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Mods: Is there a glitch or were my posts deleted? This is a rare occurence for me, and I hope I in no way offended anybody.
No one was offended, referenced characters just weren’t on the “approved” list 😉
Okay, sorry about that. I assumed there was an error, and when my next posts also disappeared I couldn’t for the life of me fathom what I’d done wrong. I’ll bear it in mind for next time…
My first attempt at the #CRDSYAC resulted in a closed thread. (I tried to direct the thread into a positive light by calling #CRDSYAC, but people seemed more interested in presenting their own opinions than joining the challenge)
I think I managed to see and present a different perspective to what I would have instinctively thought, and it was definitely less judgemental.
I declare this operation a success.
Yekke – when it’s done the way you did it, I agree (at least for the most part – I was a bit concerned that there may have been an avak LH issue with the way you did it, but I’m not sure).
In your case, you were talking about trying to understand other people. That is different from presenting a hashkafa that is different from one’s own. We are supposed to be open-minded to other people, but not necessarily to other hashkafas.
You also made sure to do it in a way that was serious and not sarcastic/joking. When people do it in a sarcastic/joking way, it makes it obvious that they disagree with the position they are presenting and that defeats the purpose.
It is possible that that is what the OP meant all along but I’m not sure that is how everyone understood it.
If that is what the OP meant (or even if it’s not), I definitely agree that it’s a great idea and I hope more people follow!
I also think it would be great if (the same) people could try to present both points of views. That is more of a challenge and avoids LH issues.
Shkoyach!
Good things about the CR:
1: It takes away from the internet.
2: You see other points of view.
3: You can talk to the opposite gender in a “kosher” way.
4: You can practice not accepting lashon hara.bmyer – +1. I had tried posting something similar but it got deleted.
Good things about acne:
1) Poka dots are cool.
2) They mask other flaws.
3) Dermatologists have more opportunities to make other diagnoses like skin cancer, c”s.
Good things about accidentally calling the wrong number:
1) You get to talk to someone new.
2) It’s a lesson in humility.
3) When it happens to you, you can empathize with the stranger.
Good things about spilling liquids onto books:
1) Afterward you can surf on the pages.
2) If it is not your book, you will be giving the library money and giving money to libraries makes you a good person. If you tell your date about it then you will appear studious.
3) If you spill enough then all you need is glue for paper mache.
Good things about dust:
1) Vacuuming is exercise.2) Dust is the soil of the domestic domain. So it’s like Adam’s cousin. Which means dust is family. And we like family.
3) Without dust many of us would have less allergies and without the burden of allergies we might be less dependent on dust-elimination and then what kind of people would we be? So dust makes us become the people that we are and must be in Hashem’s plan for the best. B”H.
Good things about buying a new conditioner because it is healthier for the environment despite your doubts:
1) Your hairbrush gets a boost of new visitors who are here to stay.
2) You get to think “I told you so” about your judgment.
3) You feel less evil next time you pay for your previous conditioner again at the checkout counter because now you have evidence that at least you tried to do the right thing.
Good things about waking up to an alarm:
1) Your mother’s voice waking you always sounds like angels in comparison.
2) Your dreams accommodate the noise into trippy scenarios.
3) You have something to do before falling asleep that makes you feel like an adult.
Good things about vampires:
1) They show you a glimpse of Olam Haba.
2) They help more people keep Kosher.
3) They start their days according to te Jewish calendar.
Good things about being insulted:
1) It’s a kaparah for who knows what but yay.
2) You get to learn new insults that you may have never heard before.
3) It raises your blood pressure and gives you a reason to practice healthy stress-reducing coping methods.
Good things about guys who don’t eat vegetables unless their wives feed them:
1) They work hard for the money.
2) Wives get to practice parenting before parenting.
3) Wives learn how to be creative and sneak vegetables into unexpected recipes.
Good things about being pressured to get married:
1) You have more opportunities to doubt yourself.
2) You are forced to discover who you are as an individual and where you want to go time and again.
3) You and someone else who is not currently married have this special bond and can do that head nod while walking by because you just know a secret that only single people share.
Good things about being stuck on a thread:
1) Soon it is almost Yom Tov.
2) You take a refreshing break from collecting new memes.
3) You have a reason to admonish yourself.
LB: “Good things about being insulted:
1) It’s a kaparah for who knows what but yay.
2) You get to learn new insults that you may have never heard before.
3) It raises your blood pressure and gives you a reason to practice healthy stress-reducing coping methods.”
LB – you’re the best!!! I have a lot to learn from you… I’m working on internalizing #1, but it ain’t easy. I’ve definitely been getting practice in the CR!
LU lol!!! <3
I’ve definitely been getting practice in the CR!
Which, I suppose, should lead to more benefits:
1) Developing a thicker skin and not taking everything so personally
2) Developing a thicker skin and being able to accept insults from lesser individuals without it bothering you.
Yekke – I think it’s actually been working. That was my point.
And I like your #2.
Of course, the trick is to not let “developing a thicker skin” affect your sensitivity to others. I used to worry about that. But now I think that once you are already sensitive to others, it doesn’t go away just because you develop a thicker skin for yourself.
Good things about mosquito bites:
1) You just fed a hungry mother. See number two for details.
2) Technically a hungry single mother.
3) See number one.
Oh she is pregnant too!
Good things about runny noses:
1) You can honestly say that you exercised today.
2) You can creep people out with piles of tissues.
3) You can be a tissue hero. You will be more inclined to carry tissues and thus find yourself being a tissue rescuer on novel occasions, such as giving a tissue to someone else needing a tissue, wiping up someone’s spilled drink, and/or cleaning the food off of a baby’s face.
(Is mosquito mom whose mate died a widowed mosquito? What if she has no clue about it and/or is not heartbroken?)
Watch a master play this game.
Poppa Bar Abba, starring in “Modern Orthodoxy”.
Defending BOTH sides of the argument. At the same time. Against himself.
See here, then here, and finally http://www.theyeshivaworld.com/coffeeroom/topic/modern-orthodoxy-1/#post-1145903
Methinks the front-leader in this challenge (not including PBA, who jumped the gun by several years) is yekke2:
Although LB is leading by a mile in sheer numbers of #CRDSYAC posts.
Yekke2, how do you link to a specific post? Just copying and pasting the URL seems to no longer work…
I doubt that was counted, mw13. To truly Defend Something You Are Against calls for justifying the position you disagree with, not using their words to claim something entirely different.
But glad you liked it!
When you just post a link, the new system automatically converts it to a link with the name of the thread title, and a link the to the thread in general.
If you create your own hyperlink, it works.
< a href=_______________________________>XXXXX< /a>
(remove spaces between the ‘<‘ and the ‘a’ for the code to work. XXXXX is where you write the text you want to appear.
I actually do it all the time, but it’s not something most people would realize since I do it in an entirely different way. I also don’t announce that I’m doing it, since it would defeat the purpose of why I’m doing it.
yekke2 – Really?
…being able to accept insults from lesser individuals without it bothering you.
If you have to call them lesser in order for it not to bother you than you may not be developing the midda appropriately.
By considering them ‘lesser’ you may be meeting them half way instead of learning to handle criticism.They aren’t lesser because they insult. They generally insult because they are lesser.
When somebody I respect insults me, I don’t want to just not care. If I respect him/her, then I would want to fix what they look down on me about. If they are better than me, I would just discard their comments about me.
The people whose insults I pay absolutely no attention to are those who I consider lesser individuals. I don’t feel the need to change, or to justify myself to them.
If I was talking about criticism, then you are certainly correct. Being able to take constructive criticism from lessers is a skill not easily learned, and certainly a valuable one. But insults? You shouldn’t give them a moments notice.
I don’t know….I think that by throwing the word into your response you were detracting from the real display of growth and maturity which is to not be bothered by insults without having to put them down in order to do it.
Additionally, considering how many insults are only dubbed so by the receiver and not the speaker it would behoove you to not let it bother you simply because your sense of self is not contingent upon it, not because you have ‘butled’ them and their opinion.
are those who I consider lesser individuals.
Hard not to be curious how what criteria you use to deem others lesser than you.
I’ve definitely been getting practice in the CR!
Which, I suppose, should lead to more benefits:
1) Developing a thicker skin and not taking everything so personally
2) Developing a thicker skin and being able to accept insults from lesser individuals without it bothering you.
I agree with Mod-29. Let’s change it.
1) Developing a thicker skin and not misreading things that were neverr meant as insults.
2) Developing a thicker skin and being able to accept insults from others [especially anonymous online posters] without it making you feel any worse about yourself.
(It would make more sense to talk about developing maturity and self esteem, as Mod-29 wrote, but those aren’t direct benefits of being insulted in the Coffee Room, they are just the correct ways of dealing with it.)
Hard not to be curious how what criteria you use to deem others lesser than you.
I was wondering if you were going to ask that. Immediately after I pressed “submit”, I wanted to change it. It isn’t about lesser or greater – it’s about people I respect. I care [on a personal level] what people who I respect think of me.
To answer your question somewhat indirectly [to allay your fears?], I don’t define “lesser” by somebody less talented, of lesser intellect or lower religious values than myself. And although unasked, I’ll let you know that respect doesn’t come from people being more talented, intellectual or higher religious values than myself.
Yekke2, I always miss your posts when the zman starts.
😉
Thanks but most of my posts here are more like the whole finding the good in unpleasant circumstances.
I would not want to defend some things that I am absolutely against, such a variety of crimes and other hurtful acts. To me, that is not being open-minded or a critical thinker, but being ignorant and apathetic.
I am very impressed by Yekke’s tactfulness (I think he was a bit stuck between a rock and a hard place, and managed to do a good job of getting out).
However, I do think that “lesser” was the correct word, and I will explain why.
First though, I have to explain what the word “lesser” means and does not mean in this context. There are two types of “lesser”. One is what I would call subjectively lesser and one I will call objectively lesser. Subjectively lesser refers to things such as intelligence level, social skills and knowledge. Objectively lesser means that a person is not as good a person.
A person’s objective goodness is based on the extent to which they use their bechira and therefore can only be measured by Hashem, since no one knows anyone else’s potential.
Subjective lesserness is not a reflection of how good someone is. It is simply a measure of the abilities that Hashem gave the person (in certain areas) and is not necessarily in the person’s control and therefore is not a reason for someone to think less of anyone else.
How good a person is has to do with the difference between their actions and their potential. Therefore, if two people have the same actions but one is lesser in terms of subjective greatness, this would actually mean that he is greater in terms of objective greatness.
As the Ramban points out in The Igeres HaRamban, if you are greater than someone else, you should not look down on them; this simply means that you have greater responsibilites.
So if two people are performing the same actions but one has more potential, this actually means he is “lesser” in the way that really counts.
I used to refrain from ever thinking that I was “better” (ie: blessed with more abilities in any area) since it seemed to be snobby, and I thought it was wrong to think that way. However, I realized at a certain point that that is simply not the correct approach, and thinking that way was actually more likely to lead to my thinking badly of others.
A person has to be aware of his talents (while acknowledging that they are from Hashem and not his own doing), so that he can be aware of his additional responsibilities (as the Ramban points out).
Likewise, it is sometimes necessary to be aware of other’s shortcomings in order not to expect too much for them and to be able to judge them favorably and in order to understand them better.
You are not doing someone else a favor if you expect things from them that they are not capable of. For example, if you are more intelligent than someone else, it is very important to realize that when you are dealing with them so that you don’t assume that something is obvious to them just because it’s obvious to you (a mistake that I often make). It is not nice to the person to do that because then you assume that they were deliberately being mean when they might not have been.
Regarding the situation at hand, while it may be true that in some cases it is possible to believe that the people who are insulting me are not doing so intentionally, that is only possible if they either are less intelligent or don’t have the same level of social skills or are lacking knowledge of the relevant halachos. Again, these things do not reflect on their objectiveness goodness and may in fact be a proof that they are objectively better people than I may have thought at first.
There seem to be two different challenges going on here.
It is not too difficult to find a silver lining to your cloud. This isn’t arguing for something you are against; this is finding something you support in something you disagree with. It is much more difficult to try turn your cloud into silver.
The aim of this thread is to try think of something you have always been against, and try consider it from a different perspective, a different point of view, and perhaps, with the new angle, see it more positively.
#FocusOnThePositive
#CRDefendSomethingYouAgainstChallengeLU: “Humility is not thinking less of yourself, it is thinking of yourself less.”
Last night I listened to a shiur on TorahAnytime about why Rabbi Akiva’s talmidim were killed.
Was it true that they acted in less regard for each other than other talmidim?
No. In fact they were likely even the most compassionate to and with one another and others.
However, they were held at a much higher level. Hashem expected more od them since they were so great. So something that we may see as a small transgression Bein Adam lechavro was in fact a huge issur in Hashem’s Eyes.
**********
Then again then again…. imagine how good it felt when I listened to a shiur last week on TorahAnytime that said that rewards and punishments are not in this world, per se. As in, Hashem is not going to kill us for sinning, similar to the explanation for why Rabbi Akiva’s students died.
In other words, if someone committed an aveirah or plenty of avarot, it does not mean that come Rosh Hashanah, Hashem is going to write off one’s life chas v’shalom. Hashem does not treat us like that, and if it was so then all of the Gedolim would still be alive.
*******
Thank you
Good things about paper cuts:
1) You get to witness that moment before and after blood fall, which is like a biological slo-mo.
2) You can finally use one of the thousands of bandaids you have in your cupboard.
3) You can say, “Ouch” and release emotional pain in the process.
Refuah Shelaima!
Good things about spending time online:
1. You can’t get paper cuts on a computer.
Good things about using acronym’s that the general cr public does not know the meaning of:
1) none come to mind
2) none come to mind
3) none come to mind
A+++++ LU 🙂
Amen thank you!
Good things about using acronyms that the rest of the CR doesn’t know about:
1. They learn something new.
2. It’s FAEBM, and that makes it cool for some reason.
3. You get to have inside jokes with yourself.
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