[magicalist]

> > So, here's one answer to how: as I am doing right now, we can encourage others to be optimistic

> Yes, did you notice that I already made that suggestion in my post that you replied to and you just repeated it?

Hmm, let's see...

> Ok... so exactly how do we address it? Do we repeat, "From now on, let's all be nicer with more positive energy and feedback!" Ok, now that we've done that, is the problem solved? Why not?

yeah, no, that's not the same thing at all.

[jasode]

>, no, that's not the same thing at all.

Are you being literal? I wasn't saying that "repeated" meant lexical equality:

  string.compare("more positive", "optimistic") == TRUE

Instead, I meant this:

  semantic_intent("more positive", "optimistic") == TRUE

It's naive to think GavinMcG's "solution" of disapproving others negativity hasn't already been done thousands of times before across other disciplines and other forums including Linux/Lisp/C++/PHP/physics/autism/etc. Yes, nice communities do exist (often because of heavy-handed moderation/censorship) but that's orthogonal to the inevitable formation of other uncensored communities that freely share negative criticisms. Therefore, the reasons that motivated JK's original post will always exist.

[GavinMcG]

Another big difference is that I'm not advocating for us to "repeat" that we should all be positive. It's not about public proclamation – it's about addressing individuals and their individual acts. That's what the communal discourse is made up of. Like you're saying, simply shouting "let's be nice" obviously doesn't work.

I'll add another thing to my list of suggestions: be really deliberate about educating people on the principle of charity. Instead of assuming that the other person is dumb/shortsighted/etc., assume that you're not giving their thinking enough credit.

> that's orthogonal to the inevitable formation of other communities

So what? Drive the downers out of JS-land, or whatever community you care about. You had been saying that even that shouldn't be bothered with. But if it can be accomplished, who cares if they all go off to learn Brainfuck, if that's the only community that will accept their behavior?

[jasode]

>Drive the downers out of JS-land,

This is not possible.

When you previously mentioned "nice communities", I thought that meant specific javascript forums. Now I see you meant to drive the undesirables out of entire Javascript language completely and force them into another language.

>You had been saying that even that shouldn't be bothered with.

I've never said this. I've never suggested that people shouldn't strive to have well-behaved communities that encourages constructive feedback. In the forums I moderated, negative rant posts were not allowed and deleted.

However, I see the confusion in interpreting my posts now. You and Mouq are focused on the "making a better world" angle. My posts were describing something else: the build up of anger about <topic> will always exist to frustrate people like JK regardless of the efforts to make a friendlier community. (E.g. see multi-decades history of discourse about C++/Java/Lisp/etc/etc)

[GavinMcG]

> Now I see you meant to drive the undesirables out of entire Javascript language completely and force them into another language

Not at all. I misinterpreted what you meant in your concern over them forming other communities.

[kazinator]

"JS-land" spans every web browser on the planet.

JavaScript isn't some open source little language with a little community; it's what everyone has to use to target a web browser, whether they like it or not.

Nobody has to like JavaScript or be in some unofficial JavaScript community in order to develop in JavaScript.

[GavinMcG]

And yet everyone who wants to develop in JavaScript does have to interact with various hubs of the JavaScript ecosystem. Why can't they be exposed to positive influences there?