Talking Just for the Sake of Talking

One of the most embarassing moment one could experience is to say something totally unplanned and get a very negative response afterwards. On the other hand, it is also irritating to hear someone making remarks just because he or she just want to be heard without making any sense at all. These people are just talking just for the sake of doing it.

In this time of constant use of social media, every interesting news seem to deserve sufficient attention and feedback from others, even it is not really needed. Sometimes, some individuals forget to understand and see the context and the different perspectives before making a comment or analysis. It would seem then that people become more concern about the event or situation than the people involved in it, as well as the people sharing their valuable opinions as well.

How many times we see people caught off guarded defending themselves for a comment in social media after not seeing the whole context of a story. It would seem then that people are in a hurry sharing their sentiments in the most distinct way possible. When we say distinct, it could either be the most insensitive, funny or the most direct using a language that average people do not use in regular face-to-face conversations.

This is very unfortunate. People seem to separate prudence from relevance. As long as feedbacks seem to fit the situation, these are made even these are hurtful and sometimes full of accusations. Worse, when feedbacks are neither relevant or prudent at the same time.

There was one time, for an instance that I myself was making a serious valid comment a news video. Instead of making a friendly discussion, other participants were focusing on the credibility of the person making the feedback and on how the feedback was made. Grammatical errors were put into question rather than the essence of the issue in hand. My purpose was to educate about precedence and consequences associated of the news to ordinary lives, but it was understood in another perspective and even received by others as defensive. There is no problem with answering a person in defense as long as it is still within the issue and not taken personally. However, it was not the case.

So how do we deal with the situation? For me, I do a two-point check on relevance and prudence. If I could make a feedback which is both relevant and prudent about an intersting topic, I make it. But if not, I do not do it. If I see a feedback, I also assess it using two points. Should it fail both, I ignore it since there is no point of argument. This is also true when the feedback is not prudent even if it is interesting and relevant. If it is prudent but irrelevant and interesting, I make a subtle feedback to redirect the person to the topic.

In these times, all of us must be responsible even others are not. It is wise to show others how to react responsibly, rather than talking just for the sake of it.