About letting go

[nullplan]

Oh dear god, that other topic has gone on long enough for my taste. As I read through "About unnecessary arguing...", I wonder if this is what cyber-bullying looks like. I see about four people ganging up on bzt, and nexos constantly trying to get the mods involved. Yeah, I don't know why that topic isn't locked already, it is pretty evident the discussion is not moving forward. And I didn't want to post a reply in that thread, as that would only add another voice to the cacophony.

Let us take stock of the situation, alright?

1. To my knowledge, we are all humans here.
2. We all have emotions, and flimsy rationalizations for them.
3. We are all way less logical than we like to think of ourselves.
4. Most people react with tit-for-tat. Be angry at them, and they will be angry right back. As you call into the woods, so it will echo.

Given the preceding, is it really fair to have a topic going on for months that's dedicated to listing the faults of one member here? I don't think so. Could you just let it go already?

I will freely concede that bzt's style of argumentation is not terribly conducive to outpourings of sympathy, but then accusations of sociopathy (that is what "total lack of empathy" means, vvaltchev) aren't either. Given that text-based media are cutting off non-verbal communication, I think we should give other people the benefit of the doubt. And none of what bzt said initially was ever bad enough to warrant such a response. Only once the discussion dragged on and everyone wanted to get the last word in did things get heated.

So here's another idea: If the discussion is going into overtime, just stop. Just walk away. Go for a run or whatever, and never open the topic again. The fate of the world is not turning on any of you getting the last word in. Nor is the possibility of someone stumbling upon the thread and finding the last voice to be persuasive a good enough reason to keep the discussion going. And once you start with the line by line rebuttals, the discussion is in its death throes, anyway. So just let it go.

Because if you don't, outsiders looking at the thread will only see a bunch of squabbling children!

[nexos]

If I've offended anyone, I'm sorry, that was never my intent. I only brought the mods in because it seems like that the mods should be trying to defuse the situation. And, I never wanted to be in this. I hadn't even picked sides. I simply was trying to explain what interfaces vvaltchev was talking about. Getting what you said called "nonsense" would make anyone upset. After bzt posted an apology, I was done. I was seeing things through his POV. After what he said was pointed out, he offered a defense. Some of the stuff he said was true, but it simply further heated up the situation.
This isn't getting anywhere. Now that I've been made to appear like a troll, I first want to tell you all I am not a troll, nor a cyberbully, nor am trying to gang up on anyone. The only reason I said anything was because lots of flame wars have broken out over the past year. I wanted change to occur. The opposite happened.
Listen, its time to let go of this incident. It's gone way to far.

[eekee]

Good words. To add some sort-of tips from personal experience:

My nature is to be an extremely stubborn argumentor. I get around it by always trying to think of peoples feelings. After all, all our technical goals and even our jobs and income are only tools with the ultimate goal of contentment and happiness. (Survival is just one of the links between job and contentment. )

It's hard to see how our personal logic can be flawed. It's easier if we realise two things: our personal experience is limited -- that's an unavoidable truth -- and the perception which builds our personal experience is also limited. All too often, our perseption is influenced by factors unrelated or even opposed to our finding the truth of a matter. These factors can be anything from misunderstanding to indigestion. Let's not forget influence from people who seem to have good arguments, but only because they themselves have ignored some part of the issue. Finally, our perception may be influenced by intentionally misleading arguments which may be rare but can be extremely powerful. Exhibit A is object-oriented programming which was, in most programming circles, the Unassailable, Unarguable Ultimate Deity of Progress throughout the 90s and most of the 00s! It's an object lesson in how the self-interest of powerful people and organizations becomes Ultimate Truth for people who imagine they are irreligious and free. I don't see how commercial interests can directly influence arguments in this community, but I'm citing it as an example of how easily and subtly our perceptions are warped.

[PeterX]

I think, nobody is ganging up on bzt, nobody is bullying him. And nullplan, you are cursing and writing attacks.

I wouldn't have called for the mods, but I can understand nexos or anybody else doing so. I think I've made clear that I don't think bzt is evil or whatever.

I guess nullplan has similar point of view as bzt on what's aggressive, so he doesn't view bzt's writings as aggressive. I differ. But we're kind of settled with this. I'll try to tell bzt next time I think he's aggressive, probably per PM.

Peter

[iansjack]

So here's another idea: If the discussion is going into overtime, just stop. Just walk away. Go for a run or whatever, and never open the topic again. The fate of the world is not turning on any of you getting the last word in.

So true but, as already demonstrated in this thread, that's never going to happen.

I did ponder before posting this, worried that I might end up having the last word. But, on reflection, there's zero chance of that.

[vvaltchev]

but then accusations of sociopathy (that is what "total lack of empathy" means, vvaltchev) aren't either

Ehm, I'm sorry if that sounded offensive. I honestly believe the bzt has no idea why a lot of other people consider his language aggressive and abusive. That's just the last episode. Since it happened in the past and lead even to a temporary ban from the forum, that's a consistent problem that doesn't change with time and/or people.
And my point was that he's probably not doing that intentionally. What could be the reason for that? Lack of empathy. It's not an offense, no matter how you want to put it. Actually, saying that someone lacks empathy is a form of understanding.

Please, be objective and don't try to make ALL the other people look "bad" or whatever. Both when we're dealing with people or machines, the following principle applies: when a given problem manifests *consistently* no matter how you change the context, we HAVE TO look at the only element all the cases have in common.

[eekee]

There may be a cultural/language issue, especially given that your first language strongly influences the way you reason and feel. bzt is the third Hungarian I've known online; all described what they didn't like in terms which are extremely dismissive and can be called abusive. The other Hungarian guys I knew had a strong tendency to state their artistic feelings as if they were facts. I'm not trying to run down Hungary; there are plenty of bad things to be said about other cultures and languages. Greek culture makes it hard to give a man corrective guidance because it's considered extremely bad to hurt his self-respect. Traditional British culture makes it hard for boys with Greek or Islamic fathers to grow up with a healthy level of self-respect because if Brits see what they think is pride in their peers, they cut it down! I'm talking about my own childhood there. We all have the consequences of cultural faults inside ourselves.

Edit: I wasn't happy with the way I worded this, so I've trimmed it down. I do hope no-one was offended by what I wrote, nor is offended by what I've left.

[eekee]

I've trimmed my last post; I didn't feel right about some of my wording. I do hope no-one was offended by it, nor by what's left of it. I had forgotten the day-to-day factors which may affect our communication online. I know at least one person here has major reason for anxiety IRL. I recently read a quote from research results: "Anxiety in men often manifests as anger and irritability."

For my part, my mother died a couple of weeks ago, which is extra-complicated with how my family was in the past. A certain family member phoned me last night. She's recently proved she's become a better person, but it still messed up my feelings a bit on top of everything else. And I wasn't really coping before all this. I'm thankful I have prayer and strong faith to keep me going, as well as guidence from a religious organization which has improved the lives of millions of people. I've seen enough with my own eyes to be certain that is literally true — I wouldn't be with them if I wasn't certain. This organization is Jehovah's Witnesses. Here's their article on anxiety in men. To put a bit of evidence behind my statement that they improve peoples' lives, here's a list of articles and videos: The Bible Changes Lives. Some of those are mind-blowing! Many have been translated to other languages; you may want to click "English" at the top and search for yours.

Some years ago, I hardly had any faith. I turned to technical matters when I wanted a break from emotional things, (I still do,) but I often found myself arguing; fighting for what I thought would make the computing world better. In part, I sort-of worshipped progress and felt it was being held back by bad attitudes and big business. I was a little bit right, the situation has got a bit better, but some of the attitudes I was fighting for turned out to be not the best for progress. I guess anyone here can see there's still a little bit of fight in me. Here's a particularly interesting and on-topic detail: I think it's about 7 or 8 years since I started trying to give up arguing. (I got so passionate about it, it affected my health.) My belief in progress and the things I was arguing for weakened almost immediately. Then, a little more than 4 years ago, I returned to religion and had a whole different set of beliefs entirely. And yet I still argue over technical things! It's not a personality trait which naturally goes away, I don't think. It evidently can be controlled, with help. In the above list is a video interview of two South Africans. One was a politician who argued so much in his work, when he came home to his wife he couldn't stop arguing! The other felt so strongly about his beliefs, he once crashed an armoured car into the parliament building to protest the end of apartheid. And when a black man saved his life, it didn't change him. Now however, he counts black men amongst his brothers! He says, "Jehovah's organization changes a person completely." And the former politician, who is black, says "The transformation of our personality traits has led us to be genuine brothers." What about me? Is my arguing perhaps too light to matter? I don't know, but when I'm alone, sometimes I really want to fight. But now I think about it, those times have got a lot less frequent over the last 4 years. I pray every time I get angry. I didn't at first, I thought I was right to get angry, but when I started praying about it, I slowly started getting better.