** 15-Dec-2021 World View: The multitude of guests
Cool Breeze wrote: ↑Wed Dec 15, 2021 1:08 pm
> Why can't the multitude of guests get a clue that we don't pay
> attention to their tripe precisely because they can't own anything
> they say or have a conversation with anyone else that has any
> clarity? All of their posts demonstrate just how stupid they are,
> and how we are right in not responding (for no reason,
> obviously).
thomasglee wrote: ↑Wed Dec 15, 2021 2:54 pm
> Agreed. If they can't even settle on a nick that at least lets us
> know it's the same person posting, why should I care what they
> say?
Tom Mazanec wrote: ↑Wed Dec 15, 2021 6:10 pm
> I third that.
The three of you may be shocked and surprised to learn this, but the
collective knowledge about the world of the registered members of this
forum, including myself, is not very great. The "multitude of guests"
do us a great service by filling in some of the gaps, especially
during crises like the Korea crisis or the Russia crisis.
I'm not even sure what the issue is. If you're responding to a
posting, all you need to know is the content of the posting. What
difference does it make if the author of the post is "Cool Breeze" or
"Guest"? In fact, knowing the name of the post's author is actually a
disadvantage, since you'll be tempted to make a personal attack on the
author, rather than just responding to the post's content.
When I'm write something, I sometimes reference articles from the
Vietnam News, from the Bangkok Post, from the Uganda Observer, from
Russia Today, and so forth. The author's name may be posted, but that
makes no difference since I wouldn't recognize him anyway. I have to
make a judgment about the credibility of the article based on the
content or the article. I usually do that by comparing it to other
articles, or from my own knowledge. Knowing the name of the author
really doesn't help. In fact, evaluating the credibility of a media
article is similar to evaluating the credibility of a post in this
forum, whether by "Cool Breeze" or "Guest".
These days there are no easy shortcuts, since pretty much everyone is
biased. Just because you recognize tha author of a post or article
doesn't mean that the article is automatically good or bad. You have
to make that judgment in the same way, whether you know the name of
the author or not.
In the meantime, just be grateful that there are "Guests" who are
willing to take the time to provide knowledge that none of us has.
You can agree with it, disagree, or ignore, but it's almost always
valuable.