Do you give GA's to someone you disagree with?

I will often, if the point is well presented and shows good reasoning. If it’s simply inflammatory and poorly thought out I won’t GA, but I also don’t GA simply because I agree with someone. Quality is quality whatever side it portrays.

Of course.

So my general rule for giving a GA is an answer that makes me laugh or makes me think… so I have given lurve to answers that expressed view points I might not agree with but that made me rexamine my views on something (or, you know, choke on my chocolate milk because I was laughing so hard).

@Lightlyseared : I know, right? Anything that makes me spit onto my keyboard gets a GA automatically!

Someone has got to be lying. xD I’ve seen some pretty horrible “arguments” receive Einstein-esque accolades. Hell, I’ll admit I’ve given GA’s for people just for agreeing with me at times. Mostly because it’s like “Thank you! Finally someone else who is right!” xD

The keyboard spitting inducers always get one too.

Unless someone has shown themselves to be totally obnoxious and unreasonable to me in the past, I’ll give a GA where a GA is due.

And there are a couple of individuals here whom I’ve had flame wars with in the past, and we’ve since settled our differences and get along together fairly well now.

Yes. There are jellies whose interactions I really don’t care for most of the time but now and then they write something that clicks with me even if it’s not my bent.

Sometimes the most horrendous posts receive loads of GAs just because everyone is so impressed that anyone would actually put such a thing out there. It’s kind of the “Can’t look away it’s so awful” syndrome. I’ve seen people who are absolutely in opposition discuss issues heatedly with each other and compliment one another on their arguments, here. Not such a big leap to assume that people are GAing for well written posts.

I suppose I mis-typed when I explained what I’ve noticed because how the hell could I know why things were given a GA. It just seems to be like that sometimes.

I disagree with @Simone_De_Beauvoir and @JilltheTooth almost 80% of the time on any subject, but I still have to GA when you gals type something sentient.

@digitalimpression – You called @Simone_De_Beauvoir a “gal”! Oh my! You’d better don your flame-proof undies!

@HungryGuy Why, is there something wrong with the Guild of American Luthiers?

@HungryGuy He doesn’t know, so why would I get mad?
@digitalimpression I don’t identify as a woman, gender non conforming person. So ‘gal’, ‘lady’, ‘woman’ and all that just doesn’t fit for me. Those that care around here don’t use those words for me.

@Simone_De_Beauvoir Oh my God, you really are difficult. xD Well, I will try to refrain from any lady-like terms. How’s “dude”?

Oh, yes, I go by the answer not the answerer.

@digitalimpression Nope. Don’t feel like a dude, either. But I mean, you can say that…in that kind of way I used to say ‘dude’ to anyone when I was little.

Sure. If I like your answer, I’ll give it a GA… even if I think you are an asshat, overall. The general ‘you’, not you @digitalimpression ;)

^ I think she’s talking about me :-p

I’d threaten to whip you, but I know that’d just get you all excited.

I been whipped by Auggie. I got all excited. She speaks troof.

you want proof? She knocked out my toof.

I give GA’s to anyone who answered a question I posed, or to someone who responds to a post of mine, as long as they were civil.
There is no reason to encourage people to use words like “asshat”.
I also give good answers to anyone who makes me laugh.
A good way to make me laugh is to use words like “asshat”

GA for cute-itude ^ ^ ^

@Simone_De_Beauvoir Fair enough dude.

@augustlan You’ve really got to stop “threatening” people with a whipping. You’re getting everyone all excited.

Hmmm. There’s something very redneck about a hat with an ass on it.

I’m surprised that Logitech doesn’t troll this forum looking for spit-on-keyboard responses and hire that jelly. Maybe they do.

Yeah, because they were brave enough to say something ignorant. Lawlz.

I agree with your logic. An answer can be “great”, whether we agree with it or not. I am not opposed to giving someone’s answer a GA if I disagree with it. I am pretty sure I already have given GAs to answers I disagreed with, but I don’t remember every single answer I gave a GA to off the top of my head.

I have real trouble with this idea. How can the answer be great and the reasoning be great and you still disagree with it? If you disagree with it, then it can’t be a good answer because it hasn’t persuaded you to agree with it. If you think something you disagree with is great, then doesn’t that make you kind of schizophrenic? Like you don’t know what you think?

I suppose I might give someone a GA for trying to be reasonable or for listening, but in the end, if they don’t persuade me to agree with what they say, how can it be a great answer?

I think we have this idea that if we are reasonable people, we can respect the person while disagreeing with what they say. I wonder if this idea expands to the situation of providing a GA to an answer you don’t agree with. Perhaps you are not saying you think it is a great answer, but you are acknowledging the respect you have for the person, even if they are making a completely asinine argument.

Other than that, I don’t see how I could give an answer I disagree with a GA. I can see doing it as a gesture of respect for the humanity of the person I disagree with. But I don’t respect their thinking if it leads them to the wrong conclusion. Does anyone really think that thinking that leads a person to the wrong conclusion is grounds for a great answer? If so, please explain this to me. How can you disagree with someone and still think they have a reasonable thought process? What am I missing here?

@wundayatta I disagree with your answer but it has made me think so you get lurve and a GA.

I give GA’s to people I disagree with all the time if I think the answer is well-reasoned and well-written. I also give out GA’s to everyone on party threads. It’s about posts, not people.

@wundayatta Plato was one of the greatest philosophers in history. I disagree with him on a lot of subjects, but I would never stop teaching Republic. I respect him, I respect his intellect, and I respect his arguments. That they fail to convince me at the end of the day is immaterial to whether or not he was a great thinker.

@SavoirFaire How is it immaterial? What do you get from his arguments that you are willing to spend time with them even though you disagree with everything he says? I can see it as a historical thing—intellectual history. I can see it as understanding the opposition and learning how they think. But there has to be something substantive in it for you, otherwise you will find it a waste of time. So what do you get out of Plato that is useful to you even though it does not support your understanding of how the world works?

I feel like I must be missing the boat on this. Something obvious. Or maybe we’re using words in very different ways, because this seems like such a slam dunk and I am truly baffled as to why anyone would respect an argument they disagree with and think is wrong.

@wundayatta Learning how Plato thought is an excellent way to learn how to think. The level of awareness that he had, the fact that he anticipated objections that wouldn’t be raised by anyone (else) until more than 500 years after his death, how he managed to build responses to those objections into his works in advance: understanding the depth of thought behind all of this is inspiring.

It is amazing to see what he was able to do with the information and tools available to him. It is amazing to see how he was able to use reason to steer clear of problems that his data did not clearly indicate an answer to. This makes his work of more than historical value. Figuring out how to overcome his arguments is also valuable. Merely disagreeing, after all, is not enough. Plato pushes me to go deeper into what I believe and why I believe it in the process of disagreeing with him. And for that, I have nothing but respect.

@wundayatta I just gave you a GA on your second last post here, even though I disagree… because I think the points you brought up are good.

If a person can back up his or her points quite well, then why not acknowledge that?

I mostly agree with @wundayatta on this. About the only time that I can give GAs on answers that I (previously) disagreed with is when they actually change my mind, usually with new information (which proves to be correct). Unfortunately in this forum, that’s pretty rare. Not rare because I already know everything, but rare because the information either isn’t new, isn’t accurate or is incomplete and “wrong” for that reason. Logic is also a frequent casualty of these discussions.

Even responses that I generally agree with, and might give a GA to on that basis, sometimes stray into… well, lunacy or falseness on other fronts.

Paradoxically – and I’m sure that @wundayatta can appreciate this – it’s usually either very short, sweet and perfectly worded responses – or very long and carefully reasoned and worded ones (that also have to be very correct!) – which get GAs from me.

Yes, if the post was civil and points are brought up that I didn’t think of before.

Sure. I often give folks the only GA’s they get when arguing with me.

I do all the time. It has to acknowledge the opposing side but have two better reasons, but I do give GA’s. We can’t assume everyone here is an adult unfortunately.

@augustlan You could use “one” over “you” so you’ll never have to explain yourself again :)

I give GAs for insightful answers, amusing answers, accurate answers, helpful answers. As rewards for participation not so much, and not for answers that are disagreeable. The rant essays are not GA worthy, IMO.

Of course! I call them pity points! (JK)

@AnonymousGirl Do you disagree with a point that you think is good? If you disagree with it, how can you think it is good?

@SavoirFaire It sounds like you appreciate Plato for teaching you how to think. Or maybe teaching thinking methods that you find useful.

I certainly think that method is separate from content. That is, if you use the proper method, then you will create valid content. If you use the proper method, then any knowledge you create should be verifiable and reproducible, etc. If it is done properly, then we should all be able to agree on it.

Analysis is where we may disagree. We can disagree, quite easily, about what something means. In some cases, there is room for many different meanings because there is no certainty about interpretation. Then we may not have the same interpretation as our primary interpretation, but we may see each other’s points because we have no compelling reason to push our own interpretation, other than it is our own interpretation. In a case like this, I’m not sure it makes sense to say we disagree. We’re different, but there’s too much uncertainty for us to really feel all that sure about our own interpretation. In a case like that, I’ll give out GAs for interpretations that are not mine.

In other cases, the arguments and evidence appear quite compelling for my interpretation. In a situation like that, any other interpretation is not only wrong, but it is evidence of bad thinking. No reasonable scientist would end up anywhere else but where I am. That doesn’t happen very often, but there are some issues where I feel very strongly that my way of thinking is the only reasonable one. I acknowledge that people of good will may not see things the same way, but it seems pretty unlikely. If someone does see things the wrong way, there is a good chance they are not of good will or they are not well trained.

It is hard for me to see how someone could have something really intelligent to teach me and for me to still disagree with them. If the Platonic method were that compelling to me, then I would expect it would lead to the same result in similar cases. If it were to lead someone to a bad result, then I’d have to wonder about the method or about the person applying the method. Could Plato have developed a very useful method, but applied it incorrectly? Interesting thought. Quite possibly. Maybe he didn’t understand what he discovered. I guess I could give him credit for his investigations even if he went off track somewhere and that’s why he ended up in the wrong place. I guess I would feel that if he caught his error, he would have ended up in the right place. Someone who is alive who made the same error would not get a GA until they caught the error and ended up where they should have.

@digitalimpression, how do you know who is giving GAs to who and who is ignoring other people’s answers? You might suspect you know, but you can’t be sure. Also, in the last few days I have seen you infer people who don’t agree with your point of view are liars on two occasions. People who do not agree with you are not necessarily lying. They are disagreeing with your perspective and putting forward their view on the situation/idea.

To your question, if someone argues their point well I will give them a GA, even if I don’t like the point they are making. Unless the answer is on a question I have asked, where I tend to be very generous with my GAs because people bothered to answer, I give GAs based on the quality of the response rather than the person giving it.

@wundayatta If a teacher refused to give a student top marks for writing a well-written essay that backed up his or her arguments quite well and met all of the expectations of the assignment just because that teacher disagreed with the arguments, would that be fair or would that be picking favourites? Should teachers only give top marks to essays that support their positions? I am, of course, not a teacher… but it’s something for you to think about.

If the response to the question is a matter of opinion, I’ll give it an GA if it’s well stated, even if I don’t agree with the opinion. Opinions vary and who am I to say someone else’s opinion is worth nothing? This is particularly true if the question was mine. If you answer, “vanilla” and I prefer chocolate, does that make your answer worth nothing? I don’t think so. I asked for an opinion and got one. That deserves a score.

I don’t hang out in any serious shit, so I don’t have to worry about that, haha.

Erm, but if I do, I have given GA’s to people I disagreed with. If I learn something, or even if we disagree but have a good time, why not?

@Bellatrix I suppose I mis-typed when I explained what I’ve noticed because how the hell could I know why things were given a GA. It just seems to be like that sometimes

Don’t recognize this? ^^

Oh, it’s what I said earlier in this question. Chill out home slice! =)

Not really.

If I disagree with part of a good answer, then yeah, I’ll GA it and I’ve done that many times and it often ends with a “agree to disagree” or “fair enough” response. But if I disagree with the entire answer, it’s rare that I’ll GA it. Not sure if I should’ve revealed that, but, it’s the truth.

@DominicX My habits tend to be pretty sporadic when it comes to GA’s. I won’t pretend to be the king of benevolence. The majority of the time I GA for appropriate reasons, but occasionally my Irish upbringing brings out some malevolent GA’s in inappropriate places. (I don’t have an Irish upbringing)

Yes, I do. Quite often in fact.

“If you can’t imagine how anyone could hold the view you are attacking, you just don’t understand it yet.”
—Anthony Weston

@wundayatta I would suggest that something being more compelling to me is not necessarily evidence that someone who disagrees is a bad thinker. What seems obviously true to me may seem obviously false to someone else, and vice versa. In such a situation, which party has evidence that the other is a bad thinker? It seems we just run into an evidential stalemate.

Humans are rife with cognitive biases, and reasonable scientists disagree all the time. That’s why it seems to me that the proper approach is to continue to inquire. A strong argument from an interlocutor serves as an important reminder that the human intellect is fallible and that certainty is an elusive quarry. It makes you reinvestigate your own reasons for believing something. Something that makes me think is a GA, whether I agree with it in the end or not.

@digitalimpression My own Irish upbringing, which I do have, has never led me to give out any malevolent GA’s. It just makes me like it when people know how to argue back!

@SavoirFaire Well perhaps the cliche “Irish Background” is something I don’t quite understand yet. =)

@digitalimpression The short version: if there were only two people left on Earth, and they were both Irish, they’d find something to fight about. Then they’d tell each other jokes. Then they might go about figuring out how to rebuild society. It’s all about priorities.

@SavoirFaire hahaha, nice. Well, we can only hope that after the zombie apocalypse that its a few Irish folks left to clean it all up whilst downing a few stouts.

Not really. There are some people on this site that I flat out dislike and others that I love and adore.

@judochop So for you is it all about giving GA’s to those that you like?

I don’t have to agree with an answer for it to be “great.” Sometimes, it explains the thought processes behind why someone would think the way they do. I learn from answers like that, and teaching me something useful is enough to warrant a GA. Evidence, especially, moves me to ponder an argument further. Internal logic (unless it’s waaaay out there) helps. Assiholism doesn’t.

Most of the time yeah. I see people get GA’s just for typing things like “awesome pajamas” if you expect me to really care much about a point structure then I guess I’d take it more seriously but I don’t. Usually I will IM someone if their answer is really that good. I guess I feel it’s kind of pointless and it usually helps with the gang up theory. The point system is pointless. If I don’t like you I’m not throwing you props, period. Shit, Hitler said a few things at one time that would warrant a GA but I’m not handing one out. My level of dislike does not have a meter. Why should I throw props to you if I disagree with you 900 times and one day you say something I agree with?
And bottom line, to answer your question; so it’s all about giving great answers to people you like? NO, it’s about giving great answer points for great answers to the people I like.

@judochop Well, good answer for being honest. One more vote for popularity contest I guess.

I agree that the points don’t really mean anything either way.

I also think that the points are ultimately meaningless. But to me, that’s just all the more reason to be generous with them. If someone says “awesome pajamas” on a non-serious question, what’s wrong with giving it a GA? Spending so much time worrying about whether or not an answer really deserves a GA seems like one more offshoot of the bizarre idea that the internet is SERIOUS BUSINESS.

One of the main reasons I ask the question is because the GA’s are sort of a quality control agent (at least that’s how I think of them). If GA’s are handed out sporadically with no quality requirements it almost makes it a waste of time to put effort into a true good answer.

E.G.
Person A spends the time to research and write a thorough,6 paragraph, thoughtful answer to a question. He/She gets 2 GA’s.

Person B writes “nice pajamas”. He/She gets 9 GA’s.

What reason does Person A have for doing so much work the next time? They didn’t receive the appreciation from the audience that they probably deserved and next time they will probably just say “nice pajamas” instead.

In this particular scenario I think not only are the points worthless, but the answers eventually become worthless too. Or at best, just funny.

Clearly I’m overthinking the whole thing but it’s only because I care about Fluther and all the jellies here. =)

Nice pajamas, @digitalimpression. ;)

(No, seriously.. I get your point. It makes sense. Points on here do seem to be at least somewhat of a popularity contest. Not with everyone, but with enough people to make one wonder if they really mean much at all when it comes to quality responses).

@digitalimpression I also don’t want to sound like I really just don’t care at all because I do and I like being friendly a heck of a lot more than not.
I will just personally send a message to someone if they’ve really hit me in the good or bad.
I like you do also care for everyone. Even if I think that we’d never sit and share a drink, if you had a flat tire I’d offer help to change it, even in the rain.
I felt the need to say this after I re-read what I wrote, I don’t want to come across like an asshole, if I did.
Anyway….Nice pajamas everyone. Cheers.

^ Don’t worry, @judochop. You don’t come across as an asshole at all. Nice pajamas. :)

Ok, you both had me laughing either way. I fear that I will be rewarded with “nice pajamas” many times in the future. xD

@digitalimpression, doesn’t it all depend on what the question is?

I signed on to Fluther to interact with intelligent people, searching for like-minded. something that’s in short supply for me

For about my first week the GA system wasn’t making any sense, but I wasn’t researching it either. After that a glimmer of understanding snuck in and I put my own interpretation on it.

If the answer requires research and 6 paragraphs, please do it because I’ll read it. I may not know if it was the greatest answer, but I might still reward the effort with a GA.

If the answer was to a social question and nice pajamas was an appropriate tongue-in-cheek, then that should get a GA too.

Now I’m not sure how much more research this question needs so if you want 6 paragraphs, let me know and I’ll see what I can do.

@DaphneT It’s not entirely about the research and of course it depends on the question.

I just nice pajama’d you both, hell, before I even read your reply! Take that fluther!

@judochop Wow, we just invented a new verb. Perhaps one day it will be as famous as Tebowing or .. or.. ok, it won’t be.

Nice pajamas, guys.

GA’s for everybody! Merry Christmas and happy nice pajamas!

Happy Halloween, foos!

@Symbeline I guess you are just getting free lurve here since my thread earlier got shut down for no reason (wink), no reason at all.

What thread?

@Symbeline I made a question whose only design was to pass out free lurve for Christmas. It got shut down pretty quickly.

Ah, yeah. I didn’t see it no, but I imagine that would get shut off pretty quickly. I do tend to champion the guidelines, but some of it I don’t like that much. So, happy larvae ing! :) Just don’t sweat it, and hang around. :)

@Symbeline Nah, I don’t sweat it. I don’t want to be a larvae either. o.O

Yes. Given his argument is laid out in a valid way – and is informative. Because, I could either be wrong, or he could be wrong – or both of us in parts. So, the richer the argument, the more likely it is for both parties to improve their respective positions.

Bring on the disagreement, with good reasons.

@phoebusg That last phrase is procedural gold for a debate. I wish more people could master that technique.

I wish some people would give any reasons at all, rather than just saying “it’s my opinion, deal with it!”

“It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.” – Aristotle

@Lightlyseared Great quote, and very true.

@Lightlyseared I love you for quoting that.

I used to be a regular on a website that allowed flaming and personal attacks. This was about 15 years ago. I don’t think there are many places like that anymore. I loved getting into the fray as much as the next person, but I respected the quality of the writing more than the opinion itself in many cases.

If someone posted ideas or opinions I didn’t agree with, but they had well thought out arguments and used a respectful tone, I would acknowledge the time and effort that they put into making the post and compliment specifically what I liked about it. I would also highly praise good research and linkage to useful sites. While I rarely changed my mind in a debate, I could better see why people could be intelligent and had their opinions and I could better respect them.

On the darker side,I would frequently get nasty with people who were “on my side” of an argument if they posted using poor grammar or had simperingly simplistic arguments. I would get especially angry when they used faulty logic or poor debating skills. I didn’t want someone who was taking “my” side of an argument and making people who share my opinion look like doofuses by association. So I’d get shamefully nasty to people who posted things I considered unworthy of bandwidth.

—

That’s not allowed on fluther, or anywhere else worth posting on these days. I’m also much older and I can’t really be arsed enough to get into a flame war anyway. But I still prefer the quality of the post over the opinion itself. I still make a facepalm of shame when I see someone butchering grammar and logic for the sake of our shared cause.

I can’t name the posters because they haven’t posted in this thread. But I am a die-hard liberal and there are MANY conservative posters here that I lurve just about everything they post because I love reading their stuff and they should be encouraged to post more awesomeness.

Sorry to keep editing, but if you don’t have people keeping the other end up on a debate… Well, there isn’t much fun in debating.

Dunno how many times I’ve written one of those researched or reasoned posts which was followed by the “nice pajamas” post that got 12 lurve, while my answer got 2.

What’s going on? Should I even care? Is it analyzable?

I think most of us respond more emotionally than in a reasoned way. How many people actually read all my post? Some do, but most are probably like me, and they’ll skim it, or just skip it entirely, depending on their interest in the topic and how much time they have.

The next post is short, sweet, and funny. It’s a relief. It’s what I need right now. GA!

Was I short changed? I don’t really feel that way. My posts take time and attention. When you do pay attention, you may have to work your brain. You’re going to be thinking about my ideas, not about GAs.

And it evens out for me, too. Under the Orange Tree. What the fuck does that mean? And yet, how many GAs do I get for it? It does mean something. It means something important to me. You may or may not figure it out. You may or may not GA it. Some will and some won’t.

Do I deserve lurve? Well, that’s the beauty of the marketplace. No one forces you to provide lurve you don’t want to provide. Deserving is not the point. Everyone comes here for their own reasons and they are not all the same reasons.

But overall, on average, I think it all evens out. I may not get lurve I “deserve.” I my get lurve I don’t deserve. There are definitely times when I think I’ve written an answer that should have gotten a lot more lurve than it did. Does that mean I was wrong? Misunderstood? Ignored? Missed?

Who knows? My comments will be around for a long time. Eventually they may get noticed. Maybe they will get more lurve. No one can predict and no one can say what justice is here. All we have are our own opinions and our responses.

Nice Pajamas.

Under the Orange Tree.

Peace out, man!

@keobooks I’ll be the first to admit that I’ve made juvenile and ignorant remarks (some of them specifically aimed at liberals). There are just times when something else in life is happening and I’ll take out my unnecessary rage on some innocent passerby. I wish I could apologize personally for all of them but hell.. there’s probably too many of them. Most of the time I’m civil, but the ease with which I can post my opinions (whether emotionally fueled or not) can prevent me from thinking enough about what I actually spew out into the world. So I can definitely empathize with your mentality from 15 years ago. I’m always learning.

@wundayatta Great points. I suppose you reap what you sew with respect to reading posts on fluther. If you take the time to read someone’s lengthy post, you’re likely to get more substance out of it than the “nice pajamas” post. However, as you (more eloquently than I could have) mentioned, a great many people will lurve what they want to read at the time, rather than give “points” for clarity and thoughtfulness.

Thanks to everyone in this “thread?” (still not sure what to call them on fluther) for the great points made. Believe it or not I’m learning from them, which is part of my goal of being here in the first place. =)