Soothe the itching and burning fast…
There certainly have been a lot of inflammatory comments. Here’s my inflammatory remark of the day: haemorrhoids.
Any new suggestions on how to soothe the inflammation (in this thread)?
I can’t help but feel that this thread crossed the line early on…
Just some thoughts on the state of this thread…
The positions are a little too polarised — though there are fence sitters etc., but when you see people dismissing whole posts as rubbish, then it makes me wonder if this thread is serving any useful purpose — we’re not reaching much in the way of compromise or concord. Our minds are made up already. What I’d really like to see are more posts like “While I can understand your concerns with … there is another way to look at it” etc. We don’t even have the usual vacuous pleasantries happening like “Interesting point, but…”
Maybe we should all step back and try our best to argue it from both sides; both sides do have valid concerns. In fact, and again I haven’t done this much either, a well prepared argument should address both sides of the issue well. Always keep in mind [i]The Principle of Charity[/i] when debating — you should put the other’s argument into the strongest possible form and discard the irrelevant bits etc. This principle suggests that the arguer be given the benefit of the doubt, but remeber that when you come up with a response that the burden of proof is your responsibility. Anyway, there is too much opinion, and not enough formal arguing, IMHO. The only opinion (position claim, belief, or thesis) that should be accepted is one that you can defend with a good argument (are the premises acceptable, relevant, and sufficient to support your conclusion). Maybe we should stick to the standard form of an argument:
Since… (premise),
and… (premise)
and… (premise)
Therefore… (conclusion)
It would also be a lot easier to read; less cluttered, less wordy, and easier to understand.
Moving on…
It’s one thing to debate, and disagree with eachother’s points of view (and I’m expressing marybeth’s sentiments), [i]ad hominems[/i] (personal attacks/insults on our fellow geezers) is not really acceptable. BTW, I am no doubt guilty of that too. To any that I have offended, I apologise, and I will try harder to be more compassionate and thoughtful.
We can expect this subject to be divisive, but I hope that this thread won’t lead to lasting animosity amongst our geezer community.
From a rather sad geezer and Prep-H: We do our best to put the reparation back in preparation. 🙂