Oh yeah... that's why I hate discussion forums...

In my online class, everyone (except me) is involved with public education, so the discussions tend in that area.

Today, I replied to a post by pointing that out.
I (nicely, I thought) suggested that we might be focusing too much on the public sector. There's a lot of adult learning going on that isn't about schools and universities.
One person replied, "Good point".

The poster that I originally responded to, however, took offense, responding with the dreaded, "If you actually read my post.... blah, blah, blah...".
No, the poster didn't counter my point at all, and didn't need to. I wasn't arguing. I was merely suggesting that there's a bigger world out there.

I haven't seen this type of knee-jerk response outside of fanboy discussions on aintitcool or sonsofsamhorn. 

But, I guess we haven't had forums and email long enough to be good at them yet. I'm not sure there is such a thing as 'long enough' however.

Typed asynchronous responses will never substitute for face-to-face conversations.

Can we agree though, to retire the "If you actually read my email/post/proposal/presentation..." crap? Let's agree that we're adults, and that just because we have a different opinion, it doesn't mean we didn't read yours?

You'd think that, in a room full of educators, Unconditional Positive Regard would be a given.
That might be assuming too much, though...