{"id":7106,"date":"2017-01-29T10:24:38","date_gmt":"2017-01-29T15:24:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/intramuralist.com\/?p=7106"},"modified":"2017-01-29T10:24:38","modified_gmt":"2017-01-29T15:24:38","slug":"the-extremist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/?p=7106","title":{"rendered":"“the extremist”"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"b1x3jgmf-ps-henry-lim\"<\/a><\/p>\n

While I\u2019m going out on a bit of a blogging limb here, my guess is that every enthusiastic, active blogger has about 37 different ideas they\u2019re pondering in their head all at the same time. Some develop into immediate posts; others take weeks, months, even sometimes years to formulate into a semi-coherent opinion. (I think my current number stands at 38.)<\/em><\/p>\n

Hence, for over a year, I\u2019ve been pondering the following post. I\u2019m still not quite finished in its formulation, but it seems there\u2019s a deep truth here \u2014 a truth I stumbled upon with a long time friend many months ago. Together we questioned the state of society \u2014 the good, bad, ugly, and all that\u2019s in between. It was a great time\u2026 so authentic, such a give-and-take with many angles to learn and digest from\u2026 excellent, varied perspective\u2026 with both of us seeking something better than what we too often witness.<\/p>\n

We seek solution\u2026 peace\u2026 and a \u201cwin-win\u201d (Covey Habit #4, by the way).<\/em><\/p>\n

But in our conversation that fall, we soon stumbled upon a proverbial thorn \u2014 far more than a thorn, actually. We identified one aspect among us that is challenging. It always seems to be the one thing actively attempting to pierce any progress. It is an unmistakeable impediment to solution. We identified \u201cthe extremist\u201d as a significant, societal problem.<\/p>\n

The challenge today immediately evolves, no less, to who \u201cthe extremist\u201d actually is\u2026<\/p>\n

Who is this?<\/em><\/p>\n

Who is \u201cthe extremist\u201d?<\/em><\/p>\n

And therein lies the challenge.<\/p>\n

The challenge is that without a doubt, \u201cthe extremist\u201d exists on both the proverbial left and right. However, we tend to minimize the one who, while potentially \u201cextreme,\u201d shares our bottom line opinion; in other words, we are far more graceful to the likeminded \u2014 especially, since we like the way they vote \u2014 and don\u2019t want to disrupt that.<\/p>\n

And so for my friend and me, we found ourselves in search of a better question. Instead of \u201cwho actually is this,\u201d we settled on the better question of what do these pejorative persons most have in common; what are the characteristics that identify \u201cthe extremist\u201d?<\/em><\/p>\n

In total transparency, we never settled on a complete, concise list. I think our conversation will continue. But the below is what we pondered then \u2014 and continue to ponder now. How relevant are the following 15 characteristics? Is this what we see too frequently in \u201cthe extremist\u201d?<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. An unwillingness to listen<\/li>\n
  2. An unwillingness to admit any wrongdoing or wrongful thinking<\/li>\n
  3. An inability to communicate with unlike others<\/li>\n
  4. An inability to argue calmly<\/li>\n
  5. Anger<\/li>\n
  6. Arrogance and condescension<\/li>\n
  7. An attempt to instill fear in others<\/li>\n
  8. A lack of consistent logic<\/li>\n
  9. Scornful of compromise<\/li>\n
  10. A refusal to change<\/li>\n
  11. No admittance of hypocrisy<\/li>\n
  12. Utilization of stereotypes or entire people group designations<\/li>\n
  13. Provocation and derived pleasure from provocation<\/li>\n
  14. The end justifying the means<\/li>\n
  15. And complete blame of the \u201cother\u201d side<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    If we could find a way to effectively and respectfully wrestle with \u201cthe extremist\u201d \u2014 even if he\/she is among our own likeminded \u2014 then perhaps we could find more solution and peace\u2026 actually making it a win-win\u2026 and building those necessary bridges to so-called \u201cother\u201d sides.<\/p>\n

    Respectfully\u2026
    \nAR<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    While I\u2019m going out on a bit of a blogging limb here, my guess is that every enthusiastic, active blogger has about 37 different ideas they\u2019re pondering in their head all at the same time. Some develop into immediate posts; others take weeks, months, even sometimes years to formulate into a semi-coherent opinion. (I think … <\/p>\n

    Continue reading ““the extremist””<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7106","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-event","category-current-issue"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7106","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7106"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7106\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7109,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7106\/revisions\/7109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7106"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7106"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7106"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}