- Joined
- May 24, 2007
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I've been around message boards and before that Usenet for over 2 decades now. The social and cultural things that develop are downright amazing and amusing in a twisted sort of way.
I am constantly amazed by the downright brilliance of most of the posters in this forum at S2, and at S2 in general. I don't want to name names because I don't want anyone to feel left out. S2 is supposed to be about celebrating this brilliance.
Yet there is something about familiarity breeding contempt and the anonymity of username and avatar that dehumanizes the real live people that make up the community. When it's a username and avatar, it's easy to type in some insult and forget about it as you make the next of your n thousand posts. If you met the person in real life, you'd probably have a good time together and a few beers...
The main thing that binds the Blazers forum together is being Blazers fans. To each individual, this may mean something slightly different - some are fans of certain players, some want the team to succeed but hate the management, and so on.
Isn't there room for everyone to be a fan in their own way?
It may help to consider the person who makes a post is a real live person. A little empathy might go a long way.
It must have been 20+ years ago when I posted what I thought was an innocent joke about someone. Turns out the guy was a cripple in a wheel chair and my joke was not very funny in that context and especially to many people in that "forum" who had come to know the guy. I truly regretted it the minute I found out how it came across. If you put yourself in the other guy's shoes once in a while, you realize that sometimes people say or do things with no ill intent, no matter how it comes across in black and white.
Black and white. You don't see the guy's face, hear the inflections in his voice as he says whatever it is (posted), see the facial expressions, etc. Dehumanized. Sarcasm is a wonderful form of humor and getting a point across, but it doesn't translate to black and white unless you somehow point out that it's sarcasm in the post.
Familiarity breeds contempt. When you post with a lot of the same people for a long time, you get to know who likes a player and who doesn't. After all, the guy who likes the player posts that a gazillion times over months or years and the guy who doesn't has to read it a gazillion times. And vice versa. On the surface it seems like you only have to make your point once or twice, but that's not how things work. New people who come to the forum aren't going to read back to threads 3 years old to see that a poster likes that player. So to the loyal and regular poster here who reads most everything as it's posted, it's like spam or trolling or whatever. To the new guys, to the search engines, it's not!
Perhaps what differentiates this site's philosophy from the others is that we (ideally) appreciate everyone as people, from the top down. Sometimes people have a bad day or other circumstances spill over into their posting. We easily forgive these things. A guy has 8000+ posts and has a couple of bad days, is he all of a sudden worthless? NO.
Sorry for being so long winded here. I really hope that you all will figure out that it's easier to get along if you don't take things so personally. You see your face in the mirror and see a human being. A guy across the country sees an avatar. I hope people are reasonable because they're people. If you use vinegar ("you're a troll!") instead of honey ("would you mind lightening up on the man crush you have on player X?") you might find the other guy digs in, otherwise he might be considerate.
Go Blazers! Luck the Fakers.
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screw you guys. I'll have you know I came in 4th in a recent mod poll! Bastards! 
