Practicing Computer Mode

A while back I read the book "The gentle art of verbal self-defense." A good little book with some practical hints about how to avoid one's self when dealing with rude people. Author Suzette Haden Elgin. he has a little bit of the process here

In a world of cruel people, one needs to know how to nip an answer in the bud. Weirdly, I read this book more than ten years ago and it's only in the mean cruel world of blogging and trolls and youtube where I have really had to use it.

Being a Christian and being Black in a world of nasty folks... well, one has to be prepared. And I must say I am getting good at this.

I recently told some anti-semitic folks to be more respectful about the death of a little Jewish boy. (Tons of mean anti-Jewish comments under the youtube news video just pissed me off.) Then I made the mistake of saying I was a Christian and it was the Christian anti-semites who really annoyed me.

What did i get? A nasty crack from someone calling me a brainwashed retard, and someone saying Christianity was inherently anti-semitic.

So I posted:

WTF??? What is wrong with some of these commentors? This is the death of a little boy here! Quit the anti-semitism and grieve for the child. I'm a Christian and I find anti-semitism even more disturbing when it comes from Christians. Honestly, people!

scifiwritir1

Then this comes up:

• @scifiwritir1

  Fuck you brainwashed retard.
  falcon5956 4 hours ago
  
  
  I responded with:
• @falcon5956 The word "retarded" is a cruel hateful word and it offends many people who have been born with Down's syndrome -- and their families as well. This word "retard" falls easily from the lips of people who would never think of calling someone a fag, a nigger, a kike, a homo, a honky, or other names. Worse, it is often used against kind people who are not able to defend themselves. I suggest you find another word to insult people instead of maligning people with disabilities.
  scifiwritir1 40 minutes ago
• Then this:
  
  @scifiwritir1 xtianity is inherently antisemitic.
  BrooklynNotQueens 1 hour ago
  
  
  I responded with:
• @BrooklynNotQueens The definition of "inherent" is an interesting one. One definition is: "Existing as an essential constituent or characteristic; intrinsic." I suggest you look up Art Katz's youtube video, "The Hebraic roots of the Faith" in addition to the writings of Sid Roth, Messianic Jewish groups, especially the thriving Jewish Christian groups in Israel, Jews who do not think Christianity is anti-semitism at all. Hope this helps.
  scifiwritir1 33 minutes ago

I used a kind of modified computer mode when dealing with the cruel comments. A bit of computer mode, and the Boring Baroque Response  with a touch of political correctness. Not sure how the political correctness thing works. ...or how well BBR and CM work online but I'm pretty proud of myself for at least attempting to follow the verbal recipe. Verbal self defense works if one is willing to go along with the game of appearing totally spacy and incapable of getting the point that someone wants to lead you into an argument. If they give up because they think you're a twit, it doesn't matter. But it seems that when I use it, I do behave in a bit of an "above-it-all" and "teacherly-correcting" mode. Oh, well, I'm just learning.... and I still want to win... even if I'm pretending I'm not actually in an argument.

Of course I should just learn to ignore...but ...