Withering words?

“Demonizing”, “shire bashing” these are all emotive words that can be used to describe a person with a different point of view. Withering words intended to cut the opposition down to size.

This can then create the perception that those who did not agree with the Woolworth decision, or those that have many serious disagreements with the how the shire acts, are all somehow suffering from a form of collective moral panic. It further hints that maybe their view lacks the analytical thinking and capacity for logic that others using less emotive terms are able to bring into the discussion. 

I fear that those using such linguistic devices to belittle the others may be only using half of their brain. 

They can see the facts but do not share the vision. 

Nobody applaudes those who are over-emotional, but neither should we strive to be overly analytical, and we can never deny that to pursue any radical change requires passion. It is passion that will sustain.

We have evolved a brain with two halves for a purpose. We have been designed to use both halves, but our educational system so often favours just one hemisphere. Each one of us will use our two brain hemispheres in different ways. Jill Bolte-Taylor manages an exceptional explanation of these hemispheres in this TED

Jill Bolte-Taylor

We must not fear the feelings we have that we cannot explain.

Neither must we fear the passions of others who do not share our views. 

Nor should those who think in language belittle those who don’t find language an easy skill to acquire. Language is an artificial man-made construct, and whatever theories of language we study we do know that a child born into a world without language will never acquire it. Many of us can think very well, very clearly, and in abstract and concrete concepts without any language at all. 

To my knowledge nobody has called Woolworths a “demon”, it is the critics of the community voice who are claiming to have identified this phenomenon, it is their own personal construct. 

If some of us do not perceive the influence of the large multi-national corporations to be beneficial or benign we are not alone with this way of thinking. Many of the world's greatest thinkers are finding many faults with the systems of democracy, law, economics, and business that have rapidly evolved to cope with global conditions they were never designed for.

If we are educated in the use of language we may be able to obfuscate, baffle, and confuse others. But that doesn’t make us decent, kind, generous spirited people. We need decent, kind and generous spirited people to share their visions of what they want for this shire, their shire. 

Barriers of language are no more valid in this debate than barriers of colour, race, religion or gender.

If the person being criticised has a vision of this shire that does not include domination by multi-national corporations then it is not wrong for them to say so, if it is their honest belief. 

It could only be wrong if there was some deception or pretence.