Much has been made of the coarsening of dialogue within America. What this refers to is the growing lack of courtesy between people discussing topics of interest. It used to be that more often than not one could politely agree to disagree. That seems to be going by the wayside as more people find it easier to fling mud and call their fellow some sort of derogatory name.
Part of out the outcome of this is that some people now think that it is appropriate to use terms like “liberal” and “conservative” as if they were four letter words. I find this to be a very sad commentary on who and what our society is becoming.
During recent disagreements on various blogs I have been told that the problems with the world are because of my kind. It is an offensive way to try and argue. I have a pretty thick skin so more often than not I ignore such foolish rhetoric because the real reason that the personal attacks begin is because the other person lacks substance. If these disagreements were taking place in person you can bet that the person voicing such foolishness would also be shouting. For some reason they seem to think that if they yell loudly it gives their words more power when all it really does is provide more evidence that they haven’t any substantive comments to offer.
What I would like to see happen is for there to be a return to a discussion of the facts and for more people to realize that it is ok to disagree. There are relatively few areas in which you can say that there is only one right way to do things. More often than not there are multiple paths that one can choose from.
Unfortunately I am not real optimistic about this. Right now there is so much anger and distrust that I suspect it will take some time before we reach a place in which people are willing to relax again. I hope that I am proven wrong.
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