Just to be perfectly clear, it was all in jest.
why do we argue?
I suppose it's human nature?
Not everyone can get along,at least all of the time.
Squablles occur in the best of families,sometimes over big issues, sometimes over small ones.
So why should the audio "family" be any different?
Some forums have gone to great pains to cleanse their sites and free them from confrontations between audiophiles who can't see eye to eye, or perhaps we should say, ear to ear.
But where's the harm in all that squabbling? Really?
If someone finds it offensive, then why continue to read it, like a moth drawn to the flame,if you think it's going to harm you, don't enter.
No one is making you.
Then if you feel you have to post your objections to objectional comments(who made you the boss?)then you are not the solution ,you're just adding to the problem.
Like bringing gasoline to put out the fire.
You're going to be on one side or the other,or perhaps you are the "let's kiss and make up type" "can't we all be friends?"audiophile who has only everyone's best wishes at heart.
There's always a "mom" to come between two fighting brothers isn't there,and you know she can't take sides,calling a truce is her job.
But until the real issues have been addressed, the argument is never over.
It's always there under the surface,just waiting to boil over given half the chance.Power cords one day, fuses the next, and demagging lp's? Please!
It usually starts in audio forums when some chump posts that a piece of something that cost more than it should, made an improvement that someone who wasn't there to hear it says it didn't.
Get the gist?
I did it, I heard it, I was there,who are you to tell me I didn't hear it, and how dare you call me dillusional?That's the response to the first response from the folks who know it just can't be real.
Surely if I am half a man, I'll have to make some sort of reply.And reply to the reply and on and on again and again.
I'll have to try to proove that I heard what I heard, but you need scientific proof.
Obviously I can't provide any, I am a chump, not a scientist, I bought the snake oil didn't I?
So on and on it goes and intensifies until enough is enough and two or more members of the family are banished from the fold.
The community all the better for it, or so it tells itself.
But is it?
If everything in this hobby is scrutinized to the point that if there isn't a scientific white paper to back up the claims, how much of what we take for granted today would be lost to the audio community at large?
Zip cord,stock giveaway cords of all srtipe would be all that we would have.There'd be no equipment stands or various footers, no isolation devices of the electrical and mechanical persuasion,no spikes,no fancy metals,in short there would be no aftermarket anything.
It would be a 100% snake free world,a totalitarian utopia for the less than feeble minded audiophiles that there are so many of. Those foolish folks who thrive on fairy dust need to be saved from their own foolish and wasteful ways.
At least that's the way I've seen it from my perspective.
I know it's too late to save me.Salvation passed me by decades ago.
Not everyone can get along,at least all of the time.
Squablles occur in the best of families,sometimes over big issues, sometimes over small ones.
So why should the audio "family" be any different?
Some forums have gone to great pains to cleanse their sites and free them from confrontations between audiophiles who can't see eye to eye, or perhaps we should say, ear to ear.
But where's the harm in all that squabbling? Really?
If someone finds it offensive, then why continue to read it, like a moth drawn to the flame,if you think it's going to harm you, don't enter.
No one is making you.
Then if you feel you have to post your objections to objectional comments(who made you the boss?)then you are not the solution ,you're just adding to the problem.
Like bringing gasoline to put out the fire.
You're going to be on one side or the other,or perhaps you are the "let's kiss and make up type" "can't we all be friends?"audiophile who has only everyone's best wishes at heart.
There's always a "mom" to come between two fighting brothers isn't there,and you know she can't take sides,calling a truce is her job.
But until the real issues have been addressed, the argument is never over.
It's always there under the surface,just waiting to boil over given half the chance.Power cords one day, fuses the next, and demagging lp's? Please!
It usually starts in audio forums when some chump posts that a piece of something that cost more than it should, made an improvement that someone who wasn't there to hear it says it didn't.
Get the gist?
I did it, I heard it, I was there,who are you to tell me I didn't hear it, and how dare you call me dillusional?That's the response to the first response from the folks who know it just can't be real.
Surely if I am half a man, I'll have to make some sort of reply.And reply to the reply and on and on again and again.
I'll have to try to proove that I heard what I heard, but you need scientific proof.
Obviously I can't provide any, I am a chump, not a scientist, I bought the snake oil didn't I?
So on and on it goes and intensifies until enough is enough and two or more members of the family are banished from the fold.
The community all the better for it, or so it tells itself.
But is it?
If everything in this hobby is scrutinized to the point that if there isn't a scientific white paper to back up the claims, how much of what we take for granted today would be lost to the audio community at large?
Zip cord,stock giveaway cords of all srtipe would be all that we would have.There'd be no equipment stands or various footers, no isolation devices of the electrical and mechanical persuasion,no spikes,no fancy metals,in short there would be no aftermarket anything.
It would be a 100% snake free world,a totalitarian utopia for the less than feeble minded audiophiles that there are so many of. Those foolish folks who thrive on fairy dust need to be saved from their own foolish and wasteful ways.
At least that's the way I've seen it from my perspective.
I know it's too late to save me.Salvation passed me by decades ago.
- ...
- 120 posts total
Lacee, not to be argumentative, but I thought there were some very thoughtful responses, Bryon's really hit the nail on the head- as did several others- we argue because we have different views and argument is not a bad thing if it is done in a civil way. It helps people learn and refine their thinking if done with some thought . I knew UnSound and some of the others were joking, although it may sometimes be hard to tell on the Internet. |
Lacee - I see that you're asking the question sincerely, but I don't think the question has an answer. Or it doesn't have a SINGLE answer. Motives for arguments are as diverse as the circumstances that create them and the people who participate in them. Asking "Why do we argue?" is like asking "Why do we get married?" The answer might be: love, companionship, attachment, emotional security, financial security, to have children, to fulfill cultural expectations, to individuate from your parents, to reenact the relationships of childhood, to obtain citizenship, to avoid the draft, because she got pregnant... The same thing is true of the question "Why do we argue?" It's a question with a thousand answers. And many of those answers are elusive, because people's motives for arguing are largely unconscious, just like people's motives for getting married. Having said that, I believe that there are some COMMON reasons why people argue, both on Audiogon and in the real world. Here are some of them... 1. Rivalry 2. Narcissism 3. Truth RE (1): Rivalry. We are animals that evolved under conditions of scarcity. Access to scarce resources, particularly reproductive resources, is determined by dominance. Dominance is established either through violence or through SURROGATES for violence. IMO, many arguments are surrogates for violence. That is reflected in the principal metaphor people use when talking about arguments, namely that ARGUMENTS ARE WAR, as in He ATTACKED my position. I DEFENDED my point of view. I SHOT DOWN his ideas. I WON the argument. etc. Arguments replace physical conflict with verbal conflict. As surrogates for violence, arguments are a way of establishing dominance without killing each other. The struggle for dominance, whether violent or non-violent, is synonymous with rivalry. Because of the scarcity of resources over the course of human evolutionary history, rivalry is written into our DNA. Literally. RE (2): Narcissism. We are all, to some extent or other, narcissistic. Narcissism has been a character flaw since there was such a thing as character flaws, as evidenced by myths about narcissism, fairy tales about narcissism, biblical passages about narcissism, literature about narcissism, psychological theories about narcissism, movies about narcissism. Narcissism is, among other things, an excess of pride and a shortage of humility. IMO, the denial of ones own shortcomings and mistakes tends to make people argumentative, since the only way to maintain the idea that you're perfect is to attack people who can see that you're not. Narcissism is easy enough to find here on Audiogon or in the real world. Having said that, it does not follow, nor do I believe, that ALL arguments are a consequence of narcissism. And that brings me to RE (3): Truth. A great number of arguments are about WHAT IS TRUE. A smaller but still significant number of arguments are about HOW WE KNOW what is true. In both cases, people have an investment in the truth. The investment can be emotional, ideological, financial, religious... any number of things. The investment people feel in the truth applies not only to important things, like whether climate change is real, but also to trivial things, like whether fuse direction is audible. IMO, theres nothing wrong with being invested in the truth. And theres nothing wrong with arguing about the truth. The problem arises, IMO, when you are so invested in your beliefs being true that you cannot argue about the truth without behaving badly. Put another way, the problem is Dogmatism. Dogmatism can be a consequence of vanity, ignorance, indoctrination... the list is long. So long as people are dogmatic, arguments will go badly. And so long as they go badly, arguments will get a bad rap. But the problem isnt the argument. Its the person doing the arguing. IMO, IME, etc. Bryon |
- 120 posts total