"Three posts?", some (usually newbies) will say. "You're doing followups to your own posts. That's a violation of Netiquette." "Really", I'll ask, "according to who? It's an established practice that predates my presence online, much less yours, and for good reason. Long posts have a way of causing screen freezes in tin. Further, if your argument is long, and you do it all in one post, someone who is reading it can't set it aside and come back to it later, without starting all over again."

Being fonder of attitude than logic, our newbie will then come back with a retort like "Didn't your mother ever teach you that you shouldn't talk to yourself?" "Really", I've responded, "so, if an author writes a book with more than one chapter, or a series of articles, he's 'talking to himself'? Have you contacted your local newspaper, yet? They've got these people working for them, called 'columnists', who do these things all of the time - AND THE NEWSPAPER IS ENCOURAGING THIS!"

The horror.

It's a little hard to get past the bulletproof attitude or the verbal equivalent of a glazed smirk. Getting at the truth is not what someone like this is about, because she already knows that she's right. No need to listen to or think about what someone else has to say, because she knows that she's right, period, and if you were open minded like her, you'd know that, too. And as she knows all, there is no need to think about any more. In person, her smirk will look glazed for a reason - there is noone behind it, any more. To try to speak with someone this vacuous is like trying to hold a debate with a mannequin or to reason with a tape recorded message. Best just to move on.

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