Occasionally, I'll see something posted online that I just have to respond to. It doesn't happen very often; I try to tune general jack-assery out, but I have an occasional failing. Want to know my tipping points? I don't care, so here they are from most irksome to least

1. Anyone who uses the word "sheeple".
2. Anyone whose first resort of witticism is sarcasm*.
3. Anyone who has firm, uninformed or misinformed opinions on any subject.*
4. Folks who decry "partisan sniping", then engage in it themselves.

I "got into it" with some dude named "stratslayer" on Youtube. This 38 year-old possible metal musician (another irk-point for me as a music lover) was pissing the industrial backed line on Global Warming.

I study geology. I know about a little thing called "carbon sequestration". Since I have an overwhelming distaste for overly fancy words, I explained it thusly (paraphrased, as I can't be bothered to recall my own words):

Ease off on the "sheeple" business. (That line might have been nastier--I don't know, as I have irrational reactions to metalhead assholes who imagine themselves to be wicked free thinkers.) These environtmentalist types may be wrong, as all water absorbs carbon dioxide, and the oceans contain a *lot* of water. They may be right, though, because if too much carbon dioxide gets into the atmosphere for the oceans to absorb, temperatures could rise to the point that methane crashes out of the oceans' solution. Only at that point are we truly screwed.

Apparently, that was enough for this metalhead to label me "sheeple", and a few other things. This, he did on my public Youtube page. Privately, I got more of the same, plus a little extra about how I have nothing intelligent to say to him. (Ah, shit...Haven't I heard that from a punk-rockin' 20-something a couple of years ago? Didn't take it from Arizona punkkid, won't take it from a fellow Gen-Xer. I know our secrets--a lot of us had classes that served as nap time, and stratslayer's favorites must've been Music and Science.)

Anyway, he wants people to look up information on IPCC errors, or something like that. (Imagine ... who benefits if the IPCC is wrong, and carbon dioxide not only isn't a greenhouse gas, it isn't even emitted by human activity? Right! The energy industry. I'm pretty reluctant to badmouth them. The last guys who did that "lost" elections.)

I responded to him. That's why I'm disappointed in myself. But, to keep the response as civil as possible, I forced myself to (mostly) stick to a form-letter style. Here's how that went, as it's still up in another window:

The comment you posted about this user being a "sheeple" has been deleted. Please turn off Michael Savage and try posting again. Although this user is not Harvard educated (as a *cardiologist* ... OOPS!) like Michael Crichton, he is still capable of forming opinions independent of self interested industrialists and misguided environmentalists**. Please come up with a real rebuttal. Thank you, and try again.

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*That includes MEEEEEE!

**As if there really is such a thing as a misguided environmentalist.