/s is an excellent modifier for sarcasm. There’s no tone in text and bold/italic can only do so much. And with how many absolute crackpots are posting all over the internet, I’d prefer to be sure to not lump in a jokester with the absolute nutjobs.
Also helpful for people with trouble reading tone in text cuz of things like autism.
That’s the only legitimate defense for having to tag your sarcasm I’ve ever read.
Back in MY DAY, nobody tagged their sarcasm on BBS or IRC and we ALL UNDERSTOOD AAAAA (but srsly for folks who have trouble with tone you’re fully right.)
What are you talking about? Even usenet in the 80s recommended using emoticons to mark sarcasm/joking remarks.
Avoid sarcasm and facetious remarks.
Without the voice inflection and body language of personal communication these are easily misinterpreted. A sideways smile, :-), has become widely accepted on the net as an indication that “I’m only kidding”. If you submit a satiric item without this symbol, no matter how obvious the satire is to you, do not be surprised if people take it seriously.
As someone with autism, I’m here to say that it is actually the opposite of helpful.
People need challenges in order to grow. They need opportunities to fail.
Putting training wheels on sarcasm makes autistic people even further behind the social curve by depriving us of opportunities to fail.
Much like a sterile childhood environment has been scientifically proven to be a causal factor in developing allergies as an adult, I predict that science will eventually establish a causal link between lack of ambiguous communication during developmental years, and reduced intelligence in life.
Human society is so fucking hard to understand for an autistic person, and I really appreciate your looking out for me, but the struggle is worth it, and human culture is intricate and beautiful, and that’s why I chose this username.
You misunderstand, this is from my own perspective as an autistic person. Plus, the lack of tone of voice over text can make communication harder, for everyone. It’s literally just a tool for communication, clearing up what you mean.
How ever did autistic people survive before the internet to help them cope?
To me it’s born out of this moment: “Wait, will someone see this joke and think I’m serious? If they did they’d think I’m a psycho…”
[…A]ny parodic or sarcastic expression of extreme views can be mistaken […as] sincere
People on Reddit are scared of downvotes affecting their karma score, so they have to tag controversial comments to make it absolutely clear if their comment is sarcasm.
I have used it because my sarcastic comment, read at face value, might encourage someone to support something I despise. I’m not interested in creating or bolstering that shit, I just want to make fun of it. Karma points never had anything to do with it. I had millions but what’s a million nothings, still nothing. Reddit Karma is just multiplying by zero.
Am i wooshing myself??
That is literally the point of sarcasm. People legitimately wanted to murder Jonathan Swift.
If you write “/s”, just write the direct unironic statement in the first place.
If that were holistically true the concept of a “sarcastic tone” wouldn’t exist in verbal speech.
“If you want to tell a joke in which the humor is derived from you saying something incorrect, or something that would be offensive if you genuinely believed it, you should instead just say the actual truth and never use sarcasm again”
That’s actually such a good idea, it would make life on the internet so much better /s
That’s the best part of internet sarcasm. There is little in this world that is more fun than a 6 reply deep argument between someone making serious counterpoints to my sarcastic comments, while I try to see how much more sarcastic I can become before they figure it out.
Putting a tag up absolutely ruins the fun.
I’ve found most people online feign sarcasm as a way to defend their ego more than anything else.
/S Is aN ExCeLlEnT MoDiFiEr fOr sArCaSm. ThErE’S No tOnE In tExT AnD BoLd/iTaLiC CaN OnLy dO So mUcH. aNd wItH HoW MaNy aBsOlUtE CrAcKpOtS ArE PoStInG AlL OvEr tHe iNtErNeT, i’d pReFeR To bE SuRe tO NoT LuMp iN A JoKeStEr wItH ThE AbSoLuTe nUtJoBs.
That’s the whole point of sarcasm though, that the delivery seems genuine. Don’t write the opposite of what you mean if you aren’t willing to have some people misunderstand you.
And yes, people who use sarcastic tone in conversation are also missing the point. They also should not say the opposite of what they mean.
Sarcasm was developed in spoken word. If you are using the written word, it needs to be painfully obvious if you want the meaning to come across. But due to Poe’s Law, that’s becoming harder and harder these days. Especially in the political and human rights discussion.
No one is forcing you to use /s. But shitting on people using it because you don’t think it’s “pure” is asinine and also abelism.
Well, we certainly didn’t leave that signature sense of superiority behind.
Honestly, that’s so much worse here… The atheist posts are making me cringe pretty hard. I’m am atheist, so that’s saying something.
It’s like we got the best, and the worst, from Reddit.
Or “for the sake of Lemmy, don’t…” or something along those lines when you disagree with someone.
Isn’t proper discussion supposed to have disagreement? Was the point of Lemmy to create a centrist echo chamber? People should disagree sometimes, we have to be reminded to consider outside perspectives sometimes, even if we don’t like that perspective.
People who need tone indicators aren’t stupid
Correct. They’re merely cognitively insufficient to successfully model the minds of the people they talk to.
Not only neurodivergent people need the “/s”. Not all subtle speech cues are easily transmitted through text.
And it is not even only neurodivergent people where /s is helpful. You dont hear the tone of voice of people in the internet which is used to indicate sarcasm irl. I would rather use an /s than people misunderstanding what I wrote abd maybe them thinking I am some kind of conspiracy idiot
Good thing poes law doesn’t exist forcing us to be more explicit about what is and isn’t a joke.
Poe’s “Law” is a simple self-fulfilling declaration that communication has failed. It’s not even a postulate about the nature of reality. It’s a declaration that we give up.
To call something like that a “Law” is ridiculous.
Declaring that confusion exists is a way to create confusion.
I’ve run into some pretty fucking stupid people here
I find /s helpful :(
I’ve been experimenting with the use of ‘⸮’. As all the best things in language, it allows me to show off my feeling of cultured superiority⸮
(and requires a link to Wikipedia) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irony_punctuation
One of these days I’m gonna get myself a space cadet keyboard so I’ll have enough Bucky bits to type this stuff on my desktop.
Until then, there’s always my phone’s on-screen keboard, I guess¿¡⸮‽
