The Most Brilliant Woman in the World
Besides being The Most Brilliant Woman in the World, I am also a Magnificently Methodical Southern Woman.
I do not apologize for being clear about my strengths and recognize that if it's a fact it ain't bragging.
I mention these two titles simply to say that what you will read next is only one more example of my brilliant methodicalness and if you have to put on sunglasses to protect your eyes as you read it, then you have been forewarned.
I am one member of a 42K+ Bacefook group built around Thomas Sowell. I happen to like Thomas Sowell. Have done since the first time I read his column in Forbes back when the Internet did not exist and the magazine came in the mail.
My father-in-law had a subscription. He kept a pile of the magazines next to his chair. When we'd visit for the weekend, my nose stayed in the magazines all weekend. Drove my (now ex) husband mad, but that's another story. Anyway, even my father-in-law got tired of me pawing his stack, so he bought me a subscription to Forbes and paid for it for over twenty years. He couldn't have given me any better gift.
I looked forward to two columns: Thomas Sowell and Joseph Garber. I ended up writing each. My letter to Sowell prompted him to ask if he could use my letter in his 2001 book "The Einstein Syndrome", which permission I gave and which was included. My letter to Garber got a response from him wherein we found we had a lot in common and wrote back and forth until he died. I've never met either, but I am a writer and so were they, so the written word was perfectly fine for us.
This Bacefook group is under fire for not toeing the party line and have started a backup group on MeWe should they be shutdown on Bacefook.
So there I am on a particularly fine morning, checking in with my Bacefook peeps, when what assails my eyes is this [you can see by the check mark which I chose]:
I was dismayed because for some time trolls joined the group whose sole purpose was to stir up trouble for trouble's sake. They had nothing of any intellectual honesty to add and delighted in doing nothing more than calling names and hurling other insults just to see who would respond with their reptilian brain thereby self-identifying as an easy victim. Henry Fu, the moderator, has had an almost full-time job refereeing them.
After I took the survey, I added my comment as to why I chose the option I did:
"The rules as they exist in this group are fine with me. They remind me of the ropes around a boxing ring, a ring in which boxers live by rules, and, when the mind gets too reptilian, a ref is called in to remind one of those rules.
"But the contenders in the ring don't whine. They know why they are there: To pummel! They know their goal is to represent.
"And in that ring, they know that at the end of the bout they will shake hands and go do the press conference wherein they praise the effort of the other and say how they look forward to their next fight. The loser may even say with a smile and not few words of smack, 'I will kick your boohiney next time, buddy, so just you watch out!'"
And those who simply comment "I agree", or who post a meme comment, or whatever, are the crowd letting the contender know they appreciate their effort or think they suck.
See? Boxers don't whine. And neither should those who enter the debate ring. So, if you don't like the sport, don't buy the ticket and put your butt in a ringside seat and then complain.*
* Do you notice how I could've said "Put on your big-girl panties", but I chose not to?
No comments:
Post a Comment