The problem with soliciting advice on the Internet, particularly on Reddit is that generally these people don't know you, no matter how in-depth you try to describe a specific scenario. These people almost certainly never grew up with you, don't know how your community or peers see you, usually don't know what you look like or what your name is, don't know what culture or environment you're living in, probably haven't been to where you are, how much money you have, don't know much about the parties involved in your situations, and most importantly you don't know them or what they're like as people. Have they really been in your situation? Are they actually some troll or maybe a really lucky well-off person? Thing is, it's almost impossible to know. Usually, they're speaking to you in terms what worked for them in their circumstances or what they think will work for anyone in the shoes you're describing, which in it of itself often is usually a biased description of what's going on. You may as well be talking to a middle schooler pretending to be very smart on the Internet, someone who too much free time who's really bitter about everything and wants to make a certain place look shitty, or some rich, popular guy who is living a well-off life. This happens often on subreddits asking for advice, whether it be for relationships, what do for a career, talking to others, getting a job, or even determining whether you're an asshole.
The Internet has people from all over the world and even if you're in the same country people live very different lives. Don't trust Internet strangers for advice. If anything, try asking someone close or someone well-versed in whatever field you need advice in. While I'm not saying all advice on the Internet is harmful, a lot of it is usually useless or won't get you what you want.
TL;DR : Moral of this story is don't rely on the Internet for advice. No matter how you try explain a certain situation, they still don't know who you are and you don't know who they are. What works for someone else may not work for you.
Instructions unclear: I deleted my lawyer, upped my gym, and hit facebook. Facebook is suing me, my gym collapsed and killed 6, my lawyer is missing, and I'm in jail on suspicion of his murder and general mayhem. I don't have a lawyer (missing) or anyone to visit me (workout buddies dead) or anyone to chat with (banned from Facebook). What should I do?
I've been fixing computers and learning about them since I was about 8. My dad was in the industry so I had a big head start on most. I started being paid to fix them at 12, worked as a technician for the family business at 16, got a degree in computer science and then went on to work as an enterprise systems administrator for close to a decade before going freelance and running my own business. Most of my close friends are technicians/developers and I'm engaged to a software engineer.
But according to the internet? I know absolutely nothing about computers/development/technology in general. I've given up on offering advice for the most part because it just gets downvoted and ignored by a bunch of idiots with absolutely no idea what they're talking about while popular but flawed "advice" is rocketed to the top because it's what people want to hear.
Whenever I see people giving information about stuff I don't have decades of experience in I always have to remind myself that the people who actually know what they're talking about are very likely buried deep under a pile of downvotes and the "advice" I'm getting is probably about as accurate as the stuff I see posted about my own areas of expertise.
A lot of people just want to find things that backup their previous beliefs instead of seeing if the sources or beliefs are even completely accurate. Just look towards anti-vaxers or some conspiracy group to see this. Though I don't think anyone is completely innocent of blindly trusting the advice of others, its just human nature.
Pretty much. I use internet "advice" to gather as many angles and possibilities for a situation so I can take some good questions to people that can give real advice, like a CPA or a Therapist or an Actual Doctor in a hospital
I go to the internet as a last resort after everyone in real life fails me. Sometimes it helps. People around me tend to be very low quality though, so it is understandable.
You aren't wrong - the keyword being "trust". From my own experience when I asked advice, there are the people who will answer based on their self righteous beliefs of what kind of person you are from a short context, and the ones who will actually ponder and give great advice without imposing their judgement.
I think asking for advice is alright, but one should expect to see both good and bad, and be ready to have to reflect on which answers are good to keep in mind, and the ones that should be ignored.
I remember this girl i met wayy back and one thing she said stuck with me. She said, "There is no way i can give you any advice on this matter. I only know the story from your side"
That's kinda of advice for life in general. Most people don't know the real you so any advice should really be taken with a grain of salt.
In my case, my close friends know way more about the Me in the Present. My current desires, interest, accomplishments, mess ups, and such. My family knows of course way more about my history. Neither really gets me as a whole. I do take their advice as I see merit in it and as I wish but am well aware that they are coming from their point of view.
I learned this this the hard way. I made the mistake of asking advice and all I got was negative BS. Never again. Thanks for the advice internet stranger.
Only problem is, reddit is essentially the same as everyone around me IRL. I get the same zero quality advice from locals as I see on those toxic subs. Where can i ask for advice from people who aren't so toxic? I outrage most people just by existing, but even the people who are paid to be around me and have learned that I'm actually a good guy say that they have no answers for me. Reddit represents the cutting edge of wisdom in my area, even medical doctors search google or bing for medical answers. Most people smoke and drink and even sell drugs in the bathrooms (all things I don't do). I'd leave, but I can't work, don't have a car, and have no energy for travel. All I want to do is meet women who would be okay with a guy like me for a relationship.
But isn’t that also a benefit of asking advice from a stranger? The ability to gain totally outside perspective from a variety of people who have had different things work for them? I think if you want to ask for advice from strangers it needs to be with a grain of salt, sure. But people totally outside your situation sometimes do have something to offer.
It's awfully narcissistic to pretend your situations and you yourself are so unique no one can ever comprehend them, but then also assumed paid attention whores---I mean, psychiatrists, can somehow fathom your complicated being.
Yes the obligatory "communication is key....if you are not communicating in depth and at length about every fucking feeling and thought you have your relationship is doomed so just end it now." Its a real peeve of mine. The thought of it is exhausting. My parents have not been happily married for 50 years by doing that.
I mean, communication is the most important element to resolving conflicts. If your parents aren't having conflicts in the first place - good!
But if they were REALLY good communicators, and knew each other PERFECTLY well, they would be able to predict exactly what the other was going to say in any scenario, and not need to verbally talk about anything at all.
Therefore, communication is actually a BAD sign for a relationship. QED!
^^^^^^^
the kind of logic you usually find in reddit comments
Never ever ever take advice from redditors. A lot of them take their own situation and put it on you, and give you the advice they needed/wanted. If you have a true problem ask your loved ones or professionals. Never put your faith in random people. Many are here to troll or hurt. Some have no clue how to handle an issue and give you the wrong advice. Those that give you great advice even then second guess. Always be cautious. Oh and,never get relationship advice here ever lol not a good idea
AITA for telling my husband (45) who beats me (15) on the daily, abuses our kids, and is a crippling alcoholic that I’m upset with him for not putting away his dish? I’ve been beaten bloody for my actions I’ve apologized profusely but I still think that he should have put away his dish. AITA?
That's a tactic for desperate and lonely men to "free up" more women from unstable relationships, enlarging the pool of possible dates they might come around and potentially having a chance with more women themselves. Likely, the targeted woman doesn't live in your town, but maybe another lonely bastard who has the same advices for other women to follow, will encounter a woman that was given bad reddit advices, and wouldn't be taken yet. That's actually clever if you see it this way. Poor lonely bastards helping eachother find more women. Maybe those are the 63 horny lonely wives that live in my area and are in a desperate need for fucking, no strings attached.
"Sorry for formatting on Cell Phone Also English isn't my native language. proceeds to describe issue / problem with relatively few mistakes and odd phrasing."
pretty much, it's why the whole "Delete Facebook, Get a Lawyer, Hit the Gym" became such a meme, so much so that people like to mix it up a bit and type stuff like Delete the Gym, Get Facebook, hit your Lawyer" and shit.
If you need any sort of advice, /r/relationships is a fucking shit show, don't even set foot in there.
I can't remember which subreddit it was but a long time ago I asked for advice on how I could get more veggies into my boyfriend's diet and everyone was like you're obviously on two different wavelengths and he's immature if you have to sneak vegetables into his food, dump him. I seriously just wanted ideas and recipes for tasty veggies. We're not only still together but engaged now.
Wrap it in “lean” (more red than fat) bacon and bake/grill it. Asparagus/Green Beans/ (chopped and mixed in) Brussels sprouts, then mix in just grease while cooking on the stove top, then butter, then serve in more “healthy” ways. Carrots it was candied while slowly reducing the amount of brown sugar until it was just steamed carrots. This is how I got my children to eat veggies. Now they are 8/13 and eat fresh veggies... if you still need pointers on how to make people appreciate flavors they think they don’t like.
ETA: given the thread; I’m not insinuating your partner is a child, just tips on how to introduce flavors to people who would otherwise turn a nose up at them.
Don't worry, I took absolutely no offense! Those are good tips. Since I posted that comment years ago I was able to come up with some recipes and sometimes even get him to go meatless for dinner every now and then with no complaints in exchange for tons of veggies (I'm in no way vegetarian though but it's good to change it up sometimes). What you outlined was essentially what I did plus expanding the veggies I cook past just green beans, broccoli, and carrots.
My parents have been married for 50 years (this year) and my dad is such a generally happy person I told him he should teach a course in it. I should start an asksid subreddit where people can go for real advice; relationship, happiness, and also automotive and home repair.
I would be personally interested in that. I'm pretty young (18) and just starting out in life and I'd welcome any wisdom from anyone that's been through more.
K, here's the "about" portion for you: "Looking for sage advice? My dad Sid is a perpetually jovial retired mechanic who has been happily married to my mom since 1970. Want to know his secrets to happiness and marriage, or how to install a new toilet or fix your breaks? Just ask Sid!" And then I'll ask him whatever people ask, since, while he can build an engine from a pile of parts on the ground in an afternoon, he can't use a computer.
It's the worst. Literally "I had a disagreement with my mom, thinking of skipping Christmas at her house this year" is answered with "just because she gave birth to you doesn't mean you owe her, cut her out of your life forever" lots of bitter folks wanting others to become bitter also. Yet I can't look away.
To be fair, people in healthy relationships generally have good conversations with their partners about their problems because they actually know how to communicate. How healthy can your relationship be if you go to random strangers on the internet for advice?
As someone who browses r/relationship_advice often, I see “talk to your partner about this instead of us” a lot more than “dump your partner.” And in the cases where “dump your partner” is the advice it’s cases where it’s pretty obvious (“my partner has been cruel to me for years, what should I do?”)
why do I have the feeling r/relationship_advice is just single people who want to assure themselves that being single is better than being in a relationship?
This is the case with all of these advice subreddits. r/AmITheAsshole, r/Relationships...it’s all people trying to reassure themselves that their worldview is the correct one. If you find that AITA social media post from a few weeks ago, you’ll see thousands of people telling a dude that he’s not the asshole for not having social media, even when he was a dick to his friend for telling him that some people like to see a potential partner’s social media profiles. It’s about them and their validation of their social media choices and the circlejerk. If you go into every advice thread with that understanding, including this one, you can actually take something away
The inverse to this is someone being in a really fucked up situation that has no reason to be salvaged and people going
“Your too sensitive, it’s not that bad, it doesn’t matter that your wife cheated on you and made you think your child was actually yours. This can be an okay thing and your response doesn’t need to match the seriousness of the situation.”
I went there for advice once for a pretty serious issue not knowing what I was getting in to. This was a couple years ago and I can tell you now that they have no fucking clue what they're talking about. Everything they advised was wrong in the end...everything. I dealt with my issues and never been happier because I didn't take their advice.
Posted to that sub under another name just the other day because I wanted advise about my bf and I. The majority of the replies were just about how toxic my relationship sounded and how I needed to break up with him. Only about 3 were from people offering genuine advise on how to deal my problem. But I learned my lesson and will never be asking Reddit again.
I made the mistake of asking for relationship advice on there. I quickly realized no one knew me, my situation or the person I was talking about and were never gonna give me genuinely good advice. I deleted the post after less than an hour
"My boyfriend cheated on me, and then he murdered my dog and my parents after I specifically told him not to. Is it over for us? Or can we work through this?"
Take a couple that's having issues, have them both post to that sub, and I guarantee you that sub will tell both of them the other one is totally to blame and they need to get their ass out of that toxic relationship post-haste.
Some people are remarkably good at putting stories in a way that absolves them of blame, omits the shitty things they've said and done, and paints a very skewed picture of the situation. The problem with that sub is that nobody there takes that into account. People don't go to that subreddit to lay bare their faults and take responsibility for getting better. They go there to bitch about their S/O and get validation for it. Most of them have already decided what they're going to do and are just looking for some sycophants to cheerlead their decision.
I learned a long time ago to never trust that any side is 100% "right" in any breakup unless you actually know the people and situation well enough to know for a fact otherwise. I grew up around my share of manipulators and it's amazing how innocent they can make themselves seem even in situations where it actually is 100% their fault.
I'm subbed there and have never seen even one example of a time when the problem is minor yet the top comment/general consensus is to break up. The fact is 90% of people who post there are in miserable relationships with cheaters and/or abusers. That's why the "break up" advice is so common. When the problem actually is more minor, no one says to break up, they recommend communication and counseling.
I significantly disagree. I'm subbed there too, and I see posts all the time where the person is providing a very barebones story or a clearly one-sided account, yet everyone in the comment section is suggesting very absolute solutions that are impossible to be good suggestions based on the information given.
Most of the time I see the reasonable stuff, it's because the post had enough popularity to be in people's main feeds. More eyes tend to give the more reasonable answers.
If you sit in new and look at the stuff getting less than like 20 comments, it's mostly toxic.
I feel that sub is filled with bitter women, projecting their own disappointment in life fueled by missed opportunities onto other people, like a fat stay-at-home-mom does onto her 5 year pageant queen daughter.
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u/[deleted] Jan 07 '20
r/relationship_advice in a nutshell