Last month, when I was in Mumbai, I met a cousin of mine who is around 20 years younger to me. Talking to her was like being on the show Who Wants To Be A Millionaire where she was the host and I was a contestant with no lifelines. I kept answering her questions patiently but when she used the word "black" for describing someone's complexion I thought I must correct her. What followed was a hell of an interesting conversation, though I don't remember it entirely.
Me: You mean dark complexion.
She: What's the difference?
Me: Well "black" sounds awkward and besides, it's racist too.
She: What's awkward and what's racist?
I explained both the terms to her.
She: If I say "white", will that also be racist?
Me: It'll be but not as racist as saying black.
She: Why not?
By this time I had become extremely uncomfortable. Had it been a grown-up asking me this question in the course of a debate or argument,I could have said a thousand things because the focus in those cases is not on answering the question. Your goal is to confuse the person you are talking to by saying something really clever to win the argument but when you talk to a 8 year old kid, it's a completely different ball game, trust me. The focus is not on winning the argument but on telling the kid the right thing. You can't mislead them because of your lack of knowledge. So for a change, I honestly accepted that I didn't know the exact answer to her question and stayed silent.
Well everyone keeps asking me if they would be alive to see the day when I would honestly admit not knowing about something which seems really complicated to me. I sometime feel like telling them that the only thing that sounds complicated to me in this world are questions of 2 words, asked by 8 year olds.
9 comments:
" Your goal is to confuse the person you are talking to by saying something really clever to win the argument" ---- The truth at last!!!!
If only I could show Rohit this.
Haha show him. So that next time we can argue over this. :)
" Your goal is to confuse the person you are talking to by saying something really clever to win the argument". If you take the "something really clever" bit out of it, then, the rest is what you accused me of doing.
I don't see how? Because I get confused very easily and frequently?
You don't have two many options here:
1) In case you didn't accuse me of confusing you:
a) I won fair and square. :D (Even I am not willing to admit that)
b) You lost (This would be really hard for you to admit)
c) You ran away from the room and closed the door from outside. (You did do that, the question is why?)
2) What exactly was the accusation leveled at us (myself/niraj)?
And it doesn't really take much to confuse you in any case.
I think most of our intra-wing debates ended that way(someone running away)...but I don't remember what forced me to lock the door from outside in the 1st year. I think you guys were not listening to me(as always) or something.
When did I accuse you or niraj...I don't remember anything.
And I think "my confusions" were the cause and not the effect of the discussions we had. So confusing me, however easy or difficult it was, couldn't have been the direct effect of a conscious effort by you guys in that direction.
Exactly my point Kumud.
Shane Warne didn't have to work hard to dismiss Cullinan (Because, Cullinan couldn't play any half decent leg spinner).
In the same way, we didn't have to work hard/ work at all to confuse you (As were confused 90% of the time).
And regarding the non listening thing: I hope you don't do that in your B school GD (There no one even pretends to listen, everyone just talks. Btw, it is a lot worse than even that in the classes that are held here).
I would definitely not do that, but let me reach the GDs first.
And I was never ashamed of being confused, on the contrary, would it surprise you if I said that was one of the few things I really liked about myself?
Dude, that's the reason you are the inspiration behind GONA. You better feel good about it.
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