I’ve only put 2 people on my list, ever. One was quickly banned, so no problem.
The other has never, in any thread, posted anything that I have any desire to read. In fact, most of this person’s posts make me roll my eyes, and cringe. Just that same as I don’t like and hang out with EVERY person I meet IRL, I don’t feel compelled to do so here either.
I’ve only put 2 people on my list, ever. One was quickly banned, so no problem.
The other has never, in any thread, posted anything that I have any desire to read. In fact, most of this person’s posts make me roll my eyes, and cringe. Just the same as I don’t like and hang out with EVERY person I meet IRL, I don’t feel compelled to do so here either.
In the words of The Duke in True Grit, “Fill your hand, you son-of-a-bitch.”
I’ve ignored only one person, ever. This poster was a local, so I met him a few times, and found him to be extremely obnoxious. It was impossible to read posts from him without “hearing” it in his (annoying) voice. The ignore feature made my SDMB life just a little bit more pleasant. This person has now been banned for a long time, and I’ve never felt the urge to employ the feature since.
(bolding mine)
Yep, what he said.
Why do you hate Ignorica?
I can imagine using the option if someone deliberately and trollishly floods a thread with nonsense, but since the moderators here are reasonably responsive, they’ll deal with the problem soon enough.
I disagree. You are missing the ideas of those 5, or 7. If you consider their ideas so disagreeable as to “ignore” them, then you need to ask yourself what it is you find so disagreeable, and why. I continue to contend that there is no good reason to ignore anyone else’s posts.
Shunning other posters for any reason is simply unnecessary on a board like this. I have yet to hear in this thread any better argument than, “I strongly disagree with that person‘s opinions, so I refuse to listen to them anymore. Nyeah!”
Hardly. What one happens not to read is not at all the same as deliberately excluding the input of certain posters.
Happier, perhaps in the same sense that the Amish are “happier” because they close out that which does not agree with their own views, as best they can.
I don’t think it’s safe to make the assumption that posters are put on an ignore list because one chooses to close out their views. There are people in real life that one chooses not to talk with, or associate with, not because of their views but because they are idiots, jerks, stark raving mad, or some combination of those.
Now I’m sure that there are some being ignored because of their views, but I don’t think that’s common.
Nobody gets introduced to iggy for 2 reasons:
I can’t fathom the need to ignore words. I’ve learned at least one thing from every person I’ve ever listened to; including a bum sitting in his own piss on a barstool in the East Village. (The lesson was - if you’re gonna get so drunk you can’t feel your own pee, wear Depends)
This corny hypothetical: You despise the faux doper Joe_Mechanic’s posts & ignore him. In a SUV thread, he mentions the fact he has inside knowledge that Honda CRVs have defective gas tanks that could cause them to explode on impact. You drive a CRV and Honda hasn’t completed it’s recall appeal process with regulators. You get rear-ended and are severely burned.
The rationale that ignored individuals are “idiots, jerks, stark raving mad, or some combination of those” is strictly a call of personal judgement. Even if one considers them as such, why exclude all of their input? Is that not antithetical to the potential that a forum like this has?
Exactly. It is a personal judgement call. That’s why it’s your ignore list. It’s just a tool. Some people feel the need to use it, some don’t. It’s there just in case you feel the need to do so. It’s not encouraging people to be anti social or to shut out logical and well intentioned views of people with whom you disagree. It’s sort of like a release valve. At least, that’s how I use it. “If I see ONE more post by that moronic nit wit I swear I will go completely nuclear and explode all over the board.” And probably go too far and say something I shouldn’t and will end up regretting. The ignore function allows me to calm down and come back to discuss or argue with that person when I’m more open to their POV.
I think ignore lists are really juvenile and allow one to live in a bubble world, which seems to be antithetical to the stated purpose of this messageboard. I don’t use it. The only way I might be compelled to use it is if there was someone who always posted big-ass pictures that slow down my connection. But this board doesn’t allow image linking, so no problem there.
I know I’m probably on some people’s ignore lists and I don’t care. If someone wants to use that fifth grade tactic that’s fine; I’ll know I’m the better person for not using it.
I’ve never used it. Personally I’ve come to gain an appreciation for the general rhythm of the SDMB. On certain threads (typically political ones) I employ skimming because I know what 90% of the posters here are going to say about any given issue, if I see something that I find particularly incorrect or galling or just plain stupid then I’ll make comment on it.
I’ve never felt the need to use an ignore list.
In fact strange as it is, I’m the type of person who never forgets a name or a face but I don’t remember posters here very well. If you’re arguing with me in a thread today and we were in a very heated debate last week I almost definitely don’t remember you or what you said. I probably remmber the debate, though.
Okay, then, let’s make it fair. How about an option by which posters can exclude their posts from being read by whichever posters they choose? If the blade cut both ways, my guess is that interaction on this board would be decreased considerably. But this would only be fair…
Exactly. So why should we be allowed to do it?
Fifth grade tactics are rife on these boards. Eradicating the “ignore” option would definitely reduce this phenomenon.
Why is this “fair?” If you don’t want your posts to be read … don’t post.
I have a fairly large ignore list – 20+ people accumulated over the years. They are essentially people who I have concluded rarely if ever have anything useful to say.
Given that I have periodically gone out of the way to praise posters who I strongly disagree with, I don’t think I have a problem with hearing alternative views. I do have a problem with hearing idiots, whether I agree with them or not. Hence, there are people of various ideological stripes on my list.
I have the entire board minus myself on my list. Everything makes a lot more sense then. 
Seriously, I don’t use it, because I’m insanely curious, and I KNOW I’d want to read what everyone is saying.
I think what he’s saying is, why doesn’t it go both ways? To use the party analogy, if you didn’t want a specific person overhearing you, you would move out of that person’s earshot. Either all information should be out or we should be allowed two-way censoring. If you can’t control yourself long enough to scroll past a post from a poster you hate, you deserve a broken monitor.
I use mine, especially back in the days when we had certain fundamentalists who seemed very eager and overly happy to let us all know just how headed for hell we were. Since that’s all they typically posted about, I didn’t miss much after having already read the first 476.
Beyond that, with anyone else on it I can always choose the “read post now anyway” option (or whatever it says). That way if it’s a serious discussion, I’m feeling up to what they usually say that makes my stomach flop or I read a quote further down thread that leaves me wondering about context. Therefore, I think I’m pretty much covered.
And I re-evaluate from time to time, certainly after I’ve done what I’ve outlined above and found said poster to be less abrasive or preachy or you-fill-in-the-blank. I can appreciate those who have enough self control to just skip right past them or take it with the proverbial grain of salt. Good on ya. But I’ve found this feature is extremely useful for keeping my stress levels down.