Plus the tone of the poster may not be as hostile in their own mind as it reads in plain text.
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True...
I have a sardonic/sarcastic (in a nice way) personality and a lot of my ‘conversation’ depends on body language, eye rolls, etc etc..
The ONLY thing that comes out here is the words and something (as you say) said in jest can be taken as hostile if the person reading it isn’t on the same page.
I suppose a self correction is available BUT I am far to old to ‘redo’ my charming (or not so) personality...<: <: <:
I once posted the epithet “Newbie” to a FReeper who was blessed with a late ‘90s born-on date. It took like five apologetic follow-up posts before he/she calmed down. I was trying to be funny; he/she didn’t see it that way . . .