What About Gossip?

Okay, so normally I believe it is harmless.  I love gossiping, really, it’s fun to hear all the good stuff about the dumb stuff that people are doing.  The reason that I think it is harmless is because I do not believe any of it, nor do I give any of it any credit in my universe.  Gossiping is just an excuse to hang out by the fencepost and talk.

Is gossip truth or is it malice?  Is telling someone in authority about an event, gossip?  How do we tell the difference between malice and disclosure?  What is the “intention” of the teller?  Okay – does intention matter?  Because if you do damage with gossip, does it really matter what your intention was?  If intention matters – how do you get to the truth of intention?  “I intended to be helpful, didn’t mean to tell your wife you’re cheating on her.”   Does that sound valid?

Okay, here it is:  The intention of the disclosure DOES NOT matter, because you can never tell what someone’s true intention is.  So it is the RESULT that matters.  I always move backwards from the result to find out a person’s true intention.

To the question of, is it disclosure or malice: it’s always malice if the gossip is relevant and it stops without an investigation.  Gossip is ONE-SIDED communication and therefore is not to be credited with truth.  All disclosure deserves an investigation.  Particularly disclosure that has an affect.  So to be clear, gossip should be described as I have above; harmless fun out by the fence post with a neighbor. Anything else, should be described for what it is: malice.