Flame Warriors

[Kate]

The Twelve Commandments of Flaming​

1. Make things up about your opponent: It's important to make your lies sound true. Preface your argument with the word "clearly." "Clearly, Fred Flooney is a liar, and a dirtball to boot."

2. Be an armchair psychologist: You're a smart person. You've heard of Freud. You took a psychology course in college. Clearly, you're qualified to psychoanalyze your opponent. "Polly Purebread, by using the word 'zucchini' in her posting, shows she has a bad case of penis envy."

3. Cross-post your flames: Everyone on the net is just waiting for the next literary masterpiece to leave your terminal. From rec.arts.wobegon to alt.gourmand, they're all holding their breaths until your next flame. Therefore, post everywhere.

4. Conspiracies abound: If everyone's against you, the reason can't possibly be that you're a ****head. There's obviously a conspiracy against you, and you will be doing the entire net a favor by exposing it.

5. Lawsuit threats: This is the reverse of Rule #4 (sort of like the Yin & Yang of flaming). Threatening a lawsuit is always considered to be in good form. "By saying that I've posted to the wrong group, Bertha has libeled me, slandered me, and sodomized me. See you in court, Bertha."

6. Force them to document their claims: Even if Harry Hoinkus states outright that he likes tomato sauce on his pasta, you should demand documentation. If Newsweek hasn't written an article on Harry's pasta preferences, then Harry's obviously lying.

7. Use foreign phrases: French is good, but Latin is the lingua franca of flaming. You should use the words "ad hominem" at least three times per article. Other favorite Latin phrases are "ad nauseam," "veni, vidi, vici," and "Fettuccini Alfredo."

8. Tell 'em how smart you are: Why use intelligent arguments to convince them you're smart when all you have to do is tell them? State that you're a member of Mensa or Mega or Dorks of America. Tell them the scores you received on every exam since high school. "I got an 800 on my SATs, LSATs, GREs, MCATs, and I can also spell the word 'premeiotic'."

9. Accuse your opponent of censorship. It is your right as an American citizen to post whatever the hell you want to the net (as guaranteed by the 37th Amendment, I think). Anyone who tries to limit your cross-posting or move a flame war to email is either a communist, a fascist, or both.

10. Doubt their existence: You've never actually seen your opponent, have you? And since you're the center of the universe, you should have seen them by now, shouldn't you? Therefore, THEY DON'T EXIST! This is the beauty of flamers' logic.

11. Lie, cheat, steal, leave the toilet seat up.

12. When in doubt, insult: If you forget the other 11 rules, remember this one. At some point during your wonderful career as a flamer you will undoubtedly end up in a flame war with someone who is better than you. This person will expose your lies, tear apart your arguments, make you look generally like a bozo. At this point, there's only one thing to do: insult the .......!!! "Oh yeah? Well, your mother does strange things with vegetables."

Flame Wars - Encyclopedia Dramatica

 

[taz3cat]

Kate, I would start a flame war but I just can't hold up to all your rules. I would have to have a cheat sheet and would become confused and indecisive. I would forget what I was flaming about. You have convinced me it is to much trouble.

 

[Kate]

Lol, sorry Taz

You don't get into fights anyway, at least not that I've noticed. It's people like me who are opinionated and busybodies who need to know how to have a good fight.

Knowing about the psychology of it can make the flame wars around here less worrying and more entertaining. I find that the more I understand about how it works the less trouble I get into and can just laugh it off.

 

[taz3cat]

Kate, I only know of one time you got into trouble, and that was when you defended us against "I can't say" person. I will not ever buy from that person.

 

[Elendil]

Lol, sorry Taz

You don't get into fights anyway, at least not that I've noticed. It's people like me who are opinionated and busybodies who need to know how to have a good fight.

Knowing about the psychology of it can make the flame wars around here less worrying and more entertaining. I find that the more I understand about how it works the less trouble I get into and can just laugh it off.

That's you? It had escaped me completely...........

 

[Coombs]

I just can't help myself

Necormancer has a supernatural ability to bring long-dead forum discussion threads back to life. After having been flogged to death the thread may have been deceased for many years, and bringing it back may have scant relevance to the current topic, yet Necromancer will unexpectedly exhume the thread’s rotting corpse, and strike horror in the forum as its grotesque form lurches into the discussion. The monster, instantly recognized by all who knew it in life, seems at first to breathe and have a pulse, but, alas, it is beyond Necromancer’s skill to fully restore the thread’s original vitality. The hideous apparition may frighten away some of the weaker Warriors or Warriors badly wounded in former battles, but the thread is only a shadow of its former self and very quickly expires.

Unlike Archivist, Necromancer compulsively saves every forum message in carefully preserved archives for future use in battle, while Necromancer collects departed threads merely for the thrill of resurrecting them. Some say he performs this unnatural act out of malice, others say he can’t help himself, but no one really knows.

I used to do this all the time.... I dont know why
Most likely will begin doing this again, Once I've been here long enough to go through all the dead threads

 

[Kate]