> I have stopped commenting on any tunnel related 
   > Elon topic due to people refusing to believe my
   > experience and expertise when it does not align
   > with what Elon Musk and his team of "experts" 
   > have said or published in their desk studies.

I think you may be misreading the response here. When you write comments in a snarky way (as you did in the parent of this comment) it completely obscures your information to the reader because they respond emotionally to the snark first. I truly believe that the number of people with your experience reading this is probably in the low single digits, so you have a tremendous amount to offer. It is easier to hear it if you put it out there with respect rather than disdain.

Had you phrased it like this

"The challenges are less technical and more in the political side of infrastructure, property and easement acquisition, dealing with spurious suits from third parties, and the ever present complex series of environmental and safety regulations. While I admire Elon's ambition and desire to get things done, these political issues have stymied projects literally for decades, and I can't see even his star power being able to defeat rampant NIMBYism."

It would be easier to hear your expertise in your writing.

I used to post reasonable and non-snarky comments like this. I stopped doing it after about the fourth or fifth time that the commenters responding to my posts told me that I clearly had no idea what I was talking about and was uninformed because they had read the Hyperloop white paper. This literally only happens in Musk related threads.

Your profile says you work in machine learning - imagine if every thread you posted in about machine learning you were told that you were an idiot because someone had read I, Robot and the AI in that doesn't match your idea of ML so of course you're wrong.

So I just try not to post in most tunneling related topics, especially those related to Musk, any more unless I see something interesting (like your original comment for this whole thread noting that nobody here knows anything about tunneling). When I do find something interesting I try to respond honestly and directly, as you can see with my other responses in this thread; however, the GP comment here offers nothing to the debate other than basically saying "Elon is a superhero".

I would not be surprised if others in their respective fields take a similar approach in other cult of personality topics (Uber, Elon, Apple, etc.).

> I would not be surprised if others in their respective fields take a similar approach in other cult of personality topics (Uber, Elon, Apple, etc.).

I no longer read the comments for things relating to medical testing, my professional field, and I try my best to avoid medicine generally.

It to me feels like many commenters are somewhat clueless on the topic, and many others have strongly held opinions that lack foundation. It's a frustrating environment to comment within: it takes a lot of energy to write a thoughtful comment that can fill in missing domain knowledge for an earnest reader, and subsequently demoralizing to have a popular frequent poster on this website to dismiss my comment with snark because they consider themselves to be informed in this area. My comments became gray. I deleted the password to my account when that happened and rarely post since, the frustration is not worthwhile.

   > This literally only happens in Musk related threads.

In my experience there are a number of people and companies that have advocates here. And they can be rather harsh when their world view is threatened. Many of my own most down voted comments are those that involve Google and its inability to make money on anything other than search advertising :-) I have also learned a lot from people who have been dismissive of my comments once I got them to help me understand where they were coming from. And that leads to this:

   > Your profile says you work in machine learning - imagine if every 
   > thread you posted in about machine learning you were told that 
   > you were an idiot because someone had read I, Robot and the AI 
   > in that doesn't match your idea of ML so of course you're wrong.

The reason that is in my profile is so that when someone is wondering about my comment, if they check my profile they can see where I am coming from. I also put my gmail address there so that folks can email me if they really disagree and they sometimes do. I also look at people's profiles to see if that can help contextualize their comments. When there is nothing in the 'about' field I have no way of knowing what their experience is. And I realize that many people don't put information in their profile because they wish to maintain a level of anonymity which might allow them to comment more freely than their employer (or acquaintances) would appreciate. But the bottom line is that asserting a counter argument from an anonymous account is much weaker than asserting a counter argument from a non-anonymous account. Counter arguments posted by throw away accounts that were created just to post the counter argument have the least weight of all.

And that brings us to this:

   > I would not be surprised if others in their respective fields take 
   > a similar approach in other cult of personality topics (Uber, 
   > Elon, Apple, etc.).

When you're writing a comment there are things you can include which will inflame the discussion emotionally. The rhetoric term I find most useful for this are 'dog whistles'. Dog whistles being ultrasonic whistles that when you blow on them dogs can hear them but most people can't. Similarly in communication you can use a phrase or keyword that relates back to a particular group of people.

In your comment you call these "cult of personality topics" and that hits two interesting points. The first is that cults are, by and large, considered to be organizations which control their hapless members. The second is that personality is not a quantitative statement. "Fanboys", "Groupees", "Sycophants" are all negatively connotative words to describe someone who irrationally favors some topic or group.

The challenge though is that these people don't see themselves coming from that perspective, and they come by their admiration of founders or companies honestly. And it is important to recognize and acknowledge that someone can both admire Elon Musk's accomplishments and companies, without being "duped." And how you disagree can be just as important as what you disagree on.

So to wrap up, if you're comfortable with it, I recommend a bit of background/bio information in your profile to help people understand your expertise. When people comment with information you know to be incorrect, ask how they came to that understanding so that you can understand how to help them learn something new. And when people are dismissive of your expertise or your comments, help them learn by pointing them to the same sources and material you used to get to your understanding. Thanks to you I've got a copy of Dunn's "Fundamentals of Geotechnical Analysis" coming via inter-library loan. Until your comment I didn't have a name for the activity that analyzes the feasibility of tunneling projects, now I do. With that I can learn more.

Recognize that everyone here comes from a different background and have different levels of expertise. When someone disagrees with you or dismisses your comment take that as an opportunity to learn something new, not about about your area of expertise but about how to communicate it clearly to a non-expert.