About coldness and debate, was Re: Sirius' death

[Amanda]

No: HPFGUIDX 115105


Carol:

I'm sorry if that view strikes you as cold. Your saying so strikes 
*me* as rude.

Nora:

I do think it is cold to make, as a hypothetic, what comes off as 
a "better off dead" value judgement, on a character.  

Carol:
 
Carol, who thought the List Elves had dealt with the incivility issue 
and is sorry to discover that she was wrong

Nora:

Excuse me.  I tried to phrase what I found, honestly, mildly 
disturbing about your message in as polite of terms as I could.  I 
would prefer, in the future, that if I have personally upset someone 
on here, for someone to let me know about that in person, rather than 
dragging that aspect of it onto the main list.
-----------

(Vaguely overweight vapor drifts into the room)
*blinks*

My, my. Not to single out Carol and Nora, but this exchange is a very 
good example of a sometimes fine point. Carol and Nora, I mean no 
criticism of you, but this really is a great example. Please forgive 
my using it to clarify something.

What Nora had originally said, prompting all this, was "Wow. I think 
that's one of the *coldest* things I've seen anyone post on here 
lately."  While I can see that Carol might take that ill, let me 
point out what Nora did NOT actually say: "Wow, Carol, I think you're 
one of the coldest people I've ever met, to say something like 
that."  Nora did target the message, not the speaker, when you get 
down to parsing; but I can understand Carol's reaction as well. And 
Nora brought up the option for discussing personal reactions to a 
post--which may well *not* be what the poster intended--off the list; 
this is a Good Thing to do.

This seems, to be, to have been a Miscommunication. They happen. But 
so does genuine rudeness, and it can be hard to distinguish.

To further elaborate, I will repost one of my earlier missives that 
addresses the phenomenon of debate, disagreement, and hurt feelings. 
Originally from February 2003, and most recently dragged out this 
past July, for your reading pleasure. Or "delete" key, if you've read 
it before.

<begin excerpt>
Debates *are* highly thought out intellectual arguments. However, 
people getting hurt or offended is not inevitable. People get hurt or 
offended when one of two things happens:

(a) the person making the argument takes a criticism of their 
*argument* as a criticism of *them* as a person;
(b) the responder really does criticize the person and not their 
argument.

Both of these involve a failure to recognize or respect the distance 
between a person and the argument the person is making. As an example:

Poster A: I think Snape is a vampire
Poster B: I think that theory is totally ludicrous because there's not
really any canon support and besides, *some* of the characters have 
to be human, we're running out, Hagrid's half-giant and Lupin's a 
werewolf...

This is perfectly acceptable. This is debate. Poster A should not feel
attacked, even though their point has been challenged. But...

Poster A: I think Snape is a vampire
Poster B: I think anyone who thinks that is a total blithering idiot 
and should not appear in public unaccompanied.

This is argument, but is not debate (at least not well done), and it 
is in this second case where feelings get hurt. Justly so. And on 
this list, generally, this Poster B would be Howlered or water 
ballooned. (It is not broadcast to the list when this occurs, by the 
way, so the rest of the list is often not aware of it, but the 
efforts of the elves to keep the tone polite are continuous.)

Also--please don't confuse a topic being discussed with an attempt to
convert you. Most of us would be delighted if our charming but 
stubbornly unswayable discussion partners would suddenly see the 
light and admit we were right. [Like there's no *way* Snape is 
anything but human.] But they don't, and they won't, and I'm not 
trying to make them. I'm just arguing my side real loud, because it's 
what I think.

The world JKR has created does not exist, just as Tolkien's, Lewis',
deLint's, etc., do not. But her world is incredibly well-constructed,
populated with vivid characters we recognize, interacting in 
situations we can identify with, and denying this list the use of 
reason to dissect and discuss that world is unfair and unreasonable.

An incredible infrastructure of guidelines and administrators has 
evolved on this list, because the people who formed it loved to 
discuss JKR's creations. They did not love flame wars, insults, or 
divisiveness. The debates you find here are detailed, intricate, 
engrossing, etc. -- but not rude. If personal attacks or hurt 
feelings happen, they are attended to.

<end excerpt>

Maybe this will help; some of the threads have gotten a little tense 
lately.

~Amandageist