The following story is a poorly written work of fiction.
There was a guitar shop, in a small town not too far down the road from the big city. The shop was opened by two sisters who loved guitars and loved playing them. It was a small shop, and the inventory was older guitars, mostly acoustic, some arch tops, a few mandolins, etc. The shop itself was an old stand alone building, at an intersection just outside of town, that had once served as a general store. The sisters would always have a pot of coffee on, and there was the smell of baked goods in the air, and the folks that came by the shop loved pulling down an old guitar, and sitting down with a cup of coffee and some homemade bread and jam, and picking and talking for a while. All kinds of pickers would come in; there were the bluegrass pickers from out in the county, and jazz folks from the big city, and blues lovers, and the folkies, and many, many others. The sisters would keep the place open late on the weekend nights; and the jam sessions drew folks in from miles around. As the pickers all grew to know each other, they would start sharing personal stories; the farmers would talk about the weather and how it was affecting their crops, the city folks had stories about traffic and road construction, there was the occasional story about a family illness, and they all had a laugh about the misspelled advertising sign out on the highway near the town limits. One night, when folks were just talking more than picking, the conversation quite innocently turned to politics, and it wasn?t long before a few things were said that some folks in the room found quite objectionable, and some of those folks responded with a few opinions that others equally found objectionable. Over time, there were some who would continue these types of discussions at the weekly jam sessions, and when they would meet in the store at other times as well, and would revel in the intensity. There were others however who never said anything, who tended to pack up their guitars and quietly leave the sessions whenever the conversation would turn to politics. And over time, the attendance at the sessions thinned out. Some of the pickers found other places to gather, some just found other things to do. Another guitar shop opened up closer to the big city. Rising property taxes and utility rates added to the falling amount of traffic in the store. Eventually, the sisters closed their shop.
Here?s another work of fiction.
There was a factory by the river just outside the big city. Nearby residents began to notice that the factory was dumping waste into the river. Citizens began to speak up about the dumping at county board meetings, and they wrote letters to the editor of the local newspaper, and the made hand painted signs and picketed in front of the factory. The local teevee station showed up with cameras and ran a three minute story on the evening news. Sales began to go down at the factory, and the county began putting pressure on the factory?s management. The management decided to stop dumping waste in the river.
Freedom of speech is a very useful tool. The citizens of every community should be watchful of their governments, and should speak out about injustice.
However.
As has been stated by many in this forum in the past, it is not necessarily a good idea to go into someone?s home, or someone?s place of business, and just say anything you want. If you are newly married, and you are invited to the home of your new in-laws, it?s probably not a good idea to announce at the dinner table that the person they just voted for in the recent election is a liar and a crook, and that anybody who voted for such a person is a fool.
No matter what you may think of the last US president, when he left office he still had the support of roughly one in four Americans. Now there are a significant number of Americans in our little global community here in the Alembic club; thus it is not unreasonable to suggest that, roughly, one in four of the Americans who are members of this club, who are your friends here in this club, supported the last president. When you make disparaging remarks about that president, you make disparaging remarks about a significant number of your fellow club members, your friends; and it is not unreasonable to suggest that you are making those disparaging remarks in someone?s private home or shop.
When you go to Alembic.com, right there on the front page is a link to this club. It?s as if you walked in the front door of the shop, and over there just past the new basses is a door to a room with couches and chairs and coffee and pastries. And right there on the back wall of the room is a window where you can watch the instruments being built. And you?re standing at the window beside someone whose new guitar is right there on the setup table, and one of the shop owners is taking pictures of it. And sitting there on the couches and tables, enjoying each other?s company, talking about guitars and basses and music and musicians, and talking about the weather and about their families and their businesses, are folks who love hanging out here by the shop, who love the instruments that the family that owns the shop makes.
While it is certainly reasonable that we have strong political positions, and while it is certainly reasonable that we would want to voice those positions, it is also reasonable that there should be some places where political differences are left behind, where we can sit down together and enjoy the things that we share in common. I do not think it unreasonable to suggest that when you say disparaging things about someone?s political positions or spiritual practices, that person may find that they prefer to spend their time someplace else. And it does not seem unreasonable to suggest that this place being the Alembic club, being a part of Alembic.com, that we should endeavor to treat each other, to be respectful of each other, in such a way as to not drive our fellow members of the Alembic community away from and out of this little living room just off the main entrance to Alembic.com.
Neither Mica nor I have any desire to close threads. However, given the tenor of this thread and the requests stated above that it be closed, I reluctantly feel that it might be a good thing in this case.
Some of you will react negatively to my comments, and that is certainly understandable. And please know that it is not my intention to say things that you may find to be hurtfully directed toward you. This is a wonderful community, and my intention here with this post is to do what I can to help make this place a community that we all can find welcoming and warm.
