Blaming the Messenger Misses the Point and Distracts from the Issues

The headline above is taken from the secular media and recognized by many as a school room truth. Some of us were taught this as early as the seventh grade. I remember it was illustrated further by the question, "Why do the neighborhood dogs bark so aggressively toward the mailman who delivers the daily mail to your home? Some answered that the dog(s) don't like someone making the unexpected noise of throwing mail into the home through a metal mail slot that slams back close with a clanky noise. 

That is true, we were told, but there is also another answer to the question. Sometimes mailmen (and they were men back then) have to deliver letters that contain bad news that get sad or angry responses from the person opening the letter and the dog recognizes that what the mailman put through the mail slot and into the house has disturbed the dog's owner or family member. The same is true of a bill which comes in double the amount which causes anger or some other negative response. Dog's are alert to this pattern and the dog's reaction teaches us a truth which is that the messenger, in this case the mailman, often gets the initial blame for bad news.

The same thing happens with the Blog. Institute residents bring issues and problem areas to the Blog, sometimes in friendly conversation, at other times as a subject they believe needs to be talked about by the residents in general. Were we to ignore honest and respected residents, we would be the first to deserve criticism. But often by writing about their concerns, we also come under criticism. This brings out another truth usually learned early--"damned if you do and damned if you don't!" That's why we compromised and created a policy of utilizing the four (4) months when readership is down for the winter and is primarily made up of residential readers--October, November, December, and January--just four months out of twelve to talk about issues our people want to read and talk about.

Not only have we established a policy of only four (4) out of twelve (12) months for this purpose, but have also established a rather lop-sided policy of withdrawing any article that receives three (3) votes of "inappropriate" in the grey, rectangular opinion box below each article. That means that less than 3% of "winter readership" gets to have an article withdrawn. We are open to altering the 3% if people complain, but in the meantime, one can see how hard we are trying to reach a workable compromise.

One of the interesting phenomena about this is that usually when people have issues to discuss and issues that really bother them, they bring it up in person. They talk to me in my living room, or at the Big Blue Dock, or at the Stoody Breakfast, and of course in the Post Office parking lot. In contrast, those who cast the blame on the Blog for writing about local or national social issues, usually do so by way of email which is an inconvenient method for serious back and forth discussion.

The Silver Lake Institute and it's shared mission with the Women's Christian Temperance Union, have a rich historical background of dealing with social ills both national and local. That's what made their conferences and preaching camps so compelling--they were dealing with those issues that were on people's minds. Our beloved SLE only comes around every other year, and our summer programs are ten (10) months away from each other. Issues arise much more often than the opportunities we give people to hear about them and talk about them except for the Blog which continues on daily.

I want to encourage more people to utilize the opinion boxes below so the opinions expressed won't be always so one-sided. Let's be more well-rounded by being more willing to express an opinion--like I am seeing you do in other media like Facebook :-).