Maybe I’m just a dumbass but to me it’s difficult to really get to know someone that well here based solely on a username. If I have a face to put a character with, I’ll remember them forever. But trying to remember a personality by name alone is, to me, much more difficult.
Therefore, my interaction with an established poster that I’ve come to know over time and have begun to cultivate a relationship with is going to be conducted with more earnest than it would be with a newbie.
It’s not that I have any problem at all with newbies, gawd, we all were one for awhile. It’s just that I don’t know them as well yet. Given time, as I begin to associate a persona with their name, my interaction with them will increase as well.
imChildFREE, you were lambasted because you didn’t state the truth of the matter correctly and your opinions were not based on facts. Once we started correcting you, you became extremely defensive and prissy. Don’t blame us for trying to educate you on exhausted conversation topics and board courtesy.
Klaatu, I don’t think the oldtimers are more self-righteous than anyone else. People who post a lot tend to display their personalities and intelligence with more strength and conviction. I believe that once we all get to “know” them, we label them as self-righteous, but we really just don’t like their personalities. My take, anyway.
The matter at hand is that some people who have been here longer tend to exert their need for power over people who have just gotten here. I would say that it is my opinion that this is true.
You are trying to make me believe that some people are nice to new comers well that may be true. But for those who have joined the boards and got the same sort of rude treatment I can bet they don’t care that some are nice to others it was how they were treated them that mattered most in whether or not THEY felt comfortable.
You took offense to my opinion and my tone as did others … are you saying that telling someone to shove a very thick book up their arse wasn’t offensive either.
I took offense that I was told I wouldn’t understand and even tried to head that lame argument off in my OP but I didn’t tell people to shove their Graco two seater SUV strollers up their butts. The fact is that because “you” meaning the general poster didn’t like insert tone/name/comments here you jumped on me as if I were a troll and treated me as if anyone who had a different opinion was unwelcome.
And if this isn’t the place then were is? Where is there a board on this site that people can rationally talk about their differences? Is there not one? Is it all about AGREE WITH US OR LEAVE here?
No I apologized to BubbleGirl for the mistake I made in my comment about leaving the baby on the changing table …
then someone took offense at that because I said my comment stood … anyone who would leave a child unattended and then complain about what happened just doesn’t have cause to complain.
And no another CHILD watching a CHILD isn’t ATTENDED.
I got upset because all most could do was call me name or nitpick about my grammar. A few just got hateful because they didn’t like my user name.
And I seriously doubt that I have EVER been PRISSY in my life.
Thanks Green Bean … I wasn’t sure what Hijacking was when I saw it in the other posts … but I will stop … I thought that this thread being about attacking newbies I could talk about it here.
I think there are two very different situations, one good, one bad.
(1) The self-monitoring by board members who want to keep this place free from assholes and idiots. Those who step in and make it very clear what type of jerky behavior isn’t acceptable on the board. We’ve seen some newbie assholes evolve in to respected posters just as we’ve seen newbie assholes banned. One of the reasons this board is so successful is that we insure that our standards of board quality are kept.
(2) I have not seen the imChildFREE thread so can’t make any judgment (had I seen it, I very well may have jumped your ass too). However lately, as the OP stated, some posters seem to have closed the circle a little bit too tight. Those who automatically assume a newbie is a potential troll and shark attack for very minor social offenses. I have seen more than a few newbies run off before given a chance to show us what they have to offer our community. In these cases, it’s no one’s loss but our own.
Sadly, example number one seems to be more and more eclipsed by example number two.
It isn’t a need to exert power over other people, but the fact that we have a lot more time, emotion, and friendships invested in this community than someone who just got here.
A-freaking-men. I said this the first day that the post counts were shown in the username box. We used to have to click “profile” to see post counts, and I only recall ever doing that once or twice to see if someone posting an off the wall thread was new or not.
The thing I’ve noticed as of late is that dissenting opinions are often beaten into the ground (using the “you’re new- what the fuck do you know” method). That bothers me. As a poster earlier said, I am board wiser now that I’ve been here a while, but I was pretty savvy when I had 2 posts, too.
I think that the label of “newbie” which is so prominent (by showing post counts in the username box) adds to the discrimination against new posters and assumption that they are joining for less then noble purposes for some people.
On the other hand, I’ve witnessed quite a few newbies enter the Boards recently and be warmly received. Those newbies posted well-thought-out, reasoned, uh, posts, from Great Debates to rants. And because they entered the Boards with integrity and informed ideas, they were treated with respect in return. I could rattle off the names of many a former newbie who I’ve seen join and become generally well-liked.
For those of us that view this particular message board as more of a community (rather than “just a message board”), there is a tendency to look askance at someone who registers and immediately begins making jackass comments. Posters that have been around longer don’t tend to jump all over established posters simply because they tend to know the posting style and online personality of the poster. If someone who’s been around a while bursts out with a jackass comment, they’re saying it in the context of all their other posts and an established record of contribution. With that, it’s easier to recognize sarcasm, black humor, or the freakish result of a bad mood. Long-time posters are just as subject to poor judgment and get called on it (see: Satan and SqrlCub).
In real life, you ease into new social situations. You don’t waltz into a gathering of strangers and instantly begin running your mouth. Why? Because it’s bad form. Once you have established a level of familiarity, THEN it’s acceptable to mouth off occasionally, make off-the-cuff remarks, whatever. Although this isn’t a real-life gathering, we expect the same social conventions to hold true. I’m simply not going to invest the same level of trust in what newbies say that I do in what established posters say. It may not be ideal, but that’s the way it is.
You know, I am often less hostile towards newbies because, hell, they might just not appreciate a good spanking. Some take it personally. I like getting GD spanked, though, so I guess it never bothered me. The two posters who have spanked me the hardest in my newbie phase are now my two favorite posters. :shrug:
YMMV
As far as the post count thing goes, it doesn’t really bother me at all. I actually like seeing who is new and who isn’t. But then, I’m usually up for debating existence once a week no matter who starts the topic; others would rather just say “We just did this” and forget about it.
YMMV
Yes, Mr Klaatu, this is a community. We know our long-time neighbors better than we know the new couple who just moved in across the street. I like to think of the SDMB as a quiet New England town… with dark secrets… MWA-HAHAHAHAHA
YMMV
But we really do recruit a lot of new users all the time… is it really so hard to become a member of the family? I am still amazed that I get mentioned now and again by people I would never think had noticed me. It is flattering, and I appreciate it in my own way. The longer I am here, the more I would like to represent what the board is about.
As usual, though, YMMV.
Beadlin, good point about how one makes an entrance. Wow, I’ve seen some people and said, “Fuck, this guy is gonna tear me apart in GD.” LOL And then there are those, “Heh, this guy is gonna sing a different tune or quit the choir.”
I wish I had joined earlier, but I was never really into message boards, just reading and rereading and rereading Cecil’s columns. :: sniff :: I love that guy… and I’m almost 100% positive that I don’t mean that in a homosexual way,
Why, back when I first started posting here, the self-righteous BS was no more than Moderately Unappetizing…these damn newbies don’t know how to BS Self-Righteously, I swear, …
I suppose this is a decent place to put this. And I realize that it has been addressed many times before. But why do people feel the need to point out that someone posted in the wrong forum? You don’t have the power to do anything about it, and it just has the feel of pointing and saying “you screwed up”. First off a lot of the time the poster saying they are in the wrong forum is just incorrect. Second, the Mod has to then come along and move the thread saying the same thing. It always seems to come off as the established pilling on the newbie who made a mistake, and if it’s someone posting to a message board for the first time ever, 3 responses in the first 10 that say “you fucked up” just doesn’t seem very welcoming even they were couched in polite terms.
Well I do agree with your posts basic premise, I think that things were often like a high school pissing match six months ago too. And six months before that. As a newbie, the thing that kept me coming back here most was my respect for Cecil’s books. I was pissed on many times for “posting in the wrong forum” and was insulted by a moderator my first post.
