What's the worst mistake you've made on a forum (non-WP)?

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What's the worst mistake or faux pas you've made on a web forum, other than WrongPlanet?

Poor theory of mind has led me to make many, as I genuinely don't realise the emotional impact a post will have on others until the mistake has already been made and people are offended, and so I have to learn from my mistakes every time rather than having innate common sense to avoid them. Time and time again, the very music of my online posting has been laughably out of key with that of other members of a (non-WP) forum. It's a miracle I've survived so long on this forum, I can assure you, given what length of time and post count I have here. I know this is an autism forum, but still.

The obvious place where I've made my worst mistakes in living memory is a forum about city, country, region etc. demographics called City Data. All despite an extremely low post count there, which despite a special interest in the subject is testament that it's a forum where one would be particularly likely to fall foul of poor theory of mind, and that the forum is particularly easily offendable if your theory of mind is poor.

I'll pick as my single worst mistake there, devising and sharing with the forum what I called a Social Exclusion Index which ranked countries and states based on indicators I chose (I won't share those indicators or the results here to spare people possible offence). This offended people and the thread was closed quite quickly.

I've made the assumption that Prince William and Britney Spears were going out together on a forum for teenage girls back in 1999. One of the girls asked, "Do you even know who Britney Spears is? I didn't think so. Don't make assumptions of people, if you don't know who they are." I attacked her back and said, "I do know who Britney Spears is. She's a yound and popular pop star. Don't presume that I'm ret*d."

I didn't go on that site after that. I was too old for that site, anyways.

Mostly telling secrets, or sharing things about the past that later I wished I hadn't.

Now I keep a little more discrete about things.

This is the only forum I've ever really contributed to. Well, except for the boards on Neopets... but I won't go there.

I asked a bunch of bozos serious questions and expected serious answers, but instead just got more of the same crap since they can't do anything other than think of one singular topic with no exceptions whatsoever.

Asking about why do pregnant women gain so much weight and why hadn't I gained much at all in a group with pregnant women. I left that group right after it happened.

Accepted a moderator position was good for a while but I got tired of having to deal with members complaining about social dynamics, along with forum wars and trolling

Having the 'wrong' opinion about Richey Edwards on a Manics forum. A friend stood by me, and that's what matters really, and I know of a few other people who were cool with it, but I wonder how many thought I was (insert devaluing word here) behind my back.

actually I take that back...

I once accused a site owner of having an alt on the same site who said some horrible things... I then raised hell on said site and people somewhat followed my lead... eventually the site went very much down hill... supposedly the owner "got sick" and wanted to sell but never replied to serious inquiries

WTH is the 'wrong' opinion about Richey Edwards?

I don't think his mental issues were the cause of his behaviour(s). Maybe they had a contributing factor, I don't know. But from the way the band fully supported and protected his actions, and other such things I observed, I think the fans don't know everything about Richey, and he could have had personal problems which made him feel the way he felt most of his life (as he reported, his troublesomeness started as a teen).

Yeah, it's crazy how people end up thinking they 'know' someone who's famous and how defensive they get when you question what they 'know'.

Exactly!

On a forum for Phoenix Wright (A series of Nintendo DS games from Japan about a defense lawyer, which was a minor special interest of mine at the time), I talked openly about my fetish and made a thread dedicated to image manipulations of the characters to support my fetish. I think I had skipped my medication that day, and when I had come back into the thread the following day when I felt better, I was deeply embarrassed about what I had done and stopped going there.

Phoenix Wright fans are mostly pervs anyway (I know because I am one!)

Wow, You're a Phoenix Wright fan too!? I never expected to find one on this website! Are you looking forward to Phoenix Wright vs. Professor Layton? I hope they release it in English.

Yeah, nobody else on the forum seemed to mind my thread at all and even asked me questions about my fetish to try to learn more about it. I don't know why I flipped out about it. I guess it just felt wrong to talk so openly about a sexual topic in a video game forum.