james duffy wrote:
Chill out, Stan. I was what is known in Ireland as 'taking the piss', a bit of ironic mockery. (Oh God, you are not one of these boring people who don't 'do' irony and are to a sense of humour what George W. Bush is to linguistic dexterity?)
On the contrary, if you look at my work, you'll see there are quite a few jokes in my comments. I've even put a couple jokes in wikipedia itself, but they're so subtle it will probably be years before anybody finds them. And indeed I'm familiar with 'taking the piss', but when the Irish I know do it, they put a big grin on their faces at some point, and unless you're a net newbie, you should know that if you're not intending to be taken seriously, you need to add the smiley face. I've been on the net for 21 years now, and I have *never* seen any writer so deft that he/she could be ironic without using a smiley face and not have it be misinterpreted.
In addition, you have a habit of arguing passionately and at length about issues so picayune that I find myself thinking "he's got to be kidding" and looking for a smiley face somewhere in the comment, but no, you're apparently completely serious. So my conclusion is that when you sound rude and arrogant, you really mean to be heard that way, and that you're not sufficiently aware of other cultures to realize that what might be OK to say over a pint in the pub sounds a lot different to someone on the other side of the planet reading it on a Monday morning.
The point I was making is that it is American arrogance in the extreme to think - ' we use the word 'movie' therefore wikipedia must use the word 'movie' and any references to the word film we will replace with the 'right' (ie American) word'. Some people use movie, some use film, as with British English versus American English, leave it in whatever language the original author used. Some time ago, a European wikian wrote about a film made in Europe that because of legal problems never got a release in the US. It never have been released there, but still someone tried to call it a (movie) not a (film) until a group of bored Europeans, inspired by GWB, decided to wage their own war for the liberation of the word 'film', collectively telling the annoying renamer to shag off and Americanise something else. And he reacted to their defence of a non-US title the way George W. reacts to anything french these days. He hit the roof with a stream of 'how bloody dare you . . . ' type responses.
I have no idea who this person is that you're talking about. Criticize my statements straight-on, don't try to tarnish my reputation with somebody else's misbehavior.
Put bluntly, Stan, this is wikipedia, not americopedia. If you want respect from non-Americans, show their language and spellings some respect. And get a sense of humour.
Well, that's sure breathtakingly arrogant on your part. Calling you on chronic rudeness, and the excuses you make for it, is hardly the same as disrespecting non-American language and spellings.
Stan