Escalation in race and team threads

[DiogoBrand]

The issue in my opinion is one that plagues most discussions in the world: fanatism.

For example, when I was debating on the race thread who was to blame for what on the Hamilton/Verstappen incident, there were plenty of people willing to read my opinions and post a counter argument, as pointless as the discussion was at that point. To me that's fine and it's always nice to read the other side of the story and have people from the other side understanding your point.

The problem is there are always those using every kind of fallacy and fanatism to take away from the quality of the conversation, like "a former F1 driver said this, so he's automatically right and you're wrong because you're just a nobody" or "driver X did something wrong on this and that occasion, so he's automatically wrong on this one as well", or even "you're just a fan of Y driver, that's why you're on his side". I mean, at that point it's just sad.

Pretty much every time I try to defend a driver on an incident I have to begin with "I just wanna make clear that I'm not his fan and I'm actually a fan of X and Y driver", and I shouldn't have to do that if I was in a rational environment.

So to me it doesn't matter what subject people discuss, even the more controversial ones can be talked about with no issue, the problem is when people use anything other than logic to try and prove their point.

[maxxer]

To be honest im dutch but not living there for awhile , but i have seen this behaviour happening more and more there on dutch fora which are not even about motorsports and I have seen dutch outside of their country becoming very rude
I dont know if its education or such but i have seen my country people becoming pretty arrogant over the years "we are the best" kind of attitude.
Living abroad i have noticed this more and more

[DChemTech]

To be honest im dutch but not living there for awhile , but i have seen this behaviour happening more and more there on dutch fora which are not even about motorsports and I have seen dutch outside of their country becoming very rude
I dont know if its education or such but i have seen my country people becoming pretty arrogant over the years "we are the best" kind of attitude.
Living abroad i have noticed this more and more

Oh, I wouldn't touch the comment sections of gptoday or motorsport.com/nl or something likewise with a 10 foot broompole while wearing a Hazmat suit. Or the ones at nu.nl, for that matter. (although it does induce some 'romantic' flashbacks to the many hours of discussing with climate change deniers during my PhD while my CFD simulations were slowly diverging...so many grey hairs... but yeah, now I just have time to write funding proposals while, due to computational advances, my simulations diverge faster. anyway, now I diverge myself)

[Wouter]

To be honest im dutch but not living there for awhile , but i have seen this behaviour happening more and more there on dutch fora which are not even about motorsports and I have seen dutch outside of their country becoming very rude
I dont know if its education or such but i have seen my country people becoming pretty arrogant over the years "we are the best" kind of attitude.
Living abroad i have noticed this more and more

Really ? That seems complete nonsense to me. As if every Dutchman is the same! Every Englishman is not the same either.
Some people, no matter where they were born, just always think they know better. What they say is the truth.
These people are found all over the world.

[Big Tea]

To be honest im dutch but not living there for awhile , but i have seen this behaviour happening more and more there on dutch fora which are not even about motorsports and I have seen dutch outside of their country becoming very rude
I dont know if its education or such but i have seen my country people becoming pretty arrogant over the years "we are the best" kind of attitude.
Living abroad i have noticed this more and more

Oh, I wouldn't touch the comment sections of gptoday or motorsport.com/nl or something likewise with a 10 foot broompole while wearing a Hazmat suit. Or the ones at nu.nl, for that matter. (although it does induce some 'romantic' flashbacks to the many hours of discussing with climate change deniers during my PhD while my CFD simulations were slowly diverging...so many grey hairs... but yeah, now I just have time to write funding proposals while, due to computational advances, my simulations diverge faster. anyway, now I diverge myself)

(Bold) this is (was???) a big part of education. You are TOLD which side you are on and have to defend it.
It really does make you look at the devil's advocate option and not just your own views.
Do they still have 'Moots' these days? maybe that is part of the problem BTW, It is not just Dutch, or indeed any nationality or gender of fan, it is the new norm

[DChemTech]

To be honest im dutch but not living there for awhile , but i have seen this behaviour happening more and more there on dutch fora which are not even about motorsports and I have seen dutch outside of their country becoming very rude
I dont know if its education or such but i have seen my country people becoming pretty arrogant over the years "we are the best" kind of attitude.
Living abroad i have noticed this more and more

Oh, I wouldn't touch the comment sections of gptoday or motorsport.com/nl or something likewise with a 10 foot broompole while wearing a Hazmat suit. Or the ones at nu.nl, for that matter. (although it does induce some 'romantic' flashbacks to the many hours of discussing with climate change deniers during my PhD while my CFD simulations were slowly diverging...so many grey hairs... but yeah, now I just have time to write funding proposals while, due to computational advances, my simulations diverge faster. anyway, now I diverge myself)

(Bold) this is (was???) a big part of education. You are TOLD which side you are on and have to defend it.
It really does make you look at the devil's advocate option and not just your own views.
Do they still have 'Moots' these days? maybe that is part of the problem BTW, It is not just Dutch, or indeed any nationality or gender of fan, it is the new norm

There is some of it. But not as much as it used to be. And also in the classroom, tolerance seems.. lower. Already back in 2011 in ethics in engineering class, arguing the role of Dow chemical in the Bhopal disaster in a class with several Indian students was tense. And these days, people seem less capable of separating message and messenger, even in roleplay.

[dans79]

imo, the big issue is that today it's far to easy for people to spout off on the internet because they are veiled in anonymity.

They can say whatever the site administrators will let them get away with, because the other person has no idea who they are or where they live. In general people are a lot less confrontational when they are known or in close proximity to people they don't necessarily agree with.

[ab_f1]

To be honest im dutch but not living there for awhile , but i have seen this behaviour happening more and more there on dutch fora which are not even about motorsports and I have seen dutch outside of their country becoming very rude
I dont know if its education or such but i have seen my country people becoming pretty arrogant over the years "we are the best" kind of attitude.
Living abroad i have noticed this more and more

Personally I don't think its to do with any nationality but generation as such. Modern micro-journalism and click-bait is fuelling this. Just this afternoon read 2 different headlines out of Sir Jackie Stewart's statement. One site headlined JS said Max was immature while other highlighted him saying said Lewis was slow.

Now with attention span of twitter gen, no-one is likely to look beyond headlines and take the impression based on which site was being followed and then spew the same here.

Very early in my career someone advised me to draft my response if I feel agitated but do not send. Wait for 24 hrs. And highly unlikely it will be sent after that time. But now waiting for 24 minutes probably is eternity.

[101FlyingDutchman]

To be honest im dutch but not living there for awhile , but i have seen this behaviour happening more and more there on dutch fora which are not even about motorsports and I have seen dutch outside of their country becoming very rude
I dont know if its education or such but i have seen my country people becoming pretty arrogant over the years "we are the best" kind of attitude.
Living abroad i have noticed this more and more

Personally I don't think its to do with any nationality but generation as such. Modern micro-journalism and click-bait is fuelling this. Just this afternoon read 2 different headlines out of Sir Jackie Stewart's statement. One site headlined JS said Max was immature while other highlighted him saying said Lewis was slow.

Now with attention span of twitter gen, no-one is likely to look beyond headlines and take the impression based on which site was being followed and then spew the same here.

Very early in my career someone advised me to draft my response if I feel agitated but do not send. Wait for 24 hrs. And highly unlikely it will be sent after that time. But now waiting for 24 minutes probably is eternity.

I agree totally with that. Long format good journalism lives on the fringes of the internet sphere. Most content is mathematically optimised for how long viewers stay on pages with clickbaity titles. Man I’m getting old

[Stu]

Oh, I wouldn't touch the comment sections of gptoday or motorsport.com/nl or something likewise with a 10 foot broompole while wearing a Hazmat suit. Or the ones at nu.nl, for that matter. (although it does induce some 'romantic' flashbacks to the many hours of discussing with climate change deniers during my PhD while my CFD simulations were slowly diverging...so many grey hairs... but yeah, now I just have time to write funding proposals while, due to computational advances, my simulations diverge faster. anyway, now I diverge myself)

(Bold) this is (was???) a big part of education. You are TOLD which side you are on and have to defend it.
It really does make you look at the devil's advocate option and not just your own views.
Do they still have 'Moots' these days? maybe that is part of the problem BTW, It is not just Dutch, or indeed any nationality or gender of fan, it is the new norm

There is some of it. But not as much as it used to be. And also in the classroom, tolerance seems.. lower. Already back in 2011 in ethics in engineering class, arguing the role of Dow chemical in the Bhopal disaster in a class with several Indian students was tense. And these days, people seem less capable of separating message and messenger, even in roleplay.

That should be a difficult (tense) subject anytime/anywhere/anyplace as to justify it you NEED to justify that those affected have less worth to a global society than those that perpetrated the potential of the consequences (an argument that is practically impossible without being fingered as a NIMBY)

[codetower]

imo, the big issue is that today it's far to easy for people to spout off on the internet because they are veiled in anonymity.

They can say whatever the site administrators will let them get away with, because the other person has no idea who they are or where they live. In general people are a lot less confrontational when they are known or in close proximity to people they don't necessarily agree with.

Personally I don't think its to do with any nationality but generation as such. Modern micro-journalism and click-bait is fuelling this. Just this afternoon read 2 different headlines out of Sir Jackie Stewart's statement. One site headlined JS said Max was immature while other highlighted him saying said Lewis was slow.

Now with attention span of twitter gen, no-one is likely to look beyond headlines and take the impression based on which site was being followed and then spew the same here.

Very early in my career someone advised me to draft my response if I feel agitated but do not send. Wait for 24 hrs. And highly unlikely it will be sent after that time. But now waiting for 24 minutes probably is eternity.

I agree with you, and not only is it too easy to just spew something without any consequences, it's also too easy to just say something without giving it any thought. Nowadays, many people have this knee-jerk reaction to things and don't really seem to care, and don't put much thought behind what they say or do.

I've been a fan of F1 for a few decades now. I've been following these threads for a few years and I decided to join in about a year ago mainly because nowadays we have all this technical "Data" that wasn't always available, and a lot more information. I like to share and learn as much as I can. So I really appreciate the contribution that MANY of the members add to the site; A LOT of you long-timers, and some of the newbies. I really hope you guys (and ladies possibly) don't end up jumping ship because of the few people that are just angry and enjoy starting all the arguments here.

[Steven]

To be honest im dutch but not living there for awhile , but i have seen this behaviour happening more and more there on dutch fora which are not even about motorsports and I have seen dutch outside of their country becoming very rude
I dont know if its education or such but i have seen my country people becoming pretty arrogant over the years "we are the best" kind of attitude.
Living abroad i have noticed this more and more

To be honest, that's an "impression" that Belgians have about Dutch people in general. But, I am frequently working with Dutch people, and I can say most of those are very humble.

Personally I don't think its to do with any nationality but generation as such. Modern micro-journalism and click-bait is fuelling this. Just this afternoon read 2 different headlines out of Sir Jackie Stewart's statement. One site headlined JS said Max was immature while other highlighted him saying said Lewis was slow.

Now with attention span of twitter gen, no-one is likely to look beyond headlines and take the impression based on which site was being followed and then spew the same here.

In terms of articles and journalism, this pretty much sums it up yes. People don't even bother about spelling anymore. I can get so annoyed with people mixing "it's" and "its", or "then" and "than". I can accept that from non-native English speakers, but really...

And then these articles like "Why Mercedes is ruining F1", or "How Red Bull's genius fixed Verstappen's car". Those articles are either endless drivel by some imaginative "journalist", or a long text based on one quote, followed by a section of rehashed content from a while ago.

Sadly, magazines have the same problem. I stopped all my motorsport related subscriptions, except for RCE.

Anyway, I'm encouraged to see so many people having the same general view, and not really blaming the mods. That would be worrying, as we are really very very busy trying to keep it somewhat under control.

Perhaps it is time to reconsider locking the race thread during the race again (and let people chat on our Discord instead). Maybe that can solve a little bit of the problem.

[Just_a_fan]

Perhaps it is time to reconsider locking the race thread during the race again (and let people chat on our Discord instead). Maybe that can solve a little bit of the problem.

That just forces people to go down another route in order to enjoy F1 races. And it won't stop the post-race stupidity. Indeed, during the race itself the thread is usually OK. It's afterwards that the silliness starts.

If you're going to lock race threads to stop idiotic behaviour rather than just dealing with the idiots, then you're going to find that you're only going to be left with the idiots. Everyone else will leave to avoid the continual unnecessary behaviour of the shouty minority.

Your choice.

[hollus]

4 cents from me:

The way many (scratch that, some) dutch or orange fans are treating anything related to Hamilton, and the way that many (damn... some!) british or Lewis' fans deal with anything orange or redbullish or Verstappen at all, reminds me oh-so-much to the way Lewis was treated in Spain in 2007 and the way Alonso was treated in England in 2007. AFAIK, that animosity lasted about 5 years, let's hope this hatred fades quicker than that. To the more casual Spanish fan, Lewis is synonym with enemy even today. All driven by the local press (both in Spain and England at the time).
Citing a famous show... all of this has happened before, and all of this will happen again.

The last two cents: roughly about half the users do not read a thread to the end before replying. They reply when they see something to reply to, as they read that particular post, then and there. Which is a perfect recipe for escalation, and for frustration as the more nuanced arguments that might lie below appear to be ignored (they were in a way). This I know from polling many members when I became mod and from looking for signs of it afterwards (timing of quotes and order of posts are often good clues). And this, I am afraid, is just a sign of the times and likely to increase, few people have time for a "slow" conversation anymore.

C'est la vie!

[RZS10]

The second part is easily observable - many links to articles/videos/etc and images/gifs get posted several times, sometimes just a page or two later and after they've already been discussed simply because some users do not even bother to skim through the threads.
Now obviously no one can really be arsed to go through 50+ pages to look for posts about a small aspect of the race and if you add all the unnecessary, let's be very polite about it: filler that adds nothing to the discussion it just gets worse and mindful conversations get drowned out in all the fluff.

I don't believe it would be too hard to just very strictly delete all posts that are nothing more than cheap "gotchas" that only serve to rile up either fanbase - and there's some accounts that do nothing apart from that.