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27453. bhelpuri - 7/1/2013 1:29:45 AM PMS,
I address you directly here, because you obviously need that. I know relatively few things really well, but one of those is that you have no credentials to pass judgement on anything at all.
You were a juvenile ass when you came on this forum - but at that time many of us were, and behaved like that. However, time has passed Monkey Boy, one must learn, one must grow up and take on real responsibilities. For literally everyone here (except you, apparently) real life proved more alluring than the Internet's shadow puppetry. At this moment, I sincerely wish you the same. Go. Get a life. 27454. PincherMartin - 7/1/2013 1:30:03 AM
And I'll post the words three times if you can find a single instance of Bhel competently debating any issue in this forum. 27455. bhelpuri - 7/1/2013 1:34:54 AM Also, I remain proud of this Mote's grown-up aspect, where so many of us have met, and continue to meet. It makes us better... 27456. PincherMartin - 7/1/2013 1:40:44 AM Bhel,
"I address you directly here, because you obviously need that. I know relatively few things really well, but one of those is that you have no credentials to pass judgement on anything at all."
You see, I knew this would happen.
Debate isn't about credentials. Or passing judgment.
But is that what you meant when you said that you were a "veteran" of a billion online debates?
Because it is much more believable to me that you've flashed your credentials or passed judgment a billion times online in lieu of actually discussing an issue.
But that's not debate.
If we're talking about India, for example, and you make some claim that I disagree with. If you retort that you've actually lived in India and I have not, you've flashed your credentials, but you're not debating
You write beautiful prose, but you haven't a single idea bouncing around in that Hindu head of yours. 27457. bhelpuri - 7/1/2013 1:42:18 AM You are an idiot. Bring me Khan. 27458. PincherMartin - 7/1/2013 1:44:59 AM Hahaha ! I'm sure he'd agree with me that you're a great stylist and a moron.
But agree or not, that's certainly the way he treated you in the good old days. 27459. PincherMartin - 7/1/2013 1:49:45 AM Bhel has an impressionistic intelligence that expresses itself best in words (rather than, say, brushstrokes or musical notes).
But he does not know how to analyze, and he wouldn't know how to debate if his family's life depended on it. 27460. judithathome - 7/1/2013 2:08:10 AM I doubt he'd be so cavalier with his family's lives in the first place. 27461. PincherMartin - 7/1/2013 2:10:12 AM Judith,
I didn't say he should bet his family's lives on his ability to debate. But if for some obscure reason his family depended on him having that skill, they'd be goners. 27462. PincherMartin - 7/1/2013 2:14:15 AM But, hey, bhel's in fine company here by lacking that skill.
It's perfectly believable to me that when you, him, ibby, and Arky get together and chitchat about the great issues of the day, that the four of you would completely agree that you all have a very fine ability to analyze and debate matters of importance. 27463. PincherMartin - 7/1/2013 2:17:27 AM BTW, no one here has bothered to thank me for sparking some life back into this forum.
When's the last time you guys ever had such a crowd? 27464. arkymalarky - 7/1/2013 2:36:33 AM it's avoiding that kinda crap which keeps us coming back here.we love our lives and interests and we don't feel a need to keep this place going with petty shallow repetitive exchanges 24/7. None of us is defined by what impression we're trying to make here, a la junior high. Thankfully we have better things to do. Hopefully one day you'll be able to say the same.
Posted from: my hammock
Which I'm here to tell y'all is my current favorite place on the planet. I can't believe I just now have one. When I think of all the lost leisure time I spent not having one.... 27465. arkymalarky - 7/1/2013 2:39:04 AM which reminds me: mildescape.com. she makes the most lovely escape games, and posted a new one just today. 27466. iiibbb - 7/1/2013 2:44:49 AM they say strange things happen to people who have been to the end of the Internet... I thought I'd never see one 27467. PincherMartin - 7/1/2013 3:03:28 AM Arky demonstrates well in her #27466 my earlier point about her (and a few others here) not having the ability to debate.
"it's avoiding that kinda crap which keeps us coming back here."
But most are NOT coming back.
This is the deadest forum on the planet, and it has been for many years.
Now if the six of you still enjoy coming back here on a monthly basis to post about some small personal episode in your lives, I think that's great. Everyone should have friends. Even Bhel.
But isn't that why they invented Facebook?
When I look on the front page of this forum, I see threads like News and Current Events, International, Religion and Philosophy, Technology and Science, Health, American Politics, etc. - all of which invite the forum's posters in to comment and debate.
But even when some poster accidentally wanders into one of those threads and makes a comment, nothing resembling a debate follows.
Occasionally when a debate does accidentally break out, some posters here are quick to squelch it - out of fear perhaps that it might become a habit and destroy the tenuous comity you've built up here.
Look, I get it. The forum's evolved. A lot of people here have always had different inclinations that caused them to shy away from debate. You've all gotten older and less interested in anything that resembles confrontation. You prefer hanging out with people online who you only vaguely know from some get-togethers every other year that only a handful of you attend on a regular basis, but who you know are kind and never tease you about your harelip.
So why don't you say so? Stop pretending that I'm some ogre who undermines debate when you know damn well that's not true. 27468. arkymalarky - 7/1/2013 3:16:59 AM post something of substance to debate. I dare you. you're content averse and you always have been. None of us have forgotten. 27469. arkymalarky - 7/1/2013 3:23:44 AM there are plenty of dead forums on the internet. Some in which the participants have moved on to other things, some in which the same old people say the same old shit over and over and over ad nauseum. 27470. PincherMartin - 7/1/2013 3:32:19 AM "post something of substance to debate."
I have, Arky.
I posted some substantive stuff about LBGT politics and sex/gender in the discussion sparked by ibby's comment about the so-called six-year-old transgender boy.
It's just that most of you are so offended by either my tone or my ideas (and probably both) that you assume I'm not serious and so can't possibly not substantive.
But that's malarky. I can be both insulting and full of content. There's no contradiction there. And I can be a good sport when I'm insulted in turn, so it's not as if I'm asking for special treatment. Only stupidity turns me off.
I also posted about my bet with Alistair. I thought one of you might follow my links to the discussion with Alistair - which is better than anything I've seen here recently - and comment on some aspect of it. There's a lot there: the quality of expert predictions; energy prices, peak oil, currency exchange, etc.
But none of you did. Not one. 27471. PincherMartin - 7/1/2013 3:34:25 AM "there are plenty of dead forums on the internet. Some in which the participants have moved on to other things, some in which the same old people say the same old shit over and over and over ad nauseum."
If you think I've been saying the same shit over and over again, you clearly haven't been reading me over the last half-dozen years.
That's fine. You have better things to do. But don't pretend you know the score when you're not watching the game. 27472. judithathome - 7/1/2013 3:45:38 AM I can be both insulting and full of content.
Just as you can be insulting and full of shit.
Look, no one wants to discuss things with someone who is calling them names. I know that's SOP at TPW but it's not like that everywhere.
I didn't follow your links because frankly, I'm not up on the price of oil or the exchange rates of the EU. And really don't care about either one.
I've had a lot of things happen to me in the last few years and it's made me somewhat jaded about what is important in my life and to my life and what is not...I consider it a good day when the sun comes up without some grime personal news.
So yeah, I don't get very deep into discussions and don't debate and couldn't care less what goes on...if that makes me shallow, so be it. I can get through the day just fine without Facebook or Twitter...or earthshaking, soul-searching fact tossing.
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