On Mon, 2006-09-11 at 09:14 -0500, Manoj Srivastava wrote: > Are you saying stupid people can't make honest mistakes? I > would think that these are not mutually exclusive characterizations. > As for determining intelligence of an action, I would much rather > call a spade a spade. It is not as if he called the people stupid > (thing, not person) -- that is merely your hyperbole and strawman.
I disagree - a thing can by definition never be braindead. But that's not relevant, when refering to the thing my point remains the same. In everyday situations, *opening* a converstation with the statement that someone has done a "very braindead stupid" thing is about the worst way to start a constructive argument. It's the best way to get people in their trenches right at the first second, solving nothing. Unfortunately, I haven't seen much support for my position yet - most responses are in the line of "if you don't want to be flamed, don't set the mailinglist to moderated". I remain at "flaming your fellows never helps the project, making requests and doing suggestions does". > > Is it appropriate to use terms like "fucking" and "damn" on a wide > It certainly speaks volumes about the author, so I am not > opposed to such terms. It help rather rapidly to locate their niche > in my score files. I agree with you here, but I aspire a mailing list environment where one could start reading right away without having to build up a database of swearing posters first. Thijs
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