Theos-Talk Archives (January 2003 Message tt00024)

Dear Paul

Why make it into such a thing. Why have such a hard time of it? Why let
how you see the faults of others effect you so badly? Practical Theosophy
is supposed to teach us how to start managing that. All these rather
unpleasant things you are seeing and feeling (and in some cases I think
imagining), can be opportunities in learning how to manage them, rather than
feeling them too personally. Of course, 9 times out of 10 we may fail in
that management, but lets at least succeed in ONE. With the world on its
knees at the moment, and with millions of people starving, you perceiving
yourself as being talked about in the third person can't surely be that bad.

You write:
<<<Therefore, people like Tony and Dallas (and today Leon) talking about me
in the third person while rejecting personal communication really have no
interest whatsoever in communicating with me. There's no intended message
for me in what they say. Putting "Paul Johnson" in "his" place has
absolutely nothing to do with me. And everything to do with *their* place
in the cosmic or Theosophical pecking order.>>>

What you write above, has a beauty to it, as in all fairness, it was you
Paul, who wrote that List on New Year's Eve, selecting certain contributors
from Theos-World, and putting them into categories: *putting them in their
place,* and putting them down in various degrees. And you also put us in a
pecking order, which is just what you are complaining about others doing.
Just because you put me at the bottom, but in excellent company, certainly
wouldn't mean from my point of view, that you wouldn't be welcome to have
breakfast with us (but think of all the possible messages Bill could be
receiving from this - but none are sent). And I can't imagine that you
would be so petty as not to come for breakfast. Is it so impossible to have
a laugh about it all? It seems that what you are complaining about and
accusing others of, is what you yourself do so well. And what is more, you
have demonstrated it in that New Year's Honours List of yours. But what you
actually can do (because no one else can do it for you) is to change your
place on the list, regardless of what others may think. But that applies to
all of us. Please laugh about it. Do you remember those wonderful
comments Larry made about folk on Theos-World. They were funny!
All the best
Tony

-----Original Message-----
From: kpauljohnson <kpauljohnson@yahoo.com>
[mailto:kpauljohnson@yahoo.com]
Sent: 2 January 2003 12:35 am
To: theos-talk@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Theos-World Being put in "one's place"


Dear everyone,

And particularly Wry, what I've been making of your comment is this--
correct me if I misunderstand. It is extremely common in ordinary life for
people to speak disrespectfully and scornfully of others, "putting them in
their place" *behind their backs*. But much less common for this to be done
to people's faces. In Internet fora, the propensity of people to diss
others behind their backs (that is referring to them disdainfully while
avoiding address them personally) is expressed just as often as in "real
life." With the crucial difference that the person being backbitten becomes
an unwilling eavesdropper, since the third person remarks are made publicly,
even though they are addressed to someone else.

Therefore, people like Tony and Dallas (and today Leon) talking about me in
the third person while rejecting personal communication really have no
interest whatsoever in communicating with me. There's no intended message
for me in what they say. Putting "Paul Johnson" in "his" place has
absolutely nothing to do with me. And everything to do with *their* place
in the cosmic or Theosophical pecking order.

To be more explicit about what mystifies me: why does everyone I know in
real life appear to like me, but devote little to no thought to what my
"place" is in any overall scheme or feel any need to define that "place" and
put me in it? Whereas quite a few strangers met on the Internet evidently
dislike me to a degree totally unknown in my reai life, and more
perplexingly seem to have a keen interest in defining what my "place" is and
publicly putting me in it? (And this is just as true of Baha'is or
Cayceites or Fourth Way folks as for Theosophists.)

My hypothesis: in "real life" people are quite secure in their "place" and
interactions are rooted in mutual understanding of where others are
"placed." Whereas in Internet fora, people are existentially insecure about
their own "place" in the world, and therefore pathologically obsessed with
putting strangers in "their place" so as to maintain some kind of internally
imagined pecking order. (E.g. BAG has *got* to be defined as a dugpa to
maintain some kind of stability in our Danish member's mental universe,)

A rather creepy vision of why people behave so much more obnoxiously online
than in real life, but more sensible than thinking that folks around here in
NC and VA are nice whereas those in most of the rest of the world are always
trying to put everybody down. Which does occur to me in my exasperated
moments!

Cheers,

Paul







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