The colour is largely arbitrary but the important point is that often we need to be aware that there is more than black or white.\u00a0 So often we find ourselves looking at shades of grey when making decisions – so often when asked by a client whether he should do X or Y my answer must be “it depends”.\u00a0 Yet so often we continue to almost expect there to be a ‘right’ and a ‘wrong’ answer.<\/p>\n
As I said this impacts many different areas of our lives – what is ‘appropriate’ behaviour – “it depends” – where is the best place for X – “it depends” – who should I turn to for advice – “it depends” – what is the best route to Y – “it depends” – perhaps it would have been better to entitle the post “it depends”!!<\/p>\n
If we address the first of the examples above – what is ‘appropriate’ behavior?\u00a0 Clearly there are a number of contexts that need to be taken into account.\u00a0 Appropriate behaviour in a crowd at a football match is clearly not necessarily going to be appropriate behaviour in a library.\u00a0 Appropriate behaviour towards your best friend is not necessarily going to be appropriate towards a stranger.\u00a0 Appropriate behaviour in one country may be entirely inappropriate in another.<\/p>\n
So – who’s rules are we playing by? and how much does it matter?<\/p>\n
Actually if there were clear cut rules we would not be dealing so much with the grey areas.\u00a0 If everything was defined by a set of “Thou Shalt”s and “Thou Shalt Not”s then all would be fine.\u00a0 Actually that is not true – there would be so many of these rules that no one would be able to remember them all.<\/p>\n
Context and perspective are extremely important when it comes to traversing the thin grey line – it is rare that we want to deliberately step over the line – but often circumstances are such that we want to tread as close to the line as we dare.\u00a0 We look at sports men and women who often have to push the rules to the limit – and here I am not talking about those who cheat by crossing the line but pretend not to (for example those who take banned substances) rather I am looking at those who are up against the limits – like sprinters who must train themselves to react in a split second to the start signal, but (as has happened several times at the current World Championships) sometimes react (or should that be pre-act!!) fractions of a second too soon.<\/p>\n
I must admit that I believe that a lot of the rules that have been put in place to ‘control’ our interactions with each other are a result of an excessive amount of political corrrectness and, unfortunately, a result of the fact that our current society is overly prone to litigiousness.<\/p>\n
How can it be ‘right’ that when the call comes out “is there a doctor in the house” the doctor’s first thought is not to say “yes” but to think “if I get this wrong will I be sued”!\u00a0 How can it be right that a teacher is not allowed to put their arm round an upset pupil because touching could be construed as assault!<\/p>\n
Leaving those (and similar) unfortunate examples aside there are many difficult decisions that we each have to make regarding how to interact with others – at what point are we in danger of crossing line.\u00a0 This is perhaps highlighted by the relative difficulty of communication by ‘electronic’ means rather than face-to-face.\u00a0 It is very difficult to ‘read’ emotion into an email or a text – even with the use of emoticons, especially as they can often be used in an ironic sense!<\/p>\n
Looking at the way that many people ‘behave’ in an online environment it is clear that on many occasions they exhibit behaviour that would not be permissible or acceptable in ‘real’ life.\u00a0 They regularly cross lines that would not be crossed under other circumstances.\u00a0 This strikes me as quite interesting because the online environment offers much less anonymity (yes you can ‘hide’ behind a persona and an avatar, but unless you are very clever it is pretty easy to trace who you are if anyone wants to make that effort) and also greater exposure (any audience is potentially much greater than you would have in the real world).<\/p>\n
Perhaps the latter (combined with the illusion of the former) is part of what drives the bravado.\u00a0 Perhaps ts just foolishness.\u00a0 Perhaps its simply that the consequences have not been considered at all.<\/p>\n
Of course the real problem with ‘appropriate behaviour’ (once we step away from the black and white world) is that everyone will draw the grey line in a different place.\u00a0 Usually, not too much of a problem. However in some instances it results in quite serious repercussions.\u00a0 This is at all levels from individuals through organisations to states and nations – how many wars have started because that grey line has been drawn in a different place by one faction.\u00a0 Lets face it, almost all arguments occur because of this very reason – what one person or group thinks is acceptable is not tolerated by the other person or group.<\/p>\n
This has painted quite a black picture (sorry!!!) of the grey world – however, I think that getting away from black\/white and either\/or is hugely important in beginning to understand how the world works and what our place is in the world.\u00a0 Our natural reaction is to want an answer that is either right or wrong, but many times we would do well to consider the fact that somewhere between is a perfectly acceptable response – even with all of the extra complexity that introduces.<\/p>\n
I have no doubt that the differences between either\/or and both\/and will permeate many of my posts.\u00a0 It is both a blessing and a curse to see someone else’s point of view when that point of view is different from your own – but I believe it to be a necessity if you are to truly understand yourself.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The colour is largely arbitrary but the important point is that often we need to be aware that there is more than black or white.\u00a0 So often we find ourselves looking at shades of grey when making decisions – so often when asked by a client whether he should do X or Y my answer … Continue reading “The Thin Grey Line”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[122],"tags":[119],"class_list":["post-380","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ignorance","tag-worldview"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/systemsthink.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/380","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/systemsthink.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/systemsthink.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/systemsthink.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/systemsthink.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=380"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/systemsthink.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/380\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":381,"href":"https:\/\/systemsthink.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/380\/revisions\/381"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/systemsthink.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=380"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/systemsthink.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=380"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/systemsthink.co.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=380"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}