quote]Jacmac:
IMO, though, I've never experienced nor do I think there is now "excess conflict" on the board.
Jac, do you think there is excess conflict in the middle east?
There many reasons why someone may not answer your questions there and then other than not caring about your feelings, such as having a bad day, too much laundry, feeling the environment is too inflamatory to be properly understood, too many questions being asked by too many people at teh same time, feeling upset etc. Jac, be a pal and gimme a break if I didn't answer some of your questions right now, OK?
In general, from my point of view, it is not conflict per se so much but modus operandi that I find really very upsetting. Even combat has rules of engagement. To name a few specific things I simply abhor are:
-- Personal attacks, calling names, character assasination, completely unfounded accusations.
-- Digging out past posts, about very personal issues, and putting them out of context to make an argument against the poster. This one I consider a great violence.
-- Not respecting one party's right to disengage.
Its true that conflict can occur when each party is trying to be heard. But it can also occur
when one party is trying to silence others or tries to drown them out. I'm not saying you are, I'm just saying there can be many reasons for conflict.
It also raises the question of whether people's desire to be heard is stifled by an excess of conflict. We don't know how many people don't speak up or simply leave if conflict is endemic.
If the atmosphere becomes too threatening, too hard, too painful or worse for them then maybe that is a measure of excessive conflict? And maybe the board isn't functioning at its optimum for the maximum number of people possible.
Mud, I think there is a bias in the dialogue we observe because those who are fine with conflict obviously speak up, but those who are quiet, withdrawn, give others benefit of doubt, etc. may not be as vocal. Let us say you (and pleese, not you as in Mud) don't like something I said, but you don't take offense. Then the same situation arises where you say something that upsets me, and I loudly decide to confront you. This happens second time. So it convinces me (and others) that you are the one who is always causing the upset, when in reality it is rather unfair because I give you benefit of doubt and you don't give me any. This is especially applicable when we are talking about fine points of tones, nuances, etc. It appears to me that members, including you, who use somewhat male/rational tone are at the receiving end of frequent complaints of perceived slights etc.
It is true that each of the parties is trying to be heard, but as they say in psyche literature that we
from N families spin wheels trying to recreate our dysfunctional family elsewhere. So I may be trying to get Mud to hear me the way my mother never heard me, gimme unconditional love and be nice to me even when I am calling him names and throwing dishes at him, listen to my story at the exclusion of everyone else's, etc. However, Mud is not my mother and he cannot do all that for me. So I may continue to feel unheard until I get the exact response I want from Mud, and feel rejected and enraged when that does not happen and he draws boundaries. Speaking for Mud, as someone from an abusive family (this is all hypothetical, my convoluted academic language, and no, I don't presume to speak for anyone in reality) it is really important to stand up and defend his turf and protect his boundaries, to not give anyone an inch more than he is willing. This cannot be sorted out by dialogue between me and Mud, but only by going within me and working it out, to stop trying to look for that mother out there in the world.
I am all the way with Brigid in what she said about conflict. I really stand up for my loved ones, environment, other things that are important to me, and simply cannot and will not engage in discussions of fine nuances or vulgar accusations. I am also willing to go a step further and go on a limb to have a dialogue with a fellow poster if I construe it as genuine and fruitful and when we are really communicating, but when I feel that discussion is not fruitful, I back off and refuse to be apologetic about it. We all come to cyberspace with limited time and energy, so as BJ put it so nicely in another thread, if we engage in conflict, it'd better be for something worthwhile.
Hops, somewhere you mentioned big fight having an entertainment value too. Boy, could I tell!
Calls from onlookers: show us more skin, give us more
feelin'Seriously, cheers and a pat on the back to you for candidly mentioning it because a lot of times when there is a very public conflict, it is propelled by many reasons less noble than a genuine desire for communication, both on parts of parties who are engaged in the conflict as well as some of the onlookers who jump in the frey.
The way I used to express it was more like, (forgive me Marta I don't mean this cruelly)...something like the kind of voice I hear in Marta's pain and fury. I think there's fear there, and the lecturing tone that got others' teeth gritted really sounded like an attempt to push away. Somehow when people get super-rational or hotly cold (Red Type) I get nervous. (Likewise, when you're all emotional glop like I can be, that's not helpful either.)
No need to forgive you because no offense was taken, I realize that it was not meant with hurtful intentions, but this is not even
remotely like me. There was certainly no attempt to push away out of fear.However, as Brigid said earlier, I cannot and will not engage in certain types of arguments. In this argument my buttons were not pushed but I just really wanted it to end. To use Mum's vocabulary, i am not into reactive stuff anymore. I realize that a lot of folks are uncomfortable with rational voice, and kept asking me to show more feelin', like onlookers demanding a notch higher scale in an opera performance if you will. It's like, don't feel your own feelings but feel the ones I think I would feel, and the ones you are feeling can't really be right. Another thing is what Bliz had mentioned back then is that when certain public events happen, including acrimonious board conflicts, other people use it to somehow feel and express their feelings in their own personal lives that are entirely unrelated to that event, and this keeps propelling the conflict.
The world abounds with projections. I just saw a documentary by Errol Morris on Robert Mcnamara, where RM admitted that Vietnam was was actually based on a projection, US not understanding why Vietnamese were fighting or what they were fighting for, but simply projecting on them. THis reference is not brought up as a political statement on the war, but admission of projections we make even at national level on others, an admission made by onetime US secretary of defense and president of ford motors and also world bank, no less.
Mum, on knowing why we feel anger, i agree it is very important, to go beyond teh "triggers" and know why.
With the rock block, you gotta stick to your guns and get your rock! It only seems fair that you do get your rock! It is really not fun to engage in these conflicts, but sometimes you gotta. Sometimes labels like attachment/detachment can get in the way. For me, detachment that springs on its own from our life experiences is liberating, and one that has to be cultivated and forced may be inhibiting. You certainly seem to love your rock, so go for it! Small pleasures mean a lot and carry us far in life. Mum, hugs to you, Marta
