"Gone Mental" (was Re: WHY TM CAN'T BE LEARNED FROM A BOOK) --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "seventhray1" <steve.sundur@...> wrote: > > --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb <no_reply@> wrote: > > So the time may be approach- > > ing in which I'm not gonna find anything posted here inter- > > esting enough to reply to. It's all been done to death and > > argued endlessly *in exactly the same words* for decades > > now. SO been there, done that. > > We are not worthy!
Some are more worthy than others. :-) > Actually, I think if Barry wanted to be honest about it, > his posting here is more akin to what we probably all did > at least once or twice when we were eight year olds - namely > ringing someone's door bell and then running away. > > I mean, sheesh, if you are into pushing peoples buttons, > why not stick around every once in a while instead of going > and hiding behind a tree. Barry Wright: Why bother? Everything I need to know about who got their buttons pushed and how severely they got pushed is visible in Yahoo's Message View. Santa Claus: Barry, Baby, you are asserting something without any feel for the way it is playing in reality. This is called perfect subjective dislocation from the necessary feedback which the universe is giving you. Get it, Barry? When you blow your nose on your sleeve, there is some mucus there which, if you want to still look pretty, you have to remove. You can't just say: The Kleenex idea, it's just an opinion. My sleeve is just as good an absorber of my snot as your bloody Kleenex. I don't need no fucking KleenexYou wimps. I blow my snot on myself and you guys offer me a Kleenex: Hey, I guess I pressed your button once more! Barry Wright: And I thought I stated quite explicitly that I don't feel I "owe" anyone here anything. Not a response to something they post, and certainly not an argument or an impassioned defense of something I said. Santa Claus: If you tell us, Barry, that ice-cream tastes good because of the placebo effect, we are not exercised about this. It don't bother us ice-cream eaters that much. Even though you used to be one of those who licked down to the bottom and then ate the cone. The deliciousness of ice-cream: just so you know, everyone: That was trained moodmaking. Maybe. Maybe not. But if in trying to tell us ice-cream just tasted good because we were told it was good, then it isn't really a matter of opinion, Barry: it is a matter of negative wish-fulfillment. It is not a question of opinion. It is a question of the sensation in your mouth. For some reason you tasted a different brand of ice-cream [by the way, I stopped eating that damn ice-cream myselfnot good for me; still I don't say it didn't go down good with me at the time]and then found yourself having to kill off the old ice-cream memories. But your ice-cream makeryour second onedidn't he choke to death on one of his own cones? My opinion, maybe; but if he's not sending you any e-mails, and can't be located anywhere, maybe it's not an opinion. Your last Guru, Barry: he's dead. That's my strongest opinion. You aren't, are youmerely giving your opinions when you get your hate on about someone on FFL, are you, Barry boy? Opinions mean some absence of knowledge. But you, surely if you were only expressing opinions in your hatred, would have to question the truthfulness of these opinions. And since you give us your opinions about, say, the geocentric reality of the universe, us Galileos, have to set you right: the universe is not Barry-centric; it is, as far as we can tellscientists will back this up with their opinionsheliocentric. Is Sati merely a matter of opinion, Barry? Should a woman be obliged to throw herself upon her husband's funeral pyre? Is your hatred of Judy mere opinion? Do you hold your views to be opinions only? How can an opinion generate intense feelings of hostility? And why, Barry dearest, do you ever refuse to argue out your case? Barry, if you expressed your attitude and beliefs *as if you knew when you stated them* they were just opinions, and they held only this status with you, then why are you bothered when we come back with our opinions about your opinions? You say x is y here at FFL. Does that mean that if someone realizes that x is not y, that making this known to you constitutes your having pressed their buttons? If you truly felt everything everyone said here on FFL was just opining, then why not join in the fun and defend yourself against counter-opining? You seem to take very seriously everything anyone says here contra your own opinions, because you are silent and unresponsive. This decision *never ever to rebut those who disagree with you*, that is decision you make at the level of opinion? As in: it is my opinion that no matter what Robin or anyone's else says, I should not respond? But if *that* is but an opinion, Barry, then perhaps it is a mistaken opinion. Perhaps your refusal to enter into the fray is determined by something way beyond opinion. It is determined by some kind of experience you have which tells you: I must never, under any circumstances, answer my critics. This ain't giving an opinion to yourself, Barry; this is based upon the subjective knowledge you have of yourself, which says: No matter what: I ain't going into battle. And the alternative to facing the music, Barry? To keep saying: You guys are just giving your opinions, and by writing anything in disagreement with me you are proving that I have stimulated you to do this, meanwhile, in my rigid and inexplicable muteness I am following a profound revelation. Well, your decision to not say anything after throwing one of your bricks, Barry: that is very much a willed act. For anyone to respond to you, that presses the button *in you*, Barry Baby, which says: Turn off everything and retreat. And then, after a while, start throwing bricks again. Barry: What I say is OPINION. What *they* say is OPINION. Neither of these OPINIONS has anything to do with "truth" or anything even remotely like it. Santa Claus: And this, Barry: "What *they* say is OPINION. Neither of these OPINIONS has anything to do with "truth" or anything even remotely like it"IS THIS AN OPINION? Is that not an opinion? How does this dogmatic statement constitute anything but an opinion? Please explain, Barry. Out of everything anyone has ever saidyou: uson FFL, are we to assume that this very assertion is the one exception to merely expressing an opinion? You seem to have forgotten your own creed, Barry. Because in this very declaration you really are providing the paradigmatic example of OPINION. If what you say here is NOT an OPINION, then how can my saying it is bullshit not have the same status as what you say, which I must believe you believe to be NOT AN OPINION? You are confused, Barry Wright. You are inadvertently paradoxical. I am doing my best to teach you, Barry; but you are a somewhat obstinate pupil. Barry: I am content with merely stating my opinions and then watching the reactions to them. Some, it would seem, are not. They feel that they are "owed" some kind of argument or debate or discussion about their opinions, as if by offering up one that is contrary to theirs you "have" to become a captive audience to how they got their buttons pushed, or their attempts to push yours in response. Not my idea of discussion, sorry. Santa Claus: You set the agenda with your opinions, Barry. We respond sincerely and honestly with our own opinions about the validity of your opinions. How is it we are to understand "my idea of discussion" if you only want to state your opinions without having anyone remark on how those opinions seem to fit into reality? No, it seems, dear boy, that you want to exercise the prerogative of getting your opinions outsome of which are negatively charged with affect [as I have pointed out elsewhere in a recent FFL post]and not elicit any kind of response to this freely chosen decision of yours to give your opinions. Isn't it true, that if each and every one of us posted back that we agreed with you, you would find that acceptable, and would not tarnish us with the accusation we are just acting because you've pushed our buttons? Would not that too be opinion-making as well?to concur with Barry every time he posts? "I am content with merely stating my opinions and then watching the reactions to them. It would seem they are not." Now I can only read this as meaning: I am happy to make severe and definitive judgments about certain issues, and have no attachment to defending these judgments. If FFL readers find my judgments faulty or obnoxious or ridiculous or indefensible, they surely know better than to "merely state their counter-opinions". They should remain silent in the face of my hurling insults or saying things which are designed to offendnot just offend people personally, Barrythat doesn't really bother me a bitbut rather offend the universal sense of truth and honesty: that's where I have a problem when you press my buttons. You say something stupid or irresponsible, Barry and we respond. It is true you then DON'T RESPOND; but don't you see, dear boy, that THAT ITSELF is just as much a response as if you did offer a rebuttal? We are condemned to be free, Barry, as one famous continental philosopher put it: and you are condemned to be judged for the opinion you express by not responding to the honest criticism of your opinion. That you think your silence constitutes proof of your detachment and equipoise in this circumstance is a rather pathetic and misinformed idea of reality, Barry, for your silence is, as it turns out, much more peculiar and strange (because of the psychological context within which it occurs) than any opinion that I have seen expressed here on FFL in opposition to what you have said in a given post. And the proof of this is how you defend yourself in these two posts of today. If your refusal to engage in debate with your critics was evidence of some disciplined existential act of freedom, we would be able to realize the proof of this when you came, as you have this morning, to post in defence of your actions. As it is, in arguing in the unconvincing and contradictory way you have here, you make us understand why you do not respond: it must bethis is merely an opinion, Barrybecause you have decided that no response represents the best response. But it is still a response, Barryand *you really don't understand why you don't respond*. You are a victim of your own unfathomed compulsions, Barry. Again, Barry, if you throw a stone at someone, if you strike at their beliefs, if you say up is down (or pretty close to this), how is it that the person or persons on the end of this are acting in a manner which is anything else but normal, responsible, and sane. What is abnormal, irresponsible, and quasi-insane is your opinionand unfortunately your opinion here conceals the truth about yourself to yourselfthat *any* response to Barry Wright proves that he has pressed your button. It is a curious world you inhabit, Barry. Just my opinion, mind you. But I have thought it out very carefully. Now if it were merely your opinion that: I will not respond to Santa Claus todaythen the act of not responding would be validated when you did come to explain why you did not respond. As it is, we can safely predict your reasonings for not responding to this Santa Claus post will be as unconvincing and as ineffectual as the reasonings inherent in your first two posts of today. What a bitter and angry fellow I am. Right, Barry? Barry: I just spout opinions, and allow others to do the same. I hold no one on this forum's (and, for that matter, no one on this planet's) opinions to be better than my own. They are on exactly the same equal footing as what they are -- OPINIONS. Santa Claus: According to this idea, Barry, then each one of us should just state an opinionbut never post anything in response to what anyone has specifically said in a previous post. Does this meet the criterion of your idea of a discussion: not to discuss? It is your OPINION that everything said here amounts to just opinions, and every opinion is equal to every other opinion. Well, then, it is my opinion that you are wrong. Is that opinion invalidated as an opinion? Why is my counter-post to your two posts of today somehow outside the category of opinion, and therefore just as legitimatesince it is after all but an opinionas your opinion that I have only responded to your posts because you have pressed my buttons? Is the assertion that this post represents your having pressed my buttons something more than an opinion, Barry? At what point and under what circumstances do you deem the discussionabout anythingto leave off the realm of opinion and enter into the realm of knowledge and fact and truth? Because you see, Barry, I am right out of the realm of opinion as I write this, and you will have to give more than your opinion that I am wrong in coming to this determination, even if it, seen objectively, is in fact just an opinion. Barry, buddy, you ain't motivated by opinion in these matters which touch your own person and your core beliefs; you are motivated by feelings and desires and memories and attitudes. If we felt you were only giving your opinions (where your posts generate controversy and tension), then we would accord your posts this interpretation. But as it is, the grumpy and misanthropic Barry Wright injects so much sullenness, resentment, and contempt into many of his posts (when not writing reviews of TV shows or movieswhen he gets more 'personal'or is discussing TM, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the Puja, the TM Movement, and Enlightenment) that we are forcedeven against our willto construe his posts as something not bearing much relation to 'opinion'; but rather assuming the form of strong reaction and judgmentfor if Barry Wright thought he was but expressing opinions, these so-called opinions would not be charged with so much negative emotion. The very absence of generosity and fairness and equity in Barry's posts (many of them: the ones certainly that ask for rebuttal) is proof of their origin in anything but abstract opinion. Barry: Those who don't feel that their opinions ARE opinions are welcome to make a big to-do about that and actNy like drama queens. I shall graciously allow them to do so, while chuckling from behind my tree. :-) Sant Claus: Again, sweet Barry Baby, you are onlyby your own argumentexpressing opinions here. And if every post amounts to just opinion, then you will surely appreciate that I have only done what you have doneand therefore you should encourage me in my opining. If there is anyone on FFL who wishes to make of Barry Wright's controversial posts and his defence of his withdrawal from the responsibility to stand behind those postssomething other than how I have interpreted this Barry Phenomenon here in this post, I would like to hear from you. But I don't want to have someone mount a defence of Barry by systematically ignoring the essentials of my argument here. I wish to be addressed directly in what I say. And until someone does this, I will assume that what I have said here goes way beyond opinion; I believe I am stating what are the facts in this matter. I am saying what happens to be the case.
