"THERE IS A STORY THERE..."

From My Lips To HIS Ears

Gossip is idle talk or rumour, especially about the personal or private affairs of others. It forms one of the oldest and most common means of sharing  facts and views, but also has a reputation for the introduction of errors and other variations into the information transmitted. The term also carries implications that the news so transmitted  has a personal or trivial nature, as opposed to normal conversation.


In the last decade, gossip has been researched in terms of its evolutionary psychology origins. This has found gossip is an important means by which people can monitor cooperative reputations and so maintain widespread indirect reciprocity. Indirect reciprocity is defined here as "I help you and somebody else helps me". Gossip has also been identified by Robin Dunbar an evolutionary biologist as aiding social bonding in large groups.



The term is sometimes used to specifically refer to the spreading of dirt and misinformation, as  through excited discussion of scandals. Some newspapers carry "gossip columns" which detail the social and personal lives of celebrities or of élite members of certain communities.

My dears, all of the above comes about due to a reply to a post placed on Appeal Democrat blog by MOI.  The person left comment that 'he or she' felt me blog was a 'gossip rag'.  Fancy that.

Been called much in life but never a 'gossip columnist'.  What is thought by this old geezer in writing down thoughts is that it gives folks an opportunity to hear what is being said and heard AND noted local by this old geezer.  Were one to need any more proof of value of what is put down, research brings up some of the uses of such reportages.

Gossip can serve to:


normalise and reinforce moral boundaries in a speech-community
foster and build a sense of community with shared interests and information
build structures of social accountability
further mutual social grooming (like many other uses of language, only more so)
be used as a form of passive aggression, as a tool to isolate and harm others
provide a peer-to-peer mechanism for disseminating information in organizations

I do so love a good quote from a favoured film and have one at the ready for this post.  "Steel Magnolias" be the film.  In one scene, ladies are gathered in a beauty parlour, chatting about one of the employees, all are wondering about the employee.  The lady who owns the beauty parlour, leans into group and says: "There is a story there..."  Don't you just love it.  You know that she be right and we wait with bathed breath to discover just what the story might be.

Local, many have been the times that folks have stopped this old geezer and told a story that just begged to be told.  There be many local who want the ghost stories told, or tell of what was once the place called Marysville.  What one sees today may well not be what many remember in looking at a building or a road.

This old geezer does not write for a living.  Mind, there be an editor for London newspaper who tells oft that there is a place on newspaper if MOI wants it.  To hear it told, many would love to read the colourful and 'thought provoking' comments of.   Fancy that.

I like to think what I do is share me diary with the whole world.  Truth be told, the whole world is hellbent on calling me a blogger or worse.  "Gossip columnist",  Oh, My!

When this old geezer wrote in Fresno, the 'gossip' placed on blog got the attention of denizens of Silly Hall and others of note.  "Gossip" got a much put upon road fixed.  "Gossip" got pavements repaired.  "Gossip" got many in community to join "Neighbourhood Watch".  Got slumlords to fix up properties.  Got neighbours to sweep and wash up pavements in front of homes.  Got American Flags to be placed outside homes on holidays.  For lack of a better word, "Gossip" is good...

This old geezer may not use; "Did you hear the latest" to catch your attention BUT watch out for "Truth be told..."