Re: straw man?
Francoise Herrmann (fherrmann who-is-at igc.apc.org)
Sat, 27 Apr 1996 15:39:30 -0700 (PDT)
>
> Francoise wrote:
> >Hi Robin, I udnerstand that two people may indeed have really different
> >perceptions of an event. But, I don't knwo that I believe in the impossibility
> >of communication. To take an example from your study (risky, I haven't read
>
> I don't believe in the impossibility of communication! Well, let me
> qualify that: I think our understanding of another person is always
> filtered through our own lens. Yet, of course we can understand one
> another "well enough", both intraculturally and interculturally, for
> practical purposes. However, I think there are times when it is
> NOT possible for two people to arrive at an understanding, and this
> doesn't have anything to do with the inherent communicability or
> incommunicability of their positions. By "understanding," I mean
> to part ways with both people having positive feelings about the
> interaction... It is unfortunate when one or both people harbors
> bitterness about an interaction, when one or both feels wronged
> by the other, but it happens. In these situations, who is "right"?
> Where does "justice" lay? Whose version of what transpired
> do we accept when we make a decision regarding whether or not
> coercion or cruelty was present in the interaction? For instance:
> a boss who lets an employee go for cause; the employee feels
> wronged, the boss feels it was deserved. The employee feels the
> boss is coercive, cruel; the boss feels the employee was not
> competent in his or her performance of the job. Whose perception
> is the "right" one?
>
> Robin
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Hi Robin, I think that we may disagree on the limits of communication then.
To pick up on your example, I think that this is an excercise of power
rather than the case of an emplopyee/employer relationship. My second
job ever as a secretary about 20 years ago, I put the carbon paper
backward on an imporant report that took me hours to type because I
knew not how to type! (and still know not). I was never fired and I
went back home that day with a huge bouquet of glaliouli (these really
big flowers)! I am idealistic and optimistic and choose to be, and
believe in the unconditional possiblities of communication, almost
prescriptively (for my own self-regulation, if nothing else(!.
Francoise
Francoise Herrmann
fherrmann who-is-at igc.org