I'd like to suggest a sentence that is appropriate when someone brings up a problem they have that either can't be solved without breaking something important, or which is not high enough on the priority list to do anything about.
"I don't agree with you that this problem is significant enough that we can devote any time to it, but I understand what's going on."
This sentence does a very important thing: it treats the person on the other side of the conversation as if they actually matter. The "You and your ilk..." approach is being dismissive and strongly implying "no one who cares about this problem matters to me".

Does that clarify why I felt your remark was personal?

I don't expect you to agree with me, nor do I want to "win". I simply am trying to communicate that there are ways to positively acknowledge the other person is a person in a conversation 0r an argument even if you can't, or don't want to, address their issue.

I'm sure you feel that you weren't unreasonable, and I understand your position - there doesn't seem to be any way that the Anonymous Monk can exist as it is without the chance that someone will abuse it, and that you feel that the upside is so much greater than the downside that messing with it might break things badly, whether technically or socially. I get this. I'm asking you to try to understand why I felt dismissed by the way you said this, in the hopes that we might be able to come to a better understanding of one another. I respect your technical contributions, and it pains me that we can't talk about other issues without it turning into something like this thread.

In reply to Re^4: Let's drop this long belaboured, never pertinent, pointless subject once and for all. by pemungkah
in thread Having our anonymous cake and eating it too by pemungkah

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