[thechat] politics, guitars, etc...

[Erika Meyer]

We should not have to wait for towers to topple and for our neighbors
to die in masses before we take the care to discuss our world with
each other.

As for whether one of us appears (via ascii) to be "aggressive" I
think we would all do well to give each other the benefit of the
doubt.

I visited Germany, and I visited England.  In Germany, they would all
push to the the front of the bakery counter... in England, they stood
in a line.  (I think they call it a "cue" or something.)

Did this make the Germans more aggressive than the English?  Maybe.

But then there was this soccer game, and there were English and
Italians... and a riot, and people were crushed.... my German father
saw it on TV and began shouting like a madman: "Those English are
barbarians!  Barbarians!"

Hmm...  Who are worse? The English or the Germans?  Do we judge by
how they line up to buy bread, or do we judge by how they treated
their colonies, or by they way they treat their neighbors or ....
hell, can we even judge people based on their nationality???

When I lived in Minneapolis I had a friend named Jamil.  He was from
Jordan.  Jamil was a good friend and very nice guy who would talk to
me about politics, or about life, or offer his truck and help me move
in the dead of a Minnesota winter.

I played cards with Jamil.  You could say that Jamil was an
"aggressive" card player.  He would slam/throw the cards (or the
money) down, often with some big exclamation and/or hand gesture....
often out of turn... didn't have the greatest poker face.

Because he was "aggressive" in his mannerisms, did that make him a
hateful/dangerous/aggressive person?  No.  He was in fact thoughtful
and intelligent and I learned quite a lot from him.

So all I'm saying is, don't assume your own personal cultural barrier
is everyone else's, okay?   I really don't understand why peoples
buttons get pushed so hard just because someone has expressed a
certain point of view.

And as for GUITARS, *everyone* knows guitars are the sexiest musical
instrument on earth, so I don't know why anyone would even bother
questioning it.  Sheesh.  Get a clue.

Erika
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