And that’s exactly the ambiguity I was trying to get at with my last paragraph.
I’m kind of surprised I got downvoted while contrarian “source?” comments got lots of upvotes. In all honesty, it feels bad. I am not sure how I said anything anywhere near offensive that deserves disapproval, but being contrarian seems a lot more purposely meant to piss off and still meets lots of peoples’ approval.
But even still, I have gone and assumed bad faith or at best, an attempt to be funny and make people laugh through what is still in the end just contrarianism. I do not think it is possible they are genuinely asking for a source because I think we’re making claims based on general observation of the world, things that do not need to be cited, like “the sky is blue” or “things fall when you drop them”. Just look up and see (or trust the wealth of statements talking about the sky’s blueness if you are (color)blind). Perhaps I’m incorrectly assuming bad faith here based off of a trend of seeing contrarianism, and I’m incorrectly extrapolating that trend here. It is very ambiguous. I really do not think I am wrong, but given that we’re literally talking about the difficulty of determining good vs. bad faith engagement it feels a little arrogant to not acknowledge the possibility that I might be wrong.
That’s one of the issues, isn’t it? I recently found someone who only responded to comments about Margaret Thatcher, challenging negative comments about her. This person’s history went back years and ALL of the comments (thousands!) only challenged negative ones about her. It could have been a bot, of course, but if real, it was a pretty weird way of engaging online. That goes beyond contrarianism, it’s some sort of “distributed sealioning” maybe?
You usually only find out after repeatedly explaining, yet the interlocutor remaining unconvinced to a point where someone with good faith would’ve had enough information to work with.
That’s the thing, it takes time and Gish gallops you into proving ever more reduced assertions.
It’s very childish in nature, yet devis as it takes on the guide of scientific rational discourse.
It’s a hard one, though. I’ve found myself challenging someone who then avoids answering and making other similarly unsupported points… eventually you learn that it’s a waste of time. Equally, you don’t want to leave their comments out there unchallenged.
Yeah it’s hard, but that’s why you, my friend, are a light in the darkness;)
Good faith is extremely important. And even though it’s much harder to read this online than in real life, there people being disingenuous in real life.
It’s the reason why online debate is hard and escalates quickly. You see people getting angry with people they agree with, even though they are arguing the same point, but they don’t share their level of anger with the opposing side.
I think remaining calm and level headed and generous through even that is important as people will pick up on genuine emotion over spam and anger, eventually. And if we all do it it makes a better community.
How can you tell good faith from bad faith?
For instance, can you tell if this question is asked in good faith or not? These things seem very hard know.
It’s tricky. Often, you can only go by tone and context. Experience helps a lot. Even still, I’ll get it wrong sometimes.
That’s probably the best way of dealing with it.
And that’s exactly the ambiguity I was trying to get at with my last paragraph.
I’m kind of surprised I got downvoted while contrarian “source?” comments got lots of upvotes. In all honesty, it feels bad. I am not sure how I said anything anywhere near offensive that deserves disapproval, but being contrarian seems a lot more purposely meant to piss off and still meets lots of peoples’ approval.
But even still, I have gone and assumed bad faith or at best, an attempt to be funny and make people laugh through what is still in the end just contrarianism. I do not think it is possible they are genuinely asking for a source because I think we’re making claims based on general observation of the world, things that do not need to be cited, like “the sky is blue” or “things fall when you drop them”. Just look up and see (or trust the wealth of statements talking about the sky’s blueness if you are (color)blind). Perhaps I’m incorrectly assuming bad faith here based off of a trend of seeing contrarianism, and I’m incorrectly extrapolating that trend here. It is very ambiguous. I really do not think I am wrong, but given that we’re literally talking about the difficulty of determining good vs. bad faith engagement it feels a little arrogant to not acknowledge the possibility that I might be wrong.
That’s one of the issues, isn’t it? I recently found someone who only responded to comments about Margaret Thatcher, challenging negative comments about her. This person’s history went back years and ALL of the comments (thousands!) only challenged negative ones about her. It could have been a bot, of course, but if real, it was a pretty weird way of engaging online. That goes beyond contrarianism, it’s some sort of “distributed sealioning” maybe?
You usually only find out after repeatedly explaining, yet the interlocutor remaining unconvinced to a point where someone with good faith would’ve had enough information to work with.
That’s the thing, it takes time and Gish gallops you into proving ever more reduced assertions.
It’s very childish in nature, yet devis as it takes on the guide of scientific rational discourse.
It’s a hard one, though. I’ve found myself challenging someone who then avoids answering and making other similarly unsupported points… eventually you learn that it’s a waste of time. Equally, you don’t want to leave their comments out there unchallenged.
Yeah it’s hard, but that’s why you, my friend, are a light in the darkness;)
Good faith is extremely important. And even though it’s much harder to read this online than in real life, there people being disingenuous in real life.
It’s the reason why online debate is hard and escalates quickly. You see people getting angry with people they agree with, even though they are arguing the same point, but they don’t share their level of anger with the opposing side.
I think remaining calm and level headed and generous through even that is important as people will pick up on genuine emotion over spam and anger, eventually. And if we all do it it makes a better community.