Banned
Well tonight I was banned from the TSA's IRC channel, my place of hangout for about a decade. The reason is, to put it simply, that the admins decided that it was against the rules for me to discuss politics in any way shape or form, once they decided that I figured it was only a matter or time. I'm not going to go into anymore detail beyond
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At the core though I don't think my actions have differed all that drastically from many of my debate partners.
Something else I feel inclined to point out is, that realistically I don't bring up politics all that frequently. This year is of course an election year so certain issues weigh more heavily peoples minds, during a normal year though the topic comes up far less.
Of course I do sometimes debate about other things, such as videogames, but generally those sorts of debates are far less passionate all around.
I guess what I'm getting at is that the perception that I'm a unyielding combative person is likely at least in part connected to very recent events and conditions, which are not likely to persist at the level they are at now beyond the end of the year.
Thus trying to summarize my decade of participation under such a light is undoubtedly going to paint an unrealistic portrait of my activities.
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I admit I have made some errors and have been too headstrong in the past, trying to deny that would be stupidity. That being said though, I don't see a reluctance to change viewpoints to be all that unusual or detrimental. Do I sometimes fail to take the time to admit where my debate partner is correct, yes, especially in a live format where there is a lot of emphasis on responding promptly.
"Sometimes" is one thing, but this is different. Failing to acknowledge issues happens far too often for you to be within average social norms - and my evidence for same is that these folks are actively saying that that's why they've banned you. (Perhaps not as much to your face, but that's largely because they don't trust you to actually do anything about that problem - which is somewhat justified, since you seem reluctant to think of it AS a problem that needs a solution regardless of the difficulty involved.)
I really do sympathize with the issues involved on responding promptly; stress from the mental workout that gives me is why I can't deal with people 24/7 no matter how much I enjoy it and want to keep going. But that doesn't mean that that difficulty makes it okay; it's something that absolutely must be practiced, because otherwise you can just as easily end up communicating incompletely or improperly. IRC gives you a whole heck of a lot more time in this regard than face-to-face discussion, and allows you to easily edit and reconsider statements before you send them; that's something to take advantage of early on.
At the core though I don't think my actions have differed all that drastically from many of my debate partners.
You may not believe so, but those partners and other observers disagree, and since debate is a social interaction, it is their perception that counts, not what you think is going on.
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Something else I feel inclined to point out is, that realistically I don't bring up politics all that frequently. This year is of course an election year so certain issues weigh more heavily peoples minds, during a normal year though the topic comes up far less.
Of course I do sometimes debate about other things, such as videogames, but generally those sorts of debates are far less passionate all around.
This is absolutely true, and this is why I'm trying so hard to get across the point that it is not your politics that are causing the problem. It is not necessarily the topic; that's just icing on the cake of annoyance. It is the way the topic is being presented, debated, and responded to.
I guess what I'm getting at is that the perception that I'm a unyielding combative person is likely at least in part connected to very recent events and conditions, which are not likely to persist at the level they are at now beyond the end of the year.
Thus trying to summarize my decade of participation under such a light is undoubtedly going to paint an unrealistic portrait of my activities.
Those recent events certainly haven't helped, but to assume they'll go back to being A-OK again after November is, I think, a little naive. This has been going on for quite some time now, and folks have been frustrated about it for some time now; they just usually don't bring it up to your face because they fear getting drawn into a debate much like this. (A significant example: you once had a fairly long topic going on on IRC about Popples around the same timeframe as the 2006 Bash. I remember this very vividly because it was driving people nuts to the point that they were still talking about it there two days later - and at least one attendee still mentions it now and again whenever your name comes up in conversation when you're not present, although admittedly he's got his own issues there.)
Take it from an outside perspective: If you know somebody who is prone to being uncompromising and stubborn on debates, and you're pretty sure that if you confront him on this you'll end up on the receiving end of that uncompromising stubbornness, would you engage, or would you just do your best to ignore the annoyance and move on? :) (This supposition is independent of whether or not that is a fair characterization of you as you see yourself. That is what people see, and you can't convince them otherwise by simply talking to them; your actions and reactions have to change, and show continued change over quite a long time.)
Having said that, I do acknowledge that given the whole decade, you have changed and improved a lot (a few years ago I doubt this conversation would be possible, for example ;) ). I'm just trying to get you to change the priority on one particular area that needs improvement.
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I've noticed that I do a lot better when a discussion isn't done live, or in front of a lot of other people. It allows me to sit back and carefully say everything I want to say, instead of trying to quickly summarize everything I want to say into as few sentences as possible.
When I try to summarize on the fly, everything seems to come out wrong, I'll readily admit this. I do feel I've gotten a little better at this, but obviously not fast enough for other peoples tastes.
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Conversation kind of works that way on IRC, unfortunately. I wish I had some sort of Super Power Secret or whatnot to share, but honestly it's just the sort of thing that really only gets easier with a hell of a lot of practice. (I find it to be so *very* worth it, tho.)
Incidentally, I put a lot of emphasis on "knowing when to stop" early on in this particular discussion because it's difficult to keep areas available to practice in when folks get frustrated by your continuing on a topic - as illustrated by the ban. ;) (At one point I had to find myself a completely different arena in which to practice at one point after things just completely fell apart at college; that turned out to be the TSA.) Also, if the forum you're in is going to be inappropriate for the debate at hand, it may be wiser to simply withdraw rather than press on; knowing when to pick your battles is very important. (And on that separate politics forum attempt on IRC... while that would be a reasonable start along these lines, you probably would have have to sell the idea to Jessie and Kristy as such rather than doing so unilaterally. When you're already on thin ice, things just get that much more rough.)
I've noticed that I do a lot better when a discussion isn't done live, or in front of a lot of other people. It allows me to sit back and carefully say everything I want to say, instead of trying to quickly summarize everything I want to say into as few sentences as possible.
When I try to summarize on the fly, everything seems to come out wrong, I'll readily admit this. I do feel I've gotten a little better at this, but obviously not fast enough for other peoples tastes.
Fair enough. In that case, there's two things I can recommend:
1) (as mentioned above) Keep practicing live discussion more, and
2) Spend even more time observing how other folks manage; look for how they respond, and how it differs from how you might respond. (And not just in terms of what the content is, but *how* it's presented and how it's done).
Just don't fall into the trap of assuming that All This Happened because They Just Don't Get it, or The Forum Was Somewhat Inconvenient, or whatnot. Communication's a two-way street; both parties are equally capable of screwing it up. ;)
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As for this situation, as far as I'm concerned it was the result of two things. Of course there's my general clumsiness in those sorts of situations that rubs people the wrong way, however I also feel that certain parties were over-emotionalizing things and over-reacted on multiple occasions.
Do I need more practice, of course, but I've been getting better, and compared to the arguments I would stumble my way into when I first arrived on IRC, the incidents lately have been very small.
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I don't recall seeing that at the time - from what I remember, what was suggested and accepted was "ban on discussion or else ban from server" - but it might have been prudent to check regardless. *shrug* Again, being on thin ice makes things much less simple than they normally would be.
As for this situation, as far as I'm concerned it was the result of two things. Of course there's my general clumsiness in those sorts of situations that rubs people the wrong way, however I also feel that certain parties were over-emotionalizing things and over-reacted on multiple occasions.
Fair enough, but that first part is the part you should be focusing on the most, because that's the part you can and ought to do something about. I also get the impression that we might disagree on the degree to which either of those factors had an impact. :) People do get very very frustrated over that clumsiness, and that's not exactly a major fault; I'm sure there are times when you get frustrated over how a discussion's going. When that frustration just keeps building and building - such as when there seems to be no hope for resolution - you get reactions like what happened.
Do I need more practice, of course, but I've been getting better, and compared to the arguments I would stumble my way into when I first arrived on IRC, the incidents lately have been very small.
The only thing I would argue here is that last part about their size. They may seem small to you, but many of them are not so small for others. Granted, it is a significant improvement over a decade ago, but it's still short of baseline. As you astutely stated previously, the pace of improvement has not fast enough for other people's tastes, and since they control who you talk to because they are your potential audience, that's something to keep in mind.
I do acknowledge, tho, that some people are just hypersensitive, and it's sometimes difficult to tell whether it's one's self exacerbating a problem or someone just being overly touchy. In those circumstances, however, I would still advise to err on the side of caution and back away.
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Well I guess I can only add that I'm aware I have issues and I'm working on. Though I do hope you'll forgive me for feeling miffed anyway.
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Fair enough. I have no issue with that last part (you being miffed), so long as that part immediately prior (aware, workin') is around. :)
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