Promote What You Love Rather Than Bashing What You Hate

Injustice, poverty, slavery, ignorance - these may be cured by reform or revolution. But men do not live only by fighting evils. They live by positive goals, individual and collective, a vast variety of them, seldom predictable, at times incompatible. ~Isaiah Berlin

Promote What You Love Rather Than Bashing What You Hate
October 9, 2014

I was shocked at her question, but I knew what I wanted to teach her. My response had nothing to do with her being gay or straight, it wasn’t political or religious. It is however the answer to some of the biggest problems we create for ourselves. So I said, “I’m not going to tell you what to believe or how to feel, but I do believe our world would be a better place if we started promoting what we love rather than bashing what we hate.”

We had a great conversation about what that meant and how that is truly a principle of influence and persuasion and she left with a positive approach.

There is no better example of this than in American Politics.

If you want to stand out, be heard, be relevant, attract people to you, create change or be an influence for good – then Promote What You Love rather Than Bashing What you Hate.

The gauntlet is thrown down, care to rise to the challenge?

This right here is why I have seriously cut back on participating in the CH. I can't tell you how tiring it is to have the same damn absurd assumptions brought up over and over and over again.

You obviously don't see our country crashing at a record pace SC and I envy you for that. I envy the fact that you and others can go through life trusting the government to preserve this great experiment for your kids and their kids.

You have no idea how I feel about our country. Maybe if you'd paid attention to what I've been writing the past 10 years you would, but you don't listen, you keep putting your biases and assumptions on me and every other liberal here. You ASSUME what sources we read, even when we state them otherwise. You ASSUME what those sources have written about, even when you've been proven blatantly wrong. You ASSUME that we all fit in one neat box 100% agreeing with what the Democratic representatives do, say, and propose for legislation.

It gets to the point where it's not worth having the same conversation over again, wasting time posting other points of view or proving facts otherwise as stated.

So I'm sorry if the reason I'm here disappoints you, but I need a place make my case and vent my frustrations since doing it in the real world with friends and family who think differently would damage my happiness. If this was The Fun House and not The Courthouse, I would have never posted here. This is why I decided not to meet you in person when I had the chance years ago... I knew I'd have to treat you like my other liberal friends, which means I could no longer talk politics here.

This right here disappoints me more than you know. I'm so glad that I and all the members here, unlike your friends and family, can simply be who you dump your shit on rather than real human beings who have complex beliefs, differing ideologies, and yet the same core values that make our country great. Our Founding Fathers had widely held beliefs yet they compromised to forge a new path forward, and these days far too many hold the opposing side as not just wrong and unworthy of listening to or understanding, but as evil and treasonous. That's the true downfall of our nation, and I'm so glad to see it alive and well here on this board.

The point of this post is that if you want to convince people that your ideology is more sound, a better way forward, then you don't do it by constantly and only bashing the opposing ideology. People aren't motivated by hate long-term, they need hope, goals, and a realistic path forward; hence, my quote at the very beginning of this topic. Politicians of both sides do this and it simply widens the divide and kicks the can down the road of solving our complex problems.

As Jim Wright says, "If you want a better country, be better citizens."

I don't just run this business and post in the CH, I volunteer in the community with the Chamber and Rotary WIldfire Ready. I listen in on BOCC meetings and share developments that impact everyone. In January I will become part of the Jeffco Wildfire Commission to work on creating policies that will (hopefully) reduce our wildfire danger because it's a critical issue. I volunteer with a local fire department. I've endlessly encouraged everyone to get involved and engaged because the way to make things better is to put in your own time and effort, however best you can, not by sitting around complaining about everything that's going wrong. If that's all you want to do, don't expect to get much response or respect from me any further.

I give up. I didn't say there were new rules, I was trying to make a point that constantly bashing the "other side" doesn't promote your cause at all, and that applies to both sides. By all means, continue dumping on liberals, or conservatives, but that's what I see as the reason why there's fewer responses because no one wants to engage in fighting constant assumptions that don't apply to them, or strawman arguments. All the people who really want to argue and be mean and nasty have moved on to FB and NextDoor, heaven forbid the owner should try to make this place be better quality discussions.

The point I was trying to make is this: if you think Republicans will do a better job, and have better ideas to fix a problem, then share that. Convince me their solutions are a better path forward, with data and rational arguments, rather than constantly telling me liberals are doing it wrong. Because I can tell you right off the bat that no one side has all the right answers, and if anyone thinks that then they are missing the strengths the other side has in creating the best solution together.

And vice versa for liberals.

I've got a multi-page topic on global warming. Read through it and tell me how many posts are me bashing how one political party keeps downplaying vs straight up data showing it's a problem and possible solutions to address it.

Injustice, poverty, slavery, ignorance - these may be cured by reform or revolution. But men do not live only by fighting evils. They live by positive goals, individual and collective, a vast variety of them, seldom predictable, at times incompatible. ~Isaiah Berlin

LOL on the Broncos FH! They've got potential!

Agreed on Manchin and Sinema. I'm unhappy with the villainization they are getting from Democrats (especially the extreme left who are toxic) and am hopeful that moderates in either party will lead the reasonable path forward.