One of the things that constantly amazes me about FFL -- and, to be fair, about most other "spiritual" discussion groups as well -- is that many of the participants seem to be reading a set of imaginary subtitles to the posts they reply to.
Judging from their replies, they seem to believe that the posts that they are responding to have a set of subtitles that say things like "This is why my ideas on this subject are RIGHT and yours are WRONG," or "My opinion on this matter is correct and yours is STOOOPID" or "I 'know' the 'Truth' about this subject and you do not" or "There is something WRONG with you if you don't believe what I believe." I propose this theory because that's what their replies sound like. They almost MUST be seeing this set of imaginary subtitles, to respond to simple statements of opinion as they do. I don't see the subtitles. I see posters on this and other forums often merely presenting their opinions on a matter AS OPINION. There is often NO attempt to suggest the "supremacy" of their opinion, or the "rightness" of it, let alone the "wrongness" or "stupidity" of someone else's. Yet the respondents react as if such implications were, in fact, there. WHY? Well, I think it's because of identification to one's own self or Ego. Some people are just SO identified with the ideas that go through their heads that they simply *cannot conceive* of there being another way of seeing an issue. These over-identified-with-their-Egos seem to believe that if anyone DOES see an issue differently, they "must" be "wrong," or there "must" be something "wrong" with them. It's like the subtext of every post they write in angry response to an opinion that differs from theirs is, "You HAVE to be wrong because you're disagreeing with ME, and I am RIGHT." I just don't get this. I don't feel that I am "right" about much of anything. I just have opinions. I try to present them AS opinions, liberally sprinkled with a garnish of "IMO's" and other such qualifying remarks. And yet people react to them often as if I had slapped them across the face with a glove and challenged them to a duel. I haven't. I have merely stated an opinion. Such as, for example, my opinion that Robin Carlsen is a shitty writer. It's NOT as if I'm the only person here who thinks so, but IMO that doesn't matter a damn. I never set out to convince other people that Robin was a shitty writer, merely express my own OPINION that he is. And yet some -- who, I guess, feel that he is a good writer -- have reacted to this as if I were challenging them to some kind of Ego Duel, and that this "slur" on my part against Robin's good name MUST be answered, by them, and often. So they set out to do EXACTLY the thing that I do not. They set out to "prove" their opinion "right" and anyone who disagrees with that opinion "wrong." Go figure. The only explanation I can come up with this is that they are seeing subtitles that I am not. The whole "I am RIGHT and you are WRONG" thang seems like an enormous waste of time and energy to me. I find it difficult to understand how after 30 or 40 years of meditation anyone can still be so attached to one's self and its silly ideas as to feel as if they have to either defend them or argue their supremacy over other silly ideas. It just does not compute for me. For others, this seems to be their whole life. My *opinion* is that Robin was like that, constantly feeling the need to assert his opinion as some kind of Truth. My *opinion* is that many of the people who now seem compelled to defend him and diss people who weren't much impressed by him is that they feel exactly the same way about their own opinions and ideas. The very fact that another person has an opinion that differs from theirs is perceived (in the imaginary subtitles) as an "attack" of some kind on their self. And everyone knows that "attacks" have to be answered. Boring. Why can't people just have simple opinions, present them as simple opinions, and not get their panties in a twist when someone has an opinion other than theirs? This approach just seems so much more sensible than "reading the subtitles" and starting a battle to "win" something that was never a battle to begin with. It was just someone stating an opinion. The subtitles you read under the real post that convinced you it was an invitation to an Ego Duel didn't exist. Your Ego just imagined them there.
