I am not being insincere.
Fair enough. I believe you. I don’t think you’re being sarcastic, but, even upon re-reading, your original response more readily comes across as sarcastic to me than sincere. I don’t think you were being sarcastic, I’m just saying what the choice of words conveys to me. Again, I think that tone can get lost in online conversations and I understand that this is not what you were trying to convey.
OP wasn’t claiming to be sincere. You are.
Since you don’t see how the link is relevant, I’ll take the time to explain. The character played by David Foley in the Kids in the Hall sketch is not being intentionally sarcastic, but his affect is so sarcastic-seeming that the character played by Kevin MacDonald in the sketch is offended and leaves, despite Foley’s good intentions and desire for human contact.
In the same way, your post, by your own declaration, is not meant to be sarcastic or condescending, but was certainly taken that way by me and probably by a large number of the folks who downvoted it. I hope this simple answer has bought it into your range of understanding.
I’ll take you at face value if you say you were being sincere in your original posting, but it certainly didn’t come across that way at all to me (and I assume most of the downvoters). Just another interesting example of how tone doesn’t translate in online forums, I guess.
Relevant Kids in the Hall sketch:
Your takeaway from my reply is that your instinct was correct? You’re going to make a great conspiracy theorist.
My pet conspiracy theory is that it was already known within the political campaigns that these misinformation campaigns were happening and they chose to at that point publicize them and use that as their scapegoat. Same with the Russian spies they publicly outed that trump spoke with.
Your framing is off. It’s not a conspiracy theory. It’s true that it was already known. The FBI investigation of Russian interference began before the election, not after. The investigation was being publicized before the election.
If you want to nurse a conspiracy theory about it, whatever. But you’re going to appear ignorant when you advance a conspiracy theory without doing the bare minimum of research into the known facts. You’re just creating a fictional narrative based on your “suspicions.” You’re not being “real.” You’re being ignorant.
I’ll never understand why people attribute to the Russian government what was in the obvious best-interests of the Republican Party and the conservative movement.
Maybe because there was a demonstrated and provable coordinated effort by the Russian government in the 2016 election to get Trump elected? Look up project lakhta. Russian election interference and the efforts of the domestic conservative movement can (and do) exist simultaneously.
What do you have against attributing to the Russian government actions that are demonstrably attributable to the Russian government?
I’ve had my 2004 Honda Element for 20 years now. Favorite car ever! I’ll drive it until it disintegrates.
I read Gorilladrums statement:
“It’s truly beyond me how people have the energy to keep with celebrities”
as being sarcastic. I find it difficult to see it any other way. I read it as Gorilladrums expressing exasperation with cultural obsession with celebrity. I didn’t read it as him asking for someone to explain it to him. I’m pretty sure that’s the last thing he wanted. In that view of his post, which is the view that I assumed most folks reading his post would have, your response of explaining it to him in simplistic terms comes across as sarcasm and condescension. I understand now that this is not the context that you were viewing his post in.
Given my understanding of his post as an expression of exasperation with the culture of celebrity that does not expect or invite a response, I’d say both your first and final sentences come across as deliberate condescension, because both of them seem to imply that Gorilladrums didn’t understand something, and required an explanation, when it seemed clear to me that he didn’t expect or want. Therefore a response providing an explanation seemed like a teasing or a taunting in defense of celebrity culture that he was really just railing against. Again, I understand now that condescension was not your intention, and you were sincerely trying to assist.
A sincere question: is English your first language?