Others will tell me Lenin is not exactly the sort of role model to be quoting anyway, so I will quit that and go to Socrates instead who described himself as a gadfly stinging the Athenian conscience, and look what happened to him :(
The point is, if you are going to make progress in overturning established ideas and ways of doing things then you are inevitably going to upset somebody and that is not necessarily a bad thing.
There are various reactions to blunt criticism, both of them probably involve feeling indignant about it.
One is to slough off the initial knee jerk reaction to having ones ego punctured and realise that if nothing else it drew ones attention to the situation in a way that a subtle softly softly approach would not.
The other is to re-inforce ones prejudice by resort to ad hominems wherein the affronted folds back into there secure world and considers the critic as that nasty piece of work they thought they were all along.
I expect there are both kinds of reactions to my last blog, and so be it, I am not here to be in a comfort zone either.
And if I have broken a few eggs in the process, well my advice is to move on mop up and enjoy a nice omelette.
I suspect however as the pig that walks on two legs I am reverting too much toward my four legged origins and breaking eggs is not going to save my bacon so to end with another quote, from Jethro Tull this time :-
Really don't mind if you sit this one out.Maybe that is all I am "Thick as a brick" :(
My words but a whisper -- your deafness a SHOUT
I may make you feel but I can't make you think.
15 comments:
Man, you write well. Keep breaking eggs!
I thought of that expression just yesterday.
You can't get any Jethro Tull off of i-tunes. Damn shame!
Larry, I needed to update myself about your breaking eggs post. I think you have a lot of important things to say. But as I said on Kev's blog, we MUST work together. Please see my comment there.
I agree with your essential point, Larry, but let me ask you this. If you remove one side from a triangle, does it make a sound?
As much as one hand clapping :)
Can I have Huevos Rancheros?
I love Jethro Tull. Saw them in concert once. Gotta love a rock band that includes a flute player.
Eye 4 1 am NOT impressed Larry Rex. Not 1 little bit. This was your grandiose performance art and not helpful in my opinion. So am I a knee jerk reactionary if you say I am?
The trouble with breaking eggs is that you are not very likely to end up with something so fine as an omelette. The possibility, perhaps probability, is that you will end up with egg splattered all over your face.
When you reprimanded Kristina for her paper - where was the reasoning? These post-post modernism days, folks generally are not allowed to mouth pious platitudes or take refuge in a very old logical fallacy that who you are gives your arguments added weight. It does not and never has.
When you reprimanded Kev for the supposed failings of the Hub, where was the consistent portrayal of what is supposedly missing on your own blog?
I think you have done a great deal of harm for no benefit whatsoever, either for you personally or for your constituency.
Well for some time I have been tired of reading the same ping-pong arguments between pro and anti mercurians in a mutually exclusive world of one will never believe the other.
The Autism hub is almost like a clique of self supporting bloggers finding mutual strenght in a consistent belief system.
Fine so far as that goes, the opposition are much the same in solidarity with each other.
I think it makes a change for criticism to come from within, and I see that as entirely healthy to the growth of any system.
At least for me it sorts out the sheep from the goats, although, ones person's sheep will be anothers goats.
So if I am the horned goat so be it.
Regarding the point about Kristina Chew, I was very much looking forward to the opportunity of engaging in debate over her paper, and was dissapointed that she could not turn up at the conference.
Disagreement with a paper does not mean disrespect for its author.
Disagreement with Kev does not mean disrespect for his person.
Unfortunately people take things far too personally. The hub does not seem any different to the anywhere else in that respect.
It bothers me even more now, that there seem to be a set of sacred taboos, or marks one cannot cross.
I think time will prove the worth of what I have been trying to say, just as the wider disability world has largely moved on from the late 1970's and 80's, so will the autism debate, and I expect by that time that some of the arguments I have seen here against my point of view will seem absurd and reactionary in hindsight even if they look to have validity now.
Let time be the judge, if our world divides further, then that is history (I will be accused of being over intellectual if I invoke the Hegelian dialectic no doubt) but stated briefly, first comes the thesis, the idea, then comes the antithesis, that is to say the opposition, the criticism of the idea, and then comes the new synthesis where the two are reconciled. It's a bit like paradigm shift.
The autism world is still stuck in an old paradigm, and is out of step.
That is my opinion, it is my right to state that on my blog, and as I say, time will be the judge when all the heat has gone out of the argument and some light crept in.
I am close to following Kev and closing comments on this myself, as the constant back on forth is preventing me from doing other things right now.
Better than breaking the eggs and making an omlette, is letting the eggs hatch and having a flock of birds.
Breaking the eggs is to liquidate their value today.
Letting them hatch is to leave a better world for tomorrow.
Seems to me I break a few eggs, then people start trashing the hen house cos they are mad at me.
I see some very personal attacks now, including presumptions as to my mood, my intentions, my thought processes.
Well I think it is clear enough now, the inherent contradictions and tensions in the hub are coming out, not just between parents and autistics, but between autistics and autistics, those who see Mercury as the essential issue, and those who see it as one big diversion.
I see it as a diversion because the debate is about compensation, and the way in which research funds should be allocated.
Let us get this clear, the debate should be how research funds are apportioned, do we want research into useless and patently wrong ideas about possible cures, or do we want research into what is effective in autism education and intervention.
For my part I would rather the money was actually spent on services, on empowering autistic people, so that we are the ones in control of the decision making processes as to how research funds are allocated.
I was pushed into a corner by Kev, and I remained polite in my estimation, I wished to keep this as a criticism of the hub as a whole, I did not want to throw personal accusations out to individuals specifically, but this house is not only divided, but the factions within it are divided too when it gets personal.
It irks me when people pursue me for my opinions, and I hold back because I know the reaction they will get if I give them, yet they persist, so I tell them what they want to hear, but it is not what they want to hear and so they forget the message and make it personal.
FWIW I'm glad you're out there saying this stuff.
I won't ask you to rejoin the Hub because if I were in your place I'd want no part of it either.
What you do is, you make holes with a needle or pin, one in the small end of the egg and one in the larger end. Holding the egg very gently, you blow the contents into a bowl, preserving the shell. You can then have omelette without breaking the eggs, although you will be left with, um, empty shells.
Uhm...you are kind of "grumpy", Larry. You used to scare the hell out of me.
I will miss your references to the good old days...music, comedy, whatever.
I have been accused of being grumpy, too, but like Rags (Dad) said, which I will clean up a little..."To heck with them if they can't take a joke".
(shaking in my boots while pressing the publish button...)
Rose
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