What is Gossip?
Gossip is a bad thing. Gossip is when a conversation moves away from the realm of suitable and upright conversation and goes to the dangerous territory of people. If conversations about people were all gossip is, gossip wouldn't necessarily be evil and we'd be alright. However, gossip takes such talk a step further to being slanderous. Gossip is unconstructive for causing people to change for the better. It's better for making people's flaws to be known to them (if it would do any good, that is) rather than have their flaws stuffed in a punching bag people slam with harsh words. So gossip is idle talk; an idle mind is the devil's workshop. Gossip should be avoided. There is certainly an infamy that goes along with having a mouth for talking trash of people; it makes one wonder, engaging in conversation with such a person, if that person speaks poorly of them. Gossip goes hand-in-hand with Distrust, like a nasty couple who like to make everyone feel awkward when they do those P.D.A. It is better to be trustworthy than not so it is better to simply not gossip.
But what if this assessment of gossip as evil is wrong? Perhaps there is a gray area where gossip is not simply evil, but just talking about others and their business, the general happenings of friends to friends. Gossip defined this way is simply another category of conversation. I've thought about this version for quite some time. I've come up with no good conclusion. This is the part where I flop around like a fish, attempting to find some meaningful conclusion.
I often talk about who is dating who and blahblahblah high school gossip BLAH! Mostly because it makes me feel as though I'm not an isolated member of this society looking in. With my newly gained psychology knowledge, I also enjoy absorbing knowledge like a social urchin and using this information to destroy people through being a manipulative psycho b-word. But this blog isn't about me; it's about the random crap my magnificent brain makes me think about. As a subject, gossiping about random crap people are doing lately isn't particularly bad. There are terrible times when I've been speaking to someone about some random eventful event that's happened in my life and been shocked at their foreknowledge. Information gets out, but when it's sensitive, it's terrifying to find out how "far" it's gotten into the ears of the public; I suppose we shouldn't spill our hearts to everyone we know, but when it is important, personas with loose lips should avoid spilling the beans. It's hard to pick up spilled beans.
So slanderous talk is bad and giving out information willy-nilly to folks the original sole-owner of that info did not intend is bad. So is talking about friends bad? No. It's a staple of topics in a conversation. It's when we, as humans, gather around the campfire and blab on and on about the things in people's lives that are bad and make them look bad and things that the gossiped-about themselves wouldn't tell you. As a manipulative sociopath, I often find myself asking people about their lives if I recently learned a secret from someone else because I'd rather hear it from them than pursue conversation with someone who is not them. It gives me "the right" to know what's going on and more importantly; if it's a false strand of info flying around, the person will be glad to clear things up. It's obnoxious having unwanted rumors flying around; I had one flying about like an angered ancient owl in Middle School and like everything in my life, it was tragically hilarious.
What does that last paragraph say about gossip? If it can be helped, it's better to learn intimate details about someone's life through the person rather than your creepy network of friends that keep tabs on everyone all the time (like me) as if to someday use that all that information to tear friendships across the entire world apart! (Muahahahahahaha!)
In short, it is bad to slander-talk, bad to talk about private stuffs like heart-to-heart conversations, et cetera, and good to learn about someone through establishing a friendship with them rather than paying off the Shadow Broker.
