88 Pages - ISBN 978 32486 202 4 All of us often find ourselves generating, hearing, or
participating in evaluative comments about someone who is not
present during the conversation. It is often valuable and
sometimes unavoidable to be part of such communications. To
function efficiently in a complex social environment, humans
require information about those around them. However, social
inter-connections are complex, and it is impossible to be present
at many primary exchanges to absorb this kind of information
directly. Thus, many people are eager to pick it up through an
intermediary, whether or not they have the luxury and patience to
confirm it later either directly or indirectly. This phenomenon, of
course, is called gossip. It is an important social behavior that
nearly everyone experiences, contributes to, and presumably
intuitively understands. A paradox of gossip is that it is everywhere,
though there are numerous social and biblical sanctions against it.
We have two types of gossip: the positive and the negative
gossip. While the positive gossip serves the purpose of sharing
healthy and problem-solving information, the negative gossip is
malicious and destructive. However, most people have an innate
craving to pull others down. And so, they continue to cause
sorrow, tears and blood; not with guns, not with knives, but with
their tongues which have proved to be deadlier than any poison
or weapon ever known to mankind.
|
