Quoted post said:Originally posted by Eidetic
There's a difference between saying a person is hooey and a person's information or opinions are hooey. Boudreaux has not said the former, IIRC, only the latter. He's usually correct about bad information.
Like most of the forum members, I've learned to live with the guy and his toxic demeanor; as others have said, pay attention to the helpful info and shrug off his bad attitude. With all due respect, though, Eidetic, I think you're playing a word game here which gives ole' boudreaux a bit too much credit.
Keep boudreaux around; fine. He's useful sometimes. He may even be a decent guy deep, deep, deep down. I don't think your assesment of the relative nastiness values of calling someone "hooey" versus calling their opinions "hooey" is true enough. One can be just as rude, caustic, unfair, narrow, obtuse, hurtful or inappropriate doing the latter as the former. You can call a bloke "hooey" all day long and not ruffle anyone's feathers.
By the same token, you can spin a critical take on a person's opinions or experience and turn it into outright ridicule easily. What bothers me is how readily (and regularly) boudreaux crosses that line. Sure, it's funny sometimes, but how often does a newbie or all-in-all mellow person arrive at the forums and feel suddenly bloodied after mis-stating the BB/crank interface format of the Sora drivetrain?
Should civility on a cycling forum have such a learning curve?