Average minds discuss events.

Small minds discuss people.

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Originally posted by Snoozin:
Great minds discuss ideas.

Average minds discuss events.

Small minds discuss people.

-- Eleanor Roosevelt

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Originally posted by Penny:

And also don't forget we all have good days and bad days, after all we are only human.

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Originally posted by Penny:
And on ES just like in the real world we have got the lot, so we discuss everything.

And also don't forget we all have good days and bad days, after all we are only human.

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I'm not condemning anyone, and I am certainly not claiming to be perfect. I can find a few posts I've made that I am not proud of. Just throwing one of my favorite quotes out there.

But I must admit I see a *lot* more vindictiveness on this board than I see in my own real life. Talking about people is one thing. Being abjectly brutal to another human being is entirely another.

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Originally posted by Snoozin:
Great minds discuss ideas.

Average minds discuss events.

Small minds discuss people.

-- Eleanor Roosevelt

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Originally posted by Semsema:
I live by the saying: Don't say behind someone's back, what you can't say to their face. It doesn't always make me the most popular but a spade is a spade.

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But calling a spade a spade isn't as great a deed as changing a spade into a heart

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Originally posted by Snoozin:
Great minds discuss ideas.

Average minds discuss events.

Small minds discuss people.

-- Eleanor Roosevelt

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"Strong minds" don't allow what's said about them online by people that don't know them in "real life" affect them.

"Weak minds" don't have a life offline.

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Originally posted by Pendarth:
But calling a spade a spade isn't as great a deed as changing a spade into a heart

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I like that a lot, Pendarth.

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Originally posted by hassancheb:
"Strong minds" don't allow what's said about them online by people that don't know them in "real life" affect them.

"Weak minds" don't have a life offline.

--Michelle

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Hmmmm, my original quote was referring to intellectual capacity rather than an emotional response to people's words. I tend to think of *strong* and *weak* as emotional reactions...

But my reaction to people being so mean *is* an emotional response. It really hurts and makes me sad when people attack others. But it's the *angry* *hateful* person that I feel so sorry for!

I feel so bad for people who are bitter and vindictive. I can't possibly imagine how bad their lives must be, or how powerless they feel that they must grasp for what little power they can by insulting someone on line, in an anonymous forum. What kind of misery are they living in? And does throwing insults actually make them feel better? Even temporarily?

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Originally posted by penelope:
well do u really thinks that what ppl say on line dose reflect their character, I don't think so, sometimes a person is v. nice on line but he/she is not that nice in real life & vice versa.

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Yeah, actually I do think it reflects their character. But I could be wrong. What would motivate someone to be nice on line while being a jerk in real life?

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Originally posted by penelope:
well do u really thinks that what ppl say on line dose reflect their character, I don't think so, sometimes a person is v. nice on line but he/she is not that nice in real life & vice versa.

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Actually, I am fascinated by what motivates people to act in a particular way. The best I can figure is that meanness comes from pain. But can you help assuage someone's pain? Particularly on line?

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Originally posted by Snoozin:
Hmmmm, my original quote was referring to intellectual capacity rather than an emotional response to people's words. I tend to think of *strong* and *weak* as emotional reactions...

But my reaction to people being so mean *is* an emotional response. It really hurts and makes me sad when people attack others. But it's the *angry* *hateful* person that I feel so sorry for!

I feel so bad for people who are bitter and vindictive. I can't possibly imagine how bad their lives must be, or how powerless they feel that they must grasp for what little power they can by insulting someone on line, in an anonymous forum. What kind of misery are they living in? And does throwing insults actually make them feel better? Even temporarily?

I love Pendarth's quote about turning a spade into a heart. I wish I knew how to do that.

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Strong or weak "minded" is the intellect.
Strong or weak "hearted" is emotional.

Most people with strong minds learn how to control their weak hearts. It doesn't mean you become emotionless, you just learn how to control those emotions. So you don't lose any sleep over some internet attacks by anonymous people that don't know you personally. If so, then "you" are the weakest link as you have given them "power" over your well being, which is exactly what they want. The mind is so powerful, and words are only the weapons you allow them to become. Your own insecurities allow you to be affected by the words of others. Confidence, allows those words to become meaningless.

I.e. If someone calls you a whore, and you know that you're not, it wouldn't bother you, as you know the person calling you the name is trying to offend you, if you succumb, then you have given someone else the power to hurt you, which in my opinion makes you weak, human, but weak nonetheless.

And I feel for people that become so "emotionally" attached to an "online" forum that they are spending any amount of consideration thinking about the life of a poster one way or the other. Most (not all) of the people are not even who they portray themselves to be online. An extremely unnattractive person can be a beauty queen on the internet. A nerdy man can be macho,etc. Anything goes, it's why I don't even think about it one way or the other until the next time I log in!

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Originally posted by hassancheb:
If so, then "you" are the weakest link as you have given them "power" over your well being, which is exactly what they want.

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I agree with you 100%. I guess my question is *why* do they want the power over someone else in the first place? It's one thing to want power over yourself and your own life, but why do people seek power over others?

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Originally posted by hassancheb:
The mind is so powerful, and words are only the weapons you allow them to become. Your own insecurities allow you to be affected by the words of others. Confidence, allows those words to become meaningless.

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Originally posted by Mirren:
And hassancheb, while I agree with most of what you say, it's not until you've been the target of hate mail, from people who you didn't even know existed, never mind attacked......then it's pretty hard not to get upset.

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It is not so much upset as you feel need to refute the allegations because of the potential damage it could do to you. I generally respond and then try ( ) to leave it alone.

I actually find the more general attacks more hurtful. All Egyptian men are after one thing, all Luxor men are gigalos, all Egyptian mothers in law hate Western women. Those kind of things.

You want to put the record stright because of first time or infrequent readers. You can't leave those hurtful genralisations unchallenged. But there is a point when you have to stop because the attacker has a hold as Hassen... said.

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Originally posted by Mirren:
I agree, Snoozin.....if you ask me, it's the people who feel they have to attack others who have the problems with insecurities and control of their emotions.

And hassancheb, while I agree with most of what you say, it's not until you've been the target of hate mail, from people who you didn't even know existed, never mind attacked......then it's pretty hard not to get upset.

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Mirren you're new here so you have no idea of how I have been targeted with personal attacks! So I attack back, but no way will I give this idiot the power to keep me down.

This sick idiot has spent hours researching my husbands and our business name online, and spams us with hatemail at our company trying to affect our day to day business offline, is that personal enough?

No matter what I say to a person in a forum, I won't agree with them 100% of the time, but when you began spamming someone at their place of business, using all these fictitious ID's trying to contact their customers, then you are crossing the line. I won't say too much else because they are being investigated, little to they know spamming is illegal in the states. Funny thing is they have all these IP hiders, but it won't protect them for long, as they chose the wrong person this time!

But nevertheless, I will not allow them to affect my day to day life, which is what the miserable person wants!

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Originally posted by Troubles101:
Just because you don't see people, it doesn't mean you shouldn't care about them. Some people meet others online and then meet them in person. It's not an issue of insecurity but relationships can take different forms; some are more risky than others and some are more intimate than others. People who make up personalities online exist also in real life and either way you will have to judge by what you see, sometimes you will be fooled in both worlds but at the end this is life and you can't gurantee anything.

Will I get hurt if someone insulted me online? Yes we are human being with feelings but it depends on how much I care about this person. Some people you never care about to the point that you will laugh seeing how desperate they are while others can indeed hurt you much if somehow you respected this person and evaluated him/her. JMO

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Yes we are human, and I agree some of us just have tougher skin than others.

When you deal with the vicious hate we deal with on a regular basis "in real life" this online stuff just becomes child's play.

I.e. this online person can't prevent us from sending money overseas, travelling free at will without harassment, having people turn to you day to day with their problems of racial abuse being Arabs because you're a leader in your community, I could go on and on it's a never ending real life drama for us, but it has made us stronger, so no way some trailer park trash with false accusations is going to make me lose any sleep when I've got to worry about how I'm going to help someone get money to their sick relatives without being accused of sending it to terrorist groups.

Anyway I've said enough, I'm exhausted just thinking about it. Good day!

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Originally posted by Snoozin:
Yeah, actually I do think it reflects their character. But I could be wrong. What would motivate someone to be nice on line while being a jerk in real life?

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I found that ppl who lives "two lives", I mean by that where is cyber world becomes more real than the real world. Those are ppl who think that ppl in real life doesnt understands them or doesnt love them. they belive that its safer on the net, cause there are so many ppl who loves them, and where your mind doesnt expect anything from them so you dont get dissapointed later if something happens.

and there this other type where he has a phsychological problem, where he enjoys fooling ppl and enjoys seeing them hurt, it gives him pleasure. where he usually uses the sex that he hates cause of incidents that happened in his life. and either attack you from the beginning or after he gains your trust. its upto how much hate he is carrying around, the more hate he has the more structured and more careful will his attack on the other person will be. where his goal is destroy as much as he can from that person.

It sad to know that this sort of ppl exist, but they do and at the end when you confront them with their faults, they wont understand it, cause they belive what they are doing is not wrong. They lack the ability of compassion and his EQ is down to the level of zero.

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Originally posted by hassancheb:
Mirren you're new here so you have no idea of how I have been targeted with personal attacks! So I attack back, but no way will I give this idiot the power to keep me down.

This sick idiot has spent hours researching my husbands and our business name online, and spams us with hatemail at our company trying to affect our day to day business offline, is that personal enough?

No matter what I say to a person in a forum, I won't agree with them 100% of the time, but when you began spamming someone at their place of business, using all these fictitious ID's trying to contact their customers, then you are crossing the line. I won't say too much else because they are being investigated, little to they know spamming is illegal in the states. Funny thing is they have all these IP hiders, but it won't protect them for long, as they chose the wrong person this time!

But nevertheless, I will not allow them to affect my day to day life, which is what the miserable person wants!

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Just for the record, whoever Hassencheb is talking about wasn't me! I had no idea that type of stuff occurred. Sheesh, and I was just annoyed over regular insults on the threads.....

I'm sorry Hassencheb. Didn't know.

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Originally posted by Serendipity:
I found that ppl who lives "two lives", I mean by that where is cyber world becomes more real than the real world. Those are ppl who think that ppl in real life doesnt understands them or doesnt love them. they belive that its safer on the net, cause there are so many ppl who loves them, and where your mind doesnt expect anything from them so you dont get dissapointed later if something happens.

and there this other type where he has a phsychological problem, where he enjoys fooling ppl and enjoys seeing them hurt, it gives him pleasure. where he usually uses the sex that he hates cause of incidents that happened in his life. and either attack you from the beginning or after he gains your trust. its upto how much hate he is carrying around, the more hate he has the more structured and more careful will his attack on the other person will be. where his goal is destroy as much as he can from that person.

It sad to know that this sort of ppl exist, but they do and at the end when you confront them with their faults, they wont understand it, cause they belive what they are doing is not wrong. They lack the ability of compassion and his EQ is down to the level of zero.

Man too many phsychology books up in my head!!

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No, you are right. I used to work in a large city's jail system, and some of the people I ran into were just awful. Wicked and cruel and no remorse. Played mind games, got people fired, even got people arrested for nothing. Really seriously hurt people and messed up their lives for years....

I've been very far removed from that type of thing for years now. I just always assume people are normal and nice and psychologically healthy until proven otherwise!