Civility on the Blend

Coretta mastered civility

While doing some investigating on the subject, I found one of the finest examples of someone who mastered civility was Coretta King. From the history we know of Coretta, having her husband continually put himself and his family at risk, the separation of him traveling to give speeches and demonstrations, and his being arrested, and imprisoned., showed a courageous, self sufficient, supportive, and gracious woman. When she was faced with the horrible fact, the hatred had robbed her of her spouse and her children's father, she was able to draw on a vast reservoir of strengths to carry on her husband's legacy, his works, and even expand on her husband's goals. The ugly sh*t thrown at this woman, from lying innuendos from the FBI about affairs, the threatening calls and letters she must have heard and seen, could have sent Mrs. King in a very rage filled and destructive path...and no one would have blamed her. Mrs.  King might have chosen to just resign from public life, and say she gave ENOUGH...and no one would have blamed her for that either.
No one would mistake civility as my strong suit, at least I can recognise someone who did it magnificently.
for Coretta
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...

What have you done today, to make ya feel PROUD?


~Heather Small

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by: peteyPornpig @ Fri Jul 10, 2009 at 02:46:23 AM CDT

I'm very glad to see the ratings are gone.

I think this was a wise choice and their absence will go a long way towards helping to foster and maintain a civil atmosphere.

Happy Civility Day!

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by: diablorobotico @ Fri Jul 10, 2009 at 03:13:07 AM CDT

Yea 4 civility!

That was a long week.

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by: veendam @ Fri Jul 10, 2009 at 04:32:31 AM CDT

A deep and heartfelt apology

A few weeks back, there was a thread on Delaware passing a SO non-discrimination bill.

As part of that discussion, Brandi Parker posted a comment to which I replied using the words "street whore". I want to deeply apologize to Brandi for using that phrase.

Autumn caught it and I was rightfully and correctly suspended for a week for using those words, and I deserved it.

Brandi -- I'm sorry!


Listen to "TransTalk" every Thursday at 4-5pm ET on http://www.falconradio.org

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by: Marlene @ Fri Jul 10, 2009 at 06:26:46 AM CDT

Kudos to Marlene

I applaud your effort to bring PHB back to a civil little coffee shop where friends can debate respectfully. Well done.

Close the GayTM. Only give to candidates who have actually done something other than make promises - most are just pandering for our cash.

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by: JohnVisser @ Fri Jul 10, 2009 at 11:19:43 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

I guess I missed

the Civility At The Blend post. I don't remember it at all. It's a read that sums up some of what I love best about PHB.

It was an interesting week to observe.  I noticed that most of the antagonism died off as the week neared its end. I wonder if that was due to the length of time itself or the approach of the endpoint. Other sets of 2- and 3-week experiments might be able to answer that, but please don't!

It's hard to comment here without feeling like I'm also commenting on the diary above about communicating. I mean, if I'm really hoping to get a point across, or even more challenging, trying to persuade someone, if that's really my goal, how does being overly confrontational, or making it known that I'm ready to be confrontational on a pin drop, help my cause?

In other news, we're waiting for the results of my senior dog's leptospirosis test. I really hope she's ok.  She seems to be feeling better, but that doesn't mean infection free. She's a rescue and one of the best dogs I've ever had, extremely gentle and yet part bad-rep breed (Chow Chow).

Electricity's for light bulbs!

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by: n8nyc @ Fri Jul 10, 2009 at 06:40:54 AM CDT

just a few ideas

i have so many thoughts about this.  i have a personality disorder [borderline] that makes me unable to control my emotions; they swing wildly up and down regardless of the situation i am in.  therefore, once i became aware of this i had to..am still..learning how to not react to emotional impulses to do anything without taking a minute first.  the old saying of count to 10 is really a good one.  if i understand correctly, it takes about 2 minutes for a strong emotion to chemically happen in the body and i see this as the key point, for me, to stop.  stop and let that energy pass through my body.  this is when i tend to take something personally.  whenever i do that, in my own experience, it is a key to my own hot button issues...white males in authority, religion, being a southern white person.  like having an emotional sunburn, i am sensitive to them and without pausing first, now with self knowledge, i would lash out and give someone a lesson in some negative way..snarky, condesendingly, etc.  of course i was right ;-] but i only accomplished making people not want to listen and not want my company.  so, do i want to be right or do i want to be happy?  i want both frankly.  so, i am learning to let people be wrong without telling them.  it is harder than i thought it would be but it does get easier with practice.  this past week has provided much practice.  when my issue buttons are pressed i know that for 5 minutes or so my emotional response will override my intellect.  i think this is like a fight or flight response as a human animal when instinct must override the brain for speed's sake.  however, the body doesn't know the difference between a thought/emotion and reality in these modern times.  we all think we are more evolved and sophisticated than we really are.  read predictabily irrational by malcom gladwell for some interesting insights.  i digress.  no matter the issue being discussed, one group needs to tell another group that they are wrong, prejudiced, bigoted, or some other judgement.  what i rarely see is success.  i was once called a bigot by a black temporary worker on the first day of work.  as a white person from the south i am downright paranoid about being considered a bigot and i was just crushed to be thought so by this new employee.  how could i get her to reconsider her judgement?  based on her life history it was clear that it was a given that white people are bigots and consciously so.  in my experience, people are most often unconsciously bigotted.  they don't know when they are 'doing it'.  as a kid with my mom, she clutched her purse and crossed the street when the black man was coming.  she didn't say anything and i didn't think i even noticed what was happening...i don't think she even really thought about what she was doing either.  as an adult i had to become aware of this so that when that instinct kicked in i could recognize it for what it was, learned behavior, and resist the impulse and let my intellect override it.  so i know that i have learned behaviors to identify before someone points them out to me.  i know i have white priviledge but until i get in a situation i may not know when it is happening because it is so 'normal'.  those of us with emotional sunburns need to realize that we must find a way to tell someone that they are doing something bigotted, wrong, whatever in a manner that it doesn't accuse a person of doing it on purpose or out of malice or we will not get the results we need.  the thing is, not everyone is 'ready' to receive the news of their failings.  if someone is in denial i don't think it is productive to try and talk them out of it.  sometimes one needs to accept that and find another way without getting lost in an emotional fog of cancer causing stress [imho].  we must pick our battles for if we fight every one as if they are all of the highest priority we will never be happy.  being the self appointed hall monitor will exhaust you and make you unwelcome wherever you go.  we do this as a community to the straight population.  religious people do it to us.  group judgement.

so i have never been known for brevity and i am so late for work...  this can be a facinating discussion and i look forward to some insights this evening.

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by: swabby @ Fri Jul 10, 2009 at 08:51:10 AM CDT