Rhetorical tango

I am certain that when we fantasize about bygone eras, we are greatly discrediting our current days. It is foolish for me to romanticize the 1950s or any other time period given my age. My only sources of what life was like during these times are people that hate lip rings and tattoos.

That said, my sense is that we’ve lost something significant in the way we communicate with one another. And this has nothing to do with social media, the Internet, or any other usual suspects that are allegedly leading us to the end of civility as we know it.

We live in a world of rhetorical tango, where words must dance beautifully and with poise to be deemed sufficiently “nice.” Simply stating an informed opinion, never mind an uncomfortable yet observable fact, must be done with a level of unprecedented grace… or else.

The most fundamental attribute of words is that they convey meaning, sometimes meaning of great consequence. When we are forced to dilute our message with linguistic filler or undue emotion, or otherwise concatenate our words with verbal pillows and parachutes to soften their landing, we are doing a disservice to all those involved in the dialogue. But it seems to be the new way of the world.

The pitfall of this means of communication is that the advantage goes to those with eloquent prose, not to those willing to say what truly needs to be said. Others will simply choose to stay silent rather than face the requisite obstacle course for having a conversation today. My experience is that relationships are strained more by what cannot be uttered than by anything that is ever said.

Words are a kind of necessary fire that we’ve always played with, but now we are naively asking that it not burn us under any circumstances.