More good "meat" to bounce off of, Xeno...you're on a roll. --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "Xenophaneros Anartaxius" <anartaxius@...> wrote: > > As far as I can see, Barry conserves his energy for what > he likes to do. If he does not engage in an argument, > perhaps he knows this, perhaps not, but he is saving > himself a lot of work by not engaging. It is really > amazing how much energy is required to maintain the > world of our thought intact against an outer world > that does not quite ever seem to fit in with them.
And wouldn't give a shit if we managed TO "maintain the world of our thought." NOTHING in the universe cares if our self "wins" an argument but that self. > ...I think you spend a much greater amount of energy > maintaining your world view than Barry does, and > whatever else he may be or does, in regard to the > forum, he has the advantage of conserving his energy > because he doesn't care. He seems to be able to take > and leave a point of view. Exactly. > You seem to care, and that means you have to maintain > a point of view. One of the things that Xeno didn't really touch on but that I will, springboarding off of his foundation, is not just the amount of energy that the compulsive "defender of a world view" requires to defend her POV, but the amount of energy she expects the people she is arguing with to expend. It's downright RUDE to be constantly trying to lure people into tarbaby arguments that you then don't allow them to leave. The two worst offenders on this forum are classic examples of this. Someone says something in 20 words that offends them because it runs counter to their world view, and they feel compelled to reply in 200 words, sometimes more, taunting the original poster into "getting into it" with them, and defending his or her offending statement. If the original poster is foolish enough TO get into it with either of these motormouths, that's just the start of it; both of these compulsive arguers will try to keep the argument going for as long as humanly possible, and will go so far as to insult the victim if he or she tries to escape. Classic tarbaby scenario; Uncle Remus would be proud. OK, it's obvious that this behavior indicates that the people who provoke such arguments have no clue about how much energy it takes for *them* to do it. My point is that they don't even for a moment consider the amount of energy it requires of their *victims* to participate in it. Their whole world view seems to be, "OF COURSE it's worth your time and energy to argue with me; I'm worth it, because...uh...because I'm ME!" It's totally ego-based, with no care whatsoever for whether the other person considers the point being argued about important or considers the person trying to lure them into an argument important. The only important thing for these two compulsive motormouths -- as far as I can tell, from my POV -- is that people focus on them, read every word they write, and are willing to be sucked into long arguments about the things they write. Bzzzzzzzt. Can you say NOT WORTH MY TIME? I think you can. Think of the energy saved by just realizing what these people are up to, what their game is, and then refusing to play. I never have to expend any of my energy even reading the stuff they write, much less arguing about it. I can instead spend whatever energy I wish to devote to this forum bouncing off of ideas like the ones you brought up in this series of posts and having fun with them. As you say, I don't have to argue about my "having fun" posts, or defend anything I say in them, I can just write them for fun. Thanks for writing -- and acting -- in such a way as to make that possible, Xeno. It's the polar opposite of what both Judy and Robin do.
