Gossip, can it be so Bad?

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Sometimes it’s hard to know when you’ve crossed the line into gossip.
Once I needed to find out about a situation one of my teenage kiddos had gotten into. Because of the nature of the situation, I had to reveal some things about another player in the whole drama to somebody who had some information I needed as a parent.

I tried to keep it as circumspect as possible, give as few details as I could. And the situation was serious.
I also made it clear that I wasn’t assigning hero’s and villains, just trying to get to the bottom of things.

Even then, I came away from that conversation wondering if I crossed a line.

The way you describe your situation, it doesn’t sound like you had any malicious intent to say what you did, but wanted to smooth things over.
It doesn’t sound like gossip to me.

But there’s always the chance the conversation gets back to the person you talked about and then you’ll have to deal with any fallout that might occur.
 
The situation I’m talking about is an example of how tricky this can be as you say.

This conversation began innocently enough but we both quickly began to realise that there may be a problem and we both care enough about this chap to share a little of what we knew individually.

No, the intent was to help him and no information was shared which would harm him in any way, or lead to any damage of his reputation etc. In fact we agreed after that it was good that we had shared our concerns. We now intend to talk to him tactfully to see whether he needs our help in various ways. He is the sort to keep troubles to himself and we thought he might have some issues he may need help with.

Also the scale of this is limited to ourselves, no one else will be involved as opposed to gossip where no such limitations are applied. I realise that many people say “ just between you and I” etc and then promptly tell everyone that! In this instance no one else will be involved, let me assure you.
 
The Old and New Testaments stress the importance of controlling the tongue. I worked in the local hospital for over 8 years, years ago, and I religiously guard anything I saw or heard there. But, elsewhere I have “crossed the line” and I am not happy about it.

Gossip is bad. I have said some things even as a JOKE that came back to me very quickly in boomerang fashion. It’s never good to gossip, no matter how juicy it seems.

i worked in another state and then moved back home. I met somebody there from my home town on one occasion. When I moved back home, a relative told me he “knew ALL about me.” Now, that’s saying a lot, because I worked in that other state for about 16 years. But, there you go. I didn’t lecture this relative about gossip or certainly not about the gossip. I just said “Great. That saves me a lot of explaining.” By that age in my life, I didn’t feel I had anything to prove or explain to anybody.

More recently, I felt compelled to gossip to counteract some pretty vicious gossip against me. Bad idea. I don’t think I changed anybody’s mind about the original gossip. The damage was done.
 
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Yes because it is talk about one not there and if not true = false witness thus breaking one of the ten commandments.
 
you always put such thought and time into your replies Petra.
 
@Lee1 Unfortunately, I have experienced first hand the terrible damage that extreme gossiping can do. As such, I have resolved that I will put in all efforts to stop all forms of gossiping.

However, I do work in HR and there is a fine line between gossiping and discussing issues for the good of a person.

So…I generally work under this philosophy:

THE TRIPLE FILTER TEST

In ancient Greece, Socrates (the famous philosopher) was visited by an acquaintance of his. Eager to share some juicy gossip, the man asked if Socrates would like to know the story he’d just heard about a friend of theirs.

Socrates replied that before the man spoke, he needed to pass the “Triple-Filter” test.

The first filter, he explained, is Truth .

“ Have you made absolutely sure that what you are about to say is true?”

The man shook his head. “No, I actually just heard about it, and …

Socrates cut him off.

“You don’t know for certain that it is true, then. Is what you want to say something good or kind ?”

Again, the man shook his head. “No! Actually, just the opposite. You see …”

Socrates lifted his hand to stop the man speaking.

“So you are not certain that what you want to say is true, and it isn’t good or kind. One filter still remains, though, so you may yet still tell me. That is Usefulness or Necessity. Is this information useful or necessary to me?”

A little defeated, the man replied, “No, not really.”

“Well, then,” Socrates said, turning on his heel. “If what you want to say is neither true, nor good or kind, nor useful or necessary, please don’t say anything at all.”

CONSIDER THIS

Before you answer a question or voice your opinion, ask yourself:
Is it true?
Is it good?
Is it kind?
Is it useful?
Is it necessary?

If it passes these filters, speak up. If not, either find a tactful way to make it pass or better still, keep it to yourself.

Not exactly a Catholic teaching, but it has worked for me so far. If it passes the filter test, I am willing to discuss it. If it doesn’t, the most I will do will be to have a chat with the person involved, to see if it is true, or if I can be of help in another way.

Hope this helps….
 
That is a very useful way to judge the matter, thank you for sharing that.
 
I’ve been damaged by gossip about me on both sides of my family. It has left me isolated. I have to “offer up” this suffering until some of my “Christian” relatives come to their senses, if that should ever happen.

They have chosen to live in widely scattered places, to begin with, far away from our mutual homestead town. I don’t know what to make of that except the obvious, that it is very easy for them to shut me off from their fellowship.

I think that the McCarrick scandal has shown up a lot of massive official gossip and detraction, with the Archbishop actually denying the allegations so far. So far, there has been no indication of when he will have a canonical trial to face the charges. No one has suggested that such a development may actually open Pandora’s box.
 
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It’s always so much easier to talk about someone else than to look in the mirror. Ever been the object of gossip? I have and I’ve seen people destroyed by it.

I like the saying in the 12 step groups that says to take your own inventory.

Yes, gossip can be so bad. It is still impossible to completely repair a reputation once you’ve ruined it.

We all need to guard our words.
 
I think perhaps I posted this a while ago but it is relevant.

A woman went to confession and confessed to gossiping in some way. The priest gave her an unusual penance instructing her to take a feather pillow to the top of the church tower and once there to split it open and empty the contents and then return to the priest. She duly complied and watched with glee as the small feathers blew away in the breeze going in all directions down streets and past the houses in the town like snowflakes on a winters day.

Once done, she returned to the priest smiling and told him the task was done. He then instructed her to go and pick up all the feathers and replace them in the pillowcase. She was horrified, she pleaded with him saying “ but the feathers have travelled all over the place and gone I know not where driven by the wind? “ The priest then admonished her by pointing out that the feathers are like her words in gossip, she had no control over who would hear or what effects her words would have. And that was the danger in gossip.

(I once told my priest this story, to his credit he listened patiently and then told me that he thought it’s source was St Frances De Sales.)
 
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Bambi’s friend Thumper got it right waaaaaaay back…
“If ya can’t say nothing nice, don’t say nothing at all”
 
Are there best ways to handle gossip? Taken that more often than not you’ll probably be the last to hear of it yourself?
 
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