[ SECRET POST #5371 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #5371 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 33 secrets from Secret Submission Post #769.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[fscom]

05. https://i.imgur.com/bHFV6oA.png

[(Anonymous)]

People don't care about the truth. They don't care about others' opinions. All they care about is being right or at least more right than the next guy. Arguing online is nothing more than a weird masochistic pastime.

[(Anonymous)]

This, exactly.

They don't care what you're saying, OP. All they care about is skimming whatever you've typed for some innocent 'wrong' they can correct you on and thus show their superior knowledge/moral standing/etc.

[(Anonymous)]

(DA) This is why I stopped commenting logged in on FS, and mostly stopped commenting at all, honestly. I initially thought my poor communications skills were showing - or else some anon had a grudge against me and was looking for opportunities to find some offense in comments I honestly did not mean to cause offense by.

So I stopped commenting at all, lurked for awhile, and it became clearer that this is happening practically every post, someone assuming the worst possible interpretation of whatever the other person said or that they also must believe some other thing beyond what they said. Which I guess they're free to do, it's not against the rules, but it means commenting on FS posts had become stressful rather than fun, so here I am almost entirely lurking and occasionally commenting anon again and not looking at notifications out of fear of accidentally starting a confrontation. (Yes, I'm a coward. I just want to live and let live in fandom, RL is hostile enough.)

[(Anonymous)]

I just want to live and let live in fandom, RL is hostile enough.

Pretty much all my problems with the current state of fandom neatly summed up, and why I will never understand this obsession with making everything into a conflict or a competition or a crusade.

I'm sorry it's getting to you so much, and boy can I ever relate... but at least there's some comfort in knowing I (and other anons in this thread, it seems) aren't just terrible at expressing ourselves.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm not familiar with the person featured in this secret, but you (and she) absolutely have a point, nonny.

Fandom (not just fandom, but staying on-topic for the community for now) is very much going through a phase of deciding people's moralities (among other things) for them. The attitude has sort of devolved into "you're either with us or against us" on whatever subject is being debated, with only those two absolutes / extremes and no room for anything in between... and more often than not, people will decide which category you fall into before you've even said a word.

Possibly your language struggles are contributing a little... but the presumption-without-actually-bothering-to-read-what-you're-saying bit is definitely a thing that's happening pretty universally ATM.

[sabotabby]

This.

I've had a bunch of experiences where I'll say something and someone will blow up at me in a way that seems disproportionate and angry. For me, fandom is a fun distraction so it's always bizarre when that happens. I was at the tail end of one of those incidents when I saw that video and it hit home as well.

[(Anonymous)]

I took a break from FS for a little bit a while ago after people blew up at a couple of my secrets in a row. My secrets were little things that weren't about anything super controversial so to have people saying that I was all that was wrong in the world was pretty shocking.

[sabotabby]

Ugh. I'm sorry. This is all supposed to be fun.

[(Anonymous)]

You're the Disney Princess poster, aren't you?

[(Anonymous)]

There are a lot of possibilities here. It's true that many, many people barely skim what's being said and then jump to conclusions based on a poor understanding of what was said. It's like they're so very eager to respond to a certain point (that they've heard elsewhere on the internet) and they miss the fact that the person they're responding to... aren't really saying that?

But there are also people who don't communicate well and then get frustrated when people don't get what they're saying. I've literally seen conversations where person A says [thing] and then person B points out that [thing] isn't true/didn't happen and person A claims that oh no, they didn't say [thing] (again, easily disproven) or they didn't mean [thing that they said] or some other excuse for why they accidentally said [thing] but meant [something else].

I think it can be a whole bunch of different factors... poor communication, poor reading comprehension, and sometimes, people taking things in bad faith just to be argumentative.

[(Anonymous)]

All the possibilities you've listed just add up to the same thing, though: people being so obsessed with defending or justifying their own point that they either ignore, deny, or just don't read others' points.

Whether that's the replyer who barely skims then jumps to conclusions or the original poster shouting down anyone who replies, it still just boils down to someone screaming "I'm right and you're wrong" while shutting down all avenues for actual conversation.

If it were just a case of poor comprehension, on either side, the response would be "sorry, let me clarify" or "sorry, I misunderstood". But that's almost never the case in these 'discussions'.

So not really that many different factors after all, IMHO. Just different shapes for the same one.

[(Anonymous)]

Well... sort of. I believe there are people who sincerely have poor reading comprehension - not because they're obsessed with their own point (though that definitely happens!) but because they're just... not good at reading and grasping what's being said. And when people lack that skill, they're usually not aware of it.

It's a fine line perhaps, but I don't lump them into the same category as people who are being sloppy because they simply want to argue, or people who are deliberately reading the worst interpretation to what was said.

[(Anonymous)]

Fair point.

It's hard to really see the nuance when dealing with much the same behaviour, but you're right that motivation -- hyper-defensiveness of one's own perceived flaws vs. genuine bad intent -- does make a difference.

[(Anonymous)]

It often ends up being just as frustrating in the end, anyway!

OP of #6

[(Anonymous)]

“Bad at communicating” over here. I think I said what I meant, and it turns out what I said made no sense.

[(Anonymous)]

As other people have said...

People don't care what you have to say. They only care what they have to say.

Whether or not the latter has any relation at all to the former... well, that's neither here nor there.

[meadowphoenix]

I'm 100% an argumentative person, so I'll say usually I can tell bad faith from good faith when I ask a question about what a persons says. For instance, if I get a response of "i didn't say that" then I'll usually quote where I got the idea they DID say that and ask what they meant by their quote. They'll either answer it and I'll get clarify around that point or they'll move goalposts and it's likely that they a) don't really have backup but feel that what they're saying makes sense (which honestly, for philosophical points is actually valid) or b) they didn't realize what they said didn't make the sense they think it did but want to still express their feelings as argument or c) they know that what they're saying is a popular argument but they don't really know how to express it's underlying principals because they just heard the argument not the premises or d) it's just bad faith or trolling.

What's hard to realize tho is that most people can't argue OR discuss, and that inability will come across as bad faith. And I mean they can't regardless of whether they have a good or bad point. There's an actual skill to arguing your position that most people simply don't have.

[epicurean]

I'm so sorry you went through that/are going through that, OP. I'm ESL myself and can relate to the frustration.

And you're right on them not wanting to listen. From my time on the internet I've realized some people are more likely to put you in a camp, not because they want to have a healthy debate, but because they want to be right over a topic. Because getting on that high horse and stroking their own ego is more important than listening to the other party.

[(Anonymous)]

I get that.

But I've also heard certain reasonable sounding points lead to completely unreasonable arguments SO FUCKING MANY TIMES that I don't want to listen to those opening arguments any more. Like, I'm so fucking tired of the same old arguments and if you're new and everything is so open and exciting you might not understand how it all feels old an dug in to someone like me but it really does.