Concertino.....and I'm not going......

[poltr1]

Some of my LJ friends are heading off to Concertino, the Northeast filk convention. This year, it will be held in Boston, MA. And once again, I'll be staying home. The family budget and my wife's vacation schedule -- or lack thereof -- have dictated that we're not going there (or anywhere) this summer. About the only vacation we'll get to do this year as a family would be to take a weekend trip (within a 4-hour-drive radius of Dayton).

The thought of driving to Boston.....and driving in Boston......scares me. I've heard so many horror stories about Boston roads, Boston drivers, the high cost of everything, the crowdedness of big cities, and the constant Rush!Rush!Rush! of city folk that going there sounds like an adventure in Hell than Paradise. That's what I thought when I was first looking for full-time work in 1988, and I still think that today.

One of these years, I know I'd be going there. My wife wants to visit Salem, and all the history surrounding that place. (Did you know former GE CEO Jack Welch was originally from there?) I have high school friends, fraternity brothers, an other folks I know that live and work in the Boston area. One of them is the webmaster for M-Power, a mental health advocacy organization. (Aside to maedbh7: Check them out!) Another is an assistant professor at the Berklee College of Music. I'd like to go and visit them, but it won't happen this year.

BTW, whose bright idea was it to schedule Concertino the same weekend as the Dayton Air Show? Grr! Argh!

Comments

[folkmew.livejournal.com]

Well it's too late to convince you and obviously there are other reasons you can't go but I promise that driving in Worcester MA is not at all like driving in Boston. I pretty much tried to avoid driving in Boston when I lived in MA but Worcester is not bad at all. Salem is pretty much fine too - as long as you avoid BOSTON you'll be ok. If you DO go to Salem, make the trip to Gloucester and go to "The Two Sisters" resterant for breakfast or lunch. It's wonderful! :-)

[poltr1]

Convince me? Of what?

For me, "convince" is one of those loaded words that are rife with connotations, mostly negative. It sounds like it's a "win-lose" rather than a "win-win". FWIW, "convince" is one letter away from "connive". I can suggest to and advise other people but I can't convince them; it's their choice to change their mind (or not), and I can't do it for them. Nor should I.

[folkmew.livejournal.com]

Convince you to go to Concertino. I wasn't actually trying to "convince" you, mostly I was posting that driving in Worcester isn't as bad as driving in Boston so that if anyone else was on the fence about going they'd not let that scare them away from the con.

You said:
I can suggest to and advise other people but I can't convince them; it's their choice to change their mind (or not), and I can't do it for them. Nor should I.

I disagree. If I solicit advice or other input from my friends about a decision I am making, I am looking for information to help me make that decision. Therefore, it is always possible that any one person may be responsible for "convincing" me of making the decision in a certain direction.

Dictionary.com says:
To bring by the use of argument or evidence to firm belief or a course of action - synonymous with persuade.

Therefore I was trying to "persuade" you to come to the con (only I wasn't really - which is why I said "it's too late to convince you").

Perhaps you feel it is negative to be "convinced" (persuaded) by your friends. I, however, have many good experiences of being convinced or persuaded by friends to do things. Move to a certain part of the world, enter into a wonderful relationship, take a job... lots of things. All decisions that were my own and freely made but certainly with the input of my friends "persuasion".

Well - there you go - my input on your comment. Hope you take it in the spirit it was intended (good lively debate) and not as me trying to "convince" you to change your mind! :-)

More semantics........

[poltr1]

Perhaps you feel it is negative to be "convinced" (persuaded) by your friends. I, however, have many good experiences of being convinced or persuaded by friends to do things.....

I do. "Convinced" and "persuaded" are both negative words to me. Both imply that some type of manipulation is being done -- either I'm being manipulated (if someone convinces or persuades me), or that I'm doing the manipulation (if I try to convice or persuade someone else). I want to be able to make up my own mind, and make my own choices, not parrot someone else's opinion or submit to someone else's subersive or not-so-covert psychological tactics like "the power of suggestion".

I already know that my persuasion skill is poor -- as I often say, I rolled a 5, and it was a 3d6 roll.

If I say to you that I think you can get a lot of benefit from the Woman Within training, am I being persuasive? No. I'm making a suggestion. It's totally up to you to make the decision to agree with me and go, or to disagree and not go.

There's lots of bad persuasion out there, where people give bad information to people, either unknowingly or knowingly. More often than I care to admit, I end up falling for it, hook, line, and sinker. Sometimes I wonder if I have the word "gullible" written across my forehead.

There are plenty of stereotypes of bad persuasion out there -- the used-car salesman (yes, I realize that hits a bit close to home right now), the born-again Christian who's out to save everyone because that's what their minister implored them to do, the Amway distributor who's convinced by their upline that everyone wants in on a piece of their action and won't take no for an answer. If there's good persuasion out there, I've never referred to it as such.

Can you start to see the shadow behind those words now?

One last attempt to "defend" myself <smile>

[folkmew.livejournal.com]

Let me first say that I respect your right to live your life the way you wish, and that I can certainly agree to disagree, however... Let me also try to give you some insight on why I think that persuasion is not necessarily a bad thing.

To me the purpose of good healthy debate is to fully discuss an issue from more than one side.It is only reasonable that each person wants, at least on some level, to convince the other side of their point of view. When I have a discussion or debate with someone I expect them to present their ideas, opinions and arguments passionately and articulately and I expect that if I find enough value in them I may be persuaded to change my mind. Please note that I am still the one who makes the ultimate decision, I am making up my own mind, I'm just using input from someone that I respect.

Dictionary.com says: "To convince is to persuade by the use of argument or evidence: The sales clerk convinced me that the car was worth the price." Is the sales clerk making me buy the car? Not unless I'm such a shallow person that I can't make up my own mind. In my case? No - and chances are the sales clerk didn't convince me of that, however a FRIEND of mine, say my friend who has been a professional mechanic and works professionally with race cars now, may well have convinced me that the car was worth the price if I had been on the fence or otherwise unsure. And yay! Glad to know there are people I can turn to when I need some help making decisions!

You gave the following example:

"If I say to you that I think you can get a lot of benefit from the Woman Within training, am I being persuasive? No. I'm making a suggestion. It's totally up to you to make the decision to agree with me and go, or to disagree and not go."

You are not merely giving me facts, you are saying that you think that I could get a lot of benefit and therefore I should go. That's the sub-message at least. So I may ask you more about why you think I should go. If I like what I hear and it fits my own life choices I may be "convinced" that you are wrong and that I have better ways to spend my time and money. Ultimately I have made up my own mind whether or not I feel you have "persuaded" me. It's not like you hit me over the head with a two by four, tied me up and made me go to the training. You feel it's a good thing, you've told me why, and I've probably gone and researched it myself (depending on how much your initial presentation intrigued me) and then I've made up my own mind.

I am not afraid to admit that my opinions, thoughts, decisions, life choices... are flexible enough and open to change enough that it is very possible for a well reasoned, passionate, articulate argument from someone I respect to "persuade" or "convince" me to change them. I think it is dishonest and hiding behind semantics to pretend that we don't want to persuade people to do things frequently in our day to day life. Even when we are talking to our partner about which movie to see and we say "I hear that Movie X is really great, it's gotten good reviews and several friends of mine online say it's very funny" we are trying to persuade the other person that at the least it's worth considering. Even if we aren't trying to "persuade" them that's the movie they want to see we at least want to "persuade" them to put it in the pool. Otherwise why would we mention it?

I feel that being open to new input and willing to remake your mind frequently is a good thing. Maybe it's because I'm an ENFP. Maybe it's because I'm a third generation Unitarian... whatever the reason. So - ok - I guess I've beaten this horse long enough.

And if I haven't persuaded you, well, then I guess I'll give up and assume you really feel strongly and that no input from me will make you change your mind.