They wouldn't phrase it that way. They'd say "meaningless self-congratulatory fluff, eugh, tastes like diabetes, I don't want to see it". I've spent some time on the Something Awful fora, and I can tell you there are people who genuinely and explictly think what makes discussions meaningful and interesting is conflict and drama, as if it was some piece of fiction. When faced with kindness and fuzziness, they react violently, as if it would weaken them; to them, it's "indulgence" and "weak-mindedness". It's the sort of people that would call "charity" "handouts", and "forgiveness" "idiocy". It sounds like I'm describing cartoon supervillains, but there's lots of people who actually advocate this.
Generally when faced with that sort I try to act even nicer than usual, and deliberately interpret every thing they say in the most charitable light I can, regardless of how obviously it was intended to be offensive and anger me. Doing this got me banned in the places where this philosophy is shared by the moderation... and kept me from being banned in the places where it isn't. So I guess it served me well.
Did the people who down-voted that stream belong to that particular category? I wouldn't know, because they didn't come out and say why they down-voted. But my money is on that hypothesis.
Fair enough, I agree with that assessment, although not necessarily with the entirety of your interpretation.
I admit that this reaction crossed my mind as well. It continues "All this being excessively nice to people is creepy. It's like being greeted by someone with an obviously fake smile." Maybe there's a better way to have gotten the same intent across?
This is my first attempt at starting a casual conversation on LW where people don't have to worry about winning or losing points, and can just relax and have social fun together.
So, Big Bang Theory. That series got me wondering. It seems to be about "geeks", and not the basement-dwelling variety either; they're highly successful and accomplished professionals, each in their own field. One of them has been an astronaut, even. And yet, everything they ever accomplish amounts to absolutely nothing in terms of social recognition or even in terms of personal happiness. And the thing is, it doesn't even get better for their "normal" counterparts, who are just as miserable and petty.
Consider, then; how would being rationalists would affect the characters on this show? The writing of the show relies a lot on laughing at people rather than with them; would rationalist characters subvert that? And how would that rationalist outlook express itself given their personalities? (After all, notice how amazingly different from each other Yudkowsky, Hanson, and Alicorn are, just to name a few; they emphasize rather different things, and take different approaches to both truth-testing and problem-solving).
Note: this discussion does not need to be about rationalism. It can be a casual, normal discussion about the series. Relax and enjoy yourselves.
But the reason I brought up that series is that its characters are excellent examples of high intelligence hampered by immense irrationality. The apex of this is represented by Dr. Sheldon Cooper, who is, essentially, a complete fundamentalist over every single thing in his life; he applies this attitude to everything, right down to people's favorite flavor of pudding: Raj is "axiomatically wrong" to prefer tapioca, because the best pudding is chocolate. Period. This attitude makes him a far, far worse scientist than he thinks, as he refuses to even consider any criticism of his methods or results.