B. U. G. S.

Shari just sent me a comment:

Not Spam
Not Spam

I hesitate to reply for a couple of reasons. One is that this is Bob’s blog and this is a side issue, and the other is that I’m not wanting my own argument. So, I will say that I think that anyone should read what ever they want. I’m not superstitious. Having said that, I also think you should also consider who you are reading and what point they are really trying to make. Not to do that, will not help to hammer out what you really DO think, but just leave you reacting to what bothers you.

Comment by Shari

ME:

The moment I saw “I hesitate to reply…” from Shari, I got ready to give her hell, as usual, for being apologetic about what she was about to say. Regular readers will remember that it upsets me when someone like Shari, whom I have long since approved as a regular member of our seminar, apologizes for saying what she says.

But in this case, she was right.

Ole Bob reads with his lips moving, so he often misses the context. That is what I keep lecturing YOU about.

Please keep in mind that a major reason I feel free to point out YOUR mistakes is because I have already made them many times before most of you were born.

There is no reason for you to suffer for boners I have already paid for, so my bumblings can be of use to you.

This time, the reason Shari said “I hesitate to reply …” was because she and Mark were having a debate between themselves. She said she hesitated to keep this debate up.

Shari is right. Her statement prodded me into going into the whole subject of commenter crosstalk.

We need to address this whole question of commenter crosstalk. Shari has made mistake. A productive mistake.

Which also why she is a full member of this seminar. being willing to risk screwups are part of your tuition.

Let me explain to Shari and Mark how they screwed up:

Your comments are required reading for this seminar. That puts a reponsibility on YOU.

Mark made a set of comments I thought were pretty good, and Shari accused him of being a disciple of some writer. Then they got into a dispute over prayer.

Shari was right to apologize for this crap, and Mark shouldn’t have gotten into it HERE either.

Please note that HERE is in caps.

I put words in caps for a reason.

I try hard to interest my readers, but I honestly cannot give you a clear explanation of why people read this Blog. But they sure as hell don’t read it to watch a debate over some dumbass writer or the Power of Prayer.

ON THE OTHER HAND (Did you notice the caps?) I would LOVE it if crosstalk here develeoped into topics RELEVANT to the reason people READ the Blog.

Ole Bob will not be here forever, and this whole effort will be pointless if I don’t leave behind people who can go from my basics into talking to each other about how to go ON from those basics.

When I am gone, all I will leave behind is YOUR crosstalk. When YOUR crosstalk is crap, all my effort is crap.

Crosstalk that goes into the usual gutter shows me I am making no impression at all.

Let me suggest some crosstalk I WANT to see:

What IS Wordism? All I hear is people labeling anything they don’t like as wordism. They are back in their own ruts using my words. If all you can do with Wordism is make it a nice erm for what you would have said anyway, all my effort is wasted.

As Shari says, this IS Bob’s Blog. That does NOT mean that this is Bob’s PROPERTY, it means we are a group of people who believe that there is something to Bob’s Basics that is worth expanding on. What we have in common is not Bob the Demigod, but Bob who is worth reading because readers think he is saying something worthwhile.

Something worth TALKING about. A good STARTING pointI keep trying to expand on my own basics, which would be enough if this were just a course on Whitaker’s Words of Wisdom.

But this is a SEMINAR.

I am giving you basics. I am giving you a way of thinking. I am passing you the ball. You are not supposed to be some kind of Marxist who catches the ball and spends the rest of his life saying, “Gosh, this is the Ultimate Ball! What a Great Man the quarterback is!”

If I am a Great Man, it is because I finallly learned how to move the ball nearer our goals.

Go thou and do likewise. How can you use what readers find interesting to provide MORE discussion readers find interesting, WITHOUT all roads leading back to Bob the Ultimate Authority?

I am begging you to write for the OTHER readers of Bob’s Blog.

Not about the Power of Prayer. Not about some other writer you happen to know about.

Write for THIS AUDIENCE.

If I am writing BASICS as I keep insisting that I am, it means that you can use those basics, expand on those basics, correct those basics.

Try to imagine, after all this effort and all the very real progress we are making, how it makes ME feel when you suddenly start arguing with each other about subjects you would be talking about if I had never been born.

There should be a LOT of crosstalk here, GOOD crosstalk.

Give me some!