Virgins of the World, Unite!

Scoop, on Virgins and Kudzu:

You need to be careful, my friend. Saying “isn’t it always better to be involved with people who know what they are doing?” and “What can one really expect out of a rookie?” is a kind of reverse bigotry, is it not? I mean, how are virgins supposed to become non-virgins if no one wants to…well, you see what I mean here, don’t you? It’s like the old Catch-22 “To get a job, you need experience” but “To get experience, you need a job.”

Everyone was a virgin once. Those who think about it long enough will realize that at some point or another, someone (virgin themselves or not) was kind enough to “hire them with no experience.” It’s the least they can consider doing for someone else. Assuming, that is, they like enough other things about that someone, that is.

Interesting article, How do Emoticons and Capitalisation Affect Perception of Email?, which made me recall Scoop’s comment.

I guess I should have used a couple of smiley faces to indicated that the virginal points in “Virgins and Kudzu” were in jest and less about virgins and more about the fascination of some in them.

I’m not a smiley face person. I never use them. I noticed them when I started using email about 20 years ago. They’re just not me. I try to convey my thoughts with words (using CAPITALIZATION, bold-faced, italics, varying fonts, and my overused house specialty the ellipsis ….) One of my cousins is fond of using animated smileys; her emails are like a three-ring circus of little yellow thingies dancing across my computer monitor.

The study in that PsyBlog post compares the responses of extroverted/emotionally-stable readers versus those of introverted/emotionally-unstable readers. What of the introverted/emotionally-stable, like me? (At least I think I’m emotionally-stable ….) Personally, while I’m very obsessive about how I write I don’t judge people by how they write (i.e., spelling, grammar, smileys, stuff like that). Email, message board discussions, and blog comments — most people whip these out quickly. A friend of mine has the most horrendous spelling; he might be dyslexic. I’ve felt odd forwarding his emails to others, concerned that they might think less of him. I almost edited one of his emails before forwarding it, but then stopped myself because that would have been dishonest and rude. If anyone thinks less of him because of his spelling, that’s their problem.

What you write is more important than how you write it.