Ewww, man! I stepped in one of username’s posts again!
Those three things pretty much cover every topic I can think of that might end up in the Pit. What else did you have in mind? What do you * want * to see here?
And so what if the topics are limited? It’s not like there’s a finite number of things that can aggravate one in real life, or that there’s going to be a shortage of people saying things in other forums that require them to be taken to the Pit for a beatdown. And there certainly are myriad ways of expressing complaints, such that an artistically crafted Pitting can be a joy to read, or a lame, poorly thought out thread can result in some enjoyable trashing of the OP.
They say that there are only 7 (or 20 or 50) original plots, and everything published in the past 2000 years is just a rehash of an older story. Doesn’t mean reading is pointless. It might mean that someone who makes that claim is a joyless lout with a stick up his butt.
Well, okay, but if anyone brings up fruitarians, there’s gonna be trouble.
Daniel
The Pit is a great place to find that “extra dimension” in each poster who frequents this forum. On the contrary, it is QUITE useful. Some posters just love to commiserate and The Pit serves as that seedy little bar in the run-down part of town where drinks are cheap and the chatter is even cheaper (1.36 cents per day!). Hell, I think this forum might keep a couple of us out of bell towers…athelas, you might want to reconsider your stance on the subject…dammit.
I like the pit grudge matches. It is often the only way that I get the skinny on who is upset with whom and why, what is going on in threads with titles that do not interest me that turn into trainwrecks, and which Mod is first in the Pit races. Also the minor frustrations that are often expressed in other Pit Threads make my life seem fare more managable. I hope to be so upset one day that I, too, can write a frustration based Pit Rant, but as I am have become more mellow as I age, this seems less and less likely. I stay away from the political ones because I often have no idea what the folks inside are yelling about, being out of the country and all, but they serve a purpose as well, and I am sure that some people enjoy them quite a bit.
To sum up, the Pit eases my ignorance and helps me not be too annoyed with the world around me and the people that inhabit that world. What is not to like?
What? Nobody’s going to get on his case for mixing up “board” with “forum”?
[NB- in the spirit of the pit, definately not a joke but as an attempt at humor]
Hah Hah lookey lookey lookey you spelled FAR wrong. (nevermind the fact that I understood what you wrote, and that the spelling of FAR was not germain to your argument)
[just to be clear the above was not an attack on the poster, it was supposed to be a critique of the Spelling Police)
[whine mode on] But I have issues that cause me to spell simple three letter words wrong. I am lazy AND a bad typist! Stop picking on meeeee! [whine mode off] 
And I would have gotten away with it, too, if it hadn’t been for those meddlesome Spelling Police. Drat you askeptic! Drat you to Gosh and Heck!
I don’t think I quite have the hang of this Pit thing. I should just go back to MPSIMS where I belong.
Two points, if I may:
One, PMs have been disabled for quite some time, and many members do not have public email.
Two, your response to finding the BBQ Pit useless, was, in protest, to open a Pit Thread.
Oooooooooookayyyyyy…
askeptic, you spelled “definitely” wrong. And Innanna spelled “manageable” wrong, too. (I’ll stop policing spelling when they pry this keyboard out of my cold, dead fingers.)
athelas, there are times when complaining about something from real life here is the only outlet you have for one reason or another. I would say the majority of my Pit threads are exactly that - something has frustrated/angered me in real life to the point that I want to rant and rave about it a little, but there is no valid target in real life (could be another driver who is long gone, or someone is making me upset through no fault of their own, etc.). I come here, I knock out a rant, I release a little of the tension this episode caused me, I go back to my real life ready to act like a decent human being again. I do actually think that’s useful.
And, as usual, if you don’t like it, don’t waste your time on it.
And not even a good imitation of the Spelling Police. A good Grammar Cop would have caught the other misspelled word.
Give up?
(manageable)
Crap to you featherlou. 
Must type more faster.
Who would have thought that one three word phrase would cause me this much grief? I am sorry to all the Spelling Police that I have offended in the past, and the many I will offend in the future. It is purely my haste (and as I said, bad typing) that causes me to offend. I will go back to running my posts through Word again. There goes all hope of ever making it past .65 posts a day sigh. I should have known better than to play in the Pit with the big children. But I really do think that the Pit serves a purpose in the fight against ignorance, even if you are all big meanie heads for picking on me.
It was pointless for you to criticize him for pointlessly pointing out that the Pit is pointless; and it’s pointless of ME to point out that it was pointless of you to…
Stuck…in…nested…loop…no…escape…
I couldn’t agree more…for types like you and me who actually expected some intelligent discourse here. As I’ve said before, emotion and political affiliation rule the day here, points are misstated and/or intentionally misconstrued so that you spend all your time defending yourself over something you never said, important aspects of an argument are left to lie ignored in favor of a response in which “moron” or “asshat” is the premise of the rebuttal. It’s why I’ve pretty much given up the Pit. Plus, I don’t like seeing people I like in the other forums acting like assholes here.
:must…not…call…names:
>>breathes<<
Butt, if someone does have an asshole quality, like askeptic who is beginning to grow on me, wouldn’t you have an ignorant perception of that person if you avoideded vieweing acknowledging it? Jesus took a good dump every now & again and guess what: I don’t recon it smelled like paradise! Did that make Him any less of…whatever it is people say it is that he was?
And where the hell has athelas gotten to? He can’t just pull the pin and walk off…can he?
yeah, I made a BUNCH of spelling errors, and I’m proud of them.
Not necessarily. Assholism has a way of exposing itself regardless of the forum, just with less profanity outside the Pit.
Yeah! What’s up with that? After all, I was the first one to agree with him.
Just for shits and giggles, here’re the forums, arranged in descending order by the number of posts in the forum (current as of 3/31/04, 4:15 PST)
MPSIMS: 1,153,820
General Questions: 909,666
The BBQ Pit: 664,043
In My Humble Opinion: 621,622
Great Debates: 618,247
Cafe Society: 512,710
About this Message Board: 54,636
Comments on Cecil’s Columns: 34,909
Comments on Staff Reports: 16,485
The Pit is the third most popular forum on these boards. athelas, you don’t see the “point” to this forum. Well, there are more than half a million posts that show that yours is the decidedly minority opinion. So why don’t you just not read The Pit, not post in The Pit, and leave those of us who appreciate this forum alone? God knows, no here is going to miss you.
What is the fucking point, Athelas?
Honestly, I spend all of my time at the SDMB in the pit. Why? Well, I got tired of mutual masturbation sessions, people whining, and looking for pathetic attention in MPSIMS. I’m not much of a debater, so GD never flipped my lid. I don’t care to review books or music or what have you, so Cafe Society isn’t my gig…
No, a place where people can bitch, moan, whine, cuss, kick, growl, have irrational viewpoints, get political without kid gloves, and whatnot is the place for me. That is the BBQ pit.
But I suspect you’re just trolling the pit, trying to see what you can dredge up since you got that little E-mail in your E-mail box letting you know that the SDMB had gone to a pay-to-post service and your interest has been renewed in the boards…
Sam
“Do you know the athelas plant”
“Aye, it’s a weed.”
Mmmmm Hmmmm :rolleyes: