Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Gossip

[Fred H Olson (fholson]

The discussion of gossip is complicated by varying definitions
of "gossip". Talk about third parties in the community can vary
from what I call "news" to malicious and false information and
every thing in between.  The way I read Sharon's post she was
including the news end of the spectrum. It seems to me that
news is clearly beneficial. Of course the  malicious and false
is unhelpful.

But the argument is made that what I'll call the accurately
critical can be helpful.

Occasionally rules for group discussion include something like
'no discussion of people not present'.  This strikes me as an
overly broad rule intended to prevent the negative.

Sharon wrote:
> There was a wonderful article in the NYTimes a few years
> ago on the benefits of gossip.

My search for the article came up with this from the NYT:
"Studies Find That Gossip Isn't Just Loose Talk"
By ALINA TUGEND
Published: June 15, 2012 [ Business Section  6/16/12]

Tho it was less than a year ago it otherwise seems like it might be
what Sharon was thinking of:

http://pirate.shu.edu/~plummeev/Dynamics1610/Gossip-NYT.htm

The wikipedia article on gossip also also discusses the positive
and negative aspects of gossip:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gossip

Fred

--
Fred H. Olson  Minneapolis,MN 55411  USA        (near north Mpls)
     Email:        fholson at cohousing.org      612-588-9532
My Link Pg: http://fholson.cohousing.org         My org:
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