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Chatterbox: Chirp at Cricket
Please read.
Has anyone heard of the growth mindset? Of not being afraid of failure? Of wanting to TRY AGAIN after you fail?
No? Well, look it up. Growth mindset.
The Politics Thread was a failure. We all know this. It was unorganized, resulting in a lot of confusion and hurt feelings. It was a first attempt, and like many first attempts, it didn’t work.
However, as a person with a growth mindset, my natural instinct was to find the problem, learn from it, and FIX IT! And TRY AGAIN!
Please, may I ask, why not try after you fail? Why not get up after you trip?
When I tried to restart the Debate Thread, (and, BTW, we’re debating about Harry Potter, which isn’t offensive like the stuff about being “privileged” to get arrested for stuff white people aren’t even fined for *coughcoughcough*) I saw an OVERLOAD of the fixed mindset. I saw stuff like, “This is gonna fail, why bother”, “Oh, the last one failed, we can’t try again”, “If we never try, we’ll never fail!” Well, those are the simplified versions of them, anyway.
Let me just remind you of one inspirational song, by Shakira.
“Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh
I messed up tonight, I lost another fight
I still mess up but I'll just start again
I keep falling down, I keep on hitting the ground
I always get up now to see what's next
Birds don't just fly, they fall down and get up
Nobody learns without getting it wrong
I won't give up, no I won't give in
'Til I reach the end and then I'll start again
No I won't leave, I wanna try everything
I wanna try even though I could fail
I won't give up, no I won't give in
'Til I reach the end and then I'll start again
No, I won't leave, I wanna try everything
I wanna try even though I could fail
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh
Try everything
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh
Try everything
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh
Try everything
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh
Look how far you've come, you filled your heart with love
Baby you've done enough, take a deep breath
Don't beat yourself up, don't need to run so fast
Sometimes we come last, but we did our best
I won't give up, no I won't give in
'Til I reach the end and then I'll start again
No I won't leave, I wanna try everything
I wanna try even though I could fail
I won't give up, no I won't give in
'Til I reach the end and then I'll start again
No I won't leave, I wanna try everything
I wanna try even though I could fail
I'll keep on making those new mistakes
I'll keep on making them every day
Those new mistakes
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh
Try everything
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh
Try everything
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh
Try everything
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh
Try everything…”
~❤️~
See? “I still mess up but I'll just START AGAIN”! “Birds don't just fly, they fall down AND GET UP! Nobody LEARNS without getting it wrong”!
Well, don’t give up. Don’t give in until you reach the end. Try, try everything, try even though you could fail.
Failure is not permanent.
I’ve analyzed the Politics Thread. I learned from our mistakes. In my head, I devised a way to make it work. I KNOW why the Politics Thread went wrong. And I KNOW how to succeed.
I just need to try.
As the saying goes, “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again!”
A lot is at stake here, you know.
I think that if you give up, it proves you have a fixed mindset. It proves that you give up. It proves that your brain is stuck into a little box, and can’t grow because it’s too afraid of failure.
But if you persist, if you attempt again, I think it proves you have a GROWTH mindset. It proves that you persevere. It proves that your brain is free, and can stretch and grow because it’s not afraid of failing, or anything.
So why the fixed mindset?
I have used the word “try” the second most in this writing piece so far, the most being the word “the”. I did this on purpose. It is, by far, the most important, and I don’t want to use synonyms. No, I do not care about redundancy right now.
"So, I implore you, try." ~Judy Hopps
Try it again. Try debating again.
Made a mistake?
Birds, they don’t just fly, they fall down and get up. Remember Shakira’s words.
Try even though you could fail.
submitted by Mei-xue (May-shreh)
(July 13, 2016 - 7:34 pm)
(July 13, 2016 - 7:34 pm)
I like this, but I have another analysis: The nature of the Chatterbox is such that all subtleties of speech (sarcasm, rhetoric, tone etc.) are lost. So it is hard to be persuasive, and hard to be a good lot of other things. It is easy to make someone angry and hard to apologize. Ethos, Pathos, and Logos still apply, and emotions got into it, and it became less and less Ethos and Logos, and more Logos. We need to remember that TO HAVE AN OPINION PEOPLE WILL RESPECT YOU HAVE TO EXPLAIN IT CLEARLY. Just 'you're wrong' doesn't cut it. Remember the 'here's why' part.
(July 13, 2016 - 7:51 pm)
Goodness, it's a single thread on a weird kids' forum website based around a fictional magazine. Calm down with your essay.
(July 13, 2016 - 8:01 pm)
This website is not weird!!!
Well, it's unique, at least . . .
(July 14, 2016 - 6:42 am)
I kind of agree. Fixed/growth mindset is not the same as this.
We don't have to make a politics thread to be happy. So don't. It will either a)BEST CASE SCENARIO: be sort of fun but die fairly quickly, or b)WORST CASE SCENARIO: become just like the last one.
Gared has a point: online, the subtleties of tone and language are lost.
Do not berate us for "not trying" or "being in a little box".
The Politics Threads are not necessary to be happy, but Mei, as an older CBer I must say that Politics Threads have never been that fun to begin with and almost always ended with a friendship being broken.
So Mei, I respectfully disagree.
(July 14, 2016 - 8:01 am)
It is not that people are not trying, but people are approaching it wrong.
(July 14, 2016 - 10:15 am)
Yes, trying again is what you're supposed to do, (Growth mindset, whatevs) but seriously, Mei, like Brookeria's said, DEBATE. DOES. NOT. WORK. ON. HERE.
OOOO!!! Sloth said bean!!
(July 14, 2016 - 7:07 am)
Also, please look up statistics about how successful fixed mindset people are and how successful growth mindset people are.
(July 14, 2016 - 2:37 pm)
*snort/coughs*
(July 15, 2016 - 12:50 pm)
Oh yes, this place is weird and unique, it a totally amazing way.
Perhaps instead of just running into it again, maybe you could lay out your plan and see what we think before trying again?
(I'm a bit of a planner so yeaaahh)
(July 14, 2016 - 7:21 am)
That's good and jolly and all, but let me remind you of one thing.
Humans tend to repeat themselves. Everything tends to repeat itself. l don't believe that it's the fear of failure that make people testy about debating, it's the fear that everything is going to repeat itself, which in the case of the Politics Thread, isn't good.
Try debating again? Make everyone ticked off as heck at each other. Failure is not permanent, but hurt feelings sure take a long time to get over.
Fixed mindset, you say? l say l'm being realistic and not overly optimistic that we're all going to be all nice to each other in debating, l'm expecting people to repeat themselves.
l feel like the "Try, try, again" thing is taken too far out of context, because what exactly do you hope to do here? Try again for the same thing? You don't need to debate, and it generally doesn't add anything and simply makes people very mad.
(July 14, 2016 - 11:57 am)
Okay, how about this.
Let's say that we all jumped off a bridge.
"We won't have any injuries," they said, however then next day they ended up in the hospital, with many broken bones.
After they healed mentally and physically, they decided to try again.
"We found out what caused it, and we will make sure it doesn't happen again," they said. "We can't give up."
They jumped off the bridge again and resulted in horrible injuries again. They had a growth mindset! Why aren't they succeding?
Because it was the same bridge, with the same people.
Now fit this scenario with our problem, except instead of a bridge, it's a website. And instead of people, it's cbers: Us.
Try a different bridge with different people. It might just work.
Oh, and I know what you're going to say. "Make the bridge shorter!" "Put water under the bridge!"
Well, what about the other people who need to use the bridge? They can't use the bridge because it's not high enough. These other people are people like me, and many others who use the website. And water--What about the animals that live under the bridge? Now they have to find another place. That's not very fair to them, is it?
And it takes time for change. And in that time people can't go jumping off bridges, because that delays the construction. But people will jump off bridges when construction is starting, because they like to rebel, and they like to jump off bridges.
Sorry for the long read.
(July 14, 2016 - 12:46 pm)
READ THIS:
Let's say that the Chatterbox is a garden. This garden is located in a very cold, dry area of the U.S.A.
You have many pretty flowers. You decide, "hey, why don't I grow tropical flowers?" You try, and fail. So you build a greenhouse next time. They still don't live. You add fertilizer. They still don't succeed. You try watering them every day. Nothing.
You try to improve ten times, but nothing works. You become angry that that one type of flower keeps dying, so you don't pay attention to your other flowers.
And because so much anger and attention is diverted to the tropical flowers, the non-tropical ones that you worked with earlier are harmed.
NOW, TO PUT THAT IN PERSPECTIVE:
On the CB, many Debate Threads have sprung up in my time. More than twenty, in fact. I kid you not, every single one has ended in at least one person being offended.
"But wait! Why don't you just make it a NICE debate thread?!"
We tried tens of times. Unfortunately, I think someone is always going to misinterpret a comment; someone is always going to accidentally be insensitive.
I do not think debate and politics threads are necessary to the Chatterbox.
Picture it this way:
You are at a house with your friends, and Person 1 walks in with two tubs of ice cream.
"Choose which one you like better!" Person 1 says. Everyone eats their favorite and begin to argue about which is better. Soon, friends are feeling hurt, and people are taking sides.
Everyone leaves the house sad.
A few weeks later, everyone goes back to the house. The same things happens.
The ice cream debaucle keeps repeating itself.
One week, a few new friends join the group. One of them is named Person 2.
Person 2 brings out two ice cream flavors and says, "Choose!"
Everyone does. A fight breaks out. Everyone is sad.
The next week, everyone meets up. Person 2 brings two tubs of ice cream. "Let's do this!" she says. But people decide not to, for good reason.
Person 2 becomes angry. "You guys are just scared to try!" she says.
Everyone is confused. They aren't scared, they just want to have fun.
A few people take some ice cream. "See? They're taking it! They aren't scared, like the rest of you!" Person 2 says.
Do you see what I'm saying? This has happened so many times and only caused hurt. I'm really sorry, but I'm just kind of depressed today.
Bye.
(July 14, 2016 - 3:37 pm)
@Gared, EXACTLY!!!!!!! You have a growth mindset.
(July 14, 2016 - 2:15 pm)
As Gared said, WE NEED A NEW APPROACH!
(July 14, 2016 - 2:16 pm)
Please, just read my post.
(July 14, 2016 - 4:35 pm)