I don’t WANT to understand!

Here’s another blog I posted when I was working in Spirit Lake Consulting:

“You are a mean, old woman,” more than one of my daughters have told me more than once.

“You know, sometimes you’re a real bitch,” I have been told by friends (but never by my husband who is commonly known as the calmest man in the world.)

I can’t even claim to misunderstand the source of this discontent. As I have said on repeated occasions,
“I may be a bitch but I’ve never been a stupid bitch.”

What is this all about, even from people who like me, sometimes love me? Well, I’ll tell you. I am not an understanding person. I don’t try to be. I don’t want to be. There are three very big lack-of-understanding areas that really upset people.

1. It is not nice to discuss ethics. I was amazed to find that even alltop, the way-cool digital magazine site doesn’t have a category for ethics. It has a category for ETSYRATI, for heaven’s sake, which is a word that I had to look up, and I have four degrees. (To save you the time, I will tell you. Etsy is a website for small business owners to sell handmade items. Etsy rati are people who do that.) Talking about ethics is like talking about racism or sexual harassment. It makes people uncomfortable. Nice people talk about the weather or the cost of Michael Jackson’s funeral or will Rush Limbaugh ever shut the hell up.

2. Even less nice than discussing ethics in general is discussing specific people’s…