From: leo@ph.tn.tudelft.nl (Leo Breebaart)
Subject: Re: Ray Shea Goes Ballistic (was Re: Top 10 bands of all time)
Reply-To: leo@ph.tn.tudelft.nl
Organization: Delft University of Technology
Date: Sat, 21 Nov 1992 14:01:50 GMT

falcon@camelot.bradley.edu (D. Nathan Hood) writes:

> >> all that anyone can express their opinions and this is the place
> >> to do it... but if people are going to be flamed for doing so,
> >> then the use of the net will decrease greatly... and then you
> >> guys would be out of people to flame...

Oh Lordy. Let me try it one more time...

In this thread people are not getting flamed for just expressing their
opinions. They are being questioned about expressing *uninformed*
opinions. We are talking certain *specific* *instances* of the general
concept 'opinion' here.

I don't give a bleep whether you are on the Silverman-side or on the
Shea-side of this particular debate -- what I am beginning to hate is
the reasoning that *because*, in this flamewar, group <X> are fighting
group <Y> over one specific 'expressed opinion' <O>, that *therefore*
group <X> is out to suppress or flame or destroy the right of every
other non-<X> member to express any other opinion on any other
subject.


> >Everyone has a right to an *informed* opinion. If you are willing to
> >inflict your opinions upon hundreds of fellow newsgroup readers then 
> >you also gotta be prepared to take the heat if they turn out to be
> >extremely uninformed and narrow opinions. Especially if you don't
> >even present them as opinions but as objective facts.
> 
> people are as informed as they want to be... you can tell people anything
> you want and it is their choice whether or not to listen...  _you_ feel
> that they are narrow and uniformed... they can say the same about you...
> just because they are 'experienced' in a different form or genre of music
> doesn't mean that they are uninformed... 

Oh, come on. Look at what you're saying. Nobody is foolish enough to
state that you have to be experienced in everything to be called
'informed'.  Just be 'experienced' *in that which you want to
publically write about*, and either shut up about the stuff you are
not 'experienced in', *or* if you won't, be prepared to take some
serious disagreement from people who know more about it than you.

> there is no such thing as a narrow opinion...

Oh yes there is.

> it is the opinion that that person holds and to them it is
> sufficiently broad... if you see it as narrow and uninformed then
> that is _your_ problem and not theirs...

The urge to start writing analogies involving nazi's and world war II
becomes almost overpowering, but I'll be strong...

Other people's opinions are indeed not my problem, as long as those other
people keep them to themselves and don't bother me with them.

As soon as they start posting those opinions to a public forum meant
for discussion and argument, they are taking an explicit step that in
effect says: "look here, these are my opinion, and I think they are
interesting enough to present to you".

Coming out in the open with those opinions was *their* decision, not mine,
and if I now disgree with those opinions, or wish to show that they are
narrow and uninformed, I should be allowed to do so. If you don't want 
your opinions questioned, *keep* *them* *to* *yourself*!

-- 
Leo Breebaart  (leo @ ph.tn.tudelft.nl)
Newsgroups: rec.music.misc