Dealer affiliations and attitudes, assumptions and lack of respectful engagement in audio.

Op ,I  absolutely agree with your thoughts and I’m guilty at times of being a butthead. My opinion is the problem is caused by our social evolution with the internet , over population and a conditioned impatience and a continual need for instant gratification. Take texting while driving , at first it was kids and now everyone does it. The town I live in is extremely mean by nature. Here it’s about not stopping for traffic lights that change to red. Every single light change has someone going through a few seconds too late. It’s interesting because now when you get a green light nobody goes for a few seconds. So the amount of movement time is essentially the same. Living in Fresno there is a popular T-Shirt that is a hand pointing a revolver at you with the caption “ Fresno , see it like a Native “. It’s just off the hook here. Anyway all our social ills carry over to chat sites. Being in recovery for over 30 years I have to rely on my Reprograming with suggestions like “ Look for the similarities, not the differences “. Or “ If you Spot it, You Got it “. I was told there is a God, and I’m not it. With all the experience I have and the instruction I’ve received, I can and still do occasionally spit fire . We live on the internet and are never together in person and are conditioned for instant gratification, as if my opinion actually matters. As a former shop owner and a professional businessman, you are painfully aware of our social ills. What I would like to share is that a few months ago I went into a showroom and adjacent warehouse that used to be Sun Stereo in Fresno. I followed the salesman showing us Quartzite for our remodel. I suddenly stopped in the doorway of the old showroom and asked him and my wife to please indulge me for a moment. I stopped looked around then closed my eyes. I had a perfect image of what I saw standing in that spot almost 50 years ago. It was absolute joy being in my “ Old Happy Spot “. So thanks for posting and bringing me back to that place of joy. If I could only grab a couple of those vintage receivers, a Nakamichi  Dragon and some JBL 300’s while in the “ Way Back Machine “. Regards , Mike B. 

Since my retirement, I have made a concerted effort to rid myself of what I saw as "flaws" in the way I lived my life and interacted with the people I love.

It wasn't that I was abusive or someone that never got invited to dinner. It was just me fine tuning my life.

My motto has been to "make better choices". Whether it is stopping when the light turns yellow or not having giving up gluten or drastically reducing my alcohol consumption, the changes have been 100% positive.

I guess what I am trying to say is that we all have the capacity to change. If you find yourself stepping over the line, just dial it back a bit.

As Mort Sahl once said,

"If you don't think you are a jerk, you probably are."

The nastiness we see is just a small slice of our larger society.  What I see almost daily is that people on TV, the internet, social media etc are nasty and cruel.  Yet in real life, at the market, the gym, or wherever in-person, we are pretty good, polite, helpful, even cheerful.  Just saying....

tony1954.  agreed.  and it is easier to be nice than nasty.

I posted this because of how I’ve seen us go after each other from time to time.  It just Audiogon either. Was on another forum and a response to me was filled with assumptions. The person was a first time responder to me. He was off base on every point he tried to make. That made me realize how many ass sumptions we can make about people we don’t know!