AIBU to be fed up with some posters who cannot accept others have different opinions?

PS April Rose wrote:

"I dont mind a debate any time but to throw rude words , phrases and comments like " you are uneducated, you are stupid , you are an idiot and to belittle people I feel goes too far."

I agree. Any properly moderated forum will have rules about calumny. Much depends on the kind of users. Some users of forums are accustomed to insults and swearwords and the moderator takes this into consideration. Gransnet is not geared up to swearwords and insults, probably rightly so. Opinions are okay although some people's opinions are boring and ill- thought out.

Some forums now exclude extreme right posters whose ideas are held by most people to be evil.

Everybody has the right to be stupid if they want to. Unlike in real life , online one does not have to respond to uninteresting people who have no information or interesting ideas to share.

From my prospective I think the question posed by the OP has been answered simply by reading the responses by posters.

Of course the OP question will be answered to all posters in different ways.

suziewoozie you complain about aprilrose spoiling threads but I have to say here that I have seen numerous threads turn unpleasant and aggressive as soon as you appear on them, along with all the bad language you throw around so she hardly practices what she preaches (quote from you above).
trisher And can I add that right wingers seem absolutely happy to call those even slightly to the left names
I have seen right wingers called all manner of unpleasant things including crass, clueless, rude, nasty, arrogant, lacking in common sense, no manners, childish. Absolutely dreadful names.
Hypocrisy from both of you or what! ?

varian I so agree with that! And can I add that right wingers seem absolutely happy to call those even slightly to the left names and yet feel they are mistreated if they are labelled.
Personally I think it's a guilty conscience.

Missfood there’s much more to the starting of this thread than the OP says there is. The first time I was aware of april was when she posted on a lighthearted thread we were all enjoying and told us all off for being childish. She hardly practices what she preaches. She also appears to believe that she should be able to post ‘facts’ without being corrected. And I mean facts - real facts not opinions or theories.

This thread was deliberately started to get others to line up on one side or the other, as has been said. You don't always get the results you want even when you pull out the bullies trump card.

aprilrose, I totally agree with you and posted at the beginning of this thread.

I have now read the thread that prompted this one and I am really surprised that something as innocuous as energy providers could spark such a response.

Thankfully it’s a minority who behave in this way, don’t leave gransnet aprilrose this will mean the bullies have won.

By memory, I think you said that green energy or green issues were of no interest to you which you may think is off topic but others won't.

I understand that you think it's hard to quantify and interpret what green energy means in reality but given the concern that huge numbers of people feel now about climate change, the way you expressed your opinion invited others to challenge and offer alternatives. That's what people do if they care about something. You call it preaching, they call it educating, it doesn't mean that they think you are stupid, it means they'd like you to reconsider and they're giving it a go because it's important to them.

I did not expect so many

Oh I think you did?

Did I? You are more privy to my thoughts than I am? Really.

No, I did not expect so many replies. End of I think.
Not willing to accept anothers point of view there . QED with regard to my OP and concerns .

I can see april that you posted about green energy and what you said upset some people and you didn't like that they disagreed with you which is exactly what you're complaining about here!

No, lets get this straight because I dont feel your summary is accurate ( not that I am chalenging your opinion , to which you are entitled).

I posted to an OP that I had used two different electricity companies and found them good . That was what the OP asked for. I mentioned green saying I did not know what their green status was because that was not my primary concern but it had been mentioned by another poster and so OP needed to check that for themselves if it was important.

I was then questioned as to why I did not check the companies green credentials and I explained that my economic situation demanded I find the best deal and I would take that deal and was not in a position to have any kind of stance on eco values etc.

This promted said poster ( who in hindsight had asked the question so that they could actually start preaching about the importance of green and renewable energy from primary providers . I responeded saying this was off topic.

I was then told I should lok for another deal and consider green energy and it was one of the purposes of GN to inform other posters when they had not got a handle on the importance of some issues.

That was when I got prickley and the following exchange made me aske my question here.

Posters might like to consider that all energy companies are required to be "green" but some do buy their energy in different ways and have to certificate their purchases, some quarters argue this is not genuine - only the more expensive companies wil have primary renewable sources it seems.
However, my point remaines that I select the cheapest and best deal based on criteria other than green energy for the most part. All companies these days will say they are green anyway - so this was not so much an issue of green energy as someone fielding their views on the more expesnive types of green energy.

This thread has become so complex that I have to confess that my curiosity was piqued so I searched via Google and I can see april that you posted about green energy and what you said upset some people and you didn't like that they disagreed with you which is exactly what you're complaining about here!

It's pretty clear what you post about and what your political leanings are and that's fine, we are all different and we have different opinions but we all have to accept that others may disagree with us and actually not take that too personally. It's a forum, people argue.

If you say so april if you say so. Whatever.

It's remarkable how reluctant right wingers are to ever admit to being right wing.

They often prefer to describe themselves as "moderate" or "middle of the road" which means "I'm no more extreme than all the people I know who think like me, vote like me and read the same newspapers"

I did not expect so many

Oh I think you did?

aprilrose, I don't know what your views are but, if they are right of centre like mine, you have no hope of any civility towards you on this site.

I do say so suziewoozie . The intonation of your comment suggests you think I am lying. Isnt that just another way of belittling or discrediting by personal insult? An example of what I was talking about really.

I will repeat, my question was prompted by an incident on a forum other than politics . I was quite taken a back as I only answered an OP's question for an opinion about a domestic matter. I did not expect to be preached at because I was not conforming to some sort of social justice agenda in my answer. Its that simple.

If you say so april

Thank you all for your replies. I did not expect so many. Thank you also to those who offered support. I am glad of the support, sometimes ones confidence is shaken when an incident occurs and it is unexpected.

However, I noticed one or two posters who immediately jumped to some conclusions .
I do not want to go into detail and identify posters or anything but I would say:

a) my question was not prompted by anything on the politics board. yes I have engaged there on occassions. I expect that forum to be contentious - although I will admit the insults are sometimes uncalled for and unjustified even in that environment . My own view is there is no need to make personal insults to have a discussion and differences of opinion can be just that, except for some that seems difficult.
My question was prompted by an incident on another forum - one of those quite backwater forums where you do not expect to be preached at or pushed into a political stance because the whole forum is about something entirely different. It was finding myself being cornered insuch a place that prompted my slip in confidence and the question.

b) fwiw I am not right wing at all ( only those who seem to be extremists themselves might say that I suspect. I am actually quite middle of the road. I do feel it was not justified by some to make that suggestion at all and it was not relevent to what I asked about.

c) I think some of the opinions expressed here were not ideal because they seem to have picked up the wrong end of the stick entirely as I mentioned in (a) and (b) above.

However, I have read all the replies. I am grateful to you all. I thank you for your opinions and thoughts. I thank those who offered support and advice. I value all your replies. Thank you

Jane I agree with your last paragraph.
It's something in our human nature that's difficult to resist.

The truth is not always up for debate. Some things are true because they are true. Some people on GN simply cannot accept that.

Take that awful woman on Question Time the other day. It is a fact she is a Tony Robinson supporter and involved in far right politics. It is a fact she was planted by the QT selector, who has close links to the far right. And it is a fact that the opinions she spouted and ranted- were false. We can debate whether, as I believe, that rant was full of hate and racism. I say it was.

Yes I saw that Jura and was disgusted. It wasn't simply what she said, but the way she said it.
The question is, should that sort of thing be publicised or not?
By tweeting about it, is the BBC encouraging others to spout hatred, or are they doing a public service by drawing our attention to such people and the dangers they present to a civilised society?

Not read the whole thread, but in answer to the OP, I think if you want to air your opinins onan open forum, you have to be prepared not only for the fact that some people will disagree with you, but also that some of them will hide behind anonymity to be unnecessarily unpleasant. Unless they breach forum guidelines, there's not much you can do about it.

My view is that if we really want to get to the truth of a subject of debate we need to have as many views as possible. Even though they might seem to conflict at first.
We all need to open our minds to the fact that we might be wrong. Only when all views are taken into account can we reach the truth, whatever it is.
I'm a Pisces so it's easier for me - I can usually see the other sides, but can't make my mind up.

I agree with you OP. Some people just like to air their views for the sake of it (or start an argument for fun - my late father was like that) and must have the last word.
I believe that in How to Make friends and Influence People there is a chapter on how to disagree with others without becoming disagreeable. Sage advice.

mryl ''Trident. and our own government has not been told
If anyone's interested that is not true. The 2 governments had agreed when they were going to make the announcement but nobody told the man in the Senate ( the one who made the announcement)
As stupid and unbelievable as that sounds, that's the truth.''

link please- are you a member of the Cabinet?

But even so- if that is fact - you do remember that we are a Parliamentary Democracy? Should MPs really find out this kind of massive news from the Press?