Nutty mentioned it in Nutty "Bureaucracy 2: Like Sartre, Only Longer" Mar 30, 2004 9:28:07 pm PST

(Still catching up, determined to neither skip nor skim a single post)

[Edit: x-posted with Suela who had real knowledge. Now back to catching-up]

Wolfram, Snacky's Law, coined by our very own Snacky.

Whenever two (or more) groups of people are arguing, anywhere on the web (usenet, mailing lists, message boards, blogs, etc.), inevitably, someone on one side of the argument (regardless of age or gender) will compare the group on the other side to "those bitchy girls who made everyone's life hell in high school."

Additionally: When this happens, if the person who made this comparison is validated with tales of "just how mean the bitchy girls were to ME in high school," the argument is over, and the side making the comparison has lost.

Q: Oh yeah? You're just like the stuck-up bitches who wore Gap jeans and looked at me funny! A: Snacky's Law strikes again.

I don't know what Snacky's Law is but it's making me hungry.

I have that effect on people.

Oh, Snacky, you said that Nutty brought you here, but I had no idea you had a law coined and all. Yay you.

(OK, really stopping to natter and back to catching up)

Ah, thanks. So it's a baseless attempt at character assassination to discredit the other side's position using broad generalities and subjective factors that are, due to lack of definition and specificity, impossible to refute.

Now I'm off to find something to nibble on.

Uh, if my editor is lurking here, Teppy just made that up in the example upthread.

Susan, thanks for the Christine Edgar update. I'm so glad she's doing well. If you can send her our regards from the Buffistas where she is fondly remembered.

I'm really heartened to know that Allyson took seriously the fallout from her kerfuffle with Jen and has made a continuing thoughtful effort to find the right words. Because, upthread she was saying, "Not gonna change" which only captures her knowing her own character, but doesn't reflect the fact that she reflected on things and did make some changes.

Suela's point about the fluidity of social capital is very apt. There's no central bank - just individual opinions. And, I don't know why people think it's a dirty phrase - it just describes something that happens; it's not a program, or an excuse or a pecking order. It's just one way to describe a dynamic. And as I said before (very similar to Trudy's hippie ideals) it's about what you can contribute to the community, not about Get Out Of Kerfuffle Free cards.

I posted (once) in the first Buffy thread.

I'll amend the list!

And, as I said a couple hundred posts ago, I don't think there's anything actionable from this conversation. But it was still a useful conversation from my perspective.

We have one clear cause-and-effect example. I think it's safe to assume that it probably left a bad taste in some mouths that just stopped coming around.

Trudy, you do this every time we have one of these big debates in here.

Please, please, PLEASE STOP bringing in imaginary, unnamed people who may or may not have been driven away by something without speaking up about it because we have NO WAY OF PROVING THEY EXIST.

It only serves to make the discussion pointless, and drives it off track.

And it really upsets people.

I'm really heartened to know that Allyson took seriously the fallout from her kerfuffle with Jen and has made a continuing thoughtful effort to find the right words. Because, upthread she was saying, "Not gonna change" which only captures her knowing her own character, but doesn't reflect the fact that she reflected on things and did make some changes.

Well, I'm still going to be as "aggressive" as whatever. But not so much violent.

Uh, if my editor is lurking here, Teppy just made that up in the example upthread.

Note to Hec's editor (who, from my example, wouldn't have been able to identify "Hec" as the author he edits) -- I didn't mean you.

As far as you know.

Well, I'm still going to be as "aggressive" as whatever. But not so much violent.

That seems like an important distinction to me. As Xanderella said, the board has fiercely protective warriors and nurturing hand-holders and both are essential or this space wouldn't be what it is.