Robin, you have quite a talent for removing the mask from slippery characters. Kudos! Judy has calling Barry out for the same behavior for years and he still doesn't get it. Never will. A zebra doesn't change its stripes.
[http://dudelol.com/DO-NOT-HOTLINK-IMAGES/Orange-jelly-Nailed-it.jpg] http://youtu.be/1pAcfJQgxjE <http://youtu.be/1pAcfJQgxjE> --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, maskedzebra <no_reply@...> wrote: > > The Barry Wright Syndrome > > Barry decides he has a point of view about somethinge.g. Puja is trained moodmaking; persons on FFL are all bigoted Monkees Fan Club members. He then asserts that his point of view must be the equivalent of reality. But you see, he never conceives of the responsibility he has to prove this, or at least even try to make his case. No, Barry is a kind of totalitarian of the mind: he insists on the truth of his point of view, without seemingly any capacity or even inclination to convince even himself that what he says is true. > > This is a strange phenomenon; asserting something is the case, but refusing to argue it out as if there is any process [implicit in stating a strong opinion/judgment] whereby one has any obligation to demonstrate the reasonableness much less the truth of one's point of view. It is quite incredible to me. Barry, from within his highly charged emotional reactiveness, dreams up concepts and ideas which then can serve the purpose of expressing his own disillusionment, bitterness, cynicism. Barry feels entitled to say something is a certain way, and he never thinks: I must really experience this is true; or even: do I really believe that reality will somehow, either in the articulation of my point of view, or in the culmination of having expressed it, corroborate this opinion? > > But no, it all comes out of his uncontrollable need to lash out, to ridicule, to sneer, and to make the world over in the image of his own experience of being Barry Wright. I mean, certainly every idea and opinion that Barry expresseswe are mostly talking here about matters pertaining to TM, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the TM Movement: i.e. what has first drawn us into posting at FFLis worth considering, examined objectively; but the problem is this: Barry drags in his negative emotionalityI suppose he is oblivious to thisand lets that drive his opinion. So that whattake this post herehappens is that someone has said: "Your mother is ugly and she behaves like a whore." The child of the woman who has thus been so characterized wonders: "Is my mother really that unattractive, and is she prostituting herself?" > > But Barry never lays out his case against the woman. He merely repeats his insult, and then proceeds to actthrough what follows in his postas if this description of the person does not need explanation or defence; Barry Wright has said it; that is enough to make it true. > > Now if Barry would assert something is the case; and then follow it out as so we could understand how Barry became convinced in himself that what he is asserting is true, we would be in a position to assess the merits of his point of view. But as it is, Barry compulsively, reflexively ignores even the theoretical possibility that there is data contradictory to his point of view; he merely ignores the very idea of another, competing point of view. Barry is thus selectively biased in this sense: Barry decides it serves his psychological needs to believe a certain thing is one way; or rather he has a strong emotional need to have the world appear a certain way to him. If he can pretend that it does seem this way, then this enables him to project onto the world what is most convenient for the perpetuation of his own undisciplined predilections. Barry never has got beyond the simple act of: 1. I experience x to be a certain way 2. I will insist that x must be the way I experience x. > > Barry doesn't realize one basic thing about human beings: the mere fact that you would like things to be seen in a way which conforms to your need for them to be that way, cannot replace the work and effort required to go from being predisposedcompelled somehowto see things a particular way, to deciding well, they must be that way. We, on the other hand, have to see how it is reasonable to draw the same conclusions as Barry has. But he deprives us of this opportunity, and makes his own subjective consciousness the only arbiter of the matter: we either trust him on this, or else we are unable to enter into the context within which he has come to believe what he says is the case. If only Barry Wright would contemplate: I despise anyone on FFL who tries to argue on behalf of a point of view which is at odds with my own point of view. Therefore I am just going to attack that point of view as if it is stupid and indefensiblebut I will never explain why this is so. I will just go on repeating my own judgment, without ever attempting to persuade, convince, much less convert, others to my point of view. > > Is this not clearly a dereliction of moral and intellectual duty? Barry Wright doesn't think so. He has said that most persons here in FFL behave like jealous, intolerant Monkees Fan Club memberswho don't want to hear any other kind of music. Well, Barry has said this. The question is: Is it *true*? > > Well, Barry has not permitted any freedom within which he has expressed this judgment for there to be any discussion as to the degree of truth in his claim. He has determinedsimply by stating his opinionthat in fact reality must vindicate his opinion. But he offers not one shred of evidence for this; he does not move through any kind of process of reasoning and argument. It is enough for Barry to say: You are all Monkees Fan Club idiots and you won't (as it were) listen to [we must suppose] the Beatles. > > I think most every intelligent and sophisticated person on FFL cannot even bother to take Barry seriously in what he says here. Not because of fear of having been confronted with the truth (and therefore not being able to defend oneself); but because this characterization of persons at FFL simply comes off as blind, wilful, spiteful prejudice. Anyone reading Barry's post today senses this immediately [there maybe a few, either active or temporarily in exile, who will, as a point of honour, go to bat for Barry; I am speaking here of the majority of readers and posters at FFL] that, Oh, it's Barry Wright; let's see if he can control his hatred and contempt. [FFL reader gets to the end of Barry's post.] "Too bad; Barry's at it again. No point dwelling on the possible truth or falseness of what he is saying, because Barry is just doing therapy here. Getting out his feelings." That's good for Barry; but it doesn't mean we should take him seriously. We can't. Barry himself does not think his opinion worth arguing out through reason and evidence. And if Barry is just tossing one of his IEDs into a crowd of peopleand then fleeing the sceneshould we assume he has performed a creative and sincere act of constructive criticism? > > We can't do this. Now I don't say that there is not a case to be made which more or less perfectly confirms the merit of Barry's accusation and judgment. But he refuses to make it. And this must be because, when it comes to these topics of discussion, Barry always thinks it enough to express his opinionnever going any further so as to bear the responsibility of finding out that it might not be true. Or, evenironically enoughthat it *is* true. > > Is there anyone out there who can, sincerely and honestly argue against how I have interpreted the Barry Wright Syndrome? > > You see, in saying what I have said here, I am quite prepared to find out I have misread Barry, that there is another point of view [let us please be spared the burden of having to listen to someone who only wants to defend in principle Barry's Wright to act this way, all the while ignoring the very point that I am making: there are such persons out there on FFL]; that indeed I am wrong. But just saying this, without going through the ordeal of proving it, will not provide me the opportunity to see that I have made an error in my analysis of Barry Wright, and in my subsequent judgment of Barry Wright. > > I simply reject the truth of Barry Wright's Monkees Fan Club argument. If there potentially is some truth in itconceived in the abstractBarry had vitiated the opportunity for us to find this out, or intuit it, based upon the animus he brings into his post. For the post represents not really a substantive point of view; it is merely Barry Wright 'getting his feelings out'which, from the point of view of his psychotherapist, may be beneficial to Barry. But why should we consider that Barry has said anything of merit here? For he will only answer those whom he senses are sympathetic to himthose whom he opposes (who might say something in reply to the Monkees Fan Club jibe) he must ignoreor abuse with a sense of self-impunity. > > > > > --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb no_reply@ wrote: > > > > Sometimes, scanning the list of posts on FFL searching for one that I > > find interesting enough to reply to, I find myself also searching for a > > metaphor to explain the sense of incredulity I feel at the > > same-old-same-old repetitiveness of it all. This morning I came up with > > such a metaphor, and it made me laugh, so I'll pass it along. Consider > > this my version of Bhairitu's "The Funny Farm Lounge" metaphor. :-) > > > > Reading FFL is like stumbling across a weird group of fanatical Monkees > > fans. They get together in cyberspace and endlessly talk about the glory > > days of Mickey, Davy, Peter and Michael as if they were gods. They argue > > about which songs were most cosmically important, and the deep esoteric > > meaning of their lyrics. When other musicians' names come up, the > > Monkees fans get angry and feel that they have to put them down, because > > however good these other musicians may be, after all they're not the > > Monkees. Some are so fanatical and so enduringly loyal to the Monkees > > that they think anyone who gets caught attending a concert by any other > > musician should be banned from the Monkees Fan Club for life as the > > heretics they are. But the most amazing part is that the fan club is > > still going strong, still doing all of this every day, 40+ years after > > the popularity of the group they revere jumped the shark. > > > > And all of this for a pop group that wasn't very good in the first > > place. > > >
