"The negotiable is reduced to the insoluble"

From "Non-Communication: a natural history of human misunderstanding"
by ROBERT ARDREY

"There seem to be several characteristics that appear in all our new exercises of misunderstanding. First, the negotiable is reduced to the insoluble. This is as true between Catholics and Protestants in Ulster as it is between father and son. Second, non-communication leads immediately to non-compassion. The policeman becomes a pig as in old-fashioned warfare the enemy became a wog. Third, there is a remarkable enhancement of what I called in African Genesis the Illusion of Central Position- the illusion gripping the lone assassin or the tiny, ruthless minority that his or their ends surpass the needs of the large majority, justifying any means. One may refer this to paranoia, but the element of righteousness eludes psychotic classification. And finally there is the common character that the new confrontation rarely involves foreigners, but almost always one's social partners."

In COMMUNICATION AND THE HUMAN CONDITION edited by Lee Thayer