OT: Hostility in Forums

[Xrati]

AgentZero, can you tell me why your sarcasm is so realistic that it's almost not funny?

Unfortunatly, not all admins are equal. This board enjoys some of the best that I've ever dealt with. AND to their credit I salute the time and effort they put forth toward making this a website that you'll want to continue to come to... [img]/threads/images/Graemlins/icon47.gif[/img]

[AgentZero]

Xrati, you, and I, for that matter, can thank my Irish mother for that. She gifted me with a very Irish sense of humour (which is essentially a British sense of humour with more cursing), so my definition of sarcasm is a bit different to the North American norm.

The object of sarcasm, to me, is to ridicule, and it is all the more enjoyable for all involved when the subject is unaware that they are being ridiculed. I'm reminded of the worn-out old joke that appears nearly every pre-teen high school sitcom, where some adult asks our antidisestablishmentarianist protagonist if they know what sarcasm means, to which our peppy teen rolls his/her eyes and replies, "NOOOooooooo."

This is not sarcasm. I'm not sure what it is. Mild douchebaggery, perhaps? The above example may draw a few laughs from younger viewers as the poor adult somehow misses the "sarcasm" and sets about explaining it, but when someone replies in a slightly curious tone, "Actually, no, I'm not familiar with the term. What is it exactly?" the entertainment value of watching someone unwittingly explaining sarcasm to the owner of a PhD in English is unparalleled.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

British humor is the best. Best comedy shows I've seen? British.

Worse comedy shows I've seen? US.

[Randallw]

In my experience, worst comedies? US remakes of British comedies.

A key factor I think is that British comedies have an idea what they want to write. Sort of "I have a few great ideas for episodes" and they condense it down into 6 great episodes a year. In the US they seem to have an idea and when they get made the writers have to wrack their brains to develop 26 epsiodes a year.

There's a great show called "Top Gear". It's about cars. Now that's normally an area I have zero interest in but it's entertaining because the presenters make jokes about stuff and have fun. If the car they're testing is a piece of junk they will call it a piece of junk. I read lately that Jay Leno thinks the idea of a US version is doomed as the presenters can't criticise anything in case the sponsors take offence.

There's a US remake of an Australian comedy in development. You can't help but read about here as it the original seems to be widely considered the epitome of Aussie humour. Me personally, I can't stand the piece of
!@#$%. I fully expect the remake to burst into flames 5 minutes before it first airs. What do I know though, there's another panel quiz show I thought would be cancelled after one epsiode, whcih kept going. It was vaguely entertaining though. Actually now I come to think of it it hasn't been on for awhile. I guess it did get axed.

Addendum: Not that I mean to go on a rant, but on a related note, I recently saw the remake of Solaris. Now I've never seen the original, although since it's Soviet Union Sci-fi and I had the misfortune of seeing one of those once I doubt it was any better, but after roughly two minutes I thought "This is the most abominably boring sci-fi film I have ever seen". It's like the 5 minutes at the end of 2001 where Dave is living the rest of his life in the one room, only it goes for 2 hours. I've never understood exactly what was happening in 2001, but there is a difference between being confused and being bored out of your skull.

I heard it has a nice twist with one guy being replaced but I couldn't bring myself to torture myself waiting to see it. Yes, yes I know I didn't watch the whole thing, but boring me within 2 minutes is not conducive to making me care about the rest.

[Xrati]

Well then AgentZero, you just keep that sarcasm coming. I like it! It is ALMOST the truth!

Cheers...
Beers...
and Comedy [img]/threads/images/Graemlins/icon23.gif[/img]

[narf poit chez BOOM]

...Isn't the BBC government sponsered? That would tend to change what the sponsers won't allow.

[Randallw]

Yes. With the BBC I guess it's a situation of "How can we entertain the people with some quality programming?". With commerical TV it'd be "What can we do to get people to keep watching?, and while we're at it lets string it out for half the year to increase revenue"

There's also the difference in culture I guess. Fawlty towers is a classic but I still saw a John Larroquette vehicle once that was a copy. Not that I remember the original having an episode where two people got their piercings stuck together . The Bean counters seemingly want to jump on a bandwagon and grab some of the revenue while missing the reason something might have been popular. It also happens a lot with Hollywood copying foreign films. Terry Pretchett is dissilusioned with Hollywood because they wanted to make Reaper Man but thought they should lose the whole Death thing because it was so morbid, and there are plans to make a live version of Akira but you know with Leonardo Di Caprio, and in New Manhattan instead of New Tokyo.

Ever heard of, or seen, the movie Enemy Mine? The original book has nothing to do with a mine, it's a posessive. Some exec didn't get it though and stuck one in so the audience wouldn't be confused

[Atrocities]

My $0.02 worth:

Caution, Long Rambling Rant

There is a sincere lack of etiquette when it comes to manors of people who use game forums. Cyber Nations forums are no exception either. The forum moderators are, for lack of a better term, fanatics and the members who post there are without, for the most part, kindness.

When the normal rules that govern our social behavior are removed, such as they are in forums, peoples natural tendency toward being socially polite and willing to discuss rationally, topics of interest, are put aside. The rationality of ones own limits are removed and well your free to say anything you want any way you want. That kind of aphrodisiac is far too powerful for most people to deal with thus all rules of adulthood go out the window and in this behavioral vacuum comes the thrill of freedom of unrestrained speech. You can say what you feel often times without having to worry about the consequences of your statements. Some people in life are to weak in the knees and are unable to express themselves in the real life work and find that when they are secure behind the anonymity of their monitor and key board, they can say what they really think, no matter how rude or twisted that message might be.

They get a rise out of pushing peoples buttons, calling people names, spouting off hate, and generally carrying on as if they are spoiled rotten little retards with no concept of proper decorum.

Often more than not, these people are childish adults who have one or more Psychiatric issues that limit their ability to function as normal social adults in real life. So these mentally challenged people find a new home, and often a new identity, on the internet, chat rooms, and forums where they harass people, push buttons, and generally carry on their anti-social behaviors.

They attack over every issue, spend countless hours on the internet looking for obscure web sites to back up their ridiculous points of view and are never willing to show the rational behavior of compromise when it has been proven that their point of view is, how shall I say this, misguided.

They are irrational, ill spoken, mean, of center, anti-social, mental morons who lack any semblance of normalcy. In most cases they are fringe hangers, zealots, and or socially challenged individuals who believe that they are sane while the rest of the world is insane. They hold true to warped ideals and beliefs and no amount of common sense or reason will ever be enough to enlighten their dark and twisted way of thinking. No matter what you do or say, they are die hardly committed to their own self deprecating way of thinking and they have nothing but disdain for any who challenge their way of thinking. In fact, they thrive upon attacking those who are not like minded to their confused and often bankrupted points of view.

The best method for dealing with such looser's is simply to ignore them, placate them, or if your up to it, challenge them and aggressively denounce everything they say and do as an act of ignorance, as in most cases it is.

When it comes to these kind of people, you can say the sky is blue and they will argue that it is not. You can show irrefutable proof that it is indeed blue, and they will not accept it, and will bury you in links to trivial, seldom visited web sites that support their ignorant views. Dispute their links and web sites, and they will flame you, attack you, and threaten you. Ultimately they will register 200 accounts and use them all to denounce you and your evidence.

They will spend every waking minute of their ground hog days dedicated to the singular goal of proving their point of view and will stop at nothing to either force you to accept it, or punish you for not accepting it. They are the worst of the worse when it comes to the internet and they all subscribers to their own self importance.

Give a fool attention, and that fool will do everything he can to keep getting your attention.

[Randallw]

See now this is something I don't understand. I hope it can be agreed that I'm a long term member of the SE community and I have a lot of knowledge I can pass on, but I'm simply not interested in being placed in a position of responsibility. I have no desire to go on power trips and so don't consider the extra effort worth the bother.

In some SE games I've on occasion been resentful of another empire riding roughshot over me and secretly vowed revenge, but this doesn't last longer than it takes me to get half way through my next turn. I simply can't see the point in expending additional effort in being petty or vindictive.

Apart from the conflict it causes getting into arguments with people, I fail to understand what the attraction is in bothering to make an issue of something. Yes I occasioanlly voice my opinions on matters but really it's not worth casting dispersions personally at someone just because you disagree with them. I'd rather just give up and forget it. In the grand scheme of things it makes no difference if you're right or not, and it just causes bad humours, you could say, to get obsessed. This is why I consider myself a Stoic (as well as a cynic, a nihilist, an appollonian, and half a dozen other half baked philosophies I once read about in a book ). There's nothing you can do about it so why bother.

Not that I'm criticising that you are making a point, just that I fail to see why people go on power trips.

[Atrocities]

Debating is fun, arguing is not.