is persuasion unevolved?

declaration of war between dissensus and 555-5555

luka said:

but i guess there is a point at which you have to accept that some people just wont 'get it.' the content is not translatable across that boundary, for whatever reason. that is not a failure of communication or a question of bad faith but too great a difference in metabolism, or cultural/intellectual reference points, or you know, whatever it might be that comes between people.

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it is confounding and perplexing that people don't hear things the same way - don't hear what you hear in something

and also lonely as well

so you might be trying to persuade them (possibly as foolhardy and futile as someone who likes anchovies trying to persuade someone who hates anchovies that they are delicious)

but it's also reaching out to see if anyone hears it or feels it in the same way

maturity is getting beyond the stage of "must obliterate your viewpoint / hearing-point" (using invalidation, mockery, abuse, tortured philosophical and political arguments etc etc) and getting to the "how interesting that you hear it so differently! how did that come about then? what forces us make us differ?" stage

trouble is, on the prose level, the immaturity phase lends itself to more exciting - cos excited, worked up - writing

the mature, each-to-their-own approach tends to be a bit tepid and easy-going

i am libidinally attached as a reader (and a writer) to that kind of writing where people lose all sense of perspective and proportion - and rage about aesthetic disagreements and other people's taste-heresy as if it really really mattered and was some kind of atrocity

the minute you start to have a more balanced, accepting type of outlook, the temperature of the prose starts to dip

but it's certainly healthier to be like that

blissblogger said:

the minute you start to have a more balanced, accepting type of outlook, the temperature of the prose starts to dip

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I recently read an article on William Gaddis' letters, in one excerpt he said that the most difficult thing about aging as a writer is remaining angry enough to continue writing well. He talked about "... summoning that indignation to surface yet once more & for long enough to sustain a fiction to embrace it...".

without the flexing, what could we generate?

i'm picturing an eternal buddha lounge of the soul

Details about your subjective experience add up to useful background for other people when they're wondering "Why the fuck is s/he telling me this?". It adds to communication, whereas hectoring people with your subjective values might not, as fun as it is.

aggression is fundamental to evolution

(Rick ross voice: I think I'm Jordan P - Angry Lobster!)

blissblogger said:

it is confounding and perplexing that people don't hear things the same way - don't hear what you hear in something

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I think you lose this as you get older (or I have anyway) because you have lived long enough not to be able to hear what you used to hear in some things.

luka said:

the most sinister people are men who disavow that outward, hearty, good, honest, cheerful agression and speak in a strained hushed tone, softening every word like theres a baby sleeping nearby.

baboons will vouch for me when i say male therapists are often like this. very creepy, sordid, dishonest types. walking around pretending to have been castrated while at the same time they're trying to peer down the tops of teenage girls.

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Someone needs to do a Taxonomy of Therapists and Counsellors - there are a few different classes, but together they encompass about 95% of the overall population. The blandly creepy male therapist is certainly one of them.

Surely this is just an issue of Ego.