Attacks?

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Gail Nazemi writes, in re Ruby Rohrlich,

"She must be quite a person to make so many of you feel this insecure."

Ruby is, indeed, "quite a person." I say this as someone who has
had the privilege of meeting her in the flesh and sharing food
and conversation face to face. I came away impressed. Long may
she flourish.

But still, this word "attack" and then the inference that those
"attacking" must feel "insecure." To me, Mary Kelly sounds like a
strong, confident woman annoyed with Ruby because Ruby has leaped
to a conclusion much like the one that I am "attacking" [sic]
here. She's labeled someone without stopping to think very hard
about how what she's saying is going to make that someone feel if
they bother to take her seriously.

Speaking only for myself I would like to 'fess up that not to long
ago I said something that implied that Ruby was behaving like a
crotchety elder (something I associated directly with my altogether
masculine dad). That was a rude, dumb, disrespectful thing to do,
and now I'm sorry I did it.

But "insecure" just isn't the word. Try "annoyed," "exasperated," a
mixture of genuine affection and "Oh my God, do we have to go
through this again?" Like everyone else I have my blind spots,
but these feel closer to the truth for me.

Penitent but grumpy,

John McCreery

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