I've encountered enough readers who take criticism of a work as criticism of them (for whatever reason) that, in general-audience discussions, I do my best to preface discussions with "this is not a criticism of you (and, where applicable) in fact I like this thing I am about to criticize too!"
I don't think such a disclaimer is necessary in every context, though. I've been trying to formulate a question that I'd be happy to receive from people who were trying to decide whether it would be safe for them to join in a discussion they'd come across, and I've been stuck on the bit where if they didn't know me they'd have no reason to _believe_ me. Have you found any useful short ways of asking, or do you rely on the tone & context of what's been said so far?
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2013-02-24 09:26 pm (UTC)I don't think such a disclaimer is necessary in every context, though. I've been trying to formulate a question that I'd be happy to receive from people who were trying to decide whether it would be safe for them to join in a discussion they'd come across, and I've been stuck on the bit where if they didn't know me they'd have no reason to _believe_ me. Have you found any useful short ways of asking, or do you rely on the tone & context of what's been said so far?