posted
Now generally this should be an easy question, undoubtably the vaste majority of North Americans past the age of 20 should be a great deal more knowldgeable at the very least then an average 5th grader and thankfully this show doesnt contradict that, but nonetheless the show is both entertaining and ironic that some people ned to use all of their "life lines" before the second question is even over.
Like CMON which gender of the mosquito bites you!? The female dumb dumb! Common knowledge and yet some people can even get that question right
Now admittedly there are some questions I can anwser, thankfully they are ones I am not expected being Canadian to know, for example the number of Federal Holidays (being an American show) thankfully no one woul blame me for not knowing another countries holidays during november.
So, how many Hatrackers are smarter then a 5th grader
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posted
Come on, I've seen that mosquito fact exactly once, and it was in a Far Side book in which Gary Larson wrote about mistakenly drawing a cartoon in which he had a male mosquito come home to his wife and complain to her about what a hard day of bloodsucking he'd had.
Posts: 781 | Registered: Apr 2005
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posted
I watched an episode or two of that and I am indeed smarter than a 5th grader. The only one I didn't know was the most common first name of US Presidents was (James). My guess was John.
Posts: 2867 | Registered: May 2005
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quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky: Do they teach grammar and spelling in or before 5th grade? I think they do.
I was tempted to make a snarky comment about having learned to spell by the fifth grade, but I know that spelling does not correlate well with intelligence.
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posted
Neither does knowing trivia like which gender of mosquito sucks blood.
I wonder if they teach the saying "People who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones." by fifth grade.
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Does anybody know where I can find a list of the questions they've had on air? I'm interested, but not enough to actually, you know, watch the show.
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posted
So you believe that the proper response to Blayne acting like a jerk is to act like a jerk yourself?
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My response was defintely somewhat jerky. With Blayne's history and original post, I'm okay with the tone I took though. Plus, I thought it was kind of funny.
Look, someone who has trouble expressing a thought in coherent writing crowing (in poorly spelled and constructed writing) about how dumb people are for not knowing trivia, to me, calls for comment.
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posted
You seem to think that a lot of things call for comment when no one else does. Plus, Blayne's post was perfectly coherent. With the exception of "can" for "can't," everything made sense, and the only errors were stylistic ones like spelling and punctuation. Hardly incoherent.
That's not to say that I didn't see the irony, too. I just didn't see how it would be productive or polite.
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Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
Trvia that frankly the average 40 year old should know. I am not dissing them for not knowing uncommon trivia, like say whether or not saturn is visible to the naked eye, its not visible where I live and getting that question wrong or right doesnt mean anything but the gender of the biting kind of mosquitos is something any adult should know.
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quote:That's not to say that I didn't see the irony, too. I just didn't see how it would be productive or polite.
It's not polite. Is it productive?
I don't know. I do know that I think that Blayne would be much better off if he started acting less like a 14 year old and I think that getting kicked in the butt sometimes may actually help him with that. I'm not being impolite without a purpose.
As for seeing things differently from other people at Hatrack, I have no problem with that description.
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posted
Well, then you can consider this me kicking you in the butt. Perhaps you've also heard the phrase "You attract more flies with honey than with vinegar."
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posted
Yes, and there are plenty of people who will come forward with kind words and gentle guidance for Blayne. It works in tandem. Ralphie and I used to do this all the time.
You need the bad cop too. It's a role I can play without actually trying to harm the other person and with their best interests in mind, unlike most of the other people I've seen here who do it.
Edit: Also, I don't particularly care if people think I'm mean, as long as posters like Blayne end up developing more maturity and consideration.
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quote:Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head: Does anybody know where I can find a list of the questions they've had on air? I'm interested, but not enough to actually, you know, watch the show.
This blog review has the first three episodes' questions on it. You have to scroll down a bit before they're listed.
Posts: 2867 | Registered: May 2005
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posted
porter, I disagree. As I've said, this is something I've done for a while. It works better when there were people who I knew I could count on to come in, but it does work. And, in my opinion, some posters benefit from it.
You are welcome to try to convince me otherwise, however. But I'm hardly going to replace my opinion with yours. Especially in cases like this. Is what I said so awful? If it even cut, it cut shallow.
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posted
Having seen the the affects from when you play bad cop is part of the reason why I say that Hatrack doesn't need anybody to play bad copy.
Edit: I hope you don't take this wrong, Squicky. I'm not trying to be snarky, but I really do feel that you patrolling Hatrack has had a net negative affect on the community, at least recently.
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Rabbit -- it's about a gameshow called "Are you smarter than a 5th grader" where they lob softball questions to the contestant and to fifth graders to see who does better.
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
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posted
porter, I accept that and, from your perspective I could see how you think that. I don't agree. And I am very confident that the best chance for certain posters to change for the better in certain areas through their interactions on this forum is through a layered approach that involves someone playing the bad cop.
As I've said, I've been doing this for a while. It has worked in the past, but I don't expect people to appreciate it or even understand what I am doing. I see things, especially social dynamics, much different from nearly all the rest of Hatrack. I'm okay with that.
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posted
Even if you are able to change individual's behavior in this way, I still think its effects are a net loss for the community.
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posted
I think I may define the community and what constitutes a net loss to it (or what causes it) differently from you.
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posted
As I've said, you are welcome to try and change my mind. But expecting me to replace my opinion with yours because you say so or because you can bring social disapproval on me isn't going to work.
edit: I realize that a lot of people don't believe this about me, but I'm not malicious and I do try to be fair.
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quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky: As I've said, you are welcome to try and change my mind. But expecting me to replace my opinion with yours because you say so or because you can bring social disapproval on me isn't going to work.
You don't think that your policing of katharina has resulted in a lot of net loss for Hatrack? Porteiro and I aren't trying to get you to agree with us just because we say so. He offered a very relevant example of how your actions have been hurtful. You haven't offered any examples of how they've been helpful. Who have you helped to change for the better?
quote:edit: I realize that a lot of people don't believe this about me, but I'm not malicious and I do try to be fair.
I believe your motives are good, but I don't think good motives always yield good results.
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quote:You don't think that your policing of katharina has resulted in a lot of net loss for Hatrack?
Of course I don't. From my perspective, what kat was doing was wrong. It may have made your experience more uncomfortable that I called her on it, but that doesn't equal a net negative for me. If she doesn't return to doing the things she did, that's a net positive to me.
I don't value social harmony over either fairness or effective conflict resolution.
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quote:Who have you helped to change for the better?
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Is that just your opinion, or do you think Nick would admit, "Yes, MrSquicky's bad cop strategy helped me become a more mature poster"?
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posted
No, of course he wouldn't. In my time at Hatrack maybe two people have understood what I was doing.
edit: I don't do what I do for appreciation or to be liked. Although, with both of those people, I appreciated and valued their opinion prior to them revealing that they had caught on to what I was trying to do. And that did actually mean something.
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Although I am perfectly willing to accept that only two people have agreed with you about what you're doing.
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posted
porter, Are you saying that prior to me explaining that I do this, you realized that this was what I was doing?
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Are we playing games now? I don't think I want to play.
But, as I said, you are still welcome to try to convince me to change my opinion. I'll try to respond fairly to respectful attempts to do so.
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quote:Are we playing games now? I don't think I want to play.
Heh. That was my exact response to your previous post. It felt like you were fencing, and my natural response was to clam up.
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
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posted
I never had any indication that anyone except for those two people have understood. I haven't had many indications from other areas that most of people here would understand. You didn't. Jon Boy clearly didn't.
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So, how is my question about whether you understood what I was doing not in line with this?
Also, I feel it may be important to emphasize again that people here not agreeing with what I am doing isn't an effective argument for me changing it. If you want to try to convince me otherwise, I'm all ears, but people not agreeing or disliking me isn't going to change me from doing it.
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posted
I've always realized what you're doing. And I disagree with Porter that there is no place for bad cops here.
On a tangential note, Blayne's opening post was obnoxious. I wouldn't have commented on it simply because I no longer comment on almost anything Blayne says. In fact, I virtually never open threads he starts. I opened this one after seeing it up here repeatedly because I am interested in trivia game shows, and I thought someone else might have something worthwhile to say.
But I do grant that sometimes it is necessary and productive for a jerk to be told he is a jerk.
As you can see, though, telling Blayne he is a jerk is a doomed strategy. It has been done. He is simply too dense to get it. The best thing to do with Blayne is ignore him. He is mostly a harmless kind of jerk, anyway. He lowers the signal to noise ratio, but he does far less damage than King of Men and Bean Counter.
I think having somebody be the designated bad cop is probably an awful idea. Because the fact is that neither you nor anybody else is impartial. From where I'm standing, you've got at least three gaping blind spots. If you're our cop, our enforcement can't help but be spotty. I do think that members who have a stake in preserving the best that Hatrack can be, and who don't mind being the bad guy once in a while, are within their bounds to occasionally call a spade a spade and call an ass an ass. (Here's a bit of irony: do you realize that this is, in fact, what is happening to you, MrSquicky? You want people to police behavior and be willing to be a bad cop, and that's just what Jon Boy and Porter are doing. Huzzah! Your model has been adopted!)
I think you are ill-suited to be the bad cop all the time. We probably all are.
Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002
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posted
You say that it's clear that neither I or Jon Boy understand what you are doing. How in the world can you say that? Lack of agreement about the affects and necessity of your actions does not mean we don't understand.
quote:And I disagree with Porter that there is no place for bad cops here. ... But I do grant that sometimes it is necessary and productive for a jerk to be told he is a jerk. ... I think having somebody be the designated bad cop is probably an awful idea.
Actually, I agree with you.
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posted
I don't think that Porter and I have been bad cops. Maybe I've been a little rude, but I wasn't being rude as a strategy, as it seems MrSquicky is.
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posted
You just told me that you didn't understand before I told you. And, I think it is very clear from Jon Boy's response that he didn't understand before I told him.
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