Types of Posters
Reader:-
There is a bewildering variety of opinion, and of various levels of intelligence on this site. It is difficult to know what is true and believable.
Comment:-
It is evident from the quality of the articles submitted to the Islamic and other Newsgroup sites on the Internet that the contributors can be divided into three kinds:-
(1) Those who seek Truth and Goodness, determine what they are, align themselves on the side of truth and goodness, and try to promote them according to their various insights and abilities.
(2) Those who are reasonable, indifferent or neutral. Only some of these come onto these sites. The reasons for them being on these sites may be to learn, to pass the time, to find entertainment or companionship, to inquire and obtain answers to certain questions, to discuss or to debate. Their opinions may vary greatly because all have misinformation or partial truth in different amounts and proportions, and these are related, systematized, digested and assimilated to different degrees. Discussion can rectify and increase knowledge in proportion to the willingness and desire to learn and the various abilities of those who participate or merely stand by and observe.
(3) Those who are on the side of evil and falsehood. They make furious attempts to spread hatred, persecution, destruction, mischief, perversity, misinformation, deception and distortions of truth. Among these we have another three types:-
(a) The stupid ones with a low intelligence who have nothing sensible to say but are also unable to recognize their limitations. Nothing can be done about them.
(b) The pathological and depraved ones who are mentally sick and have the need to express it in various forms and strengths. They need pity and treatment, but none may be available or sought.
(c) Those who give the impression of being a bit more intelligent but have strong prejudices and obsessional tendencies, perhaps because of traumatic experiences in their childhood, phobias or complexes, and have a compulsion to express these. Their perception being based on preconceived ideas, is selective, superficial and distorted, and they deceive themselves also. Some of them are like children or uneducated persons trying to make sense of Quantum Theory. But they are too naive to see, or too arrogant to admit, that they are unable to understand. Their opinions are worthless except as indications of their own inner state and suffering.
It is not very difficult to see who fits into which class though some may lie between them or belong to more than one.
Objections:-
1. Shooting the messenger does not add substance to claims. It simply implies that you have no better arguments.
2. In the modern West, unlike in the past or still in the East, people are use to thinking for themselves. Some will be trolls, but others will be critical thinkers who are used to free speech and will pull your or any other religion to bits to see if there is any substance to the arguments presented. They are a little harder to hoodwink.
Answer:-
(1) These are classifications, which any intelligent reader can verify.
(2) There are causes for opinions. If you know that someone has certain defects that affect his judgment then his opinions are not worth considering. Even if true, this is by mere accident that is not a trustworthy source of truth.
(3) It does not follow from this that there are no better arguments. When presented, some people prefer to ignore or distort them.
(4) There are all kind of thinkers:- stupid ones, naive one's, biased ones, ignorant ones, cunning ones, clever ones, objective ones etc.
(5) Free speech does not guarantee intelligence or the ability to think clearly, usefully or objectively and is driven by all kind of motives.
(6) The prejudiced, the blind, the arrogant, the low of intelligence, the ignorant, fools and those who do not look, and do not want to look at the evidence are also much harder to convince.
(7) But the critic could probably have worked this out by himself also. The question is: Why did he not do so?
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