DADvocate

The World citizen's Guide created by Business for Diplomatic Action gives 16 tips on how to be a good visitor to another country. I couldn't find the entire list of 16. The pdf file I found was not exactly as described in the newspaper article linked to above. But that is not my interest at the moment, the suggestions are well suited for all social settings, such as family gatherings, as well as international travels.

My favorites:

• Dialogue instead of monologue. - This should be obvious but I can't count the number times I've been in a group where one person seemed to think everyone else was singularly interested on what he/she had to say.
• Keep religion private. - Please don't try to save me, tell how God exists in many forms, all religions are equal, or whatever. I'm quite capable of redemption, satori, or higher incarnation.
• Talk about something besides politics. - Politics are either incredibly boring, inflammatory or both and the odds of your opinion changing mine are about as great as my opinion changing your. I'd rather you tell me how I can save a few bucks on house repairs.
• Refrain from lecturing. - Remember a "lecture" can be only a few seconds long. One of the most aggravating moments for me was when, preparing for Thanksgiving dinner, a female felt it necessary to point out how sexist us males were because we sat down for a few minutes while the finishing touches were being put on a couple of dishes. Every male there had prepared food except for my 80 something year old father. I had cooked a ham, homemade rolls and my son, 11 at the time, made pigs in a blanket. Gimme a break.

The last two are especially meaningful to me. Certain members of my family have tremendous difficulty conversing for more than 5 minutes without making political comments which often include lessons or a lecturing remark. In his blog, the husband of my sister who made the sexism remarks responded angrily when I used this quote Kahlil Gibran - "We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children." He then lectured me on lecturing him.

Oh, well. I was upset that he had referred to people with my beliefs as "Nazi fascists." This was early on in my discovery of blogging. I've since learned to not let such things bother me. But it's interesting to see what lurks in the mind of a nice guy. "Who knows what evil lurks?" - The Shadow

Oh, and that brings up another guideline:

• Agree to disagree respectfully. - Is being pro-life that bad?

OK, then.