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rivkaHow not to get into my research study: Part 17283 of a continuing series.
1. Call me "baby."
1a. Call me "baby" again, after I already told you not to.
2. "When did you last use heroin or cocaine?" (Voice slurring, eyes drooping, head rolling and nodding) "When? It was juuuuust... before... I got... clean."
1. Call me "baby."
1a. Call me "baby" again, after I already told you not to.
2. "When did you last use heroin or cocaine?" (Voice slurring, eyes drooping, head rolling and nodding) "When? It was juuuuust... before... I got... clean."
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no subject
Date: 2006-07-28 08:47 pm (UTC)But I'll remember not to call you any such thing. I promise.
no subject
Date: 2006-07-28 09:03 pm (UTC)I told this to a friend at work, who immediately started up with the "Davey" business, and when I told him that if he didn't stop I was going to move to a cube across the office.
He didn't, so I did.
Then he got it...
no subject
Date: 2006-07-28 10:47 pm (UTC)I minded it from a forty-year-old guy who swaggered into my office, passed close enough to me to invade my personal space, spoke to me as though being in the study was his right.
no subject
Date: 2006-07-28 10:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-07-28 10:57 pm (UTC)I don't think "love" is ever used that way in the states, except perhaps by extreme Anglophiles. The ubiquitous term waitresses use here in Baltimore is "hon." I've never heard "baby" used as a generic term of endearment by a white person; it's mostly used by African-American ladies old enough to be my mother.
no subject
Date: 2006-07-28 11:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-07-28 11:15 pm (UTC)-J
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Date: 2006-07-29 09:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-07-29 02:25 pm (UTC)One of the cashiers at one of the cafeterias at school is a member of this demographic. In a single transaction, she will call any given customer "honey," "baby," and either "sweetie" or "darlin'".
no subject
Date: 2006-07-30 07:21 pm (UTC)I picked up "hon" for a little while. It's a habit I've fortunately mostly gotten over, but it still slips out occasionally.
But isn't...
Date: 2006-07-29 03:55 pm (UTC)If you must, get mad at the men who call you baby and stand too close to you while you are at a cocktail party, or while you are at a meeting with professional colleagues. They should know better.
Re: But isn't...
Date: 2006-07-29 04:35 pm (UTC)But you know, I've been working in this inner-city clinic for six years now. My clientele is pretty much exclusively poor inner-city African-Americans from astonishingly deprived backgrounds, with a few poor inner-city whites and the occasional middle-class African-American thrown in for a little diversity. I can honestly assure you that it has already occurred to me, over the course of the past six years, that there might be cultural and socioeconomic differences at play in my interactions with clients and research participants. I don't need an anonymous commenter to point it out.
I find it interesting that your assumption is that manners are the province of the middle class, and that because this guy was poor I shouldn't expect him to "know better." Do you actually know many poor African-Americans? My experience is that they are raised with much more strict etiquette expectations than middle-class white kids. 99% of my clients and research participants are perfectly aware that a sexualized approach to a stranger is not appropriate in a professional setting, and it's awfully prejudiced of you to make the assumption that their "culture" must include that sort of thing.
What in the world?
Date: 2006-07-29 04:53 pm (UTC)And yes. I do know poor African Americans. Although African Americans were not the *culture* I was speaking of. I work with struggling people of all races and social skill levels, some of which are quite impaired due to mental health and drug issues, which is why I wanted to speak on this point.
By the way, I based my comments on the person you were discussing *solely* on the way you presented him. Gave my take on it. You didn't say he was out of your research study due to criteria. You said "How not to be in my study...call me baby...do so again...etc"
Not sure why I made you so mad, but you were wrong on multiple levels in your reply.
And? I do NOT have assumptions that manners are the province of the middle class. I made the comments I did about the cocktail party "don't call me baby" because that would be a good way to educate,peer-to-peer, (not doctor to potential client) about why you don't like to be called baby. And,the colleague "don't call me baby?" That is obvious. Workplaces have protection in place for dealing with coworkers that do that sort of thing.
Sheesh.
dear anonymous coward
Date: 2006-07-29 06:56 pm (UTC)If you don't like the responses you get to your anonymous comments, don't make anonymous comments. You have no right or reason to dictate how
Re: dear anonymous coward
Date: 2006-07-29 11:48 pm (UTC)Re: dear anonymous coward
Date: 2006-07-30 05:38 am (UTC)Re: dear anonymous coward
Date: 2006-07-30 07:18 pm (UTC)Re: What in the world?
Date: 2006-07-29 09:17 pm (UTC)AFAICT, she's not trying to "educate" her clients on why she doesn't like that. She's saying she doesn't like it: whether it's "don't call me 'baby'" or "My name is Kate, not Kathy," it's basic manners to accept something like that when asked. I don't need to know why someone doesn't want to be called "baby" or "Kathy" in order to address them in a way they're comfortable with.
Re: What in the world?
Date: 2006-07-29 09:21 pm (UTC)When I came back to tell him he wasn't eligible, he said, "that's all right, baby." I said, "I told you not to call me baby." And the woman he was with smacked him on the arm and said, "she doesn't like it." That was the extent of the education.
(And, incidentally, he wasn't my client - he was a guy who wanted to be in my research study. I have a very different level of responsibility to clients.)
Re: What in the world?
Date: 2006-07-29 09:18 pm (UTC)I don't object to anonymous comments per se, but I've had a whole string of lecturing ones that have made me impatient with the genre. I don't know if those were you or not, of course - which is why I prefer when anonymous comments are signed with some kind of name or handle.
Re: What in the world?
Date: 2006-07-30 05:02 pm (UTC)I replied as I did, out of *respect* for the client population, a basic population whom we happen to share, because your original comment did not actually read like you were filtering out being (annoyingly and repeatedly) called "baby" in that particular circumstance with that particular individual.
You *said* that was how he didn't get to be a participant in your research study...along with his sense of entitlement.
You only mentioned later in the thread, after I posted, that the person you had excluded hadn't met criteria, or he *would* have been included, ("baby or no baby", passed on, as it were, to a burly coworker.) I didn't *have* that information when I first responded. (And, as as an aside, both of us know there are many people who are in such crisis that they could never keep polite track of whether the someone trying to help them prefers Kathy or Katie. I get called Mom, most often, and go right on to address the issues at hand.)
Your clarification helped, because I read it, and believed it: so now, I could read your original post as it was maybe intended: a little humorous venting. But, you also asked me if I even knew any poor African Americans, and you wrote things that made it clear that you had misunderstood my use of the word "culture," and furthermore, you implied that I was prejudiced, and believed manners were something only attainable by the middle-class. Nothing could be more wrong. So, because things can easily be misread on the internet, I clarified my stance and meaning as best I could.
My clarification, apparently, did NOT help. Because, in your above post, you simply repeat that I insulted the client population you work with, among other things.
I wonder why things disintegrated into another poster calling me an "anonymous coward," and had you, berating me for not introducing myself. And, I fail to see where my first and second comment were in any way "lecturing." I wonder how you imagine it would feel safe to me to introduce myself. So, this is my last post, written here to defend, if nothing else, why I wrote what I did. This is probably also where I will be completely ignored, or perhaps even be called names, or have my posts picked apart and twisted into something nasty, or accused again of behaving insultingly to you or others.
But, I can go so far as to hope that we can meet in the middle on this one, and chalk it up as a mutual misunderstanding that has now been corrected. And that would actually be a very good outcome, because I am not a coward, and I am not a lecturer, and I am not a troll, and in real life, I suspect you'd know me to be one of the Good Guys.
Re: What in the world?
Date: 2006-07-30 06:25 pm (UTC)Unless this is the first post of Rivka's that you've ever read -- and if it is, I can't really imagine why you'd have started here, and why you wouldn't have read others before replying -- then you should know that she is a reasonable person who takes her job and the ethical responsibilities that come with it very seriously.
And, if you had that information about her, then you also have the information that the person in question would have been included had he met the criteria, because that's directly and obviously implied by the information that Rivka is a responsible person.
Instead, you seem to have been acting on some sort of information that the "how not to get into my study" was to be taken literally, despite the implications it made about Rivka's character. Where, I wonder, did you believe you got that information from? (And, can you see why your choice to believe "this statement is literal rather than flippant" instead of "Rivka is an ethically-upstanding researcher" might come off as an insult, regardless of your intentions? I don't think it's possible for the misunderstanding to be corrected unless you can see that.)
Re: What in the world?
Date: 2006-07-30 06:33 pm (UTC)FWIW i read it exactly as you did, but i figured rivka didn't actually mean it like that, being as she strikes me from years of reading her articles as scrupulously professional.
lecturing people as an anonymous commenter rarely goes over well. i recommend asking for clarification before going into lecture mode. also, if you don't want to go to the trouble of creating an LJ account, signing your name/handle and linking to some verifiable online presence is a good idea, in order to distinguish yourself from an average anon troll.
Re: What in the world?
Date: 2006-07-30 09:49 pm (UTC)Thanks for that. I think this is where we get into the implied audience of LJ. I wouldn't use wording like that in a purely public setting, because, well, it's unethical research conduct to pick and choose your participants based on anything other than your stated criteria. But here in my journal, I figure that the people reading my words know me - or at least, know enough about my public self-presentation to be able to read my tone.
Re: What in the world?
Date: 2006-07-30 10:59 pm (UTC)Re: What in the world?
Date: 2006-07-31 12:11 am (UTC)the same standards for behaviour don't apply to all public places and all public gatherings. if rivka sits in gazebo in a public park and tells an anecdote to people who're at a picnic with her, and you as a random bystander walking past overhear and are bothered by some off-the-cuff remark, do you think it'd be appropriate to pipe up out of the blue and let her have your words of "wisdom"? if you think that'd be obnoxious you have the social skills that you should transfer here. if you think that'd be just fine you need a remedial course in how to interact with strangers.
this is a mostly private gathering in a public place. since you seem unaware of the differences: livejournal isn't usenet or a public web forum. yup, anyone can wander by and misinterpret things, but the space isn't shared equally; instead said wanderer is a guest of the journal owner, and it behooves one as a guest to perform some rudimentary introductions, and learn something about the gathering before opening one's mouth. if one skips that step one is likely judged much more harshly, because there are people (whom we call "trolls") who specialize in stirring up the natives.
Pleonastic: thank you for explaining:
Date: 2006-07-31 12:34 am (UTC)I meant no harm, and I honestly didn't know the difference. Now I do. I'm sorry for writing in your journal as if it were usenet or an open discussion topic, rather than a private gathering, Rivka.
Re: Pleonastic: thank you for explaining:
Date: 2006-07-31 02:18 am (UTC)You came by here looking for posts on "HIV issues." Those posts might be tagged "research," "work," "hiv," or "therapy," but anything that references my actual clients (not by name or identifying information, obviously) is probably friends-locked.
Re: What in the world?
Date: 2006-07-31 06:39 am (UTC)Re: What in the world?
Date: 2006-07-31 10:57 am (UTC)Re: What in the world?
Date: 2006-07-30 07:26 pm (UTC)Re: What in the world?
Date: 2006-07-31 04:04 am (UTC)On another popular online venue, anyone who posts a comment anonymously is automatically (as in, given by the progam interfact itself) given the user name of "Anonymous Coward." I have picked up this habit, because nineteen times out of ten, it's completely accurate.
I see that you seem to be working things out to some degree with
Re: What in the world?
Date: 2006-08-02 12:21 am (UTC)Emma
Re: What in the world?
Date: 2006-08-02 06:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-07-29 12:44 am (UTC)Yes, I'm short. No, I'm not a child, and if you treat me like one in that particular way, I will become EVIL.
no subject
Date: 2006-07-28 09:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-07-28 10:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-07-29 12:43 am (UTC)ah, youth.
no subject
Date: 2006-07-28 09:37 pm (UTC)LOL! :)
no subject
Date: 2006-07-28 10:07 pm (UTC)