It ain't relevant, man!

   Some of you may have run a forum or three in the past, be it on a web site, a Usenet newsgroup, a mailing list, a Fidonet Echo back in the day, or, as this story concerns, a LinkedIn group.  (Groups are the main reason I use LinkedIn, though LinkedIn has seemed hell-bent on screwing them up for the past several years, and killing the whole concept off for the past few.  But don't get me started -- I'm a self-starter.)

   Many years ago, I created the Plain Old C Programming group, which I still run.  All new members are put on moderation, until they submit something clearly on-topic, at which point they are given posting privileges.  (This is the only way I have ever found to keep a group decently clean of spam.) 

   A few days ago, a submission appeared in the "Moderation Queue", from a newish user (I had approved her about a month ago).  It was about Laravel (a PHP framework, for those who don't know), so it was obviously off topic; the rules even state clearly that the groups is about "plain old" C, that "C++, C#, Objective-C, etc. are off-topic", and, to paraphrase Brother Maynard's brother, "Java is Right Out."  Worse yet, it was also a "promotion", specifically an ad for her company's Laravel training class.  LinkedIn no longer has a tab for promotions, but I'm certainly not going to clutter the Discussions tab with ads!

   So of course I instantly rejected it.  Sometimes I send a note reminding the submitter of the topic, especially if it's a crass ad... but for whatever reason, I didn't this time... but it probably wouldn't have done any good.  For you see, this submitter was not only a recruitroid, but a particularly clue-resistant recruitroid.

   And now, ladles and germs, for your amusement, our ensuing exchange is reproduced below, absolutely verbatim, wacky punctuation and all:

HER:	Approve my post of Laravel,,,
ME:	Tell me how it's on topic....
HER:	but its relevant to web
ME:	And that makes it relevant to *** PLAIN OLD C *** because . . . ?
HER:	cant understand
ME:	I'm not surprised, because there IS no such reason.
	C existed *long* before the Web was even a twinkle in Sir Tim's eye. C is an extremely rare (because spectacularly poor) choice of languages to write a *web* application. The closest link I can come up with between C and the Web is that C is a good choice of language to write most kinds of servers -- email, database, web, whatever.
	What you're trying to do (and then trying to *insist* on) is like posting something about Labrador Retrievers in a forum about cats because most cat owners probably like chocolate and there's a dog breed called a Chocolate Lab.
	When you want to post to a forum with a topic you know very little about, I strongly recommend you first consult someone who knows both topics -- that of the forum, and that of your post. If they don't see a clear connection between them, your post is likely Off Topic, and likely to get you booted out.
	It's exactly this sort of combination of willful ignorance and arrogance (as displayed in your insistence that I approve your post), that makes most techies absolutely hate HR/recruiters with a burning passion.
HER:	actually i ma not a developer so that these all is out of meeeee,,,,,,

   At this point I give up trying to get through her thick skull.  Even a completely non-technical analogy has failed.  Or maybe she's simply just as ignorant of the distinction between dogs and cats as between PHP and C.

   Of course being "relevant to web" makes it relevant to absolutely everything, right?  Because there were no computers at all, until the Wonderful Wacky Web sprang forth from Sir Tim's brow, fully formed and on horseback, right?  An ad for Laravel training would be on topic in a forum on, say, arachnophobia treatment, because it's got to with spiders, which are "relevant to web", right?

Sheesh.  (To put it politely.)