The difference between being mean and having an opinion

to that end, it would help immensely if the mods became active participants on the forums. for some reason, which i don't understand, they are not. if they were, much of the complaining about "meanness" would be understood to be as baseless as it appears to those of us who do participate, and reports to the mods about "meanness" would result in warnings or strikes or bans much less frequently, so that only those who truly deserve the punishment would receive it. as it is now, i believe all of the power is in the hands of those who complain, because each complaint seems to compel the mods to act, no matter whether the complaint is justified or not (in context).

Yes, that. :drinker:

It seems weird to me, as someone who had over a dozen years experience running a fairly busy forum (not nearly as busy as this one) that with very few exceptions, the moderators are relative "strangers" to the community. I chose my moderators among active members who shared my vision for the forum, gave exceptional advice, and had a good sense of diplomacy and fairness. I considered my forum to be like a party or event thrown at my house, and my mods were those great friends who bring a side dish and a case of beer, let me know if someone's being a jerk, and stays late to help clean up. I didn't think of them as hired caterers or bouncers or maids.

I enjoy watching the back and forth debates over which is the best way to lose weight without losing lean body mass. I love watching people deplore and defend 1200 calories. It's when the conversations denigrate into GIF posts to mock, belittle, or otherwise ridicule one or more contributing debaters/OP that my eyerolling starts - it's like people don't know how to validate their opinions with facts so they resort to GIF-posting.

I find debates, especially the heated ones, enlightening as you can get a real earful of what people think and why and are able to derive your own thoughts and opinions. I usually opt out of commenting if its a field I know next to nothing about, which even a year later is a LOT of stuff =P Most people like chiming in. Its just who we are I suppose.

That and people who are bad at losing a debate and then cry about it or have a tantrum. That is never pretty to see.

I hope this thread doesn't end up as a GIF-a-thon :grumble:

I still have three pages to go to catch up, but I have a pretty good idea where this thread goes in those three pages.

I would love it if we could make it through the day without a "why is everyone so meeaaaan!" thread. Being honest and blunt =/= being mean. And even if people are mean, so what? Is this the first time anyone's ever been mean to you? It's the internet, there is an ignore button!

Many times the folks who are "just giving their opinions" give it in a manner which is rather rude. Think about it, you go to a class that you've never been in before. You raise your hand and you ask the teacher a question in reply to which the teacher just says "This is a very stupid question and you should know the answer to it already. Thank you sir for wasting our time with your stupid question" and then behind your back, they say things like "What an idiot that guy is!". The teacher insulting in your class is the equivalent of being insulted on the forums and the "What an idiot that guy is!" behind your back is what goes on with some of these popular kids on their newsfeed.

Are they giving valid opinions. Sometimes. The knowledgeable folks have to realize that there are loud noises coming from every direction to a new user. People with 6 pack saying "Cut fat, carbs, protein and just eat 2 tootsie roll and drink your saliva" and then there are other wonderfully healthy folks saying "You can eat everything as long you're on a deficit" etc. Basically, 10 people, 10 theories, all screaming at each other on the forums.

So please, try some patience. I didn't learned these things by people yelling and screaming at me. Tough love is good but only when the other person realizes there is love present. Since most of us are strangers to each other, your tough love just comes off as being ... well... rude!

Just a thought.

Having been a teacher, and having had several teachers that behaved in that way (I went to Catholic school; I saw a student have a desk thrown at them. Rules do not apply there), and also having college professors that other students routinely hated (but I learned the most from) behave more "brusquely" than "kindly," I'd put a counter to this.

Say a teacher gave an assignment. This assignment had everything written down to do ("Eat these many calories. Do these certain things"); the teacher said, "If you have trouble, here is a book with varying ideas on what you can do. There's a Table of Contents, an Appendix, and an Index. Feel free to use them."

Now say a student disregards this, doesn't turn in the assignment, and comes in asking, "Can I just write one paragraph for the assignment instead of the whole assignment?"

Said teacher, who had given a detail assignment, given out a book with tons of content that COULD be searched for by the student if they decided to use the feature, might profess frustration.

Similarly, if a teacher spent an hour giving a lecture, and a student--failing to pay attention or do said assignment--raised their had and asks a question that was addressed five minutes into the lecture.

Or, further, student "does" all these things but still has trouble, so he or she gets a tutor. The tutor suggest different options; the student ignores (defriends/blocks/whatever), or takes any help from the tutor as a negative.

Sorry, I really like analogies.

What I'm saying is... yes. I understand that going into anything, particularly if it's new and there's lots of conflicting information, it can be difficult. There is also the issue that there is a fount of resources on this website, and many people either fail to use them, or prefer to rely on "easier" methods, or prefer to just be validated in what they do, regardless of its actual merit.

IMO:

Your analogy doesn't quite apply here for a variety of reasons.

Very few people on MFP are actual educators in the field of fitness/nutrition. Instead there are constant threads from the regulars griping and complaining about how the new people still ask the same questions. To use your analogy, it's like a teacher getting mad that his new students don't just GET IT the day they walk into his/her classroom. It takes MONTHS to educate students, why would it take less time to educate folks on here?

(Those few that are fitness/wellness educators using MFP probably don't want to advertise since they would likely get bombarded with newbies asking them hundreds of the same questions every day.) I do not see any of these would-be educators standing up and saying "this is how it's done" There have been a variety of helpful threads posted, sure - but there are few "accredited" sources being used. Some people walk in here blind, much like I did, with a billion questions. There is no one specialist constantly onhand to answer any of those questions. So we are left to start a new thread.

There is no wealth of accurate information here for the new student to learn from. Yep, there is a search feature and as a person who has tried navigating that feature looking for things like "Books to read" or "what to do if" the majority of the threads that crop up.. well it is not a pretty journey and gets frustrating rapidly. There are conflicting opinions on everything ranging from calories to net per day, eat my cals back or not, and who is mean or not. It's very overwhelming to be the new person looking for the information.

As a new person trying to sort out what I do or do not know and need to learn, it is very discouraging for someone to reply with contempt or "sarcasm" to genuine questions. As an educator your outlook should almost ALWAYS be fresh start for everyone, no matter how hard they stumble and fall. Learning how to take care of ourselves "the right way" isn't an assignment that has a deadline, and it certainly isn't ever something you can fail unless your teachers shame you into thinking you cannot succeed because you aren't learning fast enough for them.

I am glad that I have tough internet skin, but not everyone who comes here does. No one is saying to coddle folks, but being condescending about it just makes you look bad. Just a thought.

I hope I never ever have a teacher who gets angry at me for not learning quickly enough.

It's all in the delivery. Person A can give advice that comes across as helpful and encouraging.
Then Person B can give the same advice and it comes across as snotty and condescending.

I disagree as:
Person C can be having a really crappy day and go ahead and decide to interpret whatever they read in a really negative light no matter how it's presented.
Person D can have a very different sense of humor than Person E and therefore misinterpret their joke.
Person F can be just an all around waffle
People G and H can have completely different backgrounds and cultural norms or beliefs which makes a huge impact on delivery and interpretation.

Having been a teacher, and having had several teachers that behaved in that way (I went to Catholic school; I saw a student have a desk thrown at them. Rules do not apply there), and also having college professors that other students routinely hated (but I learned the most from) behave more "brusquely" than "kindly," I'd put a counter to this.

Say a teacher gave an assignment. This assignment had everything written down to do ("Eat these many calories. Do these certain things"); the teacher said, "If you have trouble, here is a book with varying ideas on what you can do. There's a Table of Contents, an Appendix, and an Index. Feel free to use them."

Now say a student disregards this, doesn't turn in the assignment, and comes in asking, "Can I just write one paragraph for the assignment instead of the whole assignment?"

Said teacher, who had given a detail assignment, given out a book with tons of content that COULD be searched for by the student if they decided to use the feature, might profess frustration.

Similarly, if a teacher spent an hour giving a lecture, and a student--failing to pay attention or do said assignment--raised their had and asks a question that was addressed five minutes into the lecture.

Or, further, student "does" all these things but still has trouble, so he or she gets a tutor. The tutor suggest different options; the student ignores (defriends/blocks/whatever), or takes any help from the tutor as a negative.

Sorry, I really like analogies.

What I'm saying is... yes. I understand that going into anything, particularly if it's new and there's lots of conflicting information, it can be difficult. There is also the issue that there is a fount of resources on this website, and many people either fail to use them, or prefer to rely on "easier" methods, or prefer to just be validated in what they do, regardless of its actual merit.

IMO:

Your analogy doesn't quite apply here for a variety of reasons.

Very few people on MFP are actual educators in the field of fitness/nutrition. Instead there are constant threads from the regulars griping and complaining about how the new people still ask the same questions. To use your analogy, it's like a teacher getting mad that his new students don't just GET IT the day they walk into his/her classroom. It takes MONTHS to educate students, why would it take less time to educate folks on here?

(Those few that are fitness/wellness educators using MFP probably don't want to advertise since they would likely get bombarded with newbies asking them hundreds of the same questions every day.) I do not see any of these would-be educators standing up and saying "this is how it's done" There have been a variety of helpful threads posted, sure - but there are few "accredited" sources being used. Some people walk in here blind, much like I did, with a billion questions. There is no one specialist constantly onhand to answer any of those questions. So we are left to start a new thread.

There is no wealth of accurate information here for the new student to learn from. Yep, there is a search feature and as a person who has tried navigating that feature looking for things like "Books to read" or "what to do if" the majority of the threads that crop up.. well it is not a pretty journey and gets frustrating rapidly. There are conflicting opinions on everything ranging from calories to net per day, eat my cals back or not, and who is mean or not. It's very overwhelming to be the new person looking for the information.

As a new person trying to sort out what I do or do not know and need to learn, it is very discouraging for someone to reply with contempt or "sarcasm" to genuine questions. As an educator your outlook should almost ALWAYS be fresh start for everyone, no matter how hard they stumble and fall. Learning how to take care of ourselves "the right way" isn't an assignment that has a deadline, and it certainly isn't ever something you can fail unless your teachers shame you into thinking you cannot succeed because you aren't learning fast enough for them.

I am glad that I have tough internet skin, but not everyone who comes here does. No one is saying to coddle folks, but being condescending about it just makes you look bad. Just a thought.

I hope I never ever have a teacher who gets angry at me for not learning quickly enough.

It's not that a teacher is getting frustrated a student isn't learning quickly enough (hell, I've specifically been a teacher for special needs, so I *do* know that people out there exist in the mainstream), as much as a teacher being frustrated when they have already talked about the subject.

Many hugely controversial, strike-worthy posts I've seen have been from people who are asking a question they already asked, or who were in another thread; there are so, so many "sarcastic" threads that spawn from people asking the same thing over and over and expecting different responses. I am thinking of specific, perhaps well known, users in particular.

I think new users see THESE posts, and get an initial impression. So I suppose it would be like a student, coming into their first day of school, and seeing a teacher reprimand a student who's been there all year for not doing the homework. That student might think, "Ah, this teacher is mean!" Until this student, being new, asks a question and gets a surprising response.

I still stand by that the majority (a huge majority) of the people who make the "everyone is mean!" posts, or contributes to them, ARE those new users who are forming an impression without all the information, OR people who have been here awhile, but don't contribute often (so the student in the back of the room who's always doodling one day raises their head to notice the teacher reprimanding the class troublemaker, and so thinks, "Damn, this teacher's a jerk" and goes back to doodling).

I can fully acknowledge that sometimes there is a legitimately new person who pushes a wrong button for a person, and the person--having dealt with attacks from people they simply disagreed with, or frustration from answering the same question over and over--can be more brusque than they usually are. But that's still not necessarily a negative, as much as they might be shorter about it.

WOW! (please don't take this in the wrong way because it is very sincere and humble) I never thought that I would agree with you a 100%, based on other posts that I've seen from you.

I enjoy watching the back and forth debates over which is the best way to lose weight without losing lean body mass. I love watching people deplore and defend 1200 calories. It's when the conversations denigrate into GIF posts to mock, belittle, or otherwise ridicule one or more contributing debaters/OP that my eyerolling starts - it's like people don't know how to validate their opinions with facts so they resort to GIF-posting.

I find debates, especially the heated ones, enlightening as you can get a real earful of what people think and why and are able to derive your own thoughts and opinions. I usually opt out of commenting if its a field I know next to nothing about, which even a year later is a LOT of stuff =P Most people like chiming in. Its just who we are I suppose.

That and people who are bad at losing a debate and then cry about it or have a tantrum. That is never pretty to see.

I hope this thread doesn't end up as a GIF-a-thon :grumble:

I still have three pages to go to catch up, but I have a pretty good idea where this thread goes in those three pages.

Just kidding...sorry...couldn't help myself...



....oooops...I did it again...sorry

I still stand by that the majority (a huge majority) of the people who make the "everyone is mean!" posts, or contributes to them, ARE those new users who are forming an impression without all the information, OR people who have been here awhile, but don't contribute often (so the student in the back of the room who's always doodling one day raises their head to notice the teacher reprimanding the class troublemaker, and so thinks, "Damn, this teacher's a jerk" and goes back to doodling).

This, and there's the Habitually Offended. There's a handful of people who just love to be offended, and sometimes they actively search through posts of people who might have slightly rubbed them the wrong way, looking for past offenses they can report.

I enjoy watching the back and forth debates over which is the best way to lose weight without losing lean body mass. I love watching people deplore and defend 1200 calories. It's when the conversations denigrate into GIF posts to mock, belittle, or otherwise ridicule one or more contributing debaters/OP that my eyerolling starts - it's like people don't know how to validate their opinions with facts so they resort to GIF-posting.

I find debates, especially the heated ones, enlightening as you can get a real earful of what people think and why and are able to derive your own thoughts and opinions. I usually opt out of commenting if its a field I know next to nothing about, which even a year later is a LOT of stuff =P Most people like chiming in. Its just who we are I suppose.

That and people who are bad at losing a debate and then cry about it or have a tantrum. That is never pretty to see.

I hope this thread doesn't end up as a GIF-a-thon :grumble:

I still have three pages to go to catch up, but I have a pretty good idea where this thread goes in those three pages.

Just kidding...sorry...couldn't help myself...



....oooops...I did it again...sorry

Gosh, why is everyone so mean???

(But seriously, I was disappointed at the lack of more gifs. Perhaps one more thing the "EISM!" crowd has killed for everyone on MFP.)