MGL – I’ve gotten to the point where I preface my advice with something like “You are not gonna like what I have to say. Should I tell you anyway?” That puts them in a decision point that sort of gets me off the hook.

I’ve never quite understood people who ask for advice and then accuse people who take the time to reply of being “judgmental” when they get answers that they don’t like.

Keep on being judgmental- we all are, whether we admit it or not.

In my very direct experience, most of the people who ask for help only want you to identify with them, pat them on the back, or somehow commiserate with them.

They are not actually looking for a solution. If they were, they would not be wasting time posting useless questions on forums but rather, doing the hard footwork to dig themselves out of their situation.

We can give our opinions, but they will never matter to most people. I do it in the hopes that it might matter to someone else who reads it at some point – someone who really IS looking for help. Maybe it will make them think just a little bit. That’s worth the time to sit down and write a response.

Pardon me. I get very worked up about all this.

ps- Please read my article on learning to handle money (http://pofile.blogspot.com/2008/08/for-crying-out-loud-learn-how-to-handle.html) as it supports a lot of what you said too.

While I agree with your assesment if someone asks for help, but the question is – when they don’t what are you supposed to do?

I live my life with the mantra, you don’t know what goes on behind closed doors and I think finances are the prime example of that statement. So while I am oppinionated and judgmental,generally, I think passing judgment when dealing with personal finances should be a hard thing to do.

P.S.
I actually just (last night at about 12am) wrote a post, which begs the question….

What makes you and I so differnet? Why are we able to run our lives with the foresight of future payments?

Sorry for the long comment