Dammit

[Arryn]

magnate said:
I don't think my one-line post was easily interpreted "as sarcasm or bitterness"

Actually, that's precisely the impression I got from it. Cainehill has pretty much said everything else I could say about it, so I'll leave it at that.

magnate said:
I'm not saying emoticons aren't useful - they are indeed, and they can be fun - but they're not mandatory, except for the linguistically challenged.

You must not do very much reading of novels in real life, because if you did, you'd understand Cainehill's point about your having omitted any clues as to tone, et cetera. Writers of novels are much more descriptive so that the "body language" which you left out is presented to readers so that they can get a proper rendering of the situation as the author intended for it to be. Leaving out such clues has nothing to do with whether the reader is "linguistically challenged", and has everything to do with whether you have an understanding of the communications medium, its limitations, and if you really care about how your message is received. A skilled writer takes responsibility for making sure that the reader does not need to be psychic in order to correctly interpret a message. Alas, far too many people nowadays fail to understand the concept of taking responsibility for their own actions (or lack of action).

So, if you write a post that could be (mis)interpreted as flamebait, you should not be surprised or indignant if the response you get is ... a flame. Remember the old (and tired) adage about sowing and reaping, and the other one about casting of stones.