470: Basic Truths
I post these as observed fact, though you may well interpret those facts as you like 9_9 such as, "Julie needs new glasses 'cause she's seeing things," or whatever X/ Regardless, I have observed two things. First:
People are willing to hate [or, more rarely, love] someone on the basis of what someone else tells them. As observed evidence, colt_steele asked me last night if I'd killed Cow yet* and commented that he HATED her, and he hasn't even met her. This is simply something people do--look at how many people hate Osama bin Laden, or Dubya, when they've never met. I'm not really criticizing this action, merely observing it. What I would have to criticize, though, is if someone totally blasts someone else--say, Joe Blow--then turns around maybe a day later and says, "Hey, Joe's not bad, you should leave him alone." I get seriously mixed messages from this kind of behaviour--if you want me to befriend others, don't talk shit about them the first you ever mention them to me.
*Oddly, I had forgotten all about Cow and Bull, in the--what?--two weeks since they abruptly stopped showing up. There's a second anecdote in here that I don't know if I should post, though.
Second: People won't follow links. I could link all day and tell you to read what these other people have to say, but almost none of you would, preferring instead to reply to keywords in my posts and possibly getting entirely the wrong meaning [skimming is another fault, one I'm trying to avoid in particular]. If you're going to reply, at least read the entirety of what I say. Mind, it's problematic that sometimes I quote somebody that's talking in slightly ambiguous or contextually-sarcastic terms. This is perhaps mostly my fault for failing to provide proper context.
A token third: Rights are a two-way street. Some of you know about the college student protesting for her right to speak freely against homosexuals and dismiss her because she's clearly a bigot. The problem is that the First Amendment guarantees her this right, the same way any of us have the right to call her an ignorant, angry bitch with an agenda. If she's not directly killing people with sticks or anything like that, she has the government-given right to be closedminded, even if it tempts the oppositely-closedminded to kill her with violence.
Alternately, if she's trying to speak out in a private arena--my house, for instance--I have the right as private owner to tell her to shut up and get out of my house. Publically, though, rights are granted--she can proclaim her bigotry near the bus stop on the corner and no one can really tell her she's not allowed to talk.
Fundamentally, the world as a whole simply needs to learn how to leave each other alone and accept other people as different, plain and simple. Apparently people don't like plain and simple, though.
For the record.
People are willing to hate [or, more rarely, love] someone on the basis of what someone else tells them. As observed evidence, colt_steele asked me last night if I'd killed Cow yet* and commented that he HATED her, and he hasn't even met her. This is simply something people do--look at how many people hate Osama bin Laden, or Dubya, when they've never met. I'm not really criticizing this action, merely observing it. What I would have to criticize, though, is if someone totally blasts someone else--say, Joe Blow--then turns around maybe a day later and says, "Hey, Joe's not bad, you should leave him alone." I get seriously mixed messages from this kind of behaviour--if you want me to befriend others, don't talk shit about them the first you ever mention them to me.
*Oddly, I had forgotten all about Cow and Bull, in the--what?--two weeks since they abruptly stopped showing up. There's a second anecdote in here that I don't know if I should post, though.
Second: People won't follow links. I could link all day and tell you to read what these other people have to say, but almost none of you would, preferring instead to reply to keywords in my posts and possibly getting entirely the wrong meaning [skimming is another fault, one I'm trying to avoid in particular]. If you're going to reply, at least read the entirety of what I say. Mind, it's problematic that sometimes I quote somebody that's talking in slightly ambiguous or contextually-sarcastic terms. This is perhaps mostly my fault for failing to provide proper context.
A token third: Rights are a two-way street. Some of you know about the college student protesting for her right to speak freely against homosexuals and dismiss her because she's clearly a bigot. The problem is that the First Amendment guarantees her this right, the same way any of us have the right to call her an ignorant, angry bitch with an agenda. If she's not directly killing people with sticks or anything like that, she has the government-given right to be closedminded, even if it tempts the oppositely-closedminded to kill her with violence.
Alternately, if she's trying to speak out in a private arena--my house, for instance--I have the right as private owner to tell her to shut up and get out of my house. Publically, though, rights are granted--she can proclaim her bigotry near the bus stop on the corner and no one can really tell her she's not allowed to talk.
Fundamentally, the world as a whole simply needs to learn how to leave each other alone and accept other people as different, plain and simple. Apparently people don't like plain and simple, though.
For the record.