One reporter reacts to JKR's revelations

[Tonks]

> ***Katie: 
But I, to whom Del was initially resonding, haven't called 
> anyone a bigot. I *specifically* have been referring to thoughts 
and 
> beliefs, *not* people. I have been trying very hard to keep the 
tone 
> of the conversations civil, and I feel like I'm being yelled at in 
> return. I understand it is very difficult to convey tone in this 
> format, but I do feel like some posts are very aggressive. 
> 

Tonks:
Well as an innocent bystander, I think both of you think that the 
other is attacking and both of you think that you are not. Of 
course, to some extent it will depend on the POV of the bystander as 
to which one of you is or is not attacking. If I tend to agree with 
Del I will think that Del is being attacked. And if I agree with 
Susan, or Katie, I will think that anyone with the opposite view is 
attacking. It is hard in these debates not to take some things 
personally. Our ideas, if near and dear to us, become part of us and 
when they are attacked, it can feel as if we are being attacked. (I 
know that I have felt this way on the main list a time or two in the 
past.) That is the nature of a debate when both sides own their POV 
and are not just debating for the hell of it. I think that is just 
the way it is. 

I agree that it would be best if we didn't bring negative judgements 
and slur words into the discussion. On the other hand I can 
understand the anger that this subject invokes in some who have been 
unfairly treated by society. It is hard to understand the other 
person's POV when you are hurting yourself.  I remember once as a 
child, my mother taught me to put myself in the other person's place 
and using my imagination, ask myself how that person might be 
feeling when I do such and such. 

It has been a learning experience for me to discover, here on this 
list, that for the younger people in our society, who do not 
remember the way things use to be, that it is apparently is a whole 
different world out there. Or maybe all of you are just from New 
York. ;-)

Tonks_op