When I first discovered Stack Exchange, it was in the form of Stack Overflow. It seemed like a great place...until I became a member. Apparently, my policy of "Upvote unto others as you would have them upvote unto you" is not common. Before long, I had deleted 10 questions, and my answers were an odd, faded gray. But then, a new problem came: the duplicate. Already, it seemed to me that the higher reputation users sat upon thrones of gold, dumping vats of acid upon lower reputation members while keeping themselves nice and happy.
What I think high reputation users don't realize is that every user on Stack Exchange came here for a reason. Whether that reason is to have fun on PPCG, or to get help on Stack Overflow, we all just want to be part of the fun/work/riddles. Also, even though a question may be a duplicate, it is not necessarily bad. The question might see things from another perspective, or have several unique parts. The only purpose the duplicate flag serves is to alienate new users. Of course, the obvious exception is a question that has been asked 5 times. But some question that happens to be a near duplicate of some obscure other question is not truly a pointless duplicate.
The point of all this is to just remember that every user is a person,too. Every question is a form of wonder, and wonder is an incredible thing. The fact that we as a species have the capability of asking, and learning, is extraordinary. So why would we want to mark harmless duplicates in such a rude way, as if we are robots built to thin out every remotely similar question and insult it? It is wrong.
How can we fix this? This is not a duplicate of How should duplicate questions be handled?, as that question is about how to handle duplicates.
