ATS Suggestion: Past Rivals, Now Friends

I have this little suggestion for ATS, not because I whole heartedly want to see it added to the ATS site but because with others discussing the subject perhaps a conclusion can be reached that if added this idea could be a tool to improve the ATS experience. Tried and search and decided this had not been offered as food for thought yet.


Any time you are reading a member's post at ATS you can see their member name and avatar to the left of the text block. Beneath that is a small box that says "member". By hovering your mouse over that box a list of functions/interactions you can take with that member will be shown - such as viewing their profile or sending them a message. Two of the choices in that box are "add as friend" and "make rival".

The "add as friend" function is pretty obvious. Perhaps you truely agree with what this member has said in this thread and somehow can remember that a number of other times you have agreed with them. Maybe you remember in the past that member agreeing with you in a seperate thread also.

Perhaps it turns out through online discussion this member shares your stances, or maybe this member doesn't share any stances on any subjects but you have decided their ability to think rationally or disagree in a mature manner conducive to the discussion regardless of disagreement. In this way you could say the "add as friend" is a contribution to that observation.

The "make rival" is also used just as freely. In some thread, a member might hold a stance on a subject that becomes so starkly contradicting to your own that it negates any discussion on the subject. I kind of imagine the old superhero/supervillian paradigm ( comics or cartoons ), but there are many reasons you could consider someone a 'rival' and it's not a bad thing, not a disrespect or meant to hinder any proper progression of relationship between members or discussion of topic.

If you go to your own or another members profile page you can see on the left of the page the two lists of members they have choosen as friends and also as rivals.


I would like to propose a third option, Past Rivals, Now Friends. In this way, it could be the circumstance that at some point a member chose to list another member as a rival for whatever reason. Let's say that it could be over a stance on a topic in a thread, for an example here. During the time in that thread, during a rational discussion, maybe a form of dialogue could lead to one of two rivals forming a transformation in their stance that resembles their rivals, due to a convincing discussion. Because of this process, one could say they no longer view this person as a rival but now an ally.

Another example I can think of would be, transformation of thought. I know now that I am not the same opinions that I was when I first joined ATS and subjects/members that I would have deemed rival worthy in the past now I could see as allies in my shared discussion here.

I also could see a benefit here at ATS for this function as a means to members to try and put forth effort not to simply be convincing and dominating with others - but rather to inspect all relationships with members and stances on subjects as well as the paths of discussions with the state of mind that these stances are all possibly transformative. That disagreements leads to discussion and that discussion if handled properly can lead to conclusion and some form of interesting/informative gain to one or more side.

Well, that's about the just of it. Thanks for reading and I look foward to responses.

I am meh about your idea. My thought is who cares. I use the friend button when I like a thread someone has written, or a post, usually I go to the profile page and check out a few other posts or threads, and then I add. I do this so I can go to 'Friends Threads' on the ribbon at the bottom and read interesting, to me, threads. It has nothing to do with actually being friends.

So if you had a friend that you agree with on most things but disagree with on others, could the designation be used "Friends without benefits"?


ETA: or even "spouse" ? ... same thing afterall