What makes an appraisal complex?

[George Hatch]

Uhh, I don't know if you've noticed it yet, but when posting here it's pretty safe to assume you're swimming with sharks. There is the occasional feeding frenzy and if you stick around long enough you're sure to get nipped. The (big) trick is to not take it personally when it happens. Obviously, some appraisers are a little better at that particular trick than others.

One of the former chairs of the ASB posts here and gets a never-ending stream of thinly veiled innuendos and insinuations for his trouble. We have present and past state appraisal board members who post here and they get bombs lobbed their way on a regular basis. Next to these luminaries I am one of the small fry. They actually do something for the profession; I'm just a lone gunman with a keyboard.

That's why I'm usually quite happy to dispense with formalities when addressing people whom I consider to be among my peers, which I prefer to think is most everyone here. I usually try to reserve my most formal and polite behavior for those people whom I consider to be our adversaries. Operative word there is "try". It's good to have goals.

 

[Calvin the Airedale]

Uhh, I don't know if you've noticed it yet, but when posting here it's pretty safe to assume you're swimming with sharks. There is the occasional feeding frenzy and if you stick around long enough you're sure to get nipped. The (big) trick is to not take it personally when it happens. Obviously, some appraisers are a little better at that particular trick than others.

One of the former chairs of the ASB posts here and gets a never-ending stream of thinly veiled innuendos and insinuations for his trouble. We have present and past state appraisal board members who post here and they get bombs lobbed their way on a regular basis. Next to these luminaries I am one of the small fry. They actually do something for the profession; I'm just a lone gunman with a keyboard.

That's why I'm usually quite happy to dispense with formalities when addressing people whom I consider to be among my peers, which I prefer to think is most everyone here. I usually try to reserve my most formal and polite behavior for those people whom I consider to be our adversaries. Operative word there is "try". It's good to have goals.

I have noticed the shark pool. That's OK. Comment and argument based on ideas, firmly held beliefs, experience, education and mutual respect make us better appraisers. That is, afterall, the function of an appraisal report, "to convince." It takes a large skill set to do it well.

I tend to the formal. Politeness and civility are the gear grease, I believe, of social discourse. I am not a fan of mean spirited debate, but being human, am tempted at times to its use.

On the other hand, insults are always welcome. Invective debate, IMO, reveals a bankruptcy of foundational support for the hurler's argument. Truth, on the other hand, is a powerful basis from which to argue. It does not need insult or sarcasm to carry its water and is much more humbling to those that would be ruled by it.

Besides, it's not like I don't make an *** of myself on a regular basis. Nothing anyone says to me on this forum will be more deprecating than the instances of ignorance and nonsense that will appear from time to time in my own posts.