On snowballs, morons and the evolution of oops
I wish that we could promise not to call anyone an idiot if we are unable to explain or show why they are an idiot on the basis of their actions or words And by that I mean every single time we want to insult a person's mentality we must corroborate our claims I'd rather it wasn't a last resort at all but I'm willing to make this escape clause-- If after we take the time to make a reasonable, logical argument in which we clearly succeed, not necessarily in winning over the opposition, but in disarming their assertions-- we can call them stupid (remembering to explain why every time). I'm willing to make this escape clause because I believe that if a lot of us took the time to do this, we'd be much less likely to get into these "my penis is bigger than yours" arguments. I wish that when we disagree or are unable to connect with what someone is saying, we try to fight the arrogance in us that wants us to conclude that this means this person is not intelligent or that we are more intelligent. I know this seems simplistic. I know we all heard it at school. I know it's very easy to say, 'Of course I understand basic respect'. But there's knowing something and there's having it repeated so many times it's inside you. I'm sure a lot of us know this but who among us can say that they practice it scrupulously? Who hasn't done or said something that snowballed? I have nothing against snowballs-- but it seems like so many of them are accidents now. I have nothing against accidents-- but it's like accidents have become the norm and doing something on purpose has become the new form of accident The point is-- I promise to stop using the words stupid, idiot, moron etc. like they're some abstract universal I've only been doing it for a little while but it's one of those little things that has satisfyingly snowballed in the direction I aimed |