Remember long ago when I used to post drunken rants? I got busy, got sick, couldn’t drink alcohol, and then went on a multi-weekend binge. Here I am, after a weekend of bars in my old hometown and 2 days before leaving for a 5 day weekend in Las Vegas. This is the eye of the storm between two massive drinking excursions and yes, even in the eye I am drinking. Shit, it’s my little brother’s 21st birthday. How can I not?

To fill everyone in, two weekends ago I did the loop in Santa Barbara with Josh and his brother Kris for Kris’ birthday. It was cool, we got trashed, and there were surprisingly scarce ladies present for the entirety of the weekend. Last weekend, I went to San Luis Obispo and spent the weekend catching up with long lost bars and friends. The story of the weekend was that there actually was no amazing “drunken feat” story and just good, solid times. Oh, and I possibly got strep throat. That is to be determined by the good people at the urgent care facility tomorrow. Hey, wait I’m drunk. Let’s get to ranting:

Rant: When there is a situation involving multiple people having to come to a decision on something, all sides need to have their own opinion and all sides need to then agree to a common ground that both incorporates their own opinions, while accommodating and sometimes acquiescing to the others. I got into an argument with a friend who shall remain nameless, about a situation that shall remain anonymous, that involved 4 of us having to decide on something. There are a lot of variables to decide and everyone has their own opinions. Unfortunately, one person (he’ll be called Fred) and I don’t agree. The other two are staying almost completely neutral instead of forming their own opinions. I am trying to give into Fred’s requests, while not losing my own entirely. Yes, I have my own opinions, but I am willing to compromise as long as others are as well. The problem is that Fred has been influencing a majority of the opinions so far and tonight was the first time that I tried to bring to light the fact that he may have to bend a little on his stranglehold over the decision making for the group.

He immediately got mad and took the defensive, which is somewhat understandable. The problem is that instead of trying to rationally argue his point of view and have a discussion, he quite literally pounded his fist on the table, accused me of attacking him, and stormed out of the bar we were at (the bar from Hell). I’ll admit, I was directly opposing some of his views and telling him that at some point he may need to bend. I even went so far as to say that he was the person that everyone to this point had been bending to and that he hadn’t really given any ground on his demands. Furthermore, his opinions create both ends of the spectrum of our decision. This means that there is no bending either way outside of his parameters. It’s as if we were all buying a cake and he wanted both the cheapest and most gourmet cake possible. Sure, we could browse around and maybe find something that fits his exact needs. But, wanting both ends of the spectrum basically renders all other opinions useless, assuming all other parties still want to split cake with Fred. However, if Fred wanted something cheap and say John wanted something gourmet, they could meet in the middle. So, there are four parts to this rant:

1. Every party in a decision needs to have an opinion. You can’t sit idly by because two more opinionated people are already opposing. Throw your own viewpoint on the table.

4. If you are going to have an opinion (which everyone should), you are going to have to logically discuss it with those of opposing opinions. Nothing is going to get resolved by turning discussions into fights or getting irrationally angry about situations.

I agree that all of these have to apply to me as well and I’m willing to accept that I am not the easiest person to agree with. I’m opinionated, but I am always willing to listen and have discussions with people holding opposing viewpoints. The keyword in that is ‘listen’ because I actually do listen and I feel that in many situation in life (speaking in general, not necessarily this one) people only ‘discuss’ things so that they can get across their own point. The time in which the opposing argument is being presented to them is spent thinking of a counter-attack instead of analyzing its points and looking for merit that may change your own views. Everyone out there, try actually listening and trying to understand opposing points of view from your own, if for no reason other than to understand where other people are coming from. I try to do this as much as possible in life and I’m sure that I fall short of doing it all the time. But, I’m working on it and I hope that others do as well.

Rant: By the way, I am not religious (this isn’t a place for a discussion on that anyways) and only capitalize God and Hell because it makes for more dramatic emphasis and because spell check hates me if I don’t do it. I don’t like seeing little red underlines on my sentences.

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Filed under: Rants by Cory