No, a problem is the poor state of public education. A problem is your car making a terrible noise. Individual life-changing (or ending) events are not problems. They are tragedies. One person using a racial slur to name-call someone else is a problem. It is not a life-ending tragedy.
Why are you so passive-aggressive in your answers? It is unbecoming of someone that holds themselves above us ignorant rabble to try to claim fair statements when they come in the form of sarcastic, dismissive quips about your perception of the other's intelligence. (This is an obvious demonstration of passive aggression)
If you notice, I have asked questions about your participation in the funding of this site and asked you to change the things that you see as broken. I did not name call and I did not try to paint myself as anything. I did not tell anything, I showed it. Please, before pointing out the speck in my eye, remove the plank from yours.
I am not sure why I am so passive aggressive. It isn't intentional. I actually think of myself as overtly aggressive, not passive-aggressive. Either way, I would like to change the way I interact with people here. I think I have some good ideas, and, for certain topics, I have a lot of information to share.
Unfortunately, much of that is lost in the melee that often ensues as a result of my communication failures with people.
So to answer your questions honestly -- I don't know. I guess my biggest problems are A) I respond too quickly without thinking things through, and B) I don't review my posts to see how the overall tone is, and C) I am absolutely terrible at seeing things from other people's point of view, and I have a hard time figuring out how others will perceive what I write.
I find this especially difficult on the internet, where tone and context are often lost for various reasons.
Regarding contributing financially, I did not mean to dodge the issue, I just don't have much extra money right now. I hope that changes soon and I expect it to. I would like to donate. I have donated to sites in the past when I find them valuable, as I do this one.
That said, if I had donated, would that somehow justify my abrasive and confrontational attitude? I don't think it would, which is another reason I ignored the question.
regarding this --
"It is unbecoming of someone that holds themselves above us ignorant rabble to try to claim fair statements when they come in the form of sarcastic, dismissive quips about your perception of the other's intelligence. (This is an obvious demonstration of passive aggression)"
I will try to address that.
Look, the simple fact is, I am smarter than most people. I am not saying that to boast or aggrandize myself in any way or to put anyone else down. I state it as a simple fact.
Now, that does NOT mean that what I say is right and what others say is wrong.
But SOMETIMES a situation comes up where the other person IS wrong, but simply doesn't seem to be able to understand why. When that happens, there are only so many ways I can explain it before i get frustrated. And if the person then says I am stupid, it becomes all the more frustrating -- because now, not only is the person not grasping the concept, but he is implying that it is MY lack of intelligence that is causing the problem.
Does this sound arrogant? I hope not because I am just trying to explain myself and illustrate a point.
Suppose I say that "If A then B." And someone argues with me, and attempts to disprove what I am saying by showing that B does not cause A.
What that person is doing does not make sense and is just plain WRONG. There is no gray area. When we say "A causes B," we are not saying anything about what B causes or doesn't cause.
But, people will make that error, and similar errors, and act as though they have said something clever or logical, when all they have said is nonsense.
I can explain the errors several different ways, but then people say I am bullying or being pedantic. So what am I supposed to do in that situation?
There are DOZENS of rules of logic, and when they are violated, the argument is invalid! Yet most people don't know these rules of logic or the associated logical fallacies, and they don't care to learn them. However, if they choose to remain ignorant, they shouldn’t be so argumentative about it.
What I am getting at is, anyone who doesn't understand the rules of logic falls into two categories –
A) not smart enough to understand them or
B) is smart enough but has chosen not to
I have little patience for people from group A who are UNAWARE of their deficiency and choose to argue illogically.
And I have little tolerance for people from group B either, because they are passing up a chance to learn how to form logical, valid, cogent arguments, but then they debate in ways that are just illogical and frustrating.
I guess I don’t know how to point out when someone has violated a rule of logic without sounding like an ass.
When I teach SAT classes, or when I tutor logic, the students know they have deficiencies or that they have something to learn, so they don’t challenge me on it. Here, people don’t always know what constitutes sound logic but they challenge me on it anyway.
It gets frustrating.
A perfect example is what MaxPowers said. “Get some friends ILR or get some hobbies.” There are just so many things wrong with that. I would never say that to anyone, because A) It is an absurd assumption, B) the other person cannot disprove it nor can anyone prove it and C) It has nothing to do with anything being discussed.
When someone says something like that, he is basically saying, “I have no rebuttal to what you said, either because I am too lazy to come up with one, not smart enough to come up with one, or I just don’t care.”
Well, why not just SAY one of those instead of making an assumption that is phrased as an insult?