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Where did I say that, exactly? How is telling people that they are wrong (when they are wrong) treating them like crap?
Though it does seem like it is perfectly acceptable in some circles to treat gay people like crap.
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Blayne Bradley
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quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: Blayne: I'm not clear on what you are saying isn't a reasonable standard.
You're mentally side stepping the need to enter into substantiated or logical discussion by automatically assuming a lack of reasoned thought from those who would discuss topic from a religious perspective.
You are taking it as a "given" that there isn't "proof" and this is very weak statement that I do not believe nessasarily or automatically holds.
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Boots: You didn't say that exactly, but it is implied, plus you asked how polite etc do we have to be to that preacher. Pointing out when someone is wrong isn't crapping on someone. If done politely. Treating people like crap while pointing out their are wrong is crapping on someone.
Blayne: I think you are misunderstanding what I was saying. I was most assuredly -not- saying that I assume a lack of reasoned thought from religious people.
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How about is it just as rude as suggesting that gays be herded and wrangled? Not -as- rude. Are you aspiring to be as rude as crazy people boots?
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And I'm just saying that just because you are right about something and the other person is wrong doesn't mean you now have permission to be a jerk to them.
Of course you -can- be a jerk to them, but then that means you are acting like a jerk doesn't it? Their bad behavior doesn't make you less responsible for your bad behavior.
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quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: And I'm just saying that just because you are right about something and the other person is wrong doesn't mean you now have permission to be a jerk to them.
This doesn't mean anything. I have permission to be a jerk to someone practically anytime I want. It can be about as trivial or as monumental an issue as I want; for instance, I can be a jerk to someone because they think transformers II was a great movie, or I can be a jerk to someone because they're a neo-nazi who holds absolutely abhorrent views.
This is only a question as to whether or not such behavior should be considered illegitimate on some level, whether strategic or moral. The moral argument is often very subjective.
If we're talking strategic: its been very helpful and productive to ostracize bigoted homophobes. Sorry, bigoted homophobes.
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Boots: Either we are miscommunicating horribly or you are deliberately missing my point. I'll assume the former. Absolutely not, telling someone that their opinion is something you thing is wrong is not rude, it how the message is delivered that I'm talking about. Often times when someone believes something that is, let's say, evil, like all gays should be rounded up in a giant cage, people respond to that kind of evil belief with anger, with harsh words, with name calling and threats.
Those actions that one takes in response, the bad ones, are still bad. Just because the other guy's views are wrong, it doesn't release the people in the right are right when they mock, belittle, etc them. It is still wrong. It isn't wrong to let them know they are wrong, and to let them know their evil views will not be accepted as evil acts. See what I mean boots?
Samp: You make a good point, but ostracization can still be done politely.
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Blayne Bradley
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Regarding Marriage: Marriage is the union of two different surnames, in friendship and in love, in order to continue the posterity of the former sages, and to furnish those who shall preside at the sacrifices to heaven and earth, at those in the ancestral temple, and at those at the altars to the spirits of the land and grain. —Confucius,
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Ostracization can be done politely? Come now, you can't mean that. Imagine for a moment that you were suddenly the target of ostracism from a group you enjoyed being part of.
Wouldn't 'rude' be a part of your feelings about it in damn near every such scenario? There isn't a way to politely ostracize someone. There *are* however many ways to doll it up so it doesn't quite sting so much, as much a salve to those ostracizing as the one ostracized. But the facts of what happens will be unchanged.
The world in general, and many Americans in the world, would benefit a very great deal from taking less care about when and for how long they can consider themselves 'offended'.,
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I do mean that. I can politely say "Your stance on gay marriage offends me, and I will not have a personal relationship with you while you are oppressing our fabulously dressed brothers and plad clad sisters. Good day Sir."
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quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: I do mean that. I can politely say "Your stance on gay marriage offends me, and I will not have a personal relationship with you while you are oppressing our fabulously dressed brothers and plad clad sisters. Good day Sir."
"Can you ever really have a 'civil' war? 'Say, pardon me...' *gunshot* '...I'm awfully sorry. Awfully sorry.'" -George Carlin
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quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: I do mean that. I can politely say "Your stance on gay marriage offends me, and I will not have a personal relationship with you while you are oppressing our fabulously dressed brothers and plad clad sisters. Good day Sir."
And if they personally don't take it as polite and are instead offended?
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That's on them, -you know- you were courteous and polite.
Some people are going to be offended no matter what you do, and it isn't about never offending people, that's impossible, but not letting other people's wrongheadedness lead to your own.
For instance, everyone is being very pleasant with Aris in the other thread despite his name calling, and non-adherence to facts, and I think the whole conversation is clearly benefiting from it.
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quote:That's on them, -you know- you were courteous and polite.
Which, of course, presents two possibilities: that you were not courteous, but did not know you were not; and you were genuinely courteous, but they did not know you were.
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Cultural differences withstanding, I would say that most people know when they are being polite and when they are being rude, even if they would not care to admit it to others.
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You're speaking as though rudeness and courtesy are tangible, objective things. They're not. Even within cultures that widely agree on a range of rudeness and courtesy, there's a lot of variance.
For example, within one person may call another selfish and greedy, but only meaning that as a trait applied to all humans. Yet to the second, this is unquestionably rude. Which, if any, is lying or deceiving themselves about the rudeness here if it exists?
Another person may say to a fourth that they're damned to hellfire if they don't change their ways, intending it as an earnest plea (well, sort of) to change one's ways before it's too late. The fourth person regards it as a rude threat.
A fifth may ask his close friend, the sixth, if his sister is seeing anyone. He doesn't mean it rudely, respecting and admiring the sister quite a lot and wanting to make her happy. The sixth considers this question so rude he might break the friendship, meanwhile the sister thinks it's rude of the fifth to be asking third parties at all, as well as being angry at her brother for rude overprotectiveness.
Rudeness and courtesy aren't objective, they're inherently subjective. I'm not sure why you think otherwise, but barring a scenario in which one person deliberately thinks to themselves, "I shall be rude!" it's never as cut and dried as you're making it out. Instead, it appears as though rudeness and courtesy are something you're using to determine how you'll respond rather than as an evenly marked grid you look to in a given situation.
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Sure, end results very, as people take things different ways, but it sure is easy to spot someone who is trying very hard to be polite vs someone who isn't. And that effort can go a long way.
Kindness of thought lubricates difficult conversations.
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So when you said most people know when they're being rude or not, you meant they know when they're being rude if they're being *extremely* rude-or polite? Seems to be a shift there.
Furthermore, you'd be hard pressed to find someone who doesn't think concepts such as rudeness and courtesy don't shift depending on context-namely, who is the instigator, how did they instigate if so, what is the past relationship, so on and so forth.
Things would be easier if people just knew, especially while they were doing it, when they were being polite or rude, but it's just not that simple. It's highly likely that anyone who *would* describe themselves as 'rude' to themselves, because under your idea they most likely know it, they will mean something quite different when they say rude than you do.
Kindness of thought may lubricate much (though it can also be quite detrimental quite easily too...depending on the context), but it really seems that what this outlook you're describing is lubricated by is wishing and it-would-be-good-ifs.
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How is trying to be polite, even to people you disagree with, wishing and it-would-be-good-ifs? Let alone quite easily detrimental?
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quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: Sure, end results very, as people take things different ways, but it sure is easy to spot someone who is trying very hard to be polite vs someone who isn't. And that effort can go a long way.
Kindness of thought lubricates difficult conversations.
You seem to confuse passive-aggressiveness for politeness. People who "try very hard" to be polite are typically failing at it, as these efforts ring false. .
Perhaps you should consider that: in being polite, it seems imperative to me that we not "show our work," because when we display the great efforts we make to be polite, we are actually showing our aggression and anger, and pretending not to. Politeness, real politeness, comes from a genuine concern for the feelings of other people. Not a need to be seen by others as proper and respectful.
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It's not the trying to be polite that is based on wishing, and trying to be polite will rarely be detrimental.
What I was saying was that this notion that people usually just know when they're being polite and rude, even if it goes unsaid, that's what's based on wishful thinking. It would be nice if it were true, except people have fundamental, major djfferences of opinion about whether a given thing is rude or not already-so the claim that people just know it is really only unsubstantiated mind-reading, based on your own personal interpretations of those two concepts which are highly subjective as it is.
As for kindness of thought, that can easily be detrimental if the person you're encountering doesn't have it. It's not unlike the golden rule: usually pretty damn solid among people who believe it, though not always, but when dealing with someone who doesn't it often needs modification.
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quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: You seem to confuse passive-aggressiveness for politeness. People who "try very hard" to be polite are typically failing at it, as these efforts ring false.
I disagree, and even if there are some who conceal a dagger tongue behind a thin veneer of politeness, they would not be who I'm talking about.
quote: Perhaps you should consider that: in being polite, it seems imperative to me that we not "show our work," because when we display the great efforts we make to be polite, we are actually showing our aggression and anger, and pretending not to.
I again don't agree with your conclusion, but you do make a good point about "not showing your work" and I thank you for bringing it to my attention.
quote:Politeness, real politeness, comes from a genuine concern for the feelings of other people. Not a need to be seen by others as proper and respectful.
Why is it mutually exclusive?
quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: ...people have fundamental, major differences of opinion about whether a given thing is rude or not already-so the claim that people just know it is really only unsubstantiated mind-reading...
I was saying that the person who is trying to be polite knows they are trying to be polite. Sure everybody fools themselves now and again into believing their motivations are better then they are in reality, and that is something to watch out for. You are right that miscommunication can cause for offense when none was meant, which is why it is even more important to -try- and be polite.
quote:As for kindness of thought, that can easily be detrimental if the person you're encountering doesn't have it.
Detrimental to whom? Sure, if you are nice when the other guy is mean, you are likely to take more crap that they will, but I do not understand your point, what is deteriorated by giving people the benefit of the doubt?
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posted
It's not mutually exclusive in the sense that one can take genuine care for other people's feelings *and* want to be seen as proper and respectful. It just isn't the same thing. If your motivation is primarily to be seen by others as proper, then you are concerned with yourself, and not others. Or rather, your efforts go towards controlling your interactions rather than working to the mutual benefit of both parties in an interaction. It's the difference between defensiveness and genuine caring. On the other hand, if you are motivated to help and please others, your politeness will not be that based in manipulation, eg: "saying something in the nicest way possible," when really the goal is the same, to control or change another person for your own benefit. Instead, your politeness will be based in respect for the other person, and not merely attention to what is required to manage that person and that interaction.
You've known people who don't care for others, but are "polite." we call it coldness, or sycophancy, or any number of negative descriptors. Falseness, and fakeness are this: manners which are intended to manipulate and impress, and not to genuinely comfort and welcome others.
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Sure they aren't the same thing, and it would be great if everyone was motivated by both, but remember, we are talking about being polite to people who's ideals one strongly disagree with, who's morality one find abhorrent. If one can manage to genuinely care about the feelings of someone like that, it is a great thing. If all one can manage is being respectful and proper for the sake of the community, then it's still better in my opinion then open animosity.
The word that stands out to me is "better", as in, when you compare two things, one is preferable. Being polite is better for the one being polite, and better for the one who receives the courtesy. It is better.
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Just don't fool yourself into thinking that good manners are ennobling. It's often quite the opposite.
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Honesty, hostility and courtesy are all separate issues.
I'm am simply making a case for a kinder, gentler form of discussion as it has obvious and clear benefits, for all concerned.
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quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: Just don't fool yourself into thinking that good manners are ennobling. It's often quite the opposite.
Good manners by definition are ennobling. But like any other virtue it must be properly understood and applied. It's little surprise to me that most people don't actually know how to properly censure, chide, or criticize. It's never actually taught in a formal setting, we just see people doing it, and try to pick up the lesson. It doesn't work that way, and usually we learn all the key phrases for poor censuring and try to excuse our inability that way. "I'm sorry I hurt your feelings but..."
"(Just about all uses of the word hypocrite)"
"I can't reason with you, your head is too far up your own butt"
"I'm just calling it how I see it/I don't hide my opinions that's dishonest."
I don't pretend to be even a proficient criticizer, but I'm definitely better at it than a lot of folks who seem to think they have a PHD in it by the age of 25 and they need learn no more.
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'Politeness, real politeness, comes from a genuine concern for the feelings of other people. Not a need to be seen by others as proper and respectful.' - Orincoro
I like this, but I think there is more to it. Even if we have this genuine concern for the feelings of other people, we can still use the wrong language. That's because we fall in the trap of thinking, if we want to be persuasive, we have to use persuasive terms as the clearest way to make our point, forgetting it is the message itself that should be convincing, not the language we wrap the message in. We use words like 'always' and 'never' and 'the truth is' , 'it is not right' etc. I have been practicing getting my own use of language better by writing just half a page with an opinion on something. Then I put it away and after a few hours, or the next day, I take it back and I start to replace all those extremes I used with more open, respectful terms, not to express doubt (my message should stay clear), but to show my opinion with respect for others. I can assure you, this exercise has been an eye opener for me, it is quite a lot I have to correct still, after practicing this for some time. It not only leads to a text that is much more friendly to read, but this way I also discover my own wishful thinking and mistakes: there where I tried to convince myself with convincing language but not with truth.
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quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: Just don't fool yourself into thinking that good manners are ennobling. It's often quite the opposite.
Good manners by definition are ennobling. But like any other virtue it must be properly understood and applied. It's little surprise to me that most people don't actually know how to properly censure, chide, or criticize. It's never actually taught in a formal setting, we just see people doing it, and try to pick up the lesson. It doesn't work that way, and usually we learn all the key phrases for poor censuring and try to excuse our inability that way. "I'm sorry I hurt your feelings but..."
I don't buy the premise. Courtesy in the sense of formality is not synonymous with respect. Good manners, and I'll use the term very broadly, encompasses following the terms of formality laid out by society, which rules change and are refined or abandoned as time passes. A good deal of what I think you could call "good manners," is not much to do with actually ennobling actions or values. Often good manners lead us to do and say things that are not in keeping with our best intentions, nor do they show genuine respect for others. Of course, good manners *can be* ennobling, but I hardly think good manners ennoble us as a matter of course. They are learned, and linked with noble action, but are in themselves only prescribed forms that can change and do become outdated or even harmful.
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'It's little surprise to me that most people don't actually know how to properly censure, chide, or criticize. It's never actually taught in a formal setting.' - Blackblade
Suggestion:
'In those countries where methods of proper censuring, chiding or criticizing are not taught in a formal setting, people might have problems expressing themselves to others in a respectful way.'
There is a difference between good manners and being careful with the settings we use in spoken and written language. Good manners are for example culture-dependent: What is polite in one country might be offensive in another. Carefully chosing one's setting though, out from the right view (the context of our opinion, the limits of this context), the right motivation (being friendly, respecting others), has not so much to do with good manners as with being open and honest.
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This is the best idea ever and I will always use it forever more, and anyone who doesn't use it is a total jerk and obviously has not a single decent human bone in their body. Forever and ever, amen. Posts: 6683 | Registered: Jun 2005
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There is also this to consider: admitting you are wrong is hard. How much harder is it if you have to admit you are wrong to someone who has been rude to you, someone who has arbitrarily assigned you negative motivations, someone who has treated you with contempt, as an enemy? Much harder. If you are kind and gentle in your approach not only are you more likely to have a receptive audience but one who has less of a vested interest in sticking by their guns.
Hatrack, I don't mean to preach at you, this not is stuff I know and you don't so I am schooling you in it. And I apologize if it has felt that way. I as much as anyone have struggled to keep my animosity in check.
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quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: Just don't fool yourself into thinking that good manners are ennobling. It's often quite the opposite.
Good manners by definition are ennobling. But like any other virtue it must be properly understood and applied. It's little surprise to me that most people don't actually know how to properly censure, chide, or criticize. It's never actually taught in a formal setting, we just see people doing it, and try to pick up the lesson. It doesn't work that way, and usually we learn all the key phrases for poor censuring and try to excuse our inability that way. "I'm sorry I hurt your feelings but..."
I don't buy the premise. Courtesy in the sense of formality is not synonymous with respect. Good manners, and I'll use the term very broadly, encompasses following the terms of formality laid out by society, which rules change and are refined or abandoned as time passes. A good deal of what I think you could call "good manners," is not much to do with actually ennobling actions or values. Often good manners lead us to do and say things that are not in keeping with our best intentions, nor do they show genuine respect for others. Of course, good manners *can be* ennobling, but I hardly think good manners ennoble us as a matter of course. They are learned, and linked with noble action, but are in themselves only prescribed forms that can change and do become outdated or even harmful.
I'm not limiting "good-manners" to any societal nuance or sensibility. I'm only talking about good-manners insofar as "Learning to communicate with your audience, and recognize what one needs to say so as to effectively convey an appropriate idea." Part of that is in how one presents themselves, but most of it, as far as a forum goes, is how one speaks. It's almost the sole criteria we can go on.
That is also why there is so much of a fixation on specific words, because we don't have things like facial expressions, tones of voice, or shared history to round out the meaning. It then behooves us to learn to write with perfect honesty, but also to reconsider that what we want to say, and would say if we were actually face to face, and say something else more suited to this medium.
Though perhaps all the cultural differences may make that impossible to a degree.
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quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: There is also this to consider: admitting you are wrong is hard. How much harder is it if you have to admit you are wrong to someone who has been rude to you, someone who has arbitrarily assigned you negative motivations, someone who has treated you with contempt, as an enemy? Much harder. If you are kind and gentle in your approach not only are you more likely to have a receptive audience but one who has less of a vested interest in sticking by their guns.
Hatrack, I don't mean to preach at you, this not is stuff I know and you don't so I am schooling you in it. And I apologize if it has felt that way. I as much as anyone have struggled to keep my animosity in check.
I, on the other hand, do not think it is useful to spare the feelings of people (aged uncles and grandparents possibly excepted) of people who work to deny families to people. They should not be given excuses and allowed to feel "okay" about doing such damage to the lives of other people because of their warped ideas.
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quote:I, on the other hand, do not think it is useful to spare the feelings of people (aged uncles and grandparents possibly excepted) of people who work to deny families to people.
To mention, it's not like we're talking about someone who just holds a view and we're accosting him in his own dining room over how much we hate his views. We're talking about an active and incendiary columnist who is engaged in a bitter campaign full of insults and derogatory labeling of entire groups and who holds a chairman position in one of the largest and most comically horrendous activist groups working against gays.
Activism (especially of card's baldly impolite variety) does not come with a vaunted no-tagbacks tower where you can harrumph at the "leftaliban" and only deserve politeness in return.
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No, that's not my point at all. It's about how what a person "deserves" versus what they are doing in the first place; the easiest way to deserve politeness in regards to your views is to be polite about your views, among other things.
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I'll put it this way. If I start a column in which I argue my own insistence of a specific public policy — strenuously and constantly barbed with insults and vitriol, frequently condemning viewpoints that run counter to my own as ridiculous and calling their proprietors as 'insane' and whatnot — and am one of the heads of an equally confrontational front group that has all but engaged in hate speech and divisive manipulations, do I "deserve" politeness? Or do I have no specific claim to deserving politeness?
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Yes. Because the need to be polite is unaffected by who one is addressing. I am polite because being rude harms others as well as myself. Morally I cannot conceive of a situation where being rude or cruel is necessary. Can you? And I don't mean "tactically". I mean morally it's the right thing to do.
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quote:Because the need to be polite is unaffected by who one is addressing.
you sound like you are coaching this in the idea that Polite and Rude exist more or less in a binary, where if you are not being polite, you are being rude. I can think of thousands of situations in which someone is not at all deserving of politeness, and where not offering them politeness is not automatically doing the morally wrong thing.
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quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: Yes. Because the need to be polite is unaffected by who one is addressing. I am polite because being rude harms others as well as myself. Morally I cannot conceive of a situation where being rude or cruel is necessary. Can you? And I don't mean "tactically". I mean morally it's the right thing to do.
BlackBlade, was it polite for black people to sit in restaurants where they were specifically not wanted and refuse to leave? Is it polite for protesters to inconvenience people by intruding on public spaces? Did a lot of those old testament prophets preface their exhortations with, "If you don't mind" and "I don't want to hurt your feelings but..."?
Speaking truth to power sometimes requires offending people.
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Boots: It isn't about not offending people, as people can get offended by -anything-, it is about not being overtly rude. Because it makes you less.
Want to murk up an issue? Act like a jerk to someone who is morally wrong. Want to make it unclear who is the hot head, who is the crazy, who is doing damage to our society? Easy, stoop to the lowest level you can, throw the most crap you can find, make sure that the other side knows you hate not only their views, but them as persons for having them. Done, easy, now no one can possibly occupy high ground as there is none left to stand on.
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Again, this comes back to a fundamental disagreement. That is to say, with certain people and beliefs, speaking truthfully even without any intent to cut or hurt personally, it will simply be rude. There isn't any way around it. Someone can find me a 'polite' way to tell someone their beliefs about public policy are destructive, unnecessary, wicked, and that those beliefs are rooted in willful ignorance borne of dislike, fear, and perhaps even some degree of hatred for a given minority group.
Now there very well may be a way of saying such a thing politely-for the sake of argument, assume that is a true review of that particular belief on public policy-but if so, I can't imagine it. And I'll bet any such rhetoric you can create will certainly not be seen as polite by the listener...in which case we're back to courtesy being important just so the speaker can know he was courteous. That seems like a kissing cousin to self-righteousness to me.
I'm not saying 'be courteous, even if they don't deserve it' (and really, some people just don't, there is no inborn 'right' to be treated with dignity and respect that is totally inviolate), isn't a good rule. Because it is. Communication will be more clear, more fights will be avoided, etc. But y'all are going a bit further than that, with ideas such as 'rudeness makes you less'. I disagree. I think that there are times when rudeness isn't just understandable but actually appropriate.
Now, as to what I meant about detrimental ideas, I was referring specifically to the idea that we should assume kindness of thought as a general rule. This is a good idea, but *only* when the person you're dealing with is either neutral or also thinks kindly of your thoughts. In other cases, it has a solid chance of being harmful.
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