If that is the case, then, you also have to accept that you are going to be less effective in changeing people’s minds than you would be otherwise. Perhaps we look at this differently, but when I post to a thread like this it is becasue I think I am right and someone else is wrong and I want them to understand and agree with my insight. I want to make them think like me. (Obviously "name your favorite . . .-type threads are in a different catagory). I don’t get on to you because your abrasive approach is mean, I get on to you because you are shooting yourself in the foot, rhetorically speaking. You are not being productive. What was to be gained by pushing the subject after TenBen had ackowledged you were right? To an outside observer, it looks like you find it really important not just that an opponent learn the error of thier ways but that they publicaly admit that you were right and that they were wrong. What is wrong with letting him preserve a little dignity?
An important insight that helps me on message boards is the realization that you almost never win arguements here and now. All you do is plant seeds, and if they are good seeds and your aqrguement is strong, than they will grow in the mind of the person you planted them in and a year from now that person will think they always thought what you taught them. You never get the satisfaction of winning, but if you are right, you win more often than you know. And you are a smart person, Diane, and your arguements are usually strong. Give people a few months or years to stew over them, don’t force them to decide right this minute whether or not you are right.
I asked him to clarify a comment that I saw as a wave of the hand dismissal toward those who tried to help by giving him advice with the “beating my head against the wall” comment to mean that he was through trying to convince us that this waitress was an “idiot” and a “dumbass”.
I asked him to explain or tell me whether I was wrong in my interpretation. Maybe it wasn’t a big deal, but his clarification would have made the difference between my respect or my opinion that he didn’t hear a word anyone had said. If I didn’t want to know, I wouldn’t have asked. I don’t know about you, but I would rather have someone know what I meant by my words than jump to their own conclusions.
I thought his second reply was an over reaction and I told him so.
Unlike a few others, I will not tell anyone how or what they should post on these boards, I’ll leave that to the mods. If someone has a problem with something I say or do, they have every right to state their feelings. If I make the decision to say something, good or bad, then I have made the decision that I better be ready to handle the responses. Again, good or bad.
However, it works the same for everyone on this board. If I make the choice to put my words out there for the world to see and if I am willing to defend, debate, back-up, or just participate in idle chit-chat, why must I do it in a manner that is not mine? Why is it felt that I need to go by one or two poster’s guidelines as to what is the correct way to do so? I don’t expect the rest of the board to do it my way, why is it asked of me?
Diane, no one is suggesting you shouldn’t be “you”. All I have ever attempted to explain is that if the reason you post is to change people’s minds, you are not as effective as you could be–and you could be very effective because you are a smart woman and a careful reader. If you are not hoping to enlighten anyone, or to make them change thier minds, to show them a new way of thinking, then ignore everything I have said.
All of us ajust our communication style in order to be more effective. Otherwise we’d each speak/write in our own private language. To do so is not to sell out the “real me”.
Today my gentleman friend took me to lunch, to a place we’ve been probably dozens of times. The wait staff know us, if not by name, by sight (we’re kind of a memorable looking pair).
My gentleman friend has always, I mean Every Single Time, paid for my meal at restaurants. Always.
Waitress today asked if we wanted separate checks. ::Sigh::