Pick and choose your battles.

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A sage piece of advice handed down to me from my grandmother, which I have always had some trouble internalizing.

Here's an intentionally broad question: how do you determine whether it is worth arguing with someone? We all make such a judgment every day, I imagine, and some are obviously better at it than others.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Thursday, 6 March 2003 22:10 (twenty-three years ago)

(An example of something not worth arguing: my workmate just sent me an email petition regarding the Security Council vote. Obviously by the very nature of email this petition is unlikely to reach anyone at the UN, and perhaps not as obviously it wouldn't be likely to change what are deeply-entrenched attitudes there anyhow. But I figure I would do no good making these observations to my coworker, since from experience I can guess that sending the email was probably something done on impulse.)

― Amateurist (amateurist), Thursday, 6 March 2003 22:11 (twenty-three years ago)

(If no one were to argue on this thread it would be unutterably classic.)

― Amateurist (amateurist), Thursday, 6 March 2003 22:16 (twenty-three years ago)

I'm passive aggressive. i almost never argue except in a joking kind of way. i find (maybe due to to my lack of practice) that when i do argue, and even if i "win", that people don't change their minds anyway.

― gaz (gaz), Thursday, 6 March 2003 22:28 (twenty-three years ago)

I think of this at work. I'm not a senior person, but I am opinionated, and I do try to restrain myself on the ones where the total of how much I care and how good my chances are isn't high and the chance of annoying my superiors is high. I then feel more able to really push on the ones where I think it matters and I have some hope of getting my way. I think it's getting me a decent reputation, generally. I have a big presentation thing I've organised next week for like 20 people (over half my division) which is part of me trying to get a new approach to change control introduced. The fact that I've been allowed to set this up and that most are coming, including the ones that matter most, suggest I might get what I want here too.

I don't know that it applies much on ILE, though.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Thursday, 6 March 2003 22:32 (twenty-three years ago)

I think a good hard and fast rule is to never argue with anyone who is a) harder than you or b) more intelligent than you.

― Dom Passantino (Dom Passantino), Thursday, 6 March 2003 22:36 (twenty-three years ago)

(97% of ILX races for the hills leaving Mark Sinker and Nabisco facing each other in the desert, guns at their hips, as a castanet rattles on the soundtrack.)

― Amateurist (amateurist), Thursday, 6 March 2003 22:38 (twenty-three years ago)

ha...

i was starting to respond to this and pressed the "back" button. am i a total wuss? (rhetorical question)

i tend to avoid arguments generally, and look rather silly when i try to argue my case. so it could be that i choose to argue the wrong things, or maybe i just suck at effectively asserting my opinions in general. or both.

something i hate--"we're not having an argument, we're having a *discussion*." usually, when this is said, it's a disagreement that's especially personal and offensive. but i wouldn't want to argue about the nature of the argument.

― JuliaA (j_bdules), Thursday, 6 March 2003 22:44 (twenty-three years ago)

a. this isn't an argument!

b. yes it is!

― gaz (gaz), Thursday, 6 March 2003 22:50 (twenty-three years ago)

nuh-uh.

(clearly, an example of what to avoid...)

― JuliaA (j_bdules), Thursday, 6 March 2003 22:57 (twenty-three years ago)

my current practice: pick no battles. do what you want and if people have a problem with it they can just fuck off. (i'm extremely tired of battling for the present, so it's all Somebody Else's Problem now.)

― Maria (Maria), Thursday, 6 March 2003 23:05 (twenty-three years ago)

i'm extremely tired of battling for the present

What you need is 8 Mile.

― Dom Passantino (Dom Passantino), Friday, 7 March 2003 01:46 (twenty-three years ago)

"Picking my battles" seems to be the only reason I'm still alive, I think

― Millar (Millar), Friday, 7 March 2003 02:03 (twenty-three years ago)

I don't like arguing with people who believe that something that is really true is false.

― A Nairn (moretap), Friday, 7 March 2003 02:08 (twenty-three years ago)

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