13137: Corbett replies to both Dorce and ayiti1804: A plea for knowledge

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

>From Bob Corbett:  In replying to the post in the sentence below,
Dorce criticizes him for not providing an alternative:


<<  To ask him to do something now,  such as put up your own man, is
ridiculous. >>
,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

Dorce replies:


I fail to see how this is ridiculous.  What is the other option, simply be
AGAINST Aristide?  If one is against something and not FOR anything.....what
good is that?  It's a gripe session.....boo hoo.....so tough to be him
(what about the starving and the ill and the helpless poor Haitian?....now
THAT's tough).  It takes no guts at all to be against everything, but to
stand up for what's right and the person (potential candidate) who
embodies those righteous values....that takes courage.

Corbett responds:

I am one who wants to both understand the situation in Haiti and wish to
somehow be a part of improving it.  Neither of those are required.  It is
obvious that most living people on this planet neither want to know or
act.  They don't know Haiti and don't care.

But I have no desire to act on what I don't think I have an adequate
understanding of.  One of the main reasons I like to read this list is
I learn things I didn't know. Often I first learn:  Ah there is a problem,
and this is what it is.  Then, only after I learn that, can I
intelligently look for a solution.

Many people seem to me much better at the analysis and revealing of the
situation than I and I look to them for that guidance.  I don't expect
them to ALSO in the same moment solve the problem too.  I just appreciate
hearing a view and an argument that this is the problem.  I can read and
evaluate that against what I think and decide whether or not I am
persuaded.

I celebrate people on this list who help me understand the situation as
they see it.  I don't have to have that SAME person go on to suggest a
solution.  Often the people with the skills, experience and insight to see
and analyze and, if needs be, criticize a situatuion, are not the people
who best suggest solutions.  I think I'm that way, more attuned with my
intellectual skills and interest to recongize when something isn't quite
the way it's being presented, than I am an constructing solutions which
seem to me to require a very different set of intellectual skills and
interests.

Kathy speaks of guts and courage and all that as though those macho values
were to be upheld as virtues.  I'm very suspicous.  I prefer truth,
insight and wisdom.  I can them act on my own, with courage or caution,
with dash, elan and guts, or in fear and trembling, which is more like me.

We don't all have to be the same and do the same.  I for one celebrate the
critics -- even the critis whom I find to ALWAYS be wrong.  That helps me.
I read their views, think, wait a minute that doesn't fit with what I know
and I begin to at least mentally construct a rebuttal, and in doing that I
often come away understanding my own counter-view with much greater
clarity.  Even the erroneous critic helps me out.  I welcome any decent
argument made to help me understand the situation better than I do.

Which leads me to also challenge ayiti1804, who says in a post today:


From: Haiti 1804 <ayiti1804@hotmail.com>

Whether or not who believes what, are these kinds of attacking slams really
neceessary?  Are they conducive to positive communication?  Is this the kind
of atmosphere the list needs, or that for which it wishes to be known?

(this was regarding the newspaper article about Aristide allegedlying
having hundreds of millions salted away somewhere.)

I have no idea whether the report was false or viscious or what.  But I
don't mind hearing it.  My job as a serious person is to not be so stupid
as to believe all that I hear, but to ASSESS.  When arguements are given
I assess the argument.  When just bare assertions are given, I am much
more skeptical.  I will assess the source if I know it and messure it
against my historical relation with that source.  If no sources are given,
I wait to see if the claim emerges again in more serious form, or if it is
one that really grabs me, I'll begin my own investigation to evaluate the
claim.

The primary reason I have always wanted and encouraged such a wide range
of views and protected the right of people to say outrageous things about
Haiti and Haitians (at times) is my strong belief that we have a
responosbility to measure claims, and a right to hear them, that we are
better off hearing them, even if they are dead wrong.

So, again, I welcome the critics and even the gossips, but especially
appreciate and encourage well-made arguments and documented sources.
Those serve us all better, but any seriously held view is a service.

Bob Corbett