ll feel really sorry for you, and then walk on eggshells in order to not offend your frail sensibilities.
I’m sure that people who can _actually function in life_ with OCD, would love to make you their champion.
“Sure, the people I represent are all insufferable assholes, but why would you judge them? It’s _your_ fault for being insensitive when they decide to attack the emotions of a “normal” person. People with OCD are by their very nature, assholes. You should consider it a blessing to be cussed out by a person that has no control over their behavior and emotions. They have the right to insult, defame, infuriate, and ridicule any and all people, since they’re special.” :rolleyes:
**Lib** , you’re doing a pretty good job at digging that hole, are you sure you never worked for the county before?
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### Author:  [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)
#### Post date: [June 4, 2004, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pitting-mr-green-bean/248200/60 "2004-06-04T21:31:06Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#):
>
> What the hell has **Lib** been snorting and where can I get some?
>
> [Pointless and insulting appropriation of God’s name as a curse deleted], **Lib** , I have OCD. So do a few others on this board. We don’t act like that.
You’re acting like it now.
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