From: Sunah.Caroline.Cherwin@pobox.com
Date: Wed Jan 15 1997 - 15:59:24 MST
>
>Bravo! I have never heard this put quite so succinctly and powerfully,
>and I must wholeheartedly agree. I have often expressed a corrolary
>to this, that tolerance is the obligation of listeners, not speakers.
>Any suggestion that a man should refrain from expressing what he thinks
>in plain, straightforward language is contemptable. Such repression
>is the enemy of the rational mind, a roadblock to knowledge.
>
>Rational minds cannot be offended. "Taking offense" is a symptom of
>an intellectual pathology that the value of ideas can be judged by
>emotional response instead of reason. To the extent one can express
>an idea in a listener's terms, and relate to him from his point of
>view, these are practical methods of communication; but one must never
>let such deference to your audience dilute the message itself.
Jeez, everyone's irrational sometimes. Besides being practical, reasonable
'deference to your audience' is POLITE.
................http://www.slip.net/~suzy/demo/................
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