Kindness as a replacement for Truth

[quiliro]

This used to be [Practicality of GNU project and libre movement]. But
since I was hijacking the thread and I did want to get more information
about this, I made another thread. I did not put the usual [was: ...] on
the subject to avoid making it too long.

Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> writes:

> On 7/31/20 2:35 PM, quiliro wrote:
>
>> Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> writes:
>>
>>> Well... I mean that coddling folks who loudly, and authoritatively
>>> pronounce bullshit - particularly when stated as fact - I say shoot it
>>> down, loudly, and often.  (As opposed to canceling people,
>>> "moderating" or otherwise censoring, or expelling people from groups.
>>> I'm sorry, but I've come to favor bluntness over kindness, when
>>> dealing with healthy adults.)
>>>
>>> Miles Fidelman
>> I am strongly in favour of using more sincerity, even if it is rude. i
>> also advocate to also stop censorship that is targeted against this
>> rudeness. It is better to have these sincerity with freedom of
>> expression than to be kind and untruthful. But, can't we have sincerity
>> _and_ kindness?
>
> Good point.  But that starts to be a cultural thing.
>
> I mean, those of us from NY tend to be rude, and just call bullshit,
> bullshit.  Folks from the South tend to say things like "well isn't
> that precious" -  but it still means "bullshit."  The Japanese are
> pretty good at giving folks a way to "save face" - but then you're
> expected to go out and kill yourself, before people call you on your
> (grave) mistakes.  And then there are the French. :-)
>
> In a design review, one can be polite, or call someone a moron - but
> ultimately it comes down to pointing out something that's broken. 
> Kind, might be providing a suggestion or a solution, and perhaps
> phrasing it as "maybe you should consider doing <this> instead of
> <that>" - but that's still putting someone on the spot, and presenting
> as better or smarter.  There's really not that really "kind."
>
> Now, if someone points at a perfectly good design, calls it crap, and
> suggests something that's broken as an alternative - and then insists
> on their correctness, leaning on their credentials as justification -
> that person, IMO, deserves  extremely UNKIND treatment.
>
> And, at some point it's hard to distinguish kindness from
> participation trophies.

I don't understand all of your statements because English is not my
mother language. But 99% of them are clear to me.

What I am not sure of is that "deserves [...] unkind treatment" (the
uncapitalization is mine) would produce the desired results. Maybe
someone would use being diplomatic in order to hide their attack on
something or someone. But I think that assuming innocence is a good way
to stop unjust accusations. I think that the attacks on Stallman were
deliberate ways to raise the profile of someone that has no relevance on
the news (as was the attacker's poor profile). But there is ample
evidence of that. In this case, a lone message was enough to be sure?
Was being blunt a good way to kill that sort of presumed hypocrisy?
Would it bring the other people together for the dificult task of
advocacy?

I do agree like seeing someone is enraged at me, rather than
diplomatically trick me into some scam. And I do support this attitude
as a replacement for silence or trickery. But I do not see how people
that are seduced by "kind communications" will understand they are
better off when someone is sincere. That takes a lot of maturity.

On the other hand, people who are affraid of hurting someone's feelings
use this sort or strategy to avoid the opposite reaction they
expect. Perhaps their intention is good and they are not sure of
themselves enough to understand that the rudeness in reactions is not
because of what they said, but because of the personal history of the
hurt person. There are many possibilities.

This is not an accusation against Miles. It is a discussion for my
benefit (and others', if interested) about the false need to "be kind"
as a replacement for direct sincere positions. Of course Tsun-tsu would
disagree with me on this one. But I guess that war is not the place for
community; or is it?