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Comment by allannienhuis | Hacker News Reader

"I'm all ears" is simply a common idiom for asking you to suggest alternatives. Not sure why that upsets you?

It's an idiom that can imply entirely different meaning depending on its inflection, though, which obviously translates terribly over text.

"I'm all ears" said in a positive tone can be "Absolutely I agree, I'd love to hear your ideas".

"I'm all ears" in a negative tone is more like "Prove it. I don't think you have any ideas to this unsolvable problem."

All a matter of interpretation, I suppose :) (and fwiw I don't know whether the author meant it in a positive or negative tone)

Great point. I didn't consider that the phrase could be interpreted in an criticising sense, but of course your right that verbally it can be done that way. Writing is hard. :P

What I was claiming in my answer was that it was done in a negative sense. I understood it that way because the comment lacked other indications of genuine interest in the matter, which would soften the lack of inflection.

Because it is rude and a lie. Also, your last phrase doesn't make any sense.

I guess rude is in the eye of the beholder? :) Your response seemed rude to me (challenging the use of a pretty common phrase to elicit elaboration), which is why I suggested you were upset. Subtleties and true intention are often lost in written communication... :)

Just to be clear, you are the one being rude.

One has the right to be rude if someone else is rude first. Right now you're being rude, for example, because somehow my rudeness offended you.

Whether or not you have the "right" to be rude, I think the more cordial we are the more we can align around learning through discussion.

If someone is rude to someone who's mistaken that could help them unlearn something, but more likely they will become more entrenched because of consistency principle.

Cialdini talks a lot about consistency principle in his book the "Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion"

https://www.amazon.com/Influence-Psychology-Persuasion-Rober...

I think being rude to someone who's rude to you is childlike and petty. It's how wars start. It's much more productive to either ignore it or try to figure out what's really going on.

It's not always natural and of course we all fail at it from time to time, but justifying poor behaviour because someone else started it just isn't cool.

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