On keeping emotions in check

-> An answer to a distro battle at linuxhumor. This is an example of a text which was hard for me to write in a calm tone. I think I mostly succeeded, but parts of the emotions on both sides still bleed through… take it as an example, how hard it is to stay calm in a heated situation - and how important.

Please keep your own language in check, and don't pull Stallman in here, when he isn't needed. He's got more important things to do than helping your argumentation.

If you look at what I wrote, you'll see I did never say "Your distro is bad" or anything similar.

I just said: "Your advertising is a good deal too blunt."

Why do you answer to other people who say things intended to offend you?

Or to put it differently: Why didn't you react to my post with backup information, why Ultumix is good and where it helps to convert people, cutting out the advertising language so it can be read as information?

I see that you're pissed off by Ubuntu (I don't like the "one distro to find them, one distro to ..." mindset (you told about) either, but I doubt that all Ubuntu people have it. I'm not active in Ubuntu, so I don't know much about the internals (I don't even know what LoCo means - I assume Local Coordinators or so), I just installed it for my wife, because my Gentoo might be a bit too much for her (this changed in the meantime. She now has a Gentoo, too :) )).

You're pissed off, and that's OK. I think if I had walked your way, I might be pissed, too. But it doesn't help you spread your Distro to other people.

Get a grip on your emotions - get a sandbag and hit it when you're just a bit too pissed (I do that from time to time, and unless you tested it yourself, it might be hard for you to see how very good it feels to just let out the anger at that 15kg sandbag). But stop, before your knuckles bleed :)

We are writing here, so it is possible to just sit back and have a break, which makes it easier to get a grip on oneself. At the same time we're just reading what others say, which makes it easier to misinterpret what others say, so keeping our own emotions in check (or letting them out where they don't hurt anyone but your knuckles) gets more important.

And I know I sound like a pseudo-wise great grandfather now. That isn't intentional. I'm learning my way in life myself, and I might just be wrong about it (and also about anything else I think I know), but I write it anyway, because I made some errors myself, and I want to help others not to walk into the same trap. And if what I see right now is only a necessary transition to even better ways to live, then I can at least help others reach that transition with less hardship than I had.