How to win friends and influence people

I was once, when a tornado was heading for the hospital. We all had to go out in the hall with our babies and wait for the tornado to pass.

I think we have come to some conclusions here, that better is not the right word, but justice, honor, respect are.

LC,

RUBBISH!

By the way, I will break it to you gently--when you are wrong you are flat out totally wrong.

Everyone has given you reasoned and polite answers, you remain steadfast in your ill-conceived stand. Enjoy...

Alice wrote:

Come, come, let's be reasonable here. l have been hospitalized on numerous
occasions--never have I been forced from my bed--hope you haven't either.

I would call that Injustice.

It wasn't very nice, certainly. But I haven't read of any deaths occurring as a result, or anything more serious than "Muslim women were insulted by the presence of men in their rooms."

I am confused about the comparison to My Lai.

LC,

I am miserably direct. I like you and admire your gumption.

I would never try to force someone to agree with my religion, so I am wondering why my patience has run out on this subject.

It could be that I am tired of seeing my Son-in-law's throat
cut from stem to stern and I am not looking forward to the endoscopy I am soon to undergo.

The idea of being forced from my bed following pancreatic surgery is especially repugnant.

In my opinion, the soldiers should have brought flowers or chocolates to the patients.

I will stand by my previous statements.

Best,

Alice

Marie,

Thanks for the link. I have bookmarked it.

Carol

Quote :

My point is that I don't care if they entered a
hospital and -oh, the horror!- went into a room where there were female
patients. I hope the patients got over the trauma.

To those women, living in their culture, it would indeed have been a traumatic horror. I, too, hope they are able to "get over it." I especially hope, for their sakes, that their husbands and fathers are able to "get over it."

Ann

alj wrote:

Quote :

My point is that I don't care if they entered a
hospital and -oh, the horror!- went into a room where there were female
patients. I hope the patients got over the trauma.

To those women, living in their culture, it would indeed have been a traumatic horror. I, too, hope they are able to "get over it." I especially hope, for their sakes, that their husbands and fathers are able to "get over it."

Ann

Exactly!

Also, some of these folks may have been on their deathbeds--remember these are not fit vacationers--these are sick people.

LC,

I don't believe you exist.

You have given us no information or books you have written.

I think you are a myth.

Enough is enough! You are too much.

If Shelagh will vouch for you, I will reconsider my position.

alj wrote:

To those women, living in their culture, it would indeed have been a traumatic horror. I, too, hope they are able to "get over it." I especially hope, for their sakes, that their husbands and fathers are able to "get over it."

Ann

YK what, Ann, I don't care if their husband and fathers get over it or not. Their issue/lifestyle/problem. I think the whole concept of us thinking they they should think and be just like us is atrocious. Bush crowed about us bringing them democracy. Who says they want it? They're obviously quite happy living the way they live, which is how they've been living for thousands of years. Who's to say our way is better for them? If they wanted to be like us, I daresay they'd be that way already. Hell, the women RAISE the men who think like they do, so they must like it.

In hindsight, Sadaam isn't looking so bad. He kept order in Iraq and we can see now what he was dealing with.

LC,

Who are you?

LC wrote:

alj wrote:

To those women, living in their culture, it would indeed have been a traumatic horror. I, too, hope they are able to "get over it." I especially hope, for their sakes, that their husbands and fathers are able to "get over it."

Ann

YK what, Ann, I don't care if their husband and fathers get over it or not. Their issue/lifestyle/problem. I think the whole concept of us thinking they they should think and be just like us is atrocious. Bush crowed about us bringing them democracy. Who says they want it? They're obviously quite happy living the way they live, which is how they've been living for thousands of years. Who's to say our way is better for them? If they wanted to be like us, I daresay they'd be that way already. Hell, the women RAISE the men who think like they do, so they must like it.

In hindsight, Sadaam isn't looking so bad. He kept order in Iraq and we can see now what he was dealing with.

I've been rereading your posts on this thread, trying to find an answer to Alice's question. Sometimes I think I get where you are coming from, but it doesn't last, because you seem to shift gears in the middle of a discussion.

I will admit to some personal qualms about this situation. On the one hand, I agree with you that we should accept cultural diversity, and not try to make other people think the way we do (which presupposes that "we" agree on how we think, which clearly "we" do not.) At the same time, I have a concern for human rights, and though I don't reserve the right, myself, to define them, I cannot get over the concern that women ought not be beaten, even killed, because of what their husbands consider "sin," especially should that sin include being looked at by men outside their family, even when there was no choice involved. Somewhere, along with recognizing diversity, we have to realize that we are all part of a common humanity. The dilemma, of course, comes from knowing where and how to draw the lines.

You have, I think, to take each situation as it comes, and from what I know of this one, I think the soldiers made a mistake and overstepped. It will do more harm than any good they might have had in mind.

None of this changes my observation that you shift your stand on these discussions to suit your personal whims, which seem to center around taking an opposing stand to whatever happens to be the discussion of the moment. You are not, in my perception, interested in coming to any sense of agreement or compromise; you just like standing apart. It seems to me that you are playing your own game.

I apologize to you for being drawn into it. It is not a fun game for me. I prefer playing toward a consensus.

Have a good evening, LC.

Ann

alj wrote:

None of this changes my observation that you shift your stand on these discussions to suit your personal whims, which seem to center around taking an opposing stand to whatever happens to be the discussion of the moment. You are not, in my perception, interested in coming to any sense of agreement or compromise; you just like standing apart. Ann

I find this to be a weird post. Come to an agreement or compromise with who, for what? None of us have the power to do anything about health care or women's rights in the Middle East. Or maybe I'm wrong -do you do something proactive after reading these threads? Otherwise, what does it matter if I come to a "consensus" with you, Alice, Carol, or anyone else?

As for opposing stance on discussions, I post on the threads -here and elsewhere- where I have something to say besides the "kumbaya" posts that populate every thread (you know, like the opinions that education is good, health care is important and water is wet).

It's good to have opposing viewpoints; it makes us question our own thoughts.

Alice, Carol and Ann share their past experiences to demonstrate how they formed their opinions. LC does not. Like a journalist in a newspaper, she states her opinion without any reference points -- just the facts as she sees them. The interchange between LC and the more transparent members here reminds me of the opening paragraph of The Power of Persuasion:

"The news items didn’t affect me much, but the journalists with a point to make were my Achilles’ heel. To a man and a woman, I disagreed with all of them. We were as black and white to each other as the printed page before me. There was no grey area, no common ground and no compromise."

I have a new policy. I will no longer respond to any poster who refuses to give any information about themseves.

Could be a troll.

LC wrote:

I think the whole concept of us thinking they they should think and be just like us is atrocious. Bush crowed about us bringing them democracy. Who says they want it? They're obviously quite happy living the way they live, which is how they've been living for thousands of years. Who's to say our way is better for them? If they wanted to be like us, I daresay they'd be that way already. Hell, the women RAISE the men who think like they do, so they must like it.

In hindsight, Sadaam isn't looking so bad. He kept order in Iraq and we can see now what he was dealing with.

I seldom respond to an anonymous person, but I happen to agree with some of what was posted by this person.

Forcing our ways on others is wrong. As for Saddam, he was a person who ruled with an iron hand. He maintained control. How he did that is another subject. For those who believe that only results count, then he could be seen as a successful leader. How he was removed from office was as bad as the actions taken by Saddam. Saying he killed hundreds of thousands of his own people and that made him evil, and then we go into Iraq and kill hundreds of thousands to remove him. Is there good and bad evil?

Abe,

Saddam is not the subject of this thread.
I appreciate your diplomatic efforts.

I agree with LC's spelling, but disagree with her heartless assessment of the hospital incident.

She threw in Saddam to muddy the water.

When she cannot answer she changes the subject.

Dick is right, she is wrong.

Marie Pacha wrote:

I personally can't take anyone seriously who says, In hindsight, Sadaam isn't looking so bad.

If half of what I read about Iraq is true, that place is FUBAR'd. We invaded a sovereign nation, it is painfully obvious there was no plan in place to maintain stability, no cultural understanding of how the citizens would react, no nothing except a breathtakingly incompetent president surrounded with equally incompetent advisors. Would you like to live in current-day Iraq, where you don't know if you'll get blown up while shopping, pulled over by another "tribe" posing as police, etc.

Yep, Sadaam isn't looking so bad to me. All we heard about in the Goebbels-like propaganda leading up to "the war" was how awful he was to his people. I'm now thinking that anyone he sent through that paper shredder probably deserved it.

I CALL FOR E. DON! It seems he can explan it better than I can.