Dear all: First, let me make it clear that I fully understand and appreciate the time and energy that oru Listmothers spend monitoring the list. As Rachel pointed out, this is an "opportunity cost". Whenever you donate your time, you are not spending your time doing something that could potentially earn money. Sometimes the value of that donated time exceeds that of money. Nevertheless IBCLCs (even in Manhattan) hardly make lots of money so those of us who live in a capitalistic society which most of us do to some extent, have to weigh and balance our time so we earn enough to live. Second, Lee Galasso's comments and some comments about what Diane Wiesseninger said that I haven't read yet in the original form. got me thinking. Thinking enough to come out of lurkdom for a brief moment (my opportunity cost right now is whether or not it is worth taking away time from doing taxes). Lee spoke about the time and energy trying to convince others and as I understand Diane made comments about honing our arguments. I myself was once accused and told to stop trying to "convince me to..." with my posts. Quite frankly, I was shocked because I thought I was in conversation hashing out ways of thinking about a particular topic. It never dawned on me that this particular person would think that it was my mission to specifically convince her to change her ways. Consider my ideas, mull them over, and then form an opinion about my ideas --- positive, negative or indifferent, yes. The concept of "honing" however really resonated with me because that's what I do --- hone my thoughts based on a dialogue with others. I learn in this way. If someone else learns a little from me, that's great, but if not, at least I've picked up some ideas from them. In thinking about Lee's comments - it dawned on me however, that we really often react as if we are the outsiders because of the cultural break with a normal human function of fundamental importance. Hence, it is normal for many of us to feel at times that we need to be on a mission to convince others. We are the underdogs and passionate at times. And sometimes passionate with each other. When that passion becomes overwhelming, however, I would suggest to take a step back and realize that the other person who just doesn't seem to get it, may never get it because they have a different world view. Take a break. You may have convinced many others on Lactnet or given them some ideas or even if you haven't done that you may have crystalized your own thought process. You don't have to convince everyone and if what they write upsets you --- skip their posts until you get to the point where you feel you can cope with "honing" your arguments. And even then you may not convince that person. Finally, I know the Listmothers work hard, I know that am not privy to all that they have to go through, all the messages they get and the time it takes to work on keeping the community civil. So, this is meant in no disrespect to the decisions that they make. It took me a while to get into lactnet this morning. I finally hit this huge message that was a long list of not to dos with the messages about legal liability and lawsuits etc. This deeply saddened me to see this long list. Reading this, I thought back on the time that I was accused to the listmothers of writing things on Lactnet that I never wrote. Moreover, I was not only accused of writing something I didn't, but of being responsible for a hot debate that followed. Reading this list of "not to dos" I certainly could have interpreted that action as some sort of libel or slaunder. But what would that have accomplished? Did this person really truly harm me in any way? Certainly not monetarily and, in my case, she didn't impinge on my right to "freedom of speech". Yes, I was upset about this, BUT these were my own emotions and not something that this particular person is truly responsible for. Will I ever convince this person that I didn't write what she thinks I did or that the posts that followed were really the responsibility of those posters? Probably never and she has a right to her own opinion and I would certainly defend that right. Should she have written the listmothers? As far as I'm concerned she had that right. I feel this way even though the accusations were extremely strong and not backed up by the physical evidence of what I wrote. In addition to feeling sad that there are voices that will be silenced because they do not fit in with what the majority considers appropriate behavior, I was especially saddened to see the admonishment that we cannot discuss problems with products. I know we have long had the rule that we shouldn't mention products by name but if it has come to the point that we cannot discuss the flaws in products to the point that we distinguish useful tools from unnecessary gadgets. More and more we are left with a situation in which corporations can say anything they want under the guise of freedom of speech and anything that counters their view is deemed "libel". This, I believe is truly dangerous and led to a situation in which it is becoming more difficult to be able to talk about the fact that many of us were fed something that carried more than a 20% higher risk of death and many babies continue to be fed this substance without suffering negative work or legal ramifications. It makes me fear a time in which we might be held accountable for the things we say in the presence of all the "monitoring devices" in elevators, entryways, banks and the myriad of other places we are photographed and recorded on a daily basis. In Manhattan, I am sure you could piece together most of my day by using the monitoring cameras that are everywhere. So, if you read an upsetting post --- if you consistently read something from one poster that upsets you, if you make no headway in changing the mind of that poster, I would suggest considering the following before going to the listmothers: 1) Is this person really saying something that is merely a perception of me that I don't like or is this person saying something that is verifiably false? 2) If it is the latter, will this comment have a measurably negative financial impact on me? Then, consider whether or not you can cope by simply ignoring the posts --- or taking a breather from the conversation. There are some people with whom we are always going to disagree and there are some people who will not appreciate us ever no matter what we write or do. And there are some people who have ways of stating things that will always upset us. Best regards, Susan Burger *********************************************** Archives: http://community.lsoft.com/archives/LACTNET.html Mail all commands to [log in to unmask] To temporarily stop your subscription: set lactnet nomail To start it again: set lactnet mail (or [log in to unmask]) To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet or ([log in to unmask]) To reach list owners: [log in to unmask]