On 09/26/2016 11:32 PM, xorc...@sigaint.org wrote: Maybe fix your mail client to attribute quotes?
>> Right, to understand people, you need to see things as they might. > > Of course! > >> >> But that doesn't mean that you agree with what they say and do. > > Of course not! :) .. the way far-out example I usually give to this is > someone like a serial killer. If they were sexually, physically, and > mentally abused by their mother for years, and then she dies before he's > had a chance to confront her in any way, it is easy to see how someone > might feel a deep hatred and intense, driving compulsion -- an incredible > hunger -- that can only be sated by killing prostitutes that happen to > look vaguely like his mother did. Well, we all have shit like that going on, albeit far more subtle ;) In _Foundations of Psychohistory_, Lloyd Demause discusses the evolution of child-rearing methods in recent centuries, and explores implications for economics, politics, etc. Behavior of societies collectively reflects their members' childhoods. > I can understand compulsions. Hungers. I can understand that, left to his > own devices, it is impossible for him to resist that urge for long. > > None of that understanding means that I think they shouldn't be locked up, > of course. For sure, after due process. > But neither am I so swift at judging him in the emotional way that people > do, calling him a monster. He's not a monster. He's a human being. One > that was broken before he knew how to talk, probably. We're all broken, in one way or another. > Not that I'm above finding people monstrous. > >> >> And it doesn't even mean that you are willing to take a position about >> them. Sometimes, there's just no point, because there's nothing useful >> about it. You just do what you're committed to, based on your own >> principles and values. > > Indeed. I tend to look at things in terms of, what can we work together > on, rather than what can we fight/argue about. I'm not interested, at all, > in "converting" a die-hard National party type to my way of thinking. Nor > am I interested in destroying someone's religious faith. They are entitled > to their beliefs. I don't need them to agree with me to validate my own. Sometimes, when I'm finding myself disagreeing with others, I get that we're just using different language, or different frameworks, to say the same thing. Or maybe it's just that we don't have a clue, really ;) > To me, its rather like being the type of asshole that needs to get into > bar fights and all that nonsense. Just a deeply frustrated person looking > to prove themselves. Some claim that it's all just good fun ;) > To the extent that a good, Church-going Christian and I can work together > to DO something we both want to do, I'm happy. I'll even make small > changes to my behavior to accommodate their sensibilities, if needed. I'd > certainly have no issue with not swearing, for example. Other things I > wouldn't change..for example there are some people.. women, and homosexual > men.. that I give hugs to when I greet them. Right, and they don't harp on the damned goin' to Hell thing ;) > Hell, I like to THINK that I'd be OK with working with a Nazi who wanted > to do something positive too. Nazis are not uncommon in privacy/anonymity circles. Just sayin'. >> I have no clue about that. He might just have good advisors. Or maybe he >> and US leaders all work for the same people, and are just playing their >> assigned roles. It's really very hard for outsiders to know. >> > > That is an excellent point. In his defense, I'd just say that from what > I've seen of him, in unscripted exchanges, he seems far more erudite, and > together than any Western politician I'm familiar with. Not that I'm a > student of such things, so I could certainly be out of my depth on that. Well, Kissinger likes him ;)
