Spoiler Alert

I don’t care about spoilers.

I realize a lot of people do. I understand that because I also used to care, but at some point what I realized was the amount of energy I spent worrying about, reacting to, avoiding and complaining about spoilers simply outstripped whatever vague enjoyment I got from being surprised around some plot point. Worse still, most of the time the thing that might have been spoiled turned out to not be that damn big a deal anyway.

Much ado was made back in 2011 about a study from the University of California in San Diego that said (spoiler alert) that having a story spoiled for you is unlikely to impact your enjoyment of that story. According to the UCSD study, in fact the opposite seemed more likely to be true, “Subjects significantly preferred the spoiled versions of ironic-twist stories, where, for example, it was revealed before reading that a condemned man’s daring escape is all a fantasy before the noose snaps tight around his neck.”

My response at the time was, “Hey, I was going to read that story about the escaping man. Thanks for ruining it, loser.” It was 2011, I had not yet grown as a person.

My big problem with spoilers is that they are arbitrarily defined. There is no clearly defined threshold for what is and is not a spoiler. It’s not that I can’t live in a world with gray areas, but more that spoilers are really an entirely constructed interpretation of a made up rule, and that rule is exclusive to the person for whom the spoiler exists, unknowable to others in advance, but an imperative for everyone around whom the spoiler-rule exists. Avoiding spoilers might be fine if we all knew and shared the same sets of spoiler rules, but we don’t.

Spoiler rules used to be fairly straightforward and uniform, or at least I thought they were. It was admittedly easier back then, when spoilers were really only about the resolution of narratives. Now, however, the misuse of a gender pronoun can send people into an apoplexy because suddenly they know the hero of some movie they haven’t seen yet is a certain sex.

In part because of that arbitrariness, spoilers are selfish. They restrict and divide, asking people who have the temerity to be interested in talking about this thing they’ve experienced to please go somewhere else. They impose your schedule for consuming media onto others.

It’s not that I don’t understand or sympathize with the desire to keep something a surprise to experience in the intended context. My problem is when people make that desire the responsibility of everyone else instead of themselves. If you want to avoid spoilers, that’s fine, but it’s on you to limit yourself, not on everyone else around you to limit themselves. As far as I can tell, even if that thing you didn’t want spoiled gets spoiled, odds are you’re going to enjoy it every bit as much anyway.

A lot of people have become absolutely obsessed with spoilers. I blame this, to some degree, on the makers of a lot of pop culture, who have themselves become obsessed with “The Big Secret” or “The Amazing Reveal” or “The Game-Changing Plot Twist.” The television and cinemas are jam packed with stories that depend largely on their own secrets. They encourage watchers to micro-analyze every little kernel of story to try and guess the secret. This is problematic because it trains us to doubt every plot point — to believe that any image or half-spoken sentence, no matter how small or irrelevant, could be the thread that, when pulled, reveals the entire thing, whatever that thing may be.

And so we become obsessed with what we do and don’t know about shows, books and films. We imagine that finding out the big secret will provide some kind of enhanced payoff for the time we invest in the story, and as a result we become petrified of anything that might diminish that payoff. Spoiler-obsessed people sometimes seem to think of their entertainment consumption in a transactional sense. I have invested X of myself into this story, therefore the payout must be Y to achieve a positive time-to-cost ratio.

And spoilers? Well those are like taxes, hidden fees, shrink or some other kind of loss against the principal. Spoilers are seen to be this thing that reduces the payoff, and by extension devalues the time you’ve invested, or in the really extreme cases, that time you would have invested but haven’t yet.

Which, I think, is complete nonsense. Worse, I think that kind of transactional stance doesn’t do justice to the quality of the work that’s out there. Reducing things down to the quantification of some gimmick undermines the power of narrative.

Look at a work like Game of Thrones and the Song of Ice and Fire series. When I read (or in my case listened to audiobooks of) that series, if I had gone in only for the occasional plot twist or epic event, then I never would have made it through a few dozen pages. That time-to-cost thing just wouldn’t have panned out, because the series is dense mostly with intricacies and world building. And if you spend your time just waiting for the big reveal, it would be like listening to DubStep that waits forty-five minutes before getting to the drop. Why bother?

Big bad things happen in these stories. “Winter is coming.” But the dramatic tension exists not because readers don’t know what’s coming, but because they know, at least in a larger sense, what is coming. Readers know that things will fairly consistently turn for the worse, even when they seemed to be looking up, and the readers’ understanding makes every act of tenderness, loyalty, honor and decadence all the more meaningful. If winter were not coming, would readers even care?

The point being, even if you know everything about the various fates that befall the characters in the story, I would argue that the value of the story is not marginalized at all.

It feels to me like deciding not to go on a vacation unless everyone agrees not to tell you where you’re going. It’s the journey and the experience that are valuable. I know when I’m on a beach that I will soon have to return to Minnesota, that winter is waiting for me. If I didn’t know that, I wouldn’t spend all the time, energy and money to go to a beach in the first place. I would not appreciate the sun’s warmth, the calming susurration of the waves, the ridiculous cocktail umbrellas.

So, I’m now moving ever further into that crowd that is simply done with spoilers. I’m done worrying about them, and I’m increasingly done tiptoeing my way around every media conversation for fear that I will reveal something. At least when it comes to the way I consume media, I’m not longer going to worry if I find out the reveal. That’s not to say I can’t be thoughtful of others or that I will suddenly make an effort to spoil your fun just to prove a point. That’s just being a jerk.

It’s time for us to all just relax on the hyper-sensitivity for plot points. It’s honestly not doing us as media consumers any favors, and it’s subverting a lot of great conversation and discussion I wish we were having more often. Let yourself be spoiled here and there. Embrace it, and maybe you’ll realize that your shows, books and movies are just as good even when you know the destination.

Comments

Therein lies the crux of the issue.

I think that's true. I get where you're coming from with: The issue is when people come into threads that are clearly marked as non-spoiler threads yet continue to make comments that they feel are non-spoilery when all it takes is two clicks to tag it if it's questionable.

But, I would counter, the issue is equally that the people who "feel" something is non-spoilery are no more wrong or right. They have come into a non-spoiler thread and posted something non-spoilery to them.

You, with a personal and self-constructed definition of spoiler, obviously feel differently. But, I don't see why your definition of non-spoilery is right and theirs is wrong.

Elysium wrote:
Therein lies the crux of the issue.

I think that's true. I get where you're coming from with: The issue is when people come into threads that are clearly marked as non-spoiler threads yet continue to make comments that they feel are non-spoilery when all it takes is two clicks to tag it if it's questionable.

But, I would counter, the issue is equally that the people who "feel" something is non-spoilery are no more wrong or right. They have come into a non-spoiler thread and posted something non-spoilery to them.

You, with a personal and self-constructed definition of spoiler, obviously feel differently. But, I don't see why your definition of non-spoilery is right and theirs is wrong.

I don't see how this is a matter of "right and wrong". To me, it's simply a matter of courtesy. If you want to talk about something specific that you experienced in a game, and are posting in the regular (non-spoiler) catch-all, spend the 2 seconds it takes to wrap your discussion with spoiler tags.

Nevin73 wrote:

No, but obviously you have consumed a story not knowing the ending. If you consume a story knowing the ending and still enjoyed it, I would say you have a general answer. Of course every story is unique (or the same if you're the philosophical type) but you can still enjoy something with some foreknowledge.

But the study and the question is whether or not you'll enjoy it more.

I'm in partial agreement with Sean because there have been plenty of films I've seen that I've been "spoiled" on, yet still enjoy. I already knew about the Alien life cycle (facehugger, chestburster, xenomorph) before seeing Alien, and yet it is still one of my favorite films of all time. I knew Ripley died at the end of Alien 3, but I still love it (and all you haters can go...I dunno. Have less fun than I am or something).

Yet those films also stand well. I think it's the difference between watching The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable. Once you know the trick in the Sixth Sense, you may go looking for all the indications, but eventually, without that mystery, the movie is just a movie. Unbreakable is more than its twist, it is a journey of Bruce Willis' character. The twist just adds a bit of an emotional "oomph" to it, one that suddenly brings Samuel L. Jackson's character into greater focus. I'd say Unbreakable is Shyamalan's greatest film because it's not about the twist, it's about the character (and even if it does break logic (though it's also explained at some point in the film), I still enjoy Signs because it is similar: it's not about the twist, it's about Mel Gibson's character and his family and how this event allows them to grow together and become close again).

If someone told me what happened throughout Pacific Rim, I might have been disappointed, but I don't think I would have enjoyed the film less. If someone gave me a plot outline of Kick-Ass 2, once again, wouldn't have been surprised. Knowing the X or Y character dies in the manner they do is honestly pretty standard story-telling. It's what it means for the characters within that story that matters, and if it is told well, then it is going to work no matter what.

As another example, I knew that Aeris was going to die in FF7. Or rather, I knew someone died. A friend told me about it (which is weird because, for some reason, I specifically asked him if anyone died), but by time I got to that moment I had forgotten about it and was still stunned.

Still, I can understand avoiding spoilers. There are some movies where, if I can, I avoid telling my friends anything about it so they can go in with no expectations. Sometimes this is a film like Wasabi, which has no big twists, and sometimes it's a film like The Usual Suspects, which I'd argue is about more than just having a clever twist at the end.

But if you told me about the "big important events" in The Dark Knight or The Dark Knight Rises, would it have mattered? Not really. Again, it's the journey.

Even so, I'd rather be safer than sorry. I avoid spoilers more because I prefer a clean slate on things so I can make up my own mind and thoughts on them. But if I find out about a spoiler, well, I may be upset, but I won't really be heart-broken.

Which I think is more or less where Sean is coming from. If I told you, in Pacific Rim, that:

Spoiler:

Raleigh's brother dies in the opening

some people would freak, even though, in the grand scheme of things, it's not important. Yet the mental energy that goes into avoiding spoilers and the emotional responses to being spoiled are a bit out of hand.

Maybe spoilers ruin someone's enjoyment of something, maybe they don't. I think that's besides the point. When you spoil something for someone, you're taking that choice away from them.

Now as for personal preference, I figure that no matter how articulate someone is, their recounting of a plot point is never going to be as quality an experience as having that experience first hand, for the first time. I think there's value in that first time. I can tell you that someone spoiled the big twist of Final Fantasy 7 for me and it totally ruined that aspect of the game for me. It simply can't have the same impact once you know it's coming.

I'm tapping out, just easier to avoid nonspoiler discussions. I can respect them enough to see I do not have a good enough spoiler filter.

Spoilers don't bother me and that makes me sloppy with the details.

I wish someone had spoilered me on that monstrous visual pun. Jesus.

I think there's a difference between a story spoiler and being surprised by something you didn't even know existed. Bit of a stretch. It also suggests we live in a world where it HAS TO BE ONE OR THE OTHER AT ALL TIMES. Which we don't, thank god.

If you wanted to start digging for contradictions from someone who writes a thousand words a week for a decade I'm sure you'll find plenty. Doesn't really make for a good argument, though.

Duoae wrote:

I guess I would have been more open to your thesis if you weren't so snarky about your superior position.

It never fails to surprise me how opinion is often misconstrued as snark because one simply disagrees with it. You of all people should know better, you've been on the receiving end plenty.

I guess I would have been more open to your thesis if you weren't so snarky about your superior position.

So, who was that on the spoiler section for Brothers?

I guess the person who wrote this was some other, parallel universe, Sean Sands because I cannot reconcile the thesis above and the feeling below...

Every year there are one or two games that come out that I have the rare luxury of going into with absolutely no preconceived notions. Too rarely, I get the unexpected joy to start a week not even giving a game a second thought and by the end of that week think it may be one of the best games you’ve played in years. To have that happen two weeks in a row is ridiculous.

It seems to me that spoilers are important to you and do affect your enjoyment of media - maybe just not as much as other people.

Certis:

His whole opening comes off as snarky - especially this:

My response at the time was, “Hey, I was going to read that story about the escaping man. Thanks for ruining it, loser.” It was 2011, I had not yet grown as a person.

He misrepresents the positions of people who don't like spoilers (straw man?) and then says that he is superior to them and implies that they are not "grown" as people - like children - they have yet to learn the error of their immature ways.

I think there's a difference between a story spoiler and being surprised by something you didn't even know existed. Bit of a stretch.

I also disagree with this. I think you're right - there is a difference between a story spoiler and being surprised by something but the mechanics of the thing are the same. You do not know about something and thus it increases your enjoyment of the thing when you do know. I think that pretty much tells us that there is an effect of enjoying media when being spoiled...

You of all people should know better, you've been on the receiving end plenty.

Hey, we're all human! I don't hold it against anyone - it's an easy mistake to make for both sides.

Duoae wrote:

He misrepresents the positions of people who don't like spoilers (straw man?) and then says that he is superior to them and implies that they are not "grown" as people - like children - they have yet to learn the error of their immature ways.

As much as I dislike defending the honor of my beard-mate, I'm going to harp on this a little because he explicitly made that a personal statement. It's true for him. There's no declarative statement saying it must be true for everyone.

I think Sean's track record would suggest a more positive assumption about his motives. It's also a bit of a false trail in terms of the actual merits of his argument. Discussing tone in place of the actual points made doesn't carry the conversation forward. Besides, that's my job.

I'll get me coat.

Certis wrote:
Duoae wrote:

He misrepresents the positions of people who don't like spoilers (straw man?) and then says that he is superior to them and implies that they are not "grown" as people - like children - they have yet to learn the error of their immature ways.

As much as I dislike defending the honor of my beard-mate, I'm going to harp on this a little because he explicitly made that a personal statement. It's true for him. There's no declarative statement saying it must be true for everyone.

I think Sean's track record would suggest a more positive assumption about his motives. It's also a bit of a false trail. Attacking tone in place of the actual points made doesn't actually carry the conversation forward. Besides, that's my job.

I'll get me coat.

That's fair enough. However, yes it's a personal statement but they can also be used in the manner I interpreted it as - especially because he's speaking to and about those with the contrary opinion in the rest of the article. Sean also tends to write articles that incite discussion and passion so that's his track record and his stance on spoilers is well known (at least to me). Intent is difficult to interpret sometimes and quite a few people had that problem with this piece by the looks of it. I wasn't trying to be mean - but pointing out what I thought was a deficiency in the piece.

I did also attack his points by pointing out what I see as an inconsistency in his actions from a recent previous piece and argument in this one so I wasn't only on a one track pony.

Strangeblades wrote:

Whoo hoo! I'm glad you said this Sean/Shawn/Entity. I could give a rat's ass about spoilers. I could care less about a single event. If I'm not entertained by the majority of the product a plot twist isn't going to make it more enjoyable.

If the enjoyment of your product comes from a single thing than f**k off. I ain't sitting around for hours waiting for that point to occur.

Spoilers-schmoilers I say.

And there is absolutely no problem with that attitude, as long as you don't force that opinion on others. To each his own. The problem lies in people that walk into conversations, whether in real life or online, who have been clearly told please no spoilers, and then start spoiling content because they feel like their definition of a spoiler is better then the other people who are taking part in the conversation.

Elysium wrote:

But, I would counter, the issue is equally that the people who "feel" something is non-spoilery are no more wrong or right. They have come into a non-spoiler thread and posted something non-spoilery to them.

I don't understand why this concept is so hard to grasp. At the point you walk into a conversation or even start a conversation with someone in real life, if they ask please no spoilers, it doesn't matter what you believe to be a spoiler. What matters is what the other people in the conversation believe. It's called common courtesy and it shows that you respect others enough to understand that their opinions matter, even if you think they are wrong. And if you feel like you can't live up to their expectations then you are free to leave the conversation or move on to another topic.

To me people who consistently spoil stories for others are like the aholes who go to watch a movie or show at a theater and carry on conversations with their friends, text, or answer their phone during the show! It's selfish and shows a complete disregard for anyone but themselves.

Elysium wrote:

Because, what I thought I was saying was "I'm not going to worry about what gets spoiled for me anymore."

That's what I took away. I just have very strong opinions about this sort of thing, and felt the article missed the point on what the major problem with spoilers are. Specifically how people treat other people in society today.

My take on this is that it depends on the story. I won't spoil Sixth Sense regardless of how far in the future we talk about it because a huge part of the movie's suspense depends on the narrative revelations. This is actually also true for jokes, some mystery stories and similar such fare. A large part of their value depends on shock and/or novelty factor, so revealing the content will make the experience grossly less powerful for people who have not yet consumed the content.

On the other hand, there are other sorts of media for which revelations really count for nothing at all, or even where revealing the main points increases the enjoyment. For instance, knowing the broad plot points of Pride and Prejudice allows the reader to concentrate on subtle character expressions, hints, and Austen's fantastic humor. There's a lot of value in reading it over and over to get at the many layers. Many layered-experiences and narratives of this sort actually improve when the most obvious parts of them are revealed.

Another example of this is good comedic content that depends on delivery and context to get the laugh, rather than the unexpected. You can freely read the entire plot synopsis of Shaun of the Dead and it won't matter in least. If you enjoy Friends, you can likewise read episode summaries and still enjoy watching the show. It doesn't matter.

Furthermore, there are media content wherein the broad plot points are necessarily spoiled. Spoiler: Superman wins. Spoiler: The Power Rangers will fight a kaiju monster and win. Spoiler: Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan get together in a heartwarming romantic ending.

We go into these content knowing what's going to happen; and to a certain extent, we want them to happen, we are looking for them to happen. We will be massively disappointed if the content doesn't go the way we already expect it to go. If you go into a Batman movie and it turns into a romcom where the climax and aftermath mainly deals with Batman's romantic misadventures with Catwoman and how they solved the mystery of the fake zombie monster in the BatMystery Machine, you're probably gonna be super pissed. This happens in games, too. Many players expected a save-the-world game from DA2, but they were given a personal story with a tragic ending instead. People felt robbed and cheated.

In a way, we are looking to reviews to spoil games and movie content for us. Does the movie "deliver?" by we we're asking "Does it end the way I expect it to?" "Does Guacamelee deliver on the melee content?" Spoilers: you punch lots of guys in Guacamelee.

in fact the opposite seemed more likely to be true

"More likely" is not equal to "always". Some of us really do enjoy things more unspoiled, even if one study says we're a minority.

But I think, Sean, you're letting yourself get all too caught up in the modern-silly-TV version of spoilers. All those fake surprises in current films, shows, and books, you're right to lambast them, because they're awful creations that they attempt to sell by way only of those teasing words, not because they have any real literary, artistic, or other value or worth.

But there certainly are a great many stories and games and other things that are worth not spoiling, meaning the ones with real quality. If you didn't believe that, you guys wouldn't cut your discussion so short on those two recent short games (Brothers and The Way Home?).

Sean Sands wrote:

[...]at some point what I realized was the amount of energy I spent worrying about, reacting to, avoiding and complaining about spoilers simply outstripped whatever vague enjoyment I got from being surprised around some plot point.

This. Given a choice, I would rather not be spoiled (despite fancy shmancy studies). But, given the extra work (and angst) involved to completely avoid spoilers is not worth it (to me - dumb I have to add this but, some people, you know how they are, they hate spoilers and read everything as a blanket statement too...). This has certainly changed as I have gotten older, though.

(Parens (for the (win))). Need coffee.

Gaald wrote:
Strangeblades wrote:

Whoo hoo! I'm glad you said this Sean/Shawn/Entity. I could give a rat's ass about spoilers. I could care less about a single event. If I'm not entertained by the majority of the product a plot twist isn't going to make it more enjoyable.

If the enjoyment of your product comes from a single thing than f**k off. I ain't sitting around for hours waiting for that point to occur.

Spoilers-schmoilers I say.

And there is absolutely no problem with that attitude, as long as you don't force that opinion on others. To each his own. The problem lies in people that walk into conversations, whether in real life or online, who have been clearly told please no spoilers, and then start spoiling content because they feel like their definition of a spoiler is better then the other people who are taking part in the conversation.

Elysium wrote:

But, I would counter, the issue is equally that the people who "feel" something is non-spoilery are no more wrong or right. They have come into a non-spoiler thread and posted something non-spoilery to them.

I don't understand why this concept is so hard to grasp. At the point you walk into a conversation or even start a conversation with someone in real life, if they ask please no spoilers, it doesn't matter what you believe to be a spoiler. What matters is what the other people in the conversation believe. It's called common courtesy and it shows that you respect others enough to understand that their opinions matter, even if you think they are wrong. And if you feel like you can't live up to their expectations then you are free to leave the conversation or move on to another topic.

To me people who consistently spoil stories for others are like the aholes who go to watch a movie or show at a theater and carry on conversations with their friends, text, or answer their phone during the show! It's selfish and shows a complete disregard for anyone but themselves.

Well, there comes a point where what someone considers a "spoiler" becomes ridiculous. I'm reminded of the Walking Dead thread where the existence of a character named "The Governor" was considered a spoiler.

Well done, Sean! Brave stance to take, and I hope you're handling the criticism well. I honestly feel that you represented only part of yourself in this article, but you did present a cohesive idea enthusiastically. I think that's one of your strengths, the ability to compartmentalize for the sake of argument, but as others have pointed out, this does contradict some of your previous articles.

Personally, I don't like things being spoiled, but I think a heavy dose of realism should go into how one lets spoilers affect one's self. I fully agree with those pointing out that spoilers are very context sensitive, and should depend on the type and quality of work under discussion.

I find it very interesting that both sides of this issue are calling the other side selfish. I think both are correct.

Of all the articles on I have read here, and I've read most of them this year, this is by far the one I most strongly agree with. Couldn't have said it better myself. My friends and I, if we are all watching a show that is currently airing, have a rule that we don't speak a word of it until it we have all caught up. This avoids the is-this-a-spoiler question. Anything that is not actively being watched by the group is totally fair game. If you can't be bothered to stay current, we can't be bothered to avoid spoilers.

And I personally don't really even bother trying to avoid spoilers on things I do care about. That study is 100% right about me, and any story that is actually ruined by a spoiler just wasn't a good enough story.

If snarky's the worst I get called today, it's a good day. It wasn't intended, but I've been writing long enough to know it's not what I intended it's the way it was received by the reader. If you took it as snarky, I apologize. I was trying to be lighthearted and defuse what I thought might end up being a thorny issue with intense feelings.

Not sure where I would've gotten that idea. (again, lighthearted, not snarky).

I don't understand why this concept is so hard to grasp. At the point you walk into a conversation or even start a conversation with someone in real life, if they ask please no spoilers, it doesn't matter what you believe to be a spoiler. What matters is what the other people in the conversation believe.

Fair enough, but I don't understand why it's hard to grasp the concept, that this can be read as: look, when someone who wants to avoid spoilers walks into a conversation, it's just polite for everyone else to adopt the arbitrary and unknowable rules that I ask for. That's just common courtesy.

It also seems like common courtesy to not walk into a conversation and say what people should and should not talk about.

To me people who consistently spoil stories for others are like the aholes who go to watch a movie or show at a theater and carry on conversations with their friends, text, or answer their phone during the show! It's selfish and shows a complete disregard for anyone but themselves..

Again, I want to stress I 100% agree with this.

The problem is, I think people who are strict and hard-lined about spoilers. Particularly when everything is a spoiler to them, seem to not recognize this goes both ways. Enforcing your demands for how everyone else in the group needs to shape their conversation is no less a disregard of others. I mean, look at Brizahd's comment, which basically says, "I don't talk with friends about media I enjoy, because they might get mad at me." That's ok?

I get where you guys are coming from. I just think the concern over spoilers does more harm than good in the long run.

It seems to me that spoilers are important to you and do affect your enjoyment of media - maybe just not as much as other people.

I'll avoid going down the road of describing why those two thoughts are very different in my head. It's a fair point, Duoae, but I think the road to disagreeing would just go down too many cul de sacs.

Add me to the chorus of people who feel the same way. If anything, being spoiled on content I haven't gotten to yet has made me more interested in that media, not less. Meanwhile, really interesting discussions of media have been completely neutralized in many places because everyone feels obliged to either tiptoe around everything and anything meaningful, or they have to case it in "Okay I'm going to say a spoiler, get ready for it, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1..." every single time.

Revealing the ending of a game or movie the day it comes out? Yeah, I can agree that's a dick move. But talking about specific plot points several months later should be fair game without warning as far as I'm concerned. If people are that concerned about spoilers for media they are taking their sweet time to get to, then in my opinion they really shouldn't be going to places dedicated to talking about that media.

MeatMan wrote:

I don't see how this is a matter of "right and wrong". To me, it's simply a matter of courtesy. If you want to talk about something specific that you experienced in a game, and are posting in the regular (non-spoiler) catch-all, spend the 2 seconds it takes to wrap your discussion with spoiler tags.

My issue with that advice, however, is that then you have people using spoiler tags constantly to err on the side of caution. The result is that interesting discussion still gets muddled, because even in non-spoiler threads there ends up being tons of content behind a blank wall, and without knowing what is being spoiled, it's still a risk unless you have already consumed the media completely anyways.

I wish that people everywhere could express opinions without having to say "I think..." and have others recognize that they are expressing an opinion.

I don't care about spoilers. They ruin interesting discussions that could happen (and often do happen in places like the New York Times Book Review) about video games specifically. I'm not too interested in movies, although I dislike movie trailers and "Coming Next Week" segments on television programs because I'd rather avoid them, so maybe I'm just a hypocrite.

I guess the difference is reading a spoiler during an interesting analysis is one thing, while watching the entire movie boiled down to two minutes is another.

LiquidMantis wrote:

Cool, I guess I'm enjoying it wrong. Having plot points exposed most certainly affects my enjoyment, otherwise I'd just watch a 3 minute recap or read the Cliff's Notes. Apparently I need to grow as a person.

Really? Getting a few plot points revealed ahead of time makes all of the other awesome stuff that's in a work of media invalid?

Knowing that the lobby battle in The Matrix happened and actually watching it are two very different things. Knowing about something and actually experiencing don't usually feel all that similar. And as far as the "big reveal" of the Matrix? Man, I WISH someone had spoiled that for me before I went in, because I almost walked out before the reveal because I felt like the movie was too weird and not going anywhere. Once that piece of information was in my brain, it made the rest of the film valid for me. However, since I saw the movie on opening night, that wasn't really possible.

Another example: I've had the existence of the Rockies "spoiled" for me since sometime in my early childhood. I've known there was a big craggy mountain range to the west for almost my entire life. Heck, I'd even seen pictures. (HUGE spoilers, you guys!) But none of those bits of knowledge made the experience of driving from Denver to Colorado Springs after a fresh snowfall any less breathtaking when I did it back in '06. Knowing about the rockies didn't make experiencing them any less amazing.

And even though oceans have also been "spoiled" for me, I still hope I get to see one in person some day.

Timespike wrote:
LiquidMantis wrote:

Cool, I guess I'm enjoying it wrong. Having plot points exposed most certainly affects my enjoyment, otherwise I'd just watch a 3 minute recap or read the Cliff's Notes. Apparently I need to grow as a person.

Really? Getting a few plot points revealed ahead of time makes all of the other awesome stuff that's in a work of media invalid?

That's a far stretch, even ignoring the strawmen. It can detract from my overall enjoyment and the impact of events, lessening my experience, without making the entire presentation a meaningless grey goo. Again, you aren't going to convince me that spoilers aren't taking something from me, no matter how much the "Sit back and enjoy the spoilers" crowd rails otherwise.

As far as the "both sides are selfish" stance from up-thread, it's only inasmuch as smokers vs. non-smokers are both selfish. You're free to do what you want but if you invade my space, an area I've designated smoke-free, and start puffing away because you don't see the harm, don't act surprised when I get indignant.

You're free to do what you want but if you invade my space, an area I've designated smoke-free, and start puffing away because you don't see the harm, don't act surprised when I get indignant.

Letting the question of whether second hand smoke and spoilers are a good metaphor for one another go for a second, I'm willing to agree with the comparison if we can also both agree that the "smoker" in this case may be the person entering an unrestrained discussion and saying "hey guys, talk about this thing the way I want you to do it, now."

LiquidMantis wrote:
Timespike wrote:
LiquidMantis wrote:

Cool, I guess I'm enjoying it wrong. Having plot points exposed most certainly affects my enjoyment, otherwise I'd just watch a 3 minute recap or read the Cliff's Notes. Apparently I need to grow as a person.

Really? Getting a few plot points revealed ahead of time makes all of the other awesome stuff that's in a work of media invalid?

That's a far stretch, even ignoring the strawmen.

Not a strawman - I'm responding to the portion of what you said that I've bolded - your initial post had a clear implication that spoilers reduced the value of something so much you might as well just hit the high points and chuck it. If that's not the actual point you were making, fair enough, but I replied in good faith.

LiquidMantis wrote:
Timespike wrote:
LiquidMantis wrote:

Cool, I guess I'm enjoying it wrong. Having plot points exposed most certainly affects my enjoyment, otherwise I'd just watch a 3 minute recap or read the Cliff's Notes. Apparently I need to grow as a person.

Really? Getting a few plot points revealed ahead of time makes all of the other awesome stuff that's in a work of media invalid?

That's a far stretch, even ignoring the strawmen.

Not a strawman - I'm responding to the portion of what you said that I've bolded. Your initial post had a clear implication that spoilers reduced the value of something so much you might as well just hit the high points and chuck it. If that's not the actual point you were making, fair enough, but I replied in good faith.

And again, those of us that are adamantly anti-spoiler avoid the threads where active discussion is taking place when we're not caught up. The only time the few of us that feel strongly about spoilers have taken offense is when people come into threads marked NO SPOILERS in the title, then proceed to talk about meta information and can't be bothered to use the spoiler tags. I'm not sure how I can be any more clear about it.

Ok, guys.

Bowing out. I got my say at the start of the conversation, and fear I'm coming off as bullheaded and argumentative. Thanks for keeping me thinking, and honest.

Still think you guys are the best, even when you disagree. Except you, Gaald. Damn you to a thousand hells!

Spoiler:

Obviously, I'm joking, but I'm testing him to see if he dares click the spoiler button. If you did, hooray. I'm proud of you, buddy.

Timespike wrote:

Not a strawman - I'm responding to the portion of what you said that I've bolded.

To me, your strawmen are your comparisons of knowledge of geographic features as reducing their glory.