can we have a disagree button please?
Trinads
Member Posts: 18
There are lots of ways to show approval of a post, but no legitimate way to simply disagree.
This has led to many posts being flagged even though there is nothing contentious, but readers have no other way to register they disagree with the given opinion.
This has led to many posts being flagged even though there is nothing contentious, but readers have no other way to register they disagree with the given opinion.
17
Comments
This is a clever post since there is no way to officially disagree with it!
Jesus!
You will rarely find such a button on any public forum, because your statement above is actually not true in an important sense.
Forum operators do not actually want people to simply state agreement or disagreement. The forums are for discussion. They want people to contribute; say I agree because or I disagree because. However, they also do not want unnecessary repetition.
There is actually only one way to completely agree with someone, and that is to say that everything they said is something you also agree with. In effect, you can only repeat what they said. However, if you disagree, there are an unlimited number of ways to disagree. If you say you agree with a poster, that tells me everything you are asserting. But if you say you disagree, that tells me almost nothing about what you are asserting. Do you disagree with a part of the post or all of it. Do you disagree with the content or the way it was expressed. Do you agree with the opposite of what was said or do you simply not believe what was said is absolutely true.
An "I agree" button eliminates unavoidable repetition when someone agrees. But if you disagree, the forum operators want you to say why you disagree in a polite and meaningful way. If you won't explain why you disagree, you're in effect saying you want to express a thought without giving any opportunity for continuing that thought. That's counter to the purpose of the forum. If you don't want people to read, analyze, and respond to you, don't post in the first place.
Separate from all of that, a content-free "agree" or "disagree" are subtle encouragements to post or not post. Without additional information backing those buttons up, you're indirectly approving or disapproving of a post, whether that was your intention or not. These are not symmetric effects. It is entirely within the purpose of the forums to encourage other posters to post, by voicing general agreement. It is entirely against the purpose of the forums to discourage people from posting by voicing general disagreement.
Note that up/down votes are not the same thing as agree/disagree. You see up/down more than agree/disagree. But up/down has an entirely different purpose to agree/disagree. You can say you disagree without saying no one should read the post. But agree/disagree is usually coupled to priority: posts with positive scores (more agree) are given more prominent position than posts with negative scores. Downvoting is not voicing disagreement, it is voicing *disinterest*. It is voting to say this post is one that fewer people should spend time reading. I don't think that's particularly useful on these forums given their relative volume.
ah..so it was you...I will probably rejoin next year in march when my academic year gets over..hectic year in 9th really..im typing with my laptop here...and bluestacks is banned so..no choices here lol
personally I would like some balance. While we have these buttons where are the dumb, disagree, dislike, lame and unfunny buttons?
No, I do not. In fact, I do not see how anyone could read my post and come to that conclusion. The entire first part of my post explicitly contrasts the difference between the agree and a hypothetical disagree button in terms of the very specific reasons why those might exist. The second part of my post discusses the basic principle that forum operators make an asymmetric distinction between support and discouragement. There is no specific need or even desire to make those two expressions fairly represented when operating a forum.
I swear I have heard dat somewhere
MIB 3?