From: altar@beaufort.sfu.ca (Ted Wayn Altar)
Subject: Suggestions on how to KILL a flame
Organization: Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1992 07:47:23 GMT

Steve Dyer has asserted:
[much of the same removed for brevity]

>The disingenuousness and hypocrisy of this guy is simply amazing.
>Ted Altar is all too ready to sling mud, but he pretends that
>his hands are clean.  It's really nauseating.  It is, however,
>characteristic of much of what Altar, Traub, and Abhay whathisname
>write.  They are cut from the same cloth; zealotry has a rhetoric
>all its own.
[...]
> Stick to recipes and political polemic.

Well, it seem that I've been promoted to recipe and political 
polemic postings.  Given the raised eyebrows about my
fast "power" breakfast, I suspect that I will also be
asked to move out of that field of endeavor as well  ;-)

 
With respect to answering a message like the above,
good olde Ben Johnson had on many an occasion simply
said, "calumnies are answered best with silence".
 
Permit me to instead to make a few suggestions as
to how one might deal with those who occasionally
or habitually make rude and mean-spirited remarks.
 
In the past, I did respond publicly to a flame-baiting or
rudeness, but I think this only perpetuated the flame and simply
provided more occasions for the insulter to cast even more
insults.  What might one attempt to do instead?
 
     1.  Remain civil and hope (but don't always expect) that the
     person will come around through reasoned appeals and earnest
     dialogue.
     
     2.  Maybe try to reason with the person via e-mail.  Besides
     maybe putting a more human face on the interaction, such a
     discretion will spare others of the burden of having to read
     what might only be a personal misunderstanding or
     disagreement between two people.
     
     3.  If 1 and/or 2 above fails, then see if one has the self-
     restraint to simply ignore or turn a blind eye to those
     seemingly pointed remarks by the person whom you find,
     for whatever reason, especially annoying and unpleasant.
     
     4.  Alternatively, there is always that handy dandy KILL
     file.  I really do highly recommend this computerized
     version of `turning a blind eye'.  It really seems like the
     person in question whom you find annoying is simply not
     there at all.  It's really quite effective!  Generally, one
     should be against voluntary ignorance, but here, alas, is
     the one exception.  ;-(
     
          "To each his suff'rings, all are men,
          Condemn'd alike to groan;
          the tender for another's pain,
          Th' unfeeling for his own.
          Yet ah! why should they know they fate?
          Since sorrow never comes too late,
          And happiness too swiftly flies.
          Thought would destroy their paradise.
          No more; where ignorance is bliss,
          'Tis folly to be wise"
               Thomas Gray (from "Ode on a Distant Prospect of
               Eton College")
     
So why suffer `agro'?  Life is too short and our brief sojourn on
the net will soon be a waning memory in that fast approaching
future.  If reason and civility and friendly exchange will not
prevail, no need to leave, make the other guy simply disappear :)
 
Let me say that again: there is no need to leave!  Instead, KILL
without violence or blood or injury by using the KILL file!  I'm
actually astonished that here I find myself advocating that we
KILL! :)
 
It is remarkable how most of us are indeed easily affected by the
occasional mean-spirited remarks of a few while the more worthy
remarks of the many seem to get forgotten.  This is not at all
fair!   Solution: stamp injuries in the dust where they belong
and simply don't waste time with the flame-baiters or those who
resort to rudeness instead of open and friendly dialogue.
 
Starting today, I now have 2 people in my KILL file.  Both happen
to be omnivores, but maybe that is just a unhappy coincidence  ;-
 
What happens, you might ask, if a former adversary does perchance
(bloody unlikely I say :) ), make a good point that ought to be
addressed?  If he or she is in your KILL file, then will not that
good point simply go unanswered?  Quite possibly, but others
can always ask in turn what THEY think the good point happens to
be and at least they might be a lot more inclined to ask in a
civil and open-minded manner.
 
So, there you have it.  At least four options on how to deal with
those difficult people you might have had the unpleasant
experience of reading on the net.
 
Now, does anyone else have any additional ideas as to how to
stifle the flames and make life more pleasant for us all on this
r.f.v?   Hint: recommending that I vanish or that we all vanish,
doesn't count ;-)
                                              ted
 
P.S.  By all means, should you find my messages irrelevant,
tiresome, addleheaded or whatever it may be that makes you
unhappy with my postings, then by all means KILL, put me into
that KILL file!  Off with you!  Off the CRT screen and into the
KILL file begone!  :-)
 
P.S.S.  How many rude posters does it take to change a lightbulb?
None, we all now that rude posters don't change anything, and they
certainly don't bring light.  ;-)

 
Xref: sparky rec.food.veg:10682 rec.food.cooking:20946