I, too, am happy to have Cordobablue here, and as I said before, I'm sorry that she found the thread that resulted here offensive.
I see that she intended her original post to be something inspirational and encouraging. But may I take the liberty of sharing my understanding of the psychology that may have led to this thread going in the direction that it did?
Many who practice preparedness and/or hold to a Golden-Rule-style anarchist or minarchist worldview feel different from the sheeple around them. We feel like a different species. We feel like we're awake in a world full of sleepwalkers, or we feel old-fashioned in a world that is barreling towards futuristic dystopia, or we feel like a handful of hedgehogs in a field dominated by sheep and wolves and their conflicts. Or whatever. In any case, we feel different from most of the people we deal with on a daily basis. We enjoy coming here to TMM and other enclaves of freedom online because we can be ourselves and talk shop with like-minded people. So far, so good.
Since we live on a planet full of, and mostly run by, sheeple and wolves, those of us who are neither frequently get cookie cuttered, shoe-horned, or simply forced into molds and systems that just plain old don't apply to us. Weren't built for us, weren't built by us, weren't designed and aren't run by anyone with an inkling of sympathy or understanding for the kind of individuals we are. In fact, a lot of these sheeple systems seem to have been designed by sheeple, to spite those of us who aren't wooly and don't say, "baaaaaa."
"They aren't wooly, and they never say, "baaaaaa," so they're nasty and they
deserve to be shoved into this Procrustean bed we've made for them." Sad but true.
We daily feel the uncomfortable effects of other people trying to pigeonhole us and force us into their molds. Sometimes this happens in their minds, and it's just annoying. Sometimes it physically happens, in the form of forced vaccinations or abortions, or drug busts, or whatever.
As a result of this felt discomfort, we come to dislike sweeping statements, since they may well be untrue of us and those we love. And if the sweeping statement clearly contradicts our own experience, then the reaction comes from even deeper in the gut. In other words, some of us are quite touchy about generalizations.
Knee-jerk reactions aren't always wise or nice. But they happen for a reason.
So how's that for a whole bunch of relatively sweeping statements?
If they aren't true of you yourself, please feel free to beat me with an ugly stick.
Now, I regret that my earlier statements offended cordobablue. In the future, I may ask myself a little harder if a poster is looking for in intellectual response or just an encouraging word in return. I may just move on and go post geeky stuff in the Open Source Tech Gulch.
I'm 100% certain that cordobablue had no ill intent, even if her post may have been perceived as overly general and not quite true according to some of our experiences. I'm sorry that she was upset by the ensuing discussion. But one person's falling-out is someone else's stimulating discussion.
I'd rather we grew to understand and love each other better, than that we quit talking.
This is a unique community, and it would pay us to understand its history, and the reasons why we are different from the average Joe at the water cooler. We would benefit ourselves even more if we can stick together instead of falling apart over relatively trivial arguments.
[Edit for typos.]
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Topic: What Women need to know (Read 16145 times)