How American Culture Deals With Conflict - Part Two

Something else to toss into the mix:

(What does toss into the mix mean?

If you toss tomatoes into a salad, the salad is different now, right?
How about some avocado?
Dried cranberries? The kind you can buy at Trader Joe's?
A little Fuji apple, maybe?
Pepitas? Dry-roasted almonds, sliced thin-thin-thinly?
Grapes?!

Each ingredient adds something new and wonderful.)

I was talking with a friend and she noted:

American culture is okay with conflict in a public setting.

What does that mean?

Democracy. Arguing about how to vote on Propostion 8. Arguing about how to educate children. Arguing about who should be president, mayor, on the School Board, or head of the Police Deparment. Oprah Winfrey. Survivor. Jon and Kate Plus Eight. Rush Limbaugh and Big Eddie and Brangelina.

We love to watch conflict when it is someone else's conflict and we love to argue about things when we think we can decide things for everyone - because we are right and we know more than anyone else and everyone should vote the way we do.

When it is small and personal and around the dinner table and in the bedroom and between you and your mom or you and your husband or you and your son - well, that is sometimes different.

Sometimes that is painful and hard and tense and people don't really say what they think and feel or they say it in a bad way and people's feelings get hurt and people get mad and people say mean things or stop talking to each other or cry and run into the other room and refuse to visit that person again at Christmas time.

How about in between?

How about conflict at Walgreen's? How about conflict with your health insurance company? How about conflict with your doctor?

For those situations, I have some suggestions.

Soon.