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Comment by verbin217 | Hacker News Reader

> perhaps you were being extremely rude as a rhetorical device

I was and I'm ambivalently sorry about it. Assuming I'm the type of perpetually angry person who has experience with people using unnecessary condescension to reel them in... those were some pretty typical reactionary comments. There is another form of victim emerging out there and I am concerned about it. We can be more tolerant than he was being. I was trolling for it...

Entirely invalidating someones opinion because they're angry is not acceptable in my opinion. I sort've still think it was worth the example. But we can agree to disagree. It's too bad he deleted his comment. It was perfect.

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I sometimes get mildly annoyed by what I perceive as unnecessarily negative comments on peoples' hobby projects.

The linked article wasn't very interesting to me either, for the same reasons as the person I responded to, but I found it unnecessarily negative to call it "wanking."

So I politely reformulated the comment to avoid implying that the author is a wanker, while still getting most of the point across.

On a free-for-all forum like reddit, I wouldn't mention it. Here, though, there are guidelines that explicitly ask the community to gently remind peers about unnecessary negativity.

Since I linked to the guidelines, and you responded with "fuck off," I inferred that you aren't interested in following the forum guidelines, which makes conversation about those guidelines groundless.

You don't have to help me with my emotions. If your anger problems prevent you from participating according to the guidelines, focus on yourself.

Notably you're further demonstrating my point by continually asserting your right to ignore it. While appealing to authority. And still being sort've condescending...

The "wankery" didn't mean nothing. But you just utterly removed it. You did not reformulate it. You ignored it.

I'm not saying you have to care. I just wish you did. Honestly I think this is how you brew a michaelochurch.

--- can't reply yet

No I was pretending to be that person. Not saying it was you. Sorry if you misunderstood. I feel that person is out there and perpetually angry. And that you stomped on them with your behavior. Furthering their condition. I think it would be better for everyone if we just gave them empathy. Even if it's hard given how foreign their mental state is. And also even if they don't apparently deserve it.

Maybe I'm still trolling. Maybe I care? Honestly wtf am I getting from this... I knew it was going to suck the moment I did it. I do feel it's becoming uncivilly civil around here lately though. Enough to throw my time away like this. Just an anecdote.

I did misunderstand.

The guidelines asks the community to gently remind peers of unnecessary negativity. That's a pretty vague request. When you disagreed with my interpretation, you should have done that politely and without telling me to fuck off. I'm not always right, I can be annoying to some people, but I adhere to a baseline of civil language, and I'm open for reasonable discussion.

I feel you could've eaten the "fuck off" had you really cared to. Did you read the article? This guy is (or was?) using a ⇒ symbol instead of => in Javascript source code. He's wanking a bit. I enjoyed it otherwise... That's just the right word. Idk. I'm a bit of an FP wanker. It's not so derogatory. "Fuck off" really isn't either. It just can be. And you decided it necessarily was. Who I was. And what sort've consideration and treatment I deserved. You could have responded to my actual point in combination with correcting my tone. I wasn't ranting in my first few comments. They were brief. You didn't need to be so affronted that you completely ignored them. It was just convenient. Also you are and have been following the rules while I have been aggressively disregarding them. What am I trying to do? Why do I keep escalating? Do I want to be heard?

--- can't reply yet

It's cool at this point. I know where you're coming from. I don't mean to be an ass by trolling. I ultimately wanted to be constructive. Like I wanted the anecdote. I feel this is an issue and I sort've just incited exactly my concern. Idk if that proves anything or if it just makes me a sociopath. But it's the internet so who cares. Enjoy your evening.

At the risk of being even more condescending, I hear you. I get annoyed with people on the internet too. Sometimes I even manage to annoy myself. Sometimes I get so angry that I need to put on gangsta rap beats from YouTube and do my angriest Eminem impression. I just make sure nobody's looking. Mostly this happens because of npm errors, not HN comments, but whatever.

I mentioned the guidelines, you said "fuck off," so I replied tersely focusing on the impossibility of discussing forum rules with someone who blatantly disregards them. We can have a meta discussion about rules and following them and politeness and stuff, but I'm getting really hungry and I need to sleep, so, sorry for being annoying.

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