And now, dearly beloved, I am quite nigh to shifting to nightshift mode. In a couple of hours I'll be proletariorating, so kindly behave and be doing your duties. You have many hours now to spam this to oblivion.

quote:

Originally posted by The Monk:
/rén,

Well said. Thanks for your post. I don't mean to plagiarize, but it is clear and concise, and it provides much food for thought.

You are welcome to play anything I say however you feel inclined. I have a feeling you'll be respectful about it.

So really the Monk, you just have a HUGE crush on me.

No. (to answer your question)

Thank you for that, /rén. And ditto on that last post, by the way.

+++++

Absolutely, Melissa.
Although my infatuation has been somewhat weakened by the fact that you did not filter out the question to which "no" can never be an answer. But carry on...

I guess I will have to live with that.

I hope you don't live in the same part of the Funky Niffs I will be inhabiting.

Monk

I gotta go. More paths to cut in my new tangled wilderness and darkness is coming soon.

quote:

Enlighten me, please, baby. What's a "con" and what's a progressive? Who are "cons" and who are progressive? Are there still people around who actually think these words have any meaning whatsoever?

Well maybe you need to get out of your monkville more???
But seriously maybe ask the person that brought that into the conversation as in:

quote:

We have several others on this thread, who have interestingly enough been chastised by the resident cons for their concerns, pointing out that they, too, are often perplexed, and somewhat confused about what appropriate behavior even means.

We can see what side your butter is spread on. Here is another passage:

quote:

Another fine example of attacking the character of the partipants rather than addressing the words and what they mean. We have the famous categorical binary opposition framing trick: "it's the libs/progressives vs. cons," along with inventing a straw man argument with the "two rules" fallacy.

Brilliant.

How? As opposed to calling others it, cons, etc??? Calling others banal and boring? Oh, thanks now I get "Brilliant". I am sure that is not in some ironic manner?

Also Monk notice that I did not say libs??

Well if you can show me how your rules are applied fairly then maybe I was too generous to say progressive???

Wow, he's all worked up.

quote:

Originally posted by /rén:
Monk,

quote:

Thank you. It seems to me that they simply mean "insults". As a general remark, it seems to me that following this one, they ought to reconsider their understanding of racism, anti-Semitism, trolling and the manifold manifestations of the lot. If the rule you cited is to have any meaning, that is.

To my way of the thinking, meaning is the least of anyone's concerns regarding what rules mean, when they are applied, and why.

We have several others on this thread, who have interestingly enough been chastised by the resident cons for their concerns, pointing out that they, too, are often perplexed, and somewhat confused about what appropriate behavior even means.

quote:

On a related note, logical fallacies can be applied by folks who are fully aware that they are applying logical fallacies, and as such they may serve as insults disguised as "simple" ad-hom attacks. Such attacks should instantly be obvious from the context, though, and can thusly be put in a rule book.

I've seen that happen often enough, kind of like the how many images are we seeing in two facing mirrors effect. While they might be instantly obvious to some, to others it seems they are confusing.

Explaining the details of how an ad hominem fallacy works to someone who probably knows quite well what they are, is more of that mirroring of mirroring.

quote:

Monk,
I have NOT understood your line of questioning throughout this an entire thread, and I suspect I am not the only one. So questioning your state of mind, when writing these posts, does not seem so extraordinary.

Sorry, mel, but everything I've read of his makes perfect sense and fits the context. I feel the tone, the irony, and the satire.

Now I grant you this, I grasped immediately I was reading someone literate and well read, who has a sense for the subtleties of language. Perhaps that takes a certain immersion that not everyone here has had. I can't say. Just that it makes sense to me to read, and I feel this sense of relief at reading a lively voice of intelligence. Something that's become rare, where once upon a time in the misty mythical past, it was not.

Yes, Slab, rare. You misspelled the species. It's properly spelled 'N-e-a-n-d-e-r-t-h-a-l.'

How can you stand the verbal slum this place has become.

quote:

Originally posted by meljomur:


How can you stand the verbal slum this place has become.

I like it here. So, I'll stick around.

No offense to you Kate, I'm just a wee bit put off by the "intellectual" snob discourse.

Huh?

If it makes sense to me, I don't much care about how big the words are, or how developed the thought is. In a thread about Calvinism, I'm discovering how hard it is to squeeze a sound bite out of ponderous theological statements by John Calvin. Poor John Kerry got skewered, among other reasons, because his explanations were too "nuanced." Well, give me a break, Life is complicated. (lol, ... if he'd only stayed from Botox, or had a personality, it might have helped.)

The posts that are a waste of time are the ones that don't make sense, and that slide in between the elements of a decent conversation. But, I've gotten kind of used to it, so it's part of the scenery now.

And, all in all, I guess some people understand some posts, and other people understand other posts.

That is very diplomatic of you Kate.

quote:

How can you stand the verbal slum this place has become.

I was always a sucker for fieldwork in anthropology.

Gerbil A is always a sucker for Paranoid Logic studies...
Loganthor, I am "A" and you are something else???

quote:

Well maybe you need to get out of your monkville more???

But baby, I'm an expeditionist!

quote:

But seriously maybe ask the person that brought that into the conversation as in:

As in not really, you know, because this "two sets of rules" thang you've been evading just now was your pot of steaming tea.

quote:

We can see what side your butter is spread on.

Was that addressed to me, love? For it seems to me that only those who can read can see that it's jelly, not butter. Labels turned into a single possibility of diametrically opposed characteristics living in a world without context mean nothing to me. What is actually said... does.

quote:

How? As opposed to calling others it, cons, etc??? Calling others banal and boring? Oh, thanks now I get "Brilliant". I am sure that is not in some ironic manner?

What does this even mean? Can you not give us a detailed discussion of the words themselves, actually explaining what your apparent beef is? (No need to overdo it, though; I'm a vegetarian).

quote:

Also Monk notice that I did not say libs??

‘Course. Why, because it would have looked like a frame of three, or nuance, which some here seem to despise?

quote:

Well if you can show me how your rules are applied fairly then maybe I was too generous to say progressive???

My rules? I don't have rules. None that matter here anyway. All I said was that an ad-hom's and ad-hom, no matter which way you try to flip it. Isn't that right, Melissa?
Really, I don’t see why you should get all worked up about it, honey. There's really no need to shout! Silly.

Carry on...

quote:

Originally posted by The Monk:

quote:

You know what a pleonasm is?

Only if it's not predominantly tautological in its wild nature.

... Ren, is that you, cleverly disguised as an alter-ego-cyber-Sybilistic-secondary-personality?!...

... Ren is the only other person that I have witnessed here to have ever used the word 'tautology' in a sentence... Uncommonly intriguing... Hmmmm...

... Carry on... (btw, I'm sure 'I' was the first)

quote:

'I' was the first

Lawrence,

I am so busted. My apologies.

lol

quote:

Originally posted by Lawrence:

... Ren, is that you, cleverly disguised as an alter-ego-cyber-Sybilistic-secondary-personality?!...

... Ren is the only other person that I have witnessed here to have ever used the word 'tautology' in a sentence... Uncommonly intriguing... Hmmmm...

... Carry on... (btw, I'm sure 'I' was the first)

I can see why you might think that, given how boring many of these discussions tend to be these days, now that most of the thinker writers, like you, are relative strangers to this board. After all, why not try to amuse myself with an alter ego? But I'm happy to say that whoever is producing these refreshingly lively words under the name "The Monk" is not me.

I don't know if you've paid much attention to some of Antifascist's discussions, but I seem to recall he uses the term 'tautology' on occasion, as well as other logic-oriented identifiers. If I were to guess, I'd be inclined to venture that he may even have some formal training in that area, he drops into using it with such ease and seeming familiarity.

quote:

But baby, I'm an expeditionist!

LOL!

I would like to clarify my reaction to this whole thread.

ren, first I didn't mean to be critical of you, you are obviously a very intelligent individual who wants to make sure that everyone else is completely aware of this fact.

Monk, you are a strange dude/ dudette? who seems to be attempting to play little mind games with everyone. I see it now, and at this point I find it amusing.

I too have wondered if you are the same person, for I knew a man like (well with the same "personality") you when I was in university. He was a very odd duck, and suffice it to say it ended in my having to take out a restraining order on him- it was not a good year!

So I suspect this entire exchange has brought up some very bad memories for me.

Phew, I feel so much better now.

This is much cheaper than an hour on "the couch".

quote:

ren, first I didn't mean to be critical of you, you are obviously a very intelligent individual who wants to make sure that everyone else is completely aware of this fact.

You don't suspect that's just a little presumptuous to project what my intentions are, from what you interpret of what I say, mel?

The people who I have enjoyed discussions with in the years I've been on this board, seem to enjoy word play, much as I do.

I personally don't feel intelligence has much to do with such enjoyment. Language is a gift each human is endowed with, and anyone can do as they please with it.

I have a cousin with a 165 IQ, and she bores the hell out of me with the way she uses her words, but I don't think ill of her for it. We just don't have much to say to each other.

I happen to like words and I like playing with them. I like playing with the rules of grammar. It gives me a sense of personal freedom to do that.

Freedom, personal freedom.

I openly admit that I do try to avoid getting deeply involved in discussions with folks I don't find stimulating. I find insulting people to be especially insipid, and I've always been good with responding in kind. My first grade teacher didn't appreciate it, and she taught me with a ruler to the hand to be a bit more cautious with my natural abilities (interesting that they seem to tend to like to use anything that has to do with rules to control people, especially playful kids). Some folks give me the feeling they'd like to do that here.

I figure if someone doesn't like to do what I like, they probably like to do something else. I look for people who like to do what I like to do and then we find ways to interact with language.

Seems to me that there can be discussions on this board to suit anyone's tastes in language use.

I don't tend to point that out unless someone I happen to find to be uninteresting follows me around and makes deprecatory comments, over and over, about what I say, and tries to put rules on me by looking for rules in what I say that I'm therefore expected to conform to, as if somehow I'm obligated to conform to that person's sense of rule abidement, kind of like I'm some sort of wild animal that needs to be controlled. Now that's really boring.

Melissa,

quote:

This is much cheaper than an hour on "the couch".

If you want something comparable to a couch, I suggest you be prepared to look deeper. Something like this:

quote:

I would like to clarify my reaction to this whole thread.

Clarify, maybe. But it's aggressive nonetheless. Maybe it makes you feel "so much better now", but your post is aggressive.
Firstly I agree with /rén’s comment about this assumption (!):

quote:

ren, first I didn't mean to be critical of you, you are obviously a very intelligent individual who wants to make sure that everyone else is completely aware of this fact.

You continue:

quote:

Monk, you are a strange dude/ dudette?

Fair enough.

quote:

who seems to be attempting to play little mind games with everyone. I see it now, and at this point I find it amusing.

You find what I seem to be doing amusing? That's nice for you. So you're having a little laugh while your opinion of my behavior is reminiscent of the nasty:

quote:

I too have wondered if you are the same person, for I knew a man like (well with the same "personality") you when I was in university. He was a very odd duck, and suffice it to say it ended in my having to take out a restraining order on him- it was not a good year!

In other words, you look at my words and you link them to a real-life restraining order, meanwhile building a sub-zero automatical connection ("suffice it to say") between what you call a "very odd duck" and said restraining order; in other words: oddness means danger — and at the same time you are playing this real-life example to pertain to message-board interaction. That, I'm afraid, is another ad-hom.

quote:

So I suspect this entire exchange has brought up some very bad memories for me.

Which, considering the above, you appear to be projecting on the folks on this thread.

(Oh, and please stop playing the intellectualism card, because 1) people apparently understand, and 2) it's never an excuse to evade fair talk.)

Thank you both for your honest and "caring" words.

I suppose I should be flattered, but now I am bored.

Ciao.

"Bored". Familiar one, Melissa...
This thread should not be on top either, should it?

Thank you, yourself, for being so "caring" and "honest", what with your fraudulously designating me as having a "personality" deserving of a restraining order. (Do you abide by those words, or should they perhaps be reported for what they are?)

I'm guessing, though, that if such had been your real experience, you would not be "bored", but scared shitless. O.

Carry on...

quote:

Originally posted by meljomur:
Thank you both for your honest and "caring" words.

I suppose I should be flattered, but now I am bored.

Ciao.

One thing you can count on from me, mel, if someone isn't interested in interacting, and indicates that, I won't pursue it.

I certainly don't want to bore anyone. It'll be up to you.