started asking people to follow some very basic rules in the replies to my posts on here (like “no starting arguments" and “no unsolicited advice/explanations”) and it's going really well so far, everyone is really nice about it
Mastodon started off being much worse than twitter for me (at first I got a LOT of unsolicited advice that was not helpful to me). It's gotten way better and I really like it here now, but I think it could be even better
@b0rk I see this happen all the time. Even to simple enough questions or heavily clarified questions-- almost like the helpers are just scanning for terms they know rather than reading what the question is.
(substitute question for "expression of confusion" if you wish)
I've been getting unsolicited explanations forever (lots of people have tried to explain basic git facts like "what is HEAD” to me haha) and I generally just tune out the ones that aren't useful.
But I'm trying to say something about it now because I don't want other people who reply to my posts to be have to deal with that kind of thing.
(this phenomenon is sometimes called "mansplaining" because men often assume that women know less than them)
In your original question, I commented how I originally found detached HEAD as confusing, which someone then followed up in splaining it to me, even though I now know what it means. That is one thing I have noticed here is that people like to do that, which if solicited is helpful.
Thank you for all you do and for calling this out! I find your work invaluable to share with students and appreciate you doing what you do!
@b0rk "I'm writing a post with a reply button at the bottom. How dare you show enthusiasm for a subject I am clearly the expert in. That reply button is only for special people. Respect my soapbox!"
@b0rk but Julia, the LWN comment section is pretty sure you're just a silly little girl who doesn't understand git! they have explanations for you! so many explanations
@adamw i find this kind of “i'm going to make up an offensive statement about you and attribute it to someone else” joke very tiring and I wish people would stop
@b0rk Is the big problem with "mansplaining" really that it comes unsolicited? I thought it's mainly about underestimating the competence of the receiver.
There may be a significant overlap and it's obviously a good idea to be cautious when giving advice, but shunning it completely seems like overkill to me.
@flakm personally I try to remember to ask myself if I ACTUALLY understand the person's problem and context before chiming in. Usually the answer is no.
For example even though I understand git extremely well, I'll almost never offer git advice even to a good friend, because I know (from experience) that my assumptions about why they're struggling are going to be wrong 95% of the time and so my advice won't be useful.
@b0rk@flakm one might hope that a healthy conversational style could iron out misconceptions with little friction. Then one wouldn't have to withhold potentially useful assistance for fear of offense.
There could be helpful phrasing techniques and correspondingly receptive listening styles.
@b0rk@flakm I suspect this is a misfiring of the muscles we train when debugging. Someone having a problem does not require that inferences are drawn and provided.
@b0rk I think sometimes I do this because I'm just so excited to expose people to stuff that I I know they'll love that I don't stop to think about whether they already know about it. I don't mean to patronise. I'm just excited by it all. But I should definitely try harder on it.
@b0rk also, regardless of how well-intentioned and helpful it is, sometimes it's just not wanted; my profile explicitly eschews unsolicited advice, because often I'm just having a rant and know how to solve my problem, and I resent the assumption that I don't.
In 1989, my imaginary Internet friends and I called it Male Answer Syndrome. Some of us even did PhD theses on the gender imbalance. The rest often just said, "No MAS!"
Fast forward to now, and we have ChatGPT providing Mansplaining-as-a-Service. So we've had to change our tune a smidge: "No MaaS!"
One thing many disabled friends now online do is say "I have some ideas that I think might help but don't want to unsolicited advise you. LMK if you want me to share."
That way it's opt-in, people tend to think carefully before offering in the first place (often discreetly in PM).
Then even if you agree to advice, there's no gratitude-demand one way or another & it may not be useful and that's OK.
Have also seen people explicitly say "no advice" or "ideas welcomed" as clear guides.
@b0rk This schema plays out in so many places, especially at work. Typically the person giving that advice thinks they've got a very clever and simple hack solution to my problem, but doesn't understand my needs (or didn't listen in the first place, or was a drive-by to the conversation), and formats their advice with the phrase "Why don't you just...."
@b0rk I really appreciate your commentary about this practice! For me it's been really hard to undo the impulse of "I can help, and helping is good, therefore I should help" - the realization that, in fact, I might not be helping when I think I am, is hard but worthwhile!
@b0rk I think a key thing is to start with a question to try to understand where the confusion is.
I've seen colleagues spend hours trying to make someone understand something only to discover the confusion was actually about how some related thing worked.
@b0rk@fennix sometimes I just want to vent (about my frustrations being forced to use git or whatever :) ) and then get "attacked" by a ton of "well, akshually, you are using it wrong, if you used it right, let me explain how, you would see it's the best".
It's just extremely patronizing and condescending.
@b0rk@fennix A lot of people assume all online interactions are implicitly prefixed with "Feel free to disregard, but ..." – I feel like there's a big generational divide here where people who were on the internet long before people had to be on the internet assume everyone else sees it as opt-in, take what you like and ignore the rest. Younger people, who have never had a real choice about whether they want to use the internet, tend to want everyone else to follow some rules of the road.
@b0rk i posted on Reddit the other day a bit of a rant about how the NY mass transit agency is bad at communicating problems at street level, meaning you often learn of problems once you've already gone down/up flights of stairs and paid a fare.
Dozens of dudes showed up to tell me about all the apps I should use and to mock me for the fact that I recently needed to take the subway without a charged phone. Almost no one engaged with my actual complaint.
@b0rk yup. I love John Scalzi’s saying that “the failure mode of clever is asshole” because its pithy enough to pop into my head when needed and makes me stop and think about how something well intentioned (clever, funny, helpful, etc) can go wrong. Saved me from myself many times.
@b0rk Good guidelines! Personally I find unsolicited advice is the most upsetting when you haven’t even asked a question in your post/reply. I think that’s an important thing to ask yourself before suggesting something to someone, whether there even is a question mark in their post.
@b0rk You do a great job of moderating discussions on here. I really appreciate reading comments on your posts and learning things along with everyone else.
Add comment