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Published On: Dec 22, 2003 02:57 PM
Total entries in this category:
Published On: Dec 22, 2003 02:57 PM
Gossip, Gossip, Evil Thing
Gossip and unhealthy triangles go
hand-in-hand.
Some of the most pernicious triangles you'll ever
experience are formed over the gossipin' fence. Triangles and gossip aren't the
same, but gossip is a primary recruiting tool for emotional
triangles.
Parking-lot meetings, whispers in the restroom, clandestine telephone conversations...all of these are places where one person or more is reluctant to say openly what they're thinking. As a species, we tend to talk to everybody else except the person we're actually having trouble with.
Maybe you've seen the movie "Chocolat," in which the mayor sees the Gypsies frolicking and cavorting on the boat, and says to the tavern-keeper, "Something has to be done." The tavern-keeper doesn't hesitate: he sets fire to the boat at the first opportunity. There's an obvious triangle, with the mayor triangling the tavern-keeper in and the Gypsies out. In the movie, the mayor seems not to realize that his relatively innocent statement nearly cost people their lives.
Gossip is the same way. The things people say in gossip sessions are often designed to win sympathy, or to stir someone to action. The truth is that those who gossip secretly hope that what they say will eventually make it back to the person about whom they're talking—they just don't want to be responsible for it. By gossiping, they recruit triangles, with the hope that someone will have greater courage and will do something about the problem.
Parking-lot meetings, whispers in the restroom, clandestine telephone conversations...all of these are places where one person or more is reluctant to say openly what they're thinking. As a species, we tend to talk to everybody else except the person we're actually having trouble with.
Maybe you've seen the movie "Chocolat," in which the mayor sees the Gypsies frolicking and cavorting on the boat, and says to the tavern-keeper, "Something has to be done." The tavern-keeper doesn't hesitate: he sets fire to the boat at the first opportunity. There's an obvious triangle, with the mayor triangling the tavern-keeper in and the Gypsies out. In the movie, the mayor seems not to realize that his relatively innocent statement nearly cost people their lives.
Gossip is the same way. The things people say in gossip sessions are often designed to win sympathy, or to stir someone to action. The truth is that those who gossip secretly hope that what they say will eventually make it back to the person about whom they're talking—they just don't want to be responsible for it. By gossiping, they recruit triangles, with the hope that someone will have greater courage and will do something about the problem.
Posted: Tue - December 9, 2003 at 09:04 AM