dkpstarkey wrote: ↑Mon Dec 20, 2021 10:01 pm
AshvinP wrote: ↑Mon Dec 20, 2021 8:03 pm
Again, what you write above is extremely vague and therefore not helpful to me. Can you quote something I wrote to JMG and explain why or how I should "present myself differently" so as not to be censored by people like him? I am just patiently and politely asking you for specificity here so as to make your original feedback more constructive for me going forward. Thanks.
Yes, I should be more specific, so the next step is as you suggest, a quote from your 2nd message to JMG:
“I just meant, based on what was written here, I don't think you have *understood* The Philosophy of Freedom. So your critique of it in subsequent articles will likely be critiquing your own misunderstanding rather than his phenomenological arguments.”
On the surface, this could be taken as polite at least in a formal sense. But in truth, it is a bold and broadly insulting statement that insults not just JMG's position on some particular point, but his intellectual capacity to comprehend Steiner. Of course, it may indeed be true that JMG doesn't comprehend Steiner. I would expect him, alongside a great many other people who I have no reason to insult, to in fact take this as an insult. This is no way to begin a conversation unless one is speaking to someone who answers to you, like a staffer.
DKP,
I am curious why you are leaving out JMG's stubbornly dismissive response prior to my comment you quoted - "
Awakening, if by “promising” you mean accepting the truth of everything Steiner said, yes, you’re going to be disappointed, but then I never promised that."
Should this, the fact that he has no idea what I am talking about and therefore confuses my initial comment for a claim for him to blindly accept "everything Steiner said" - have no bearing on my response?
That being said, I think you are correct in some sense. I have become so familiar with the blind spots re: PoF and Steiner that I can immediately spot why someone is misunderstanding my comments. What I forget is that the other person is not familiar with our discussions here and therefore cannot understand what or how I have immediately spotted the flawed assumptions in their comment. I should try to remind myself that and really start over from scratch with every new person. Not to avoid offending them, but because they will have no idea what I am specifically pointing to and therefore cannot follow the logic.
DKP wrote:Then there's: "So I hope you accurately represent the "evolution of consciousness" as people like Steiner and Barfield and Gebser understood and communicated it in their writings." Again, this is a proper way of speaking to someone who answers to you, signaling that they are subject to your expectations. Such authority! Great move, dude. Not.
It's almost as if you expect people to answer to you because you represent such a powerful authority. Not to mention your impeccable arguments in regard to Thinking and to Steiner. I mean, why doesn't everyone just throw down their weapons and surrender in the face of your superior firepower. I have an aversion to warrior types, which you remind me of, but regardless, I do wish you well.
Ok, I suppose I could have left my hope out of it at the end. Again, I write that because I clearly discerned from his "linear model" comment that he was completely misunderstanding all those people I mentioned. But I can also see why he would not be aware of that and therefore take it as a sleight.
The deeper unspoken thread running through your comments here is that people's ability to think through things for themselves, without antipathies of all sort coming into play (your "aversions"), is and should be related to my online "authoritative" tone. If someone yields their own logical thinking in the face of such a perceived tone they are averse to - no less a person who writes blogs and answers many comments each day - then they stand no chance in the 'real world' where much harsher realities will confront their ego when investigating their own spiritual and soulful activity. The comments you quoted above are so minimally aggressive and condescending as far as online commentary goes. I have no interest in further coddling that entirely irresilient attitude towards life. And, again, JMG is a blog writer, author, and general commentator on topics so foreign and 'controversial' to modern people that he really has no excuse to let my tone, however slightly negative it is perceived to be, blind him from the logic of what I am writing and make him feel forced to censor me.
I don't think he felt the way you do, though, for the above reasons. Rather I think it's clear he simply wanted to avoid the arguments I was making because he had never thought of them before and therefore had no response.