The "I Didn't Comment in Another Thread" Thread

[Jacob Lewis]

Oh wow. Talk about misreading. I totally read @payn s comment as making a joke. Never even considered taking it seriously.

This is how I try to approach most comments in THIS thread, even when responding to semi-serious comments I make. It is part of the shenanigans we do to keep our heads level and our minds sane (for the most part).

Likewise, I don't take comments like @Umbran made to @payn as directed or personal. Whether or not our comments were made in jest, they all have valid points. But we typically drop them here so's not to raise the ire of irrational and hot-tempered denizens of the boards, and prevent ourselves from becoming more of them.

 

[Umbran]

Oh wow. Talk about misreading. I totally read @payn s comment as making a joke. Never even considered taking it seriously.

There is nothing in the text that suggests it is a joke.

This is a problem with snark and sarcasm, folks. If it fails, it looks really bad.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

There is nothing in the text that suggests it is a joke.

This is a problem with snark and sarcasm, folks. If it fails, it looks really bad.

Any bit of comedy that employs satire, irony, or sarcasm in a proper and correct fashion requires that some portion of the audience be confused (or even hurt) by the comedy.

Ambiguity is not a bug, but the central feature of any type comedy that plays with or invokes satire and irony. Simply put, the possibility that a reader can misunderstand the message is necessary to the proper conveyance of the message.

This ambiguity is not a bug - it is the distinguishing feature.

 

[trappedslider]

Sure! Look around ....

Look around, look around at how
Lucky we are to be alive right now!

 

[prabe]

Any bit of comedy that employs satire, irony, or sarcasm in a proper and correct fashion requires that some portion of the audience be confused (or even hurt) by the comedy.

Ambiguity is not a bug, but the central feature of any type comedy that plays with or invokes satire and irony. Simply put, the possibility that a reader can misunderstand the message is necessary to the proper conveyance of the message.

This ambiguity is not a bug - it is the distinguishing feature.

We've ... discussed this--and I have no desire to go through that again--but if the possibility of being misunderstood is the distinguishing feature of your comedy, then maybe you shouldn't complain about being misunderstood.

"You" there is general, not personal.

 

[overgeeked]

Any bit of comedy that employs satire, irony, or sarcasm in a proper and correct fashion requires that some portion of the audience be confused (or even hurt) by the comedy.

Ambiguity is not a bug, but the central feature of any type comedy that plays with or invokes satire and irony. Simply put, the possibility that a reader can misunderstand the message is necessary to the proper conveyance of the message.

This ambiguity is not a bug - it is the distinguishing feature.

This also covers academic writing and philosophy. The central point of both seems to be intentional inscrutability for the specific purpose of talking down to anyone who's honest enough to admit they don't understand it.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

We've ... discussed this--and I have no desire to go through that again--but if the possibility of being misunderstood is the distinguishing feature of your comedy, then maybe you shouldn't complain about being misunderstood.

Sure. A lot of people got all hot and bothered and concerned about all the baby eatin' being proposed.

Can't cure stupid, and can't cater to it.

The problem isn't humor that is ambiguous; the problem is humorless scolds. IMO.

 

[el-remmen]

This also covers academic writing and philosophy. The central point of both seems to be intentional inscrutability for the specific purpose of talking down to anyone who's honest enough to admit they don't understand it.

I know that some academics can be like this about their work or the work of others, but honest curiosity, inquiry, and confusion is not only part of the scholarly process, but misprisions are often productive.

In my experience of grad school, when it was positive, it was a group of us sitting around in a seminar trying to collectively parse difficult texts and ideas. I think ascribing intentional inscrutability is a mistake and often a mistake made by those who are confused and too embarrassed to admit it and thus lash out instead.

 

[CleverNickName]

I very nearly posted in that thread, but stopped myself at the last minute. So basically, I'm a hero.

It was the same old post you've already read, and already dismissed, and will never listen to, no matter how true it is:

Your friends aren't "everybody." You don't know "everybody," you've never even met "everybody." So when you write something like "everyone hates this" or "nobody uses that rule," you are already wrong. You need to backspace over whatever profound insight you just typed, and change it to "people I play with" or "in the games I've run" instead. Because no matter how badly you want it to be otherwise, you are only ever referring to a very small group of people.

TL;DR: stop thinking that you speak for me and my friends. You don't. You can't.

 

[Benjamin Olson]

Your friends aren't "everybody." You don't know "everybody," you've never even met "everybody." So when you write something like "everyone hates this" or "nobody uses that rule," you are already wrong. You need to backspace over whatever profound insight you just typed, and change it to "people I play with" or "in the games I've run" instead. Because no matter how badly you want it to be otherwise, you are only ever referring to a very small group of people.

That's all very valid, but it also seems like it all boils down to needing to throw in some qualifiers of "everybody I know" or "in my experience, everybody". It gets tiring to have to police the extent of every statement you make to repetitively acknowledge the limits of your own experience. But of course, when you don't, the reader often has no way of knowing whether you are simply being uncareful in your language, or whether you are actually being uncareful in your thinking, because one of the central bummers of saying anything online is that you are forever making first impressions.