For one of those people though, my response wasn’t enough. This blogger took my response to her a step further and decided to blog her own viewpoints, opinions of me if you will, on her own blog.
That’s fine. We have freedom of speech for a reason. We also have opinions. Except my twitter comment wasn’t an opinion, it was a fact. A statement. I don’t like my neighbors. Nothing more, nothing less. I don’t like them. I’m tired of dealing with them. I haven’t always not liked them but after years of putting up with disrespect for us and our property… I’m tired of it all.
I’m trying very hard to let what was said about me by the other blogger go but I’m finding it hard. I’m finding it hard to let being called a “bigot”, “spouting garbage”, ”incite hatred”, or “making a sweeping generalized statement about people you have very little knowledge of” (which isn’t even accurate. I have quite a bit of knowledge of them but whatever) roll off my back. I find it hard because, I am not a bigot and it seems as though someone is now making a statement about me; someone whom she has very little knowledge of.
This post isn’t written in defense of my statement.
It’s written in frustration, confusion, and every emotion in between.
Short of this post, I refuse to get into any further public debate with the blogger over this. I’m not calling her out publicly, I’m not giving her free link love, and I’m definitely not going to resort to name calling as she did to me. I make no apologies for what I said and I am not defending a prejudice to save face (as it’s been suggested I am doing).
I don’t want to stoop to that level. I don’t want to throw names out there and then not be able to take it back. There is no going back once you’ve accused someone of inciting hatred or being bigoted. Accusing someone of being a bigot or racist is a strong accusation to make and anyone doing so needs to be able to back up those statements.
I can back up my statements with years of living next to the Amish (near the border of what we call Amish Country) and having them in my daily life, whether I’m at the store, getting gas for my car, or talking with them as they’ve gone past our house in their horse and buggies. I’ve watched them work quietly and diligently in the fields next to our house and been in awe of their dedication to their lifestyle. I’ve spoken with them on countless occasions on how they live, the holidays they celebrate, school for the children (the school house is just around the corner from ours. Girls only go till the 8th grade in my area and school starts in October after harvesting is done and ends in March or April when it’s time to plant crops) and everything else I could to understand the people that would be so much a part of our life when we moved here. I’ve been in their home and they’ve been in mine. We’ve paid them for services and goods (including a baby quilt made for Peanut right before he was born), given them rides to places they needed to go, and given them things we had no use for (but knew that they would).
I’ve been a good neighbor.
What can you back up your statements with?
From this point on, I’m not touching this topic again or revisiting it. It’s been a serious drain on my energy. It has saddened me that our blogging community (it is 2010 remember?) has to continue to resorting to posts slamming each other. I won’t engage it (as I told her I wouldn’t). This is as far as I’m allowing it to go on my end.
Instead I’m going to wish my husband luck in getting our neighbors to respect our property lines. I’m going to write my posts, meet my client deadlines, celebrate the end of a rough week (you don’t even want to know what else) with a glass of wine or two and a good friend, welcome the weekend and do a little baking from all the cherries the boys have picked for me this week.
Anyone is welcome to comment here and weigh in or spend their own time tracking down the other blogger and her post and commenting there or tweeting with her but I won’t be.
Well. That sucks. Good for you for rising above. Lousy neighbors suck, no matter what religion or lifestyle. Maybe the blogger meant you were a bigot against neighbors?
Cheryl´s last [type] ..Define Mom Blogger
Thanks Cheryl, I honestly don’t know what she meant. I read her post and took it to mean that I was bigoted against an entire culture of people, which is simply not true and instead of talking about it privately she decided to go at me publicly.
I *am* bigoted against neighbors! You know the saying, good fences make good neighbors. When we moved here, I thought our neighbors were going to be great, all older people who want to be left alone.
It wasn’t long before I couldn’t go outside before hearing how I needed to do this, and that, and that too, for our property. I found the one neighbor spraying a really nasty undiluted chemical on our yard “as a favor.” My kids & pets play in that grass, and my chickens eat bugs from it. Another neighbor trimmed his trees & left about 2 tons of stuff on our side of the fence. Then told us he was being nice for not charging us for the firewood. The other neighbor hooked to our well one day when his was out, and burned our pump out.
So, I guess I’m bigoted against Catholics, Baptists & Mormons, because those are the religions of my neighbors that have no respect for our property lines.
OR I could just want to be left alone lol
The main problem with textual conversation is that you can’t hear tone. The person speaking may mean one part of a statement to be important, while the listener can’t hear past one part that bugs them. No matter WHAT you say, you’re gonna tick someone off.
We all have racist/bigoted attitudes in our hearts. It’s how we act on those & not attaching the actions of 1 person to the entire group that matters.