I Cogitate
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Willful Ignorance
Hey, I'll talk respectfully with just about anybody anytime. Does that put me in a minority? Hey, maybe that's a 'protected-class' and--no, no, we don't want to go there, do we? I'm off on another of those damn tangents, so back to point.
Our manner of discourse in this country, especially the media type but also person-to-person, has too often unfortunately 'devolved' to one of a Roman Colosseum-like gladiator/gladiatress shouting the loudest, 'vanquishing' the opponent, getting his/her hand raised in victory and becoming the frontrunner for the next vacant host spot on MSNBC.
Facts and civility get mothballed for volume and spin.
Or the anchor dragging all to the bottom is the attention-deficit-disorder-like, rapid-fire positing of questions, without so much as taking a breath awaiting a response. Are you listening Chris Mathews? Don't mistake style for quality. Incisive questions throw people off point much better than an oral barrage.
But I'm not clamoring for all social intercourse to be akin to an English tea party. There is room for some of the Boston tea party. Verbal jousting and a touch of roughhousing is just fine. But louder doesn't equate with better and lies or half-truths do not advance personal or audience knowledge
Hold it--on second thought, let me amend my opening sentence. Oh, c'mon, it's not like I'm amending the Constitution because two human beings want to 'unionize,' so to speak, but I am daigressing yet again.
I would struggle discussing matters with those who choose to remain ill-informed. Yes, we blue staters were castigated by the punditocracy right after the 2004 presidential election to not be so snooty and to open avenues of appreciative discourse with those who think and feel differently than ourselves. (Hell, members of my own political party fit the description of that latter half of the previous sentence!)
Well, I have no problem with that. Doing such should be a daily act on the part of all human beings.
The question I have is how to do so with those who choose to believe such illusions as Saddam Hussein being behind the acts of terrorism on 9/11, as stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction being located in Iraq, as Usama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein being virtually one and the same, and so on.
One would have to be getting a fill of news solely from Fox or Sinclair Broadcasting or The New York Post to still maintain such beliefs. If such individuals would be willing to change their minds (as I should if my 'facts' are proven incorrect) then a full exchange of views would be healthy, educational and worthwhile.
If not, why would such communication even be appropriate, let alone feasible? It would be a waste of that element we can never manufacture more of--time.
This type of discourse reminds me of the Zen koan about a tree falling in the forest--if no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound? If two (or more) people are blathering to closed ears and minds, has an interchange of ideas taken place?
Maybe it all boils down to the parallel universes of opinions and facts. I may have a disagreement with opinion but facts are indisputable. I have no problem with someone harboring a different conclusion than me about an issue. But for someone to deny factual truth because it fails to 'fit' into that individual's 'thought universe' is simply unacceptable.
Why bother engaging such individuals in such a nonbeneficial manner? I'm from Mars and they're from Uranus.
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