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10 Dec 99 - 03:01 PM (#147679) Subject: Thinking out loud From: paddymac Earlier in the week, a thoughtful and sentient M'Catter posted a thought for the day alluding to his very recent 21st birthday. Based on previous postings, I had just assumed that he was "older" and was, admittedly, somewhat surprised when he claimed to be barely 21. That has caused me to reflect on the nature of communication within this community (and most any other cyber community as well). It's no great discovery, but I realized that communication here is devoid of the visual and auditory clues that we "normally" use to categorize people we communicate with, and, inevitably, form prior judgments about what they might have to say. We subconsciously marginalize people's thoughts for a host of different reasons, which seem mostly to relate to ways in which we perceive them as being different from ourselves or their value/significance to us. The result of not being able to use those subconscious sorting mechanisms is that we're more or less forced to evaluate cyber-communication on the merits of the ideas expressed, but filtered through our individual experiential "BS detectors". The result, I think, is that those of us truly desireous of communicating with other sentient souls strive to improve the way in which we use the language in our postings. Perhaps more importantly, it has served (at least for me) to make me a better listener in real-world communications. Yes, it is an imperfect world and there are some here with no apparent interest in communicating who seem content with the cyber-version of "shooting a bird", but they seem to be largely ignored, as just so much clutter or background noise. All in all, I think that cyber-communication is tantamount to ressurection of what many consider to be the lost art of effective writing. I thank you all for your contributions. |
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10 Dec 99 - 03:30 PM (#147689) Subject: RE: Thinking out loud From: Little Neophyte When in person, my rosary & 'habit' are a sure 'give a way'. BB |
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10 Dec 99 - 04:06 PM (#147708) Subject: RE: Thinking out loud From: Bert Hmmm, "the lost art of effective writing". I think that now we must beware of adopting a different set of clues to form our judgements. In the everyday world we pre-judge people by age, gender, color, appearance and a host of other clues. Now I find that I have to be careful not to judge others by their choice of words, their spelling and even by the length of their messages. Some of us aren't as gifted as others in their writing abilities. This can be due to many factors other than innate ability. Some of us are trained as engineers or scientists and can sometimes come across quite terse, others may have dyslexia or maybe physical disabilties which can hinder typing. Whilst some may "strive to improve their language skills", others may have a constant struggle to be able to write anything at all. I don't pre-judge people by their writing abilities any more than I would judge them by their engineering abilities. Bert. |
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10 Dec 99 - 04:46 PM (#147730) Subject: RE: Thinking out loud From: Little Neophyte Excellent point Ernie. Even on the Mudcat, it is important to avoid judgements. By being non-judgemental you have the greatest chance of discovery the richness and depth of a person. BB |
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10 Dec 99 - 04:54 PM (#147734) Subject: RE: Thinking out loud From: paddymac Bert - I couldn't agree more. Thanks for rounding out that weakness in my first post. |
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11 Dec 99 - 12:55 PM (#148124) Subject: RE: Thinking out loud From: McGrath of Harlow I tend to check out bbc's mudcat resources (in quick links at the top of the page) to see if the writer has put in a photo or a profile. Most Mudcatters haven't so far though - I wonder if that is modesty, shyness (not to be confused), or secretiveness?
Of course you could always use someone else's picture to fool people. I wonder if any of us have? |
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11 Dec 99 - 01:26 PM (#148144) Subject: RE: Thinking out loud From: kendall I tried to, but, Brad Pitt wouldn't give me a photo |
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11 Dec 99 - 01:52 PM (#148151) Subject: RE: Thinking out loud From: AnTirKitten *smiles* I agree with a lot of what's been said on this topic so far. I'll admit, as a professional writer, I do tend to find things like typos, incorrect grammar and poor writing annoying. However, I do try to give someone a fair "read" first. Some of the most brilliant people out there are not natural born writers and do have important things to say. It's just hard sometimes to turn off my inner editor and not judge someone based on writing style (or lack thereof). BTW, for anyone who cares, I do have a pic
Slainte, |
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11 Dec 99 - 02:36 PM (#148163) Subject: RE: Thinking out loud From: CLETUS I kin seez az howz yall cud be a mite upset bout havin ta reed bad riten an all but I like the wayz thet folks think az much az howz thay rite an ta me itz awfull hard ta figger zackly whut tis thair sain ifn Ise spennin my time awhirrean bout thair ritin ur thair spellin. Senz I dun got me a gud forth grayd edgeekayshun them thangs ainta problem fer me. An I allus trys ta be leenyent in my castin of aspurshuns on uther folks. CLETUS |
