Posted by Undustan Kant on September 6, 2007, at 23:11:43
In reply to Re: test, posted by gardenergirl on September 3, 2007, at 14:23:02
I’ve never understood why people take prominent roles in web forums then announce they are leaving, but don’t.
I’ve never understood why some people need to quiz others about their behavior when those others' behavior has no impact on the person quizzing.
Sometimes the only thing I get out of reading someone’s message saying they don’t understand somebody else is the feeling the person being quizzed might be irrational, or beyond understanding. Other times, or at the same times, I get the feeling a person might talk about how they don’t understand someone else to encourage me to feel the person is not understandable, or not rational.
Why remind others that posts containing the word “test” are sometimes efforts to start posting again after being subject to a punitive action?
When I read messages expressing a person's lack of understanding and their failure to comprehend, I ask myself, why do they need to understand?
When I see such statements, I ask myself, is their statement that they don’t understand constructed so as to help them develop an understanding? Does the person stating that they don’t understand something explore any possible understandings in an effort to correct a misunderstanding, or does it simply convey their sense of incomprehensibility with regard to the subject.
For example, if a person does not understand why a person clears their throat before they start speaking, do they say “I don’t understand why people clear their throat before they start speaking” or do they offer reasons a reasonable person might consider, such as “I don’t understand why a person might clear their throat before speaking – sometimes it seems they are trying to refine the acoustic environment of their throat, or are they uttering a sound to see if others in the area respond to the sound, so as to test if anyone is listening before they start speaking. Or, maybe the person doesn’t want to waste mental energy expressing thoughts when nobody is listening. I don’t know. Can you tell me what is your reason?”
Sometimes when I read some messages in some places where people are expressing an inability to understand, I ask myself, does this person have a history of trying to understand others? Do they, in other texts, demonstrate skills for collaborative development of understanding, or do their expressions of incomprehension often correlate with others feeling incomprehensible? Do they generally help others develop a sense of purposefulness or a sense of worthlessness?
I particularly don’t understand forum administrators who pretend to foster civil, supportive dialogue, but who, over a period of several years, nurture and even empower as authorities in that forum people who often engage in conversations that tend to result in others feeling worthless. Sometimes I wonder if such a person feels worthless.
One time, I met a wealthy man working in a care-giving profession who said others might express concerns about the wealth he and his peers accumulate because they envy him and his peers. I felt put down when he minimized my disclosure that I often feel repulsed by people who accumulate wealth with no concern for justice, for others who are hungry and homeless and who use their wealth in such a way to destroy the opportunities for life-forms to survive on his planet. The poor fellow just couldn’t understand that I want no part of what he has, that I feel sickened to even consider living that way myself.
poster:Undustan Kant
thread:780570
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/admin/20070817/msgs/781299.html