my experience is actually quite different. i have one friend, for instance, who much prefers to spend his time sitting in pubs talking about football with his middle-aged friends, than he does spending time with people his own age.

^_^

i'm not sure how it works anywhere else, though.

lol @ Regal. Heh.

Hmmm... all of my posts were about normal friendship relationships. Dating relationships... in my opinion, people should date people their own age... specially if they're young. Dating maturity differs a lot from the rest of the other phychological aspects people, and most of the times if you have a contrast there, the relationship will NOT work out.

I've used my example of the capoeira class, but that also is a pretty rare case here. It's not everyday that these "for-everyone" situations appear. Which is quite a shame.

@Regal

You are from the UK, right?

Actually I always liked how in 'Lovejoy', Eric and Tinker were best friends and Eric was in his 30's and Tinker had to be in his 60's at least, whereas Lovejoy was probably in his late 40's/early 50's.

How commonly do you see examples like your friend who talks football with middle-aged men, outside of the pub environment and across genders?

If Regal was joking I missed the joke. Do you think that there is only two classifications: friends and dating, and nothing in between (i.e. a non traditonal relationship)?

... yeah, i'm from the UK.

i have a bunch of friends (7 or 8) that are... ooh. pretty close to 30 now. 29. yeah, quite often me and some of my mates (different ones almost every time) will go over to theirs and sit around, imbibing substances and having a good time. it's harder to meet people of a different age, maybe, because they very often hang out in different places... but i wouldn't really want to say that people of different ages don't want to mix, or even that they don't mix as friends.

... as for your question, i don't think it's physically possible to talk football outside of a pub. the vocal chords need the smoky atmosphere and alcohol to be properly capable of it. i don't really know, though, since i know exactly... erm... hardly anything about football =P

^___^

and it wasn't really a 'joke', per se. it was just something that i and TG found funny. unless i also said something that translates into a brilliantly subtle and clever joke in Brazil, in which case i'd be laughing retardedly on my own yet again, and he'd be laughing at something else... hehehe... that'd be just typical, really.

><

Probably Regal wasn't joking. I just find the scene of a man in his middle 20's inside a small pub filled with cigarette smoke with a huge mug of beer in one hand discussing football with a lot of middle-aged men quite amusing. Though most of that image I made up =P *read Regal's post after posting this. So, yeah, I got it right ^^*

As for classifications. Nah. There are a lot in-between. There's just friends, there's dating, there's sexual friends, kissing friends, and a lot, a lot more.
But I think anything that's already over just friends can't go together with very strong age differences.

heh... not middle 20's. he, like me, is 19. the rest of the image is right, though ^_^

I always thought everyone around here were in their middle 20's except those who... you know... weren't. =P

And oh, that makes the image even better. xD

actually, most of us are around 19, or around early-mid 20's. Poster Profiles has an age thing, though, so you can go find out if you want ^_^

Actually, I was ignoring your question and responding to the fact that you asked it at all.

*shrug*
By all appearances you don't actually read posts, so I'll just leave it there.

@N.L.Y.

Why do you say that "By all appearances you don't actually read posts?" What led you to that conclusion?

Perhaps it was hasty to say you do not 'read' posts, but you certainly did not do much in the way of responding with a statement that lets me know you are comprehending what has been said. This too could be hasty.
*shrug*
Either way.

My point was that there is no difference between what you have posited so far as RL, societal conventions are concerned and all other conventions.
Each has its respective points of prejudice and uncanny ability for insight to prosper.
If you are of the opinion that the advantages inherently involved with RL conventions are outweighed by the advantages of net convention, that is one thing.
However, the question itself is comical to me, for reasons that I have attempted to define in my original post and summarized in this one.

You argued points, I intended to respond to said points.

If I failed to comprehend your points or failed to properly address your points then so be it, but to THEREFORE conclude that I apparently (NECESSARILY) failed to ‘read’ them does not logically follow.

Unless you maintain that this statement above is logically invalid (and if so please tell me why), it was not that your comment about me not ‘reading’ the post was ‘hasty’ (after all, you would then be guilty of doing what you are criticizing me for) but rather that it was a debate technique to either make me look like I am close minded, or to make it look like you were providing me with a service that I was too ignorant to be thankful for.

Am I wrong in this conclusion?

I am still confused about two things.

First, you assert (I am broadly speaking here) that RL and net conventions are not different (otherwise how would the question be comical?) yet you assert that each have respective points of prejudice and ability for insight (so then there is a difference regarding them somewhere). I don’t understand why you would not assume that I might have been talking about this difference (wherever it may be) in my original question.

Second, you consider the question to be comical. Why? Is it funny? Maybe I don’t understand you point of view but even so, does my attempt to understand seem funny? Is the question (itself) comical or my lack of ability to start with your perspective regarding the question comical?

*shrug*
I was hasty. I do not claim to act logically.

My point in the original post was that the two were analogous.
I defined there, I believe, the differences and similarities.
When working with analogies put forth by another individual one does not push analogies to their comparative extremes. I stated before, as I said, exactly -how- they were analogous.
Both function under what I believe you agreed with me was the general, analogous state of conventions. Being analogous does not mean that each must necessarily be indentical, and I then outlined their differences.
Note, however, that I capitulated my stance with a view that says in their differences they are yet analogous. Where there is cause for dissent or adulation in one convention there is not necessarily cause for dissent or adulation in another convention. However, all conventions have their points for consent or adulation and it is therefore fruitless to inquire as to which one is more inter-personally accessible.

I, then, consider the question laughable, as it fails to take such things into account.

If the point for consent or adulation specifically differs from convention to convention, then I maintain that it IS fruitful to inquire as to which one is more inter-personally accessible, as those people specifcally biased toward a specific point of dissent or adulation can more optimally decide which convention is most suitable. Do you disagree?

You know... not everything needs to be understood.

What is your comment in response to?

Pretty much everything you say.

I do, and will once again turn to what I have already said.
The point was that each convention has as many ways to operate off of exclusion as the other. There is no differing measure of prejudice, merely different prejudices. Even if this is a haughtily general statement to pronounce, there are certainly as many, if not more, ways to operate exclusively on the internet as there are off.
Once more, as I said - if you or anyone else are of a partisan opinion concerning either of the conventions, that is not what I chuckle at.

I do, however, chuckle when I read your question concerning whether or not A) Real world interactions are overrated and B) The internet allows for deeper inter-personal accessibility by gapping Real-world prejudices.
There is as much prejudice involved in web interactions, and if Real-world interactions are overrated then I suspect the web's are as well.

It does not follow to ask: "Is this really OK!?"
And, on that note, I suspect it'll have to be OK, as what travesties you set your question against arise in varying forms no matter which convention you reside within.
It's akin to asking: "Is human interaction really OK!?"
And, that is why I laugh - not because of the opinions involved, but for what the opinions are being called to answer: something which is necessarily moot.
If you prefer web, fine.
If you prefer Real-world, fine.
I really couldn't care less, I think.
Clearly, then, I wasn't ever talking about your opinions at all.



I suspect we both merely enjoy debate.
If everything needed to be understood I would've shot myself a long time ago.

@N.L.Y.
When I asked if this was "really OK", I meant to imply in that example that the guy and the girl would talk online about FF12 (and develop some kind of relationship) but not in 'real life'. My question was regarding the justification for acceptability within one convention and not another. It is a question regarding "OK" with respect to relative conventions, not conventions in isolation. I am asking why someone who finds acceptability within one convention cannot find the acceptability within a relatively similar convention, but rather functions to respect the tradition of the convention instead of to modify it.

As a side note, I like to argue. I don't like to debate. I use the word 'argue' in the proper philosophical sense (premises, reasoning conclusion) and not the common sense (fight with words). I consider debate to lie in the middle of these two senses because the goal of a debate is not for everyone to win, but rather for a single side to win and it incorporates non-argumentative appeals.