Wahad, you and I are kindred spirits in that regard. I feel ya and I'm sorry because I understand you're frustration completely.
Whine like a baby, now with 500% more drama!
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Wahad - I can relate. When it comes to debates about social issues, religion, or politics, I am awful. I have a position and an opinion, but I get frustrated when I can't seem to get my point across properly. Then the person I am talking to thinks I'm being argumentative/defensive/combative and it all goes to hell. So I usually don't get involved in those discussions.
Cajungal
Staff member
I generally avoid those conversations too. Especially here at home.
I end up getting mowed over by people who would rather call Hillary Clinton a d--e and Obama a "nazi" than say anything interesting. While I'm well informed about some things, there are also some issues I'm not confident enough to discuss.
I end up getting mowed over by people who would rather call Hillary Clinton a d--e and Obama a "nazi" than say anything interesting. While I'm well informed about some things, there are also some issues I'm not confident enough to discuss.
My actual thought process:
"Dame? That's weird, a little 1920's, but why would anyone go out of their way to call her th... oh... ohhhhh, that word."
I am so tired. I hate doing my exercise in the morning.
If this is something you want to get better at, I have four pieces of advice:
1) Just do it. Like everything, practice improves your ability. You will get flustered, embarrassed, overwhelmed, and 'lose' arguments, but you'll gain the experience of how people exchange and express ideas. You'll learn who does it well, who does it poorly, who pisses you off, who is trying to piss you off, and so on. Some people don't want a dialogue: they want to tell you what they 'know' and why they're right. Identify these people and don't argue with them. Sometimes this takes an incredible level of patience. When my father talks about gay marriage, for instance, I simply leave the conversation, or I change the topic if it's just the two of us. He won't change his mind because he doesn't want to, and he knows just the things to say to get under my skin. It's not worth having a fight- that's an emotional experience that exhausts both people, and is best avoided. And argument is intellectual, even when heated and impassioned. The people involved want to have an argument; most people don't want to have a fight.
2) Argue a position you disagree with. This is an incredibly valuable skill. Not only will you learn to understand the other side's arguments better, you will also be better able to combat them. You may surprise yourself and learn you don't disagree as much as you thought you did, even. I find this has the added effect of making me less susceptible to getting emotionally charged or personally offended during an argument. The calmer you stay, the more reasonable you can stay, you can also avoid letting people drag you off your point when they don't want to/can't fight it.
3) Read. Read a lot. Not even about a particular topic, but reading things subtly affects the way you're expressing yourself day-to-day. If you read a lot of Harry Potter, you're going to make nerdy fantasy jokes, if you read a lot of Aristotle, you're gonna see comparisons to his reasoning everywhere. Regardless, writers --good writers anyway-- are communicators. The more you read good communication, the better you become at communicating.
4) This sort of breaks into two things, but the main part is: talk to yourself.
4a) Explain things to yourself until they're clear and concise. Just, whatever. If you like to cook, for example, explain what the recipe is, and how it's made. Now cut out the superfluous things you said: get rid of exact measurements, temperatures, times. Go back again. Until you can say "I make the cake in two steps: batter and icing. I mix the icing while the cake is in the oven, and then I pour it on the cake and put it back in the oven to glaze it." No one knows how to make a cake, now, but everyone understands that there are two major components and how they're put together. Reddit has a subreddit called "Explain to me like I'm five." This is a decent rule. Explain things to people simply. Don't forget or forgo your advanced knowledge, just keep it until the basic message is clear and well understood.
4b) This goes with #2: Argue with yourself. Pull up a proposition in your head: "Guns are a dangerous weapon with one purpose and should be heavily controlled." I don't care what you think, refute every point you come up with for either side. Just keep arguing with yourself about something. Out loud. Yes, you will feel like an idiot.
3 & 4 you can do on your all the time. 1 & 2 you have to wait for the opportunity to present itself (or start the conversation yourself). And enjoy it. If you're getting heated to the point of agitation, back off, change the topic, whatever. Don't get angry when you argue, don't regard other people as stupid or stubborn, etc. Patience is key to having a good argument.
Edit: I'll also add that it isn't that you're not smart. You're just not used to this environment. Probably when you compose most arguments, you've done research, written notes, and then submitted a paper. Off the top of your head, in a social environment... That's totally different! If you dropped my dad in the middle of the woods with a bag of camping gear, he'd be home tomorrow; if you did the same to me, I'd be found dead in a month, having mistakenly eaten the flare gun. I'm a smart guy, but I'm fucking useless at camping. If I spent a lot of time camping and learning about how to camp and live in the woods, and explore and find exists... Well, things would be very different.
However, don't make the mistake of thinking HF is a good place to practise. Once upon a time you were asked to re-explain, to take a look at what you wrote and reiterate your point; people wanted to know what you thought. Today, there are too many people here intent on trolling or scoring points and even those who don't are often caught up in it. It only takes one person deliberately taking a remark the wrong way or extrapolating your point, pushing you from your original point into some more extreme position to make everyone look at you and see an extreme idiot.
To take a non-controversial example, let's say you prefer your steak slightly under-grilled. Well, no, let's take guns, as they're less controversial around here. No matter what your personal opinion, it probably isn't that, either, all people should be given a tank and some anti-armor rifles for their 12th birthday, and it isn't that all guns in the country should be rounded up and handed back out to the criminals. However, a lot of people who're on "the other side" will try to push you to "your" extreme to make it easier to refute your points.
You can sort of assume that anyone who either asks questions about your reasons/reasoning is interested in your opinion and wants to know/learn more. Anyone who just attacks/breaks down your opinion without bothering to try and understand, and/or tries to reduce the argument to two "sides" and tries to force you to choose, is probably just looking to "win" the discussion. It's really not worth it unless you want to have a fight yourself.
My last two paragraphs don't just apply here, of course, and often enough don't.
I rarely come into arguments on Halforums, so I can't really say. My advice is definitely for face-to-face interactions, that's why I emphasised talking out loud to yourself. It helps with the brain-mouth disconnect we all feel sometimes.
Naaahh, there's plenty of HalForumites who can touch me there.Show me on the doll where the mean Halforums touched you.
How can they not make money selling $100 printers with ink changes of $60 a pop, and the damn printers don't last but a few years/months now anyway...
I don't know what happened to the reular rant thread so I had to post in the minor rant thread.
Left 4 Dead 2... I finally got you back. So why are you giving me this VAC plug-in shit. WORK DAMMIT.
I've deleted the app folder, validating the cache, deleted and reinstalled the game... trying something else now, but fuck, I need my fix.
I've deleted the app folder, validating the cache, deleted and reinstalled the game... trying something else now, but fuck, I need my fix.
B
BErt
oh! oh! Do "halfoeums.com" too please...I'm pretty sure that "users found this page by" on the main forum page is from me. Stupid fingers...
Bookmarks?
Been talking to a girl that messaged me on Plenty of Fish. She lives about two and a half hours away, but when she first messaged me, she said that she comes to town all the time.
Anyway, after chatting back and forth for the past few weeks (this has been going on since my 2-week vacation to Halifax). She was coming down this weekend and we were going to finally meet.
But then she decides she's going back earlier than originally planned. And isn't feeling well to go. Turns out, she's incredibly incredibly nervous to meet. Plus, we finally agreed that the distance just wouldn't work because she doesn't come to town very often and I don't have a car of my own. So...yeah, pretty much a total kaput as far as that goes between me and her.
Christ, I'm tired of being alone.
Anyway, after chatting back and forth for the past few weeks (this has been going on since my 2-week vacation to Halifax). She was coming down this weekend and we were going to finally meet.
But then she decides she's going back earlier than originally planned. And isn't feeling well to go. Turns out, she's incredibly incredibly nervous to meet. Plus, we finally agreed that the distance just wouldn't work because she doesn't come to town very often and I don't have a car of my own. So...yeah, pretty much a total kaput as far as that goes between me and her.
Christ, I'm tired of being alone.
I know both the situation and that feeling,bro.
Have this sharp pain in my elbow that's probably from a nerve or tendon.
When I looked up causes and ways to deal with it, I saw different incidents of overuse for people and feel my reason doesn't measure up: one person had overdoing it on the violin. Another was biking. One guy had boxing.
Mine is either from sleeping on my arm or Kid Icarus: Uprising.
When I looked up causes and ways to deal with it, I saw different incidents of overuse for people and feel my reason doesn't measure up: one person had overdoing it on the violin. Another was biking. One guy had boxing.
Mine is either from sleeping on my arm or Kid Icarus: Uprising.
I have a slightly curved spine. So on any day I will feel either completely fine or like there are nails jammed into my back. And the fact that I may have my dad's arthritic bones doesn't help either.
Do yoga!
I know, I really ought to and it helps my dad too. It's on my list of things I need to do that will help me physically slash emotionally that I still have yet to do. It's...kind of a big list.
Indeed I'm back, ready to enrich lives with my crazy postings!
A green Yoshi? PREPOSTEROUS! I am a Grey Yoshi! Basically the greatest yoshi ever.
Have you had it checked out?