Poison not spread by food, water, or air

Poison spread by Word. This is in response to my own feelings and actions as well as others around me, at school, in life, in general.
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gos·sip
n.
Rumor or talk of a personal, sensational, or intimate nature.
A person who habitually spreads intimate or private rumors or facts.
Trivial, chatty talk or writing.
A close friend or companion.

"The line between what will stimulate positive word of mouth comments or cause negative ones is a very thin one. And in an age that loves gossip, negative word of mouth comments seem to spread faster than positive ones." Godfrey Harris

Okay guys. We live in a day and age where gossip is the thing to do. We gossip about movie stars, we gossip about millionaires and gameshows, we gossip about our friends, we gossip about the person right next to us. Gossipgossipgossipgobblegoopcrap. We don't always mean to, it may just be something of our nature that we must realize. And gossipping is okay sometimes, I mean I love to talk about what happened to So and So yesterday with What'stheirname, but when it comes to it being negative in anyway, that's wrong. Doesn't anyone remember Middle School? Doesn't anyone remember how horrible it was to happen upon a cruel conversatiomn about you?

Don't you remember feeling like crying or tearing something apart?

Negative Gossip is a disease. Whether it's fact or a rumor, or even something you KNOW you made up. If you weren't there, if you don't have a neutral point of view, if you don't know the situation or the life scenario of whoever is involved, you shouldn't be speaking negatively about it. But this Disease is infecting not only America, not by a long shot, but everywhere. If I may quote Don Miguel Ruiz, author of "The Four Agreements" (If you haven't read it, I suggest you go out and buy it before you finish reading this.):

"The word is the most powerful tool you have as a human… But like a sword with two edges, your word can create the most beautiful dream, or your word can destroy everything around you. One edge is the misuse of the word, which creates a living hell. The other edge is the impeccability of the word, which will only create beauty, love, and heaven on earth."

Granted, sometimes in this world we take things too seriously, but when gossip gets out of control and never stops, it's poison. Have you ever noticed how awful you feel when you're being eaten by something negative from the inside? It's hard, it's miserable. We judge people so quickly on rumors instead of just talking to them. You could pass up an amazing person based on rumors that were lies.

The first step in stopping this horrid disease is to STOP LISTENING to negative gossip. The next step is to STOP SPREADING IT. It's one thing to write down how you feel, or talk to someone who has no earthly form of contact with someone that you are bothered with, or at least NOT use their name; but if you're just throwing their name around to people who know/will know/have met this person, saying all of these cruel, mean, hurtful things, then you are gossiping. Venting or not. If you have to use their name, write it down, write it as a letter and burn it. It's ridiuclous to not care at all about how the other person feels, to not know what they've been through, and to not know all the details. I'm so sick of it. I'm sick of people standing at the sidelines watching someone else's life and judging them all the way through it without seeing the details. Be APART of it, talk to them everyday, play in their game of life. Let them do what they want, if it's not hurting anyone, get over it, no matter how much it bothers YOU.

I don't know if anyone knows how disturbed I am by seeing things like this everyday, and how much I hate it.

I'll stop sounding accusatory for a moment: Gossip is such a natural part of human conversation, we sometimes don't even realize when we slip up. The best thing to do is only say positive things, next to stop gossiping altogether. And this is a problem for me as well; I am not Holy Mother Saint Mary here. We don't always mean to be hurtful, sometimes we don't even realize what we're saying is negative, but before you know it, the poison is spread, someone ends up getting hurt, and the damage is done.

Maybe the best thing to do is keep these thoughts in the back of our heads should we hear rumors. Is this something with decent background and evidence, and true? Can it be based on miscommunication, hatred, misunderstanding, false assumptions, or made up in general? Is the source reliable? Is there any negative bias? What's your experience with the said person? Should I investigate it, or believe the assumption is automatically true?

And before you repeat it, think about what this is going to do, what is actually being said, if it's truly useful information, if it's for ego boosts/own goals, are you absolutely sure it's true, and if it's not, could it hurt someone? We need to live lives more impeccably, with more integrity. We need to stop judging, stop assuming, stop gossiping negatively about people.

All we're doing is hurting each other and ourselves. Do we really want to do that?

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"On the whole, the public is unable to distinguish truth from falsehood when news arives by word of mouth." Jean-Noel Kapferer

"Rumors do not convince or persuade people: rather they seduce them."

"Practice the 'Sunset Rule': Never let the sun set on a problem without first calling your customer." Bill Gates

"Employee talk, bad or good, is extremely influential. In my opinion, it is most often the most powerful kind of insider talk, even more influential than that of executives and managers. Negative insider talk is the first thing you shoudl teach your employees to avoid, no matter how bad conditions are. Once your employees start badmouthing you, your customers will pick it up and pass it along with even more authority, becuase the word comes straight from the horse's mouth." Jerry Wilson

"When dealing with people, remember that you are not dealing with creatures of logic but with creatures of emotion." Dale Carnegie

"A reputation once broken may possibly be repaired, but the world will always keep their eyes on the spot where the crack was." Joseph Hall