Another...META FROM HELL! IMPASSE!
All right, it’s time for another damn Meta from Hell. Because apparently…ya NEED it. So gather round young NT naives. Fix you a cup of tea, or cup of coffee, or a High Ball, or Long Island Iced Tea, or grab a beer, or a jar of shine. Whatever you need, get comfortable. Uncle Bruce is gonna school you on IMPASSE. Now pay attention and behave. No playing grab fanny while I’m talking. I have 2x4 handy, and I aint afraid to use it.
Way back in the yonder days of NewsTalkers, debate was lively and colorful. Once debating members had expounded all of their reasoning on a certain topic, the debate inevitably turned to the usual comments about self-sexual acts, sexual acts with another member’s trusty steed, and in some cases acts of fornication with mothers, sisters, and various barnyard animals.
Our Ad-Hoc team of moderation knew that something should be done. So a committee was formed, doughnuts, coffee, and cupcakes provided, and the CoC was developed to rescue the masses from the messes.
In the course of that development, it was recognized that at times in a debate, the free exchange of opinion could cease, and further debate would be useless. Thus was born the concept of Impasse.
“Uncle Bruce, what does Impasse mean, and how do I use it?” Hush little NT naïve, I shall explain with a hypothetical example.
Let’s say that Perrie makes a statement that regular use of Flintstone Vitamins will increase a woman’s bust size. And let’s say that PJ disagrees. And the debate begins. Perrie posts links and pie charts. PJ posts venn diagrams and bar charts. Perrie posts studies. PJ dismisses said studies because they were funded by Playtex Cross Your Heart. PJ posts double blind studies, which Perrie dismisses because they were funded by The Augmentation Trade Association (TATA’s for short). This goes on with Studies by Victoria’s Secret, the American Association of Boobie Augmentation, and so on. Until a point is reached where there is no further meaningful dialogue, and one member is about to accuse the other of titty envy.
At this point young naïve, either Perrie or PJ, realizing that further debate is pointless and a circle jerk is about to ensue, would state:
“Oh wise and learned opponent. I fear that our debate has reached a stalemate, and further discussion is neither desired nor necessary. I therefor bid you good day, and offer my hand in friendly acknowledgment that we must agree to disagree.”
Except Perrie and PJ are lazy. And don’t feel like typing out such an eloquent declaration of truce. Thus either of them simply types “IMPASSE”.
Now I’m not gonna sit here and quote you from Webster’s works what the dictionary definition of impasse is. You’re a big boy/girl/whatever. You can Google it yourself.
I will tell you what the NT definition is. It means the discussion is over. Period. End of conversation, literally. No more comments from the opponent, OR YOU! The thread stops. Further comments, regardless of how on topic or well-presented will be deleted by the moderators.
“Oh that’s great, Uncle Bruce! I can use impasse to ignore someone that I don’t want to debate with!” NO! Young naïve, impasse was never intended to be used as an ignore function. But I swear to God, it has been thrown out there so much in the last few days that the Imp’s Ass is blistered RED.
You DO have an ignore function. It’s called “Scroll the fuck on down!” Here’s how it works. You put your curser (that’s the little arrow that moves when you move the mouse) on the down pointing arrow all the way over on the right hand side of your screen. Then you press your left mouse button until the screen moves past whatever you want to ignore. If you have some advanced computer skills, and an appropriate mouse, you can use the scroll wheel to do the same.
Impasse is not an ignore tool. Let me say that slowly so you can fully understand it. Impasse…is…not…an…ignore…tool. Impasse is not to be used to stop healthy debate. Impasse is not to be used when you don’t like what the other person is posting or saying.
“But Uncle Bruce, how many comments must I or they make before I can call Impasse?” Young naïve, do you think there is a measured metric to healthy debate? I cannot tell you how many comments it takes for a debate to run its course. I CAN tell you that you will be hard pressed to convince me or any other moderator that it has run its course after only one, two or even three comments. If I keep seeing that, using impasse to shut down otherwise healthy discussions, I’m going to start yanking your impasse comment and Purple Pen you to put on your Big Boy/Girl/Whatever panties and either continue, or IGNORE them.
Now, here are some mechanics of the use of Impasse. Pay close attention young naives, I do not want to lose any of you in this part.
Impasse is used when two members have reached a point that further debate is meaningless. One or the other member posts a comment with the single word “Impasse”. You do not precede it with a debate point. You do not follow it with a debate point.
When Impasse is declared, both participants are prohibited from any further comments IN THAT THREAD. This does not prevent either participant from commenting elsewhere in the article. And since Impasse is not an ignore function, it does not preclude any further interaction of the participants in that article or other articles. Impasse is not used against a participant, but rather to stop a debate.
“But Uncle Bruce, what if there are more than one participant in a thread? “ That’s a good question young naïve. Because it has never been addressed in our CoC. So I will tell you, as a moderator, how that should be handled.
Keeping with the intended use of Impasse to stop a debate that has run its course, you must be careful that you truly have nothing more to say in the thread. To any party. If Perrie wanted to end the debate with PJ, but she wants to continue to argue with Sister Mary Agnes Amplebottom that Flinstones Vitamins increase bust size, but do nothing to make the pushin-cushion bigger, then she should ignore any further comments from PJ, and start every response to the good Sister with “Good Sister Mary”. If she has nothing more to add in the discussion, she may declare impasse, or simply ignore the thread.
Now, there is a school of thought out there that in the above example, Perrie should be able to declare Impasse with a specific member in a thread. The problem with that is it makes the Impasse function an ignore function. Frankly, you're better off just ignoring comments rather than declaring Impasse.
One other point I want you naives to understand. Impasse stops debate in a thread. Let's say that Dowser is late to the party. She's reading the thread between Perrie and PJ, and she wants to comment. But just as she's about to hit the reply button, she sees that Perrie has declared impasse. Dowser really wants to respond to one of Perrie's or PJ's comments, but with Impasse declared, she's not sure what she should do.
Here is what she should do. Dowser should copy the comment she wants to respond to, and past it into a brand new thread with her response. By doing so, she creates a new discussion, and doesn't muddle up the thread that has been impassed. THIS ONLY APPLIES TO NEW PARTICIPANTS IN A DISCUSSION. If you have been involved in a thread, and impasse has been declared, you cannot copy a comment and start a new thread to bypass the impasse.
"But Uncle Bruce, if I declare Impasse on a debate, and someone else starts a new thread, then the debate can start all over again!" You're damn right it can. And then you gotta go through this whole mess all over again. Which is why you should seriously consider why you are using Impasse, and if it would be better to just ignore comments.
Seriously young naives, the use of Impasse should be well thought out, and not thrown around to arbitrarily stop comments directed at you.
Lesson is over young naives. If you are still confused, or have any further questions about it, post them below. I and the moderating team will help you understand.
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For the record, Perrie is in a blackout right now. She'll be on when the power comes back on.
She's not in the path of the hurricane is she?
No. It turned out a car hit a tree and took down the wires in the area. They got the power up pretty quickly given the damage.
Glad to know you're okay, and sorry for the derail. I worry about anyone who might be in Florida right now. Sorry for the derail.
It's a good kind of derail. We are all worried for the people in FLA. My parents are snowbirds and they have only just repaired both their condo there and their home here from Sandy. I also have a lot of family there that I am very concerned about.
Thanks again for you concern.
AMac, the actual author of the Impasse section of the COC, and I have had several conversations that have ended in Impasse. It has never caused problems between us, and has never been used to shut down our discussions prematurely because we were unhappy with the outcome.
But frankly, it's much easier to save impasse and just say "We'll have to agree to disagree". Doing that doesn't invoke the rules of impasse, and still ends a debate on relatively civil terms.
Correct. When one says the words "We'll have to agree to disagree" or similar words to that effect, and the other replies "agreed" then it should be unnecessary to post "IMPASSE" and it should have the exact same effect.
That was important to note. I think agreeing to disagree is better in general to use.
Excellent informative article, Bruce, delivered with humour and understanding.
One of the best advantages of using IMPASSE properly, is that it prevents becoming enemies with another member because in essence it means that you don't want to take your debate to a fistfight in the alley because you don't want to cause resentment, anger and personal animosity, even to the extent of hatred.
It has worked well with repect to another member of NT with whom I have a lot in common, and in complete agreement on many things, but we are at opposite poles when it comes to a couple of issues. We are able to maintain our friendship because we both properly use the IMPASSE rule when it comes to discussion of those couple of issues.
So, use it properly to maintain your friendships and prevent creating enemies.
Damn uncle Bruce, I'm worn out just reading the article.
I'm going to enjoy the last 5 minutes of the Chiefs, Patriots game as the Chief kick the crap out of Billychex and company.
Good article uncle.
wish I could open that meme. All I see is this:
"Image result for memes on meta articles."
I get that a lot happening, although I am usually able to see photos or pictures that are posted. It must be a certain way of posting that causes it, but I'm sure if it were posted differently I could open it.
It shows a group of goofy characters with musical instruments and the caption is,
''Is meta-analysis an empirical article?''
Thanks six.
Too many rules. It's that simple.
All we need more of here is people running around yelling "impasse''.
Just kidding . We actually need more intelligent comments.
Can "impasse" provide that?
You have a point John. We do have a lot of rules. Too many? I'm not sure, but I do remember a time when NT's CoC was simply no personal attacks.
One of the main reasons for writing this, as with my RBR article is to show that the rules have two sides. In this case, impasse used incorrectly shuts down debate in a thread completely. And so it should not be used where simply ignoring someone, or just saying agree to disagree can work.
Using impasse stops all comments, intelligent or not.
Excellent article Uncle Bruce..
BTW Flintstone Vitamins WILL increase a woman’s bust size. Just ask the hubby.
I rarely use impasse. Most of my friends and I are very capable of ending a discussion on fairly even terms even if we disagree. there are those that like to push it to negatives, at that point I usually close down the discussion.
Common sense people respond intelligently and respectfully, and there should never be a need for "Impasse"
(RBR's either but some couldn't handle it without them)
Very good article. Thanks for posting.
A thing I take from this that I hope people pay attention to, is that you should read the entirety of a comment thread before adding to it. That will help prevent misunderstandings and will allow you to note an impasse before responding to the person who enacted it.
As a recent arrival, IMPASSE sounds like splendid idea. You all know each other so well and also know when you simply can't agree that this becomes the only remedy to a food fight. I have started to comment on a few threads here, but have hesitated after reading the thread and realizing there was nothing additional that I could add that would move the conversation to a solution, or a compromise.
Interesting and informative.
I have hopes of participating in more conversations than battles to the last word, but it is interesting that on NT there is now the last word option.
Thank you for a very helpful article!