in reply to Re^2: Belittling Beginners
in thread Belittling Beginners

moritz is a really good hacker and his was the first reply of: even if embarrassing, that's just how I started. Others spoke up about the things you're talking about, don't harsh on the newbies. And the author came here, participated in the discussion, revised some code, got complemented on the new code, and welcomed by a couple of monks; including me.

I wish everyone would be friendly. I agree it makes a difference. Discussions about etiquette make me cringe though and generally seem to be covered by: "Never teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and annoys the pig." I think about how things go in most other forums, technical ones included, and this place seems like paradise even with the occasional scrap.

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Re^4: Belittling Beginners
by Gavin (Archbishop) on Jul 22, 2009 at 10:06 UTC

    "this place seems like paradise even with the occasional scrap."

    But it's all done in the best possible taste!

    Seriously

    From my own experience it is most often those that criticise and belittle the most, are the ones that are the least secure in their own knowledge and have an over inflated opinion of themselves.

[reply]
Re^4: Belittling Beginners
by Argel (Prior) on Jul 22, 2009 at 19:32 UTC
    The problem is that it could have gone the other way. We are lucky that instead of taking it personally he took it as a learning opportunity. But imo that is despite the harsh tone set by that thread. If anything we can probably thank ELISHEVA for changing the tone of that thread in 776334. But exhibiting bad behavior and assuming someone will offset it (or not caring that it happened to be offset) does in no way justify said bad behavior.

    Elda Taluta; Sarks Sark; Ark Arks
[reply]

      I know what you're saying and again I'm personally invested in being kind to strangers. This is a problem to me-

      …justify said bad behavior.

      It's behavior. It's participation. It's like anything else personal: a personal choice. In a free and open (source) world it doesn't need to be justified. Disparaging it as sub-standard is little different from disparaging code as sub-standard.

      Down vote, respond directly, participate as you like, etc, but don't be surprised if your desire to force conformity or to force others to agree there is a need to push it is perceived as rude by someone else. Like me (who upvoted everything in this thread, I think, so don't take that as a --; it's a reminder that everything offends someone). Free exchange is more important than perfect agreement, harmony, or avoiding (non-fatal) tussles.

[reply]
        Communities, especially online ones, can live or die due to the behavior of members. Tilly gives us an example (see the links in the middle paragraph) of how the PerlMonks community almost failed due to a clique engaging in and promoting bad behavior. The reality is that it is inevitable that communities will define what is acceptable, unacceptable, forms of etiquette, etc. and that makes your agnostic view on behavior untenable.

        And we are seeing this in practice right now. People are discussing what some consider to be undesirable behavior, people are voting (or not voting) on nodes related to said discussion, voting (or not) on consideration of nodes related to said discussion, etc.

        Update: Fixed "example" link. Thanks ELISHEVA!!

        Elda Taluta; Sarks Sark; Ark Arks
[reply]

In Section Perl Monks Discussion