Feel free to specify whether you mean being polite to others or having others be polite to you.
This is a public poll with only one answer allowed per respondent, and no set ending date.
I answered All the Time, but that doesn’t really describe the reality of it. I believe in treating people with respect and keeping my composure, but if someone is being a complete jackass to me, then politeness is not at the top of my to-do list.
Tdn’s answer is pretty much mine. But I believe that civility, even if it doesn’t make the world go 'round, greases the wheels.
There’s no reason not to be civil ever. Remember, you’re not just representing your perspective to the person with whom you’re discussing them but, especially online, your behavior acts as an ambassador to everyone who is following along. Sure, it’s hardly a logical reason to like or dislike something, but if one person is being a jerk and the other person is being reasonable, it can at least give someone an ear to an opinion they might have otherwise cursorily dismissed or turn someone away from an idea they might have otherwise liked.
Besides, why not just show some basic human decency? Just because you disagree with someone doesn’t make them less of a person. I can understand showing frustration if they’re being a jerk, but just because you disagree?
I figure in most situations the options are
- Be polite/civil/argue in good faith
- Walk away
That said, there is something satisfying about staying up for hours once in a while (like, every two or three months) to argue pointlessly with someone who is clearly and utterly WRONG ON THE INTERNET. However, I don’t think that’s very useful, or even pleasant, 99.9% of the time.
Generally, politeness leads to better discourse. I frequently fuck up but I try to be polite.
As I’ve grown older, and perhaps a little wiser, I’ve learned that you almost never persuade anyone by being rude, even if it may be personally satisfying. The only people that will like you for doing that are the partisans on your side, and they are on your side anyway.
You may never get those on the other side to agree with you*, but there is always a relatively uncommitted middle section, and they are much more likely to go with those offering polite and reasoned arguments, in the long run.
- Though a long time ago, at a week-long trade union conference, I once swayed a delegate from the other side to switching sides by getting him to hospital after he’d collapsed in the street after dinner, and staying with him in hospital until he discharged himself. The next day, he told me he was changing his vote to my side at the conference.
I try to be polite all the time, even with strangers on the Internet. I may not always succeed.
I have to wonder about people who think it’s perfectly OK to start an Internet conversation by insulting everyone. My first thought is that they are basement-dwelling teenagers who never had the chance to develop real interpersonal skills. I’m often surprised to learn that they are adults with positions of responsibility and social interaction.
Depends what is meant by polite, but if someone holds a stupid opinion I’m going to tell him it’s a stupid opinion. I’d expect nothing less in return.
I try to be polite. But in theory at least, I am forced to conclude that politeness is a barrier to discourse. In a perfect world, we would all be intellectual warriors, giving no quarter and expecting none.
But in reality, we’re most of us ninnies. I’m a ninny. There are probably three or four thousand insufferable ranting geniuses in places like New York who aren’t, but do we want them setting the rules of interaction?
What tdn said. Politeness has its limits and at a certain point I won’t bother. But it should take serious provocation before you get to that point and politeness should be the default.
But everybody screws it up once in awhile. That’s just human.
Civility is always better, for a lot of reasons.
–Rudeness quickly degenerates the discussion into a yelling match, which is both stupid and pointless. Intelligent discourse requires civility in order to work at all. Rudeness leads right to shallowness and lack of thought.
–As a purely practical matter, you will never win through rudeness. As noted, insulting people is not the way to get them to agree with you.
–I find it easier to live with myself if I treat everyone with civility. I suspect the world would be an easier place for us all to live in if we were all more civil.
I try to be polite because when I read the writings of people that are being jackoff douchey bags to others, it makes them seem stupid.
I don’t wanna look stupid.
Can you expound on why you think politeness is a barrier to discourse?
I think politeness is very important, especially when you disagree with someone. Though it’s not always true, having a disagreement with someone can offer you an opportunity to learn something new. That “something” may not always be valuable to you, but even if your goal is to argue against it, you can’t do that and have the other person listen unless you remain polite and respectful.
It’s a lot like trying to discipline through screaming. Kids, like adults, don’t care what you have to say by the time things have escalated to screaming - all they hear is that you’re screaming and they tune what you’re actually saying out.
Pretending to have a serious discussion against an obviously ridiculous opinion gives uninformed observes the impression that there is a legitimate controversy, even if none exists. See the creationism vs evolution debacle.
That’s not what we’re discussing here though. Being polite doesn’t mean that you have to have the discussion. One could always say “I’m sorry, but I’m not going to debate you about this.”
Absolutely! Being polite forces me to listen. The better I listen to others, the more I learn. The day I stop learning is the day I die.
Yeah, I agree with that. If the discussion is too ridiculous to have, then don’t have it.
With C vs. E, I guess that’s mostly where I fall. If the E’s want the higher ground, insulting the C’s doesn’t keep them there. Either be polite or walk away; screaming just makes the C’s think “See? They haven’t got a leg to stand on, so they resort to insults.” At least if you’re polite, onlookers give you credit for reason and effectiveness.