GabeU, I hear you. You work very hard, out of the goodness of your heart, and people use you as a whipping boy. Some users don't seem to understand that this is a peer-to-peer community and that the mods only participate sporadically. Users are also angry and frustrated and they seem to be unable to state their case unemotionally -- many times they seem to just want to vent and are not seeking solutions. There is a lot of ignorance, anger, and hostility.
It's sad that they're missing great opportunities for help from people like you, Mark, BirdDog, GWalk, etc. I've noticed that all of you are posting less and less, so I wonder if there's burnout all around.
I honestly don't know what to say, really. I personally think the community would be very impoverished if you and the others stopped posting, but I can't blame you for being tired of the ingratitude. Perhaps you need to just ignore those who only want to rage. Don't engage them. Just walk away.
I truly hope we won't lose you. You contribute so much that it'd be a shame if you left.
Honestly, I see a couple of cateogries:
1. People who just want to type something, anywhere. They claim they've read though the solutions, but haven't, otherwise they'd see we give basically the same advice over and over. That gets a little cumbersome. Why I started showing people where the search bar was.
2. People who don't really want help, they just want to vent and because they're angry. I actually get this, because I remember a time when I was under a lot of pressure and wasn't too pleasant either. Eventually came around tho. Retirement helped me not take too much too serious. lol
I'll pass up most of these unless I see someone being totally obnoxious or abusing someone else. I've also learned to pass up on speed complaints - those are just are just a moon door to **bleep**.
Edit: gotta love the bleeps.
Mark, once you wrote something I thought was very insightful -- it was something addressed to a raving eejit, and you admonished them that they didn't know how to negotiate from a position of weakness. That really hit the nail on the head. Yes, they are angry, but they are also full of entitlement, and seem completely incapapable of taking responsibility for anything and of negotiating in a civilized way. (And apparently were raised by monkeys, judging by the way they keep flinging their bleep about).
That's part of it.
One thing I found out a while back was that anger makes people do things they normally wouldn't do. It puts people into positions that are out of character and make decisions that are clouded and personal. It's like the whole premise of how evil attempts to prevail in Star Wars, but nobody gets it.
Social media doesn't help in this regard, because it just makes it easier to unload enmasse. People now think it's normal and acceptable when it really isn't healthy at all. Today, everyone thinks they're Howard Beale. Social media's their drug, and Paddy Chayefsky's rolling in his grave.
The bleeps are awesome. LOL
maratsade wrote:The bleeps are awesome. LOL
Hey! Can Big **bleep** make a comment here? :smileyhappy:
GabeU was the first to reply to my first post here.
soon found out he had a sense of humor and we started "poking" jabs at the other.
We, sometimes have fun. Gotta remember the good times too.
Dont leave "Bud"
