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Small-Scale Question Sunday for January 15, 2023

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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How much stock do you put in the age of someone posting? How much in their "stage of life?" Does it matter to you whether a poster is in high school? University? Do you care if a poster is only in their teens or early 20s, already in their late 30s, or early 40s, or approaching senescence in their mid 50s? Does it matter whether they're married or not, whether they have kids or not? Whether they're male or female? From the first world it third world? Do any of these factors affect how you read their posts?

Some of these definitely affect me, but I can't decide whether it's a good heuristic or just a knee jerk reaction.

Not to put too fine a point on it, yes.

The opinion of someone with extensive life experience will carry more weight for me than those of someone who barely cleared the age of 20 or never got out of his scholastic or academic bubble. I'll listen more closely to someone with children of his own than to someone to whom kids are an abstract concept. As for women posting on an online forum, I beg their pardon but I'll be somewhat more inclined to suspect attention-seeking. I'll relate more to a European than to an American, and more to a Westerner than to a Third-Worlder.

But ultimately everyone here is a Mottizen first and whatever else second, to me. Obviously I'm influenced by their identity, in so far as they make it public, but I think I can honestly say that what someone says wins out in the end over who's saying it.