“It’s hard for me to answer a question from someone who really doesn’t care about the answer.” (Charles Grodin)
That was today’s quote in the Jack’s Winning Words blog. Jack when on to relate a story about a remembering seeing a woman in his congregation elbowing her husband to keep him awake during the sermon.
I’ve written here a few times about being a good listener. It is a mark of respect for the speaker that you pay attention to what they are saying and not spend that time thinking about how you will be replying. Grodin’s quote points out a second benefit from paying attention – you can figure out from how the speaker is talking where they are coming from and whether or not they really care about what your opinion is on the topic.
Showing respect for the speaker doesn’t mean that you are agreeing with their position. It merely means that you respect their right to have an opinion and to express it. Too many people these days don’t show even that level of respect; rather they shout over the speaker, hoping to drown out the expression of the opinion that they disagree with.
With so much misinformation and disinformation circulating in our society it is sometimes hard to have a civil discourse on controversial topics. When one bases their point of view on things upon the base of bad information or untruths it is hard to discuss it with them and the conversation quickly turns into arguments about the source of their “facts” upon which they base their beliefs. The old hack, “I saw it on the Internet, so it must be true” is the only base that many have to stand upon.
An even more disturbing trend of late is the rather fluid definition of the term “facts”. Over the past year or two we have seen many TV interviews in which it was asserted that facts aren’t facts or that there are “alternative facts”. The term “facts” has morphed from describing an accepted absolute into describing a belief, subject to change. I guess the relative term there is the word accepted. If one doesn’t accept a “fact”, there is a tendency to make up an alternative and call it a fact, when really it is a belief or point of view.
That leads me back to a variation on Grodin’s quote – It’s hard to argue the truth of a statement with someone who doesn’t care about the truth.
If one is not paying attention to what is being said in a conversation it is relatively easy to be drawn into an argument about the wrong thing. Instead of arguing against a belief one could inquire about the basis for that belief – the facts upon which it is based. It is not enough to just say, “That’s not true.” Remember that the person speaking believes it is true, but that they may have never taken the time to question the source of that belief. A discussion about the basis for that belief may be more productive than just a direct challenge to it. Of nothing else, maybe you can plant a seed of doubt in their mind about the basis of their opinion.
So, show respect for the right of others to have and to express an opinion. You may not agree with it and perhaps your knee-jerk reaction is to talk over it or to quickly move from conversation mode into an argument about it. Don’t go there. If you are paying attention, you will realize the futility of arguing the point with that person. Better that you should add a note to your mental file about that person on their position on this topic – a topic perhaps to be avoided in the future. If that file gets too big, this may be a person to avoid in the future.
In the end, showing enough respect for the other person to understand where they are coming from also shows respect for yourself by stifling the knee-jerk reaction to argue with them. You just saved yourself a frustrating waste of time. Respect yourself.
Posted by Norm Werner 
In our daily lives there are probably lots of people who do things for us that normally go unnoticed and unappreciated. There’s the bus driver who helps get us to work or maybe the guard at the guard shack who there to help insure our safety. Maybe it’s the day-care worker who takes care of our children while we work or the lunch room worker or the waitress who is there to server our noon-time meal. It may be the paper delivery person who has to get up at 4 AM in the morning each day to go get the papers and deliver their routes. Perhaps it one of the many retail people that we may encounter during the day.
these people blend into the background and become just a part of the environment to us. We only recognize them when something doesn’t go as we wish and we complain about it and them. We may call their managers in anger over some perceived slight in the service; but, how many call just to tell that manager what great service they gave us?
Sometimes this tendency to ignore and not appreciate them extends to our life partners, especially to the career-oriented men in the relationship. Call it complacency or just laziness, we sometimes become so self-centered that take for granted all that a spouse does for us to make our life better. The cooking and cleaning and housekeeping and laundry and child care all seem to fade into the background and become unappreciated expectations, rather than something that could be and should be acknowledged and appreciated. It takes only a moment of your time to give your partner a hug and tell them how much you appreciate the meal that they just served, even though you may have no real appreciation of how much time and effort went into the making that meal.
encounter to whom you can show appreciation. It should start at home, but there are countless other opportunities throughout the day to show appreciation to others and make their day better because of it. You may be thinking, “what difference can it make?”; however remember that the great majority of people just don’t make the effort. You can be the one bright moment in that person’s life today and that’s a great opportunity that will make you feel better, too.
interesting story about the sign on Truman’s office and the origin of that phrase at the 
cheek. (Where have we heard that before?) Maybe, instead of just blurting back, “You’re wrong”, we could say instead, “I see that we have different opinions on this; is there anything about it that we can agree upon?” There may not initially be any apparent common ground; but, just changing the situation from a confrontation into a conversation may defuse what otherwise might escalate into something that you both regret later. We can start by respecting that we have differences and being civil about it. See how that works..
have happened in our everyday lives, especially in the aspects that deal with politics.
own opinions by looking through the lenses that are held up by others or by choosing our own lens and view of things. If we really need an external lens to look through, we might do better by looking through the lens of the Bible and the “truths” that we will find there, rather than the “truths” that we see in a political ad or a tweet.
would be enough “I’s” being respectful; and civil to others that it would turn us into “we” and then everything would be better. “We” would be living in a more respectful and civil world. I like that; and it starts with me.
social, racial and economic justice” on the other. One side fears that “those people” are taking things away from us; while the other side fears that “those people” are preventing us from having equal opportunity. Both sides fear the other and see the other side’s success as taking something away from their side. Both sides view the world as a zero-sum game in which the outcome must be a winner and a loser. The position taken by both sides is “I’m right and you’re wrong”. There is no respect in this game.
called conservative and liberal factions within government. In days long gone the crack that divided the two groups was just that – a crack. It was a gap in thinking and approach to government that could be easily bridged or crossed. There were many politicians on both sides who crossed back and forth on issues, based on what they perceived to be for the good of the county. Due in many ways to the recent (relatively speaking) focus on social issues by our politicians, that crack or gap has now widened into a chasm which politicians on either side find to be too politically dangerous to cross. So they stand on 
each side of the divide hurling insults at each other across the chasm. No attempt is even made to build bridges between the opposing ideologies. They totally lack respect for each other.
helping where we can to make them right. This new party could start by showing respect to the people and the real problems at hand.
that marriages, in order to be successful over time, had to be based upon things more substantial than the initial physical attraction that may have led to the marriage in the first place. I hadn’t really put a word to those things before, but respect seems to be an appropriate choice.
when one partner had no respect for the other; but it is hard to take over time. Marriages involving a so-called “throphy-wife” come to mind. There is often little respect involved in those unions.
constitutional amendment to the Michigan Constitution that would protect the GLBT community from discrimination. Patterson is a well-known Republican conservative, but has also recognized the ugliness and hate that comes with discrimination. He is basically saying – respect other people’s way of living.
general. Our modern day pharisees are the moralizing, so-called Christian evangelicals who seem to spend more time criticizing the lives of others than putting their own lives in order. Like the high priests and pharisees of old, these modern day pharisees are sure that they occupy the moral high-ground and that their way is the only right way to live. And like those hypocrites of old, they try to take actions to correct or discriminate against those who choose to live differently. In modern times this holier-than-thou group uses political power to try to legitimize their discrimination through laws (or lack of laws) aimed at those who are “different.” They wrap themselves in a false morality that does not – respect other people’s way of living.
people who were immigrants escaping religious persecution due to the fact they the religion that they practiced at the time was different from the prevailing religion in England and Europe. It is convenient also to forget about the threat that their immigration to America posed to the Native Americans who were already here. They essentially took the country from those who owned it at the time. Imagine if the Native Americans had enacted a law stopping the flow of these refugees from religious persecution from entering America because they posed a threat. Maybe that would have solved everything. The early settlers obviously did not – respect other people’s way of living.
us in return, no matter what lifestyle they choose to live. In the end, wouldn’t that make the whole world a better place in which to live? It would, because it would be a place in which we all would – respect other people’s way of living
responsibility, much less worrying about how others live. We need to focus less on others and more on doing the right things ourselves to make sure that we aren’t becoming modern day pharisees and discriminating against those with lives that are different from ours. So, as we begin a new week maybe, before we leave the house today we can resolve to – respect other people’s way of living.
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