BS: Conversation Stoppers

Subject: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: GUEST,Slag
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 04:03 PM

Dialog or monologue? I have worked in rehab centers for recovering alcoholics and the drugged addicted and one of the true things one comes up against is that you cannot talk to the addiction. If someone is intoxicated you are "speaking to the alcohol" or "speaking to the drug", not the person. They cannot begin to be helped until they are off the drug.

I believe this phenomena has a broader application. You cannot reason with an ideologue. You waste your time butting up against an "ideal" and not actually reaching the person or their own thoughts. The same holds true for for religious zealots, hidden agendas or used-car salesmen.

Conversation occurs when you can say to yourself; I can set aside me belief system, my biases, my culture, long enough to hear you and to try and understand where you are coming from; what works for you and why. I can examine my own beliefs honestly in the light of what you hold to be true and see what may apply and how. This is dialog.

I, and I am sure that many of you, have instinctively known that this is how real conversation works. Lack of logic, ad hominem attacks, pre-recorded messages from some guru or religious leader can be a real stopper to any meaningful conversation.

It is always easier to "preach to the choir" and soak up the agreement and applause (or applesauce). A shared body of beliefs and core values allows us comfort and the security of knowing we are among our own. It is a jumping off point for other interests. Emily Dickinson wrote "...The soul selects its own society, then shuts the door." It is this "door shutting" that ends all real conversation.

There are some folks here who have a real gift for listening and really considering what is being said even though they may disagree with your stance, Bill D among others. Little Hawk always seems to to understand what you are saying, SRS, Big Mick, Joe, Art Brooks many others. Thanks all!

The integrity of the language is an absolute necessity for an honest conversation. Vocabulary and definition must be shared in common. When a belief system gains its meaning from redefining terms all that results is confusion and bogus "enlightenment". I mean no offense to anyone of the Christian Science persuasion (at least they are honest about doing so) but they have re-defined many common terms (listed in many dictionaries as "Christian Science") that leads the hearer to believe they are speaking about the same thing when in actuality, they are not.

I don't know if this will draw comment or not but it IS something to think about. There are other impediments to dialog that you may want to share.

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: Rasener
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 04:16 PM

Thats a lovely yellow zit you have on your nose

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: wysiwyg
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 04:29 PM

I know ways to get past the usual stops, and I think that's more usful tan cataloguing stoppers.... but that Mudcat can be, itself a stopper. PM if private conversation desired.

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: Peace
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 04:35 PM

Fart.


Slag, what you have posted is both insightful AND true, imo. People need to be heard not just for their words but also for their intent. The society (or societies) in which I have seen that best illustrated is native North American--what I refer to as Indian (because when I asked a Cree chief what I should refer to the group of people as, whether it would be PC to say, Aboriginal Peoples, Native North Americans, First Nations, etc., he replied "Well, we call ourselves Indians").

In some Inuit cultures, when a guy smiles as he nods up and down, he means 'not a chance in hell'. If he ain't smiling, he means yes. One thing that does help is to restate what the other person said and ask if that's what the other means.

Good post, buddy.

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: gnu
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 04:46 PM

What Peace said... especially, "Good post..."

Brings a lot of thoughts to mind. Thanks.

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: GUEST,Slag
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 04:50 PM

Peace, you're obviously from my side of the tracks! (Lol'ing)

Yes WYSIWYG. There are ways. One is laying yourself wide open and honest and saying "Take your best shot!" I posted for a while on some conservative sites and after a while the echoes were intolerable. What? Was I talking to myself? What weight or validity did my thoughts carry?

I happened into Mudcat while searching for some old crazy songs my Dad sang to my brother and me when I was a small child. I stayed for the interesting conversation. I'm still here, learning and growing. Yup, I turn 60 this year, still learning and growing.

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: artbrooks
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 04:51 PM

What you say is entirely true, Slag, but I don't know that there is a good solution. We have all been involved at one time or another in threads in which two or more people with rigidly entrenched ideas "talk" back and forth in circles for days, seemingly without listening to the other(s). The only real thing to do, since the mods won't shut them off (and there isn't any real reason they should, under Mudcat's rules), is simply to leave.   It's a shame, really, since a number of interesting discussions have been hijacked that way.

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: GUEST,Slag
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 05:47 PM

Guilty! On several accounts but not all threads are intended as dialog. The problem is when they "purport" to be dialog. I have made statements of faith---fair game---and then defended the same and that IS what I intended and said so at the time. That can be fun to do and I have also learned from the responses. And I will agree with you; it does get tedious at times and then I too, walk away from it, even though I started it!

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 06:04 PM

If you can explain the position of the other person in a way that they would agree was accurate and fair, you are in a position to start a real discussion about your disagreements.

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: Bill D
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 06:10 PM

Good points, slag... and I do appreciate being listed among those who at least try.

Now, I have a list of some TV & radio talk shows I need to get you booked on.

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: Janie
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 06:26 PM

As others have already said, Slag, excellent post.

Many of us here have a tendency to confuse a person's position with the person themself. I try to not do that, but know that I do more often than I like to admit.

Here's a simple but good description of active listening and effective communication.

Janie

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: kendall
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 07:15 PM

You can not reason a person out of a position which he/she didn't reason themselves into.

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: Janie
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 08:11 PM

Good one, Kendall!

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: Alice
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 08:25 PM

Yes, slag, what you say is true, and you used a good example of "thought stopping techniques".

People who are adept at controlling others (con-men, cult leaders, etc.) design thought stopping techniques into their followers so that there is a "self-checking" barrier that exists in a follower's mind. The phrase "don't go there" applies. Some people will go to their deaths and take their children with them while they blindly follow an ideal. I've seen it happen. We see people taking the lives of others while they blindly follow their ideals.

When a person thus programmed comes up against someone posing questions that may shake the validity of their beliefs, they resort to blocking out the "evil other".
scroll down to Mind Control, Thought Stopping Techniques

People who are addicted to a belief or belonging to a particular group are just as addicted and "hooked" as those who are substance addicted.

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: Bill D
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 08:53 PM

Alice...there was a woman who led a cult...used to be on TV a lot... she was centered in Montana, I think. Is she still going? Or do you know of her?

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: Alice
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 09:16 PM

She has Alzheimer's.

She was a narcissistic, delusional leader whose religious hallucinations were woven into her complex "salad bar" of beliefs. If you were interested in any type of religion, she had an aspect of the one she created that was cobbled together from everything from Helena Blavatsky, the Catholic Church, Buddhism, Judaism, Islam.... you name it, she wove it in, and then claimed she had the "new dispensation" for all religious knowledge.

Her name is Elizabeth Clare Prophet, and her cult was first called Summit Lighthouse, now is called Church Universal and Triumphant.

She claimed to be the current Messenger of God, displacing Jesus and all previous messengers, and tried to groom her son Sean to be the next "messenger".

Sean now has a web site that discusses his life and what it was like to be brought up in the cult. They were treated like little gods, so Sean does not even know how much damage the cult did to people.
Her cult was the reason I began helping people get out of cults, as it was a five year old who was molested by a pedophile member of the cult while her parents were members, that made me become aware of CUT and other cults were really doing to their members.

Sean Prophet's web site is called Black Sun Journal.
Sean is making a film about the time that CUT built (failed) fallout shelters when his mother predicted nuclear destruction by the Soviets (late 80's, early 90's)

Here is the story of another ex-CUT member, Cheri Walsh.
The Church Universal and Triumphant experience

Alice

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: GUEST,Slag
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 10:24 PM

Good clicky Jaine. Alice, yes! I have had numerous encounters and dealing with cult and ex-cult members. James Jones got his start in the community just over the hill from here and that area of Mendocino county just seems to have some kind of weird connection to the, what? Weird? The Steven Stayner case, Polly Klass/Richard Allen Davis case, there are others. I've often wondered if it were the water or something? It is amazing to me how otherwise intelligent people can be beguiled by a charismatic person.

I worked a number of years as a suicide hot line counsellor in Marin county, California and that was a real eye-opener in the realm of active listening. You absolutely do NOT want to address a caller's situation with any preconceived notions or judgments. The center's recruiting poster was a field of identical persons standing alone. Only one pair were holding hands and the caption read "To communicate is the beginning of understanding."

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: Amos
Date: 02 Mar 09 - 11:15 PM

Slag:

I've never seen a better post on the subject; I am only sorry I didn't make your A-list, but I know I have been a bit rough to talk to at times. I know I should do better.

It's not just conversation that gets stopped. We are as a species very prone to reaching conclusions which allow us to ignore whole areas of subject matter. I once wrote several essays on the subject, where I called this "conclusive ignorance"--the kind of conclusion reaching that lets you stop thinking about certain subjects altogether and not need to know. The simple term for it is "idee fixée", the fixed idea.

Finding ways past such things is a real art and worth sharing.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 03 Mar 09 - 05:41 AM

You can not reason a person out of a position which he/she didn't reason themselves into.

That's true for lots of things people argue about, but not all. For example, up above the line here, people are always arguing about musical preferences and suchlike, and we don't generally reason ourselves into what we like or dislike, at least not consciously.

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: John Hardly
Date: 03 Mar 09 - 06:43 AM

Ideology - What the other guy believes.

Subject: RE: BS: Conversation Stoppers
From: GUEST,Slag
Date: 03 Mar 09 - 06:52 AM

It's a survival mechanism Amos. Some snakes are very dangerous. Best to avoid ALL snakes. When in doubt, DON'T! Black folks have higher crime rate, best to avoid...! We draw some hasty conclusions for "good reasons" that don't really serve us or our fellow man well. And too, there is such an overload of information out there that the filters go up and we think we hear what we are expecting to hear and such is not always the case. It is real work to listen actively. It can be draining and so, even if you are adept at the skill, you still have to be selective. In that regard, it's a crazy world indeed!

M of H! Yeah. Emotions are non-arguable. They just, are! The error is made when one intellectualizes that which is not intellectual. In matters of taste and beauty (and music appreciation) there is no argument.