I know I’ve explained this before, but maybe Ames Mayor Ted Tedesco wasn’t listening or maybe thought it had nothing to do with him, being as he’s the mayor and all.

Here’s how he was quoted in The Des Moines Register on March 2: “If you’re mature, you come and talk out your issues,” Tedesco said. “You don’t go off the deep end and try to do something radical, because it really hurts your position when you try to sit down and negotiate.”

In the first place, the mayor is wrong about the facts of the matter. It is not true that achieving a desired level of polite deference enhances your position in dealing with self-deceived superiors, nor is it true that effectively getting their attention hurts your position.

You may recall that the last time students came to address the City Council, they were “booed and hissed” at by the “adults” assembled there. The fact of the matter is, in dealing with self-deceived higher-ups, the first thing you have to do is get their attention.

In the second place, Tedesco’s claim that going off the deep end and doing something radical “really hurts your position” is also an illegitimate or dishonorable rhetorical maneuver.

Whenever you shift the discussion to the behavior or etiquette of your opponent and, thus, away from the putative subject (say unnecessary sidewalks or punitive ordinances directed against students), you are guilty of ad hominem. Really.

The fact is that in order to have a conversation or negotiation, both sides have to be engaged in the process. The grain of truth in Tedesco’s statement is that you cannot negotiate with people who don’t respect you. The bad news is that the lack of respect precedes the negotiation and it usually goes in both directions.

When all the power is on the other side of the table, the hardest part is getting their attention, compelling them somehow to take you seriously. Anything that unbalances the status quo can give you a handle. You can wear a clown suit, carry helium balloons and pass out fliers, or you can strap explosives to your body, walk into an elementary school at pick-up time, then blow yourself and three city blocks to some ecumenical hell. The principle is the same.

As it happens, forcing a vote on City Council term limits was an absolutely masterful stroke. I applaud the creators of this clever and constructive strategy.

I will definitely go out and vote for the measure, as I’m sure will the anti-mall advocates and the anti-sidewalk petitioners who, most recently, were scolded by the mayor and the newspaper editor for engaging in “personal attacks” by those who chose to, uhmmm, “come and talk out [their] issues,” if I may quote the mayor.

Faced with an assault on their self-esteem (which is what disrespect is all about), most people respond with either “silence” or “violence.” When someone begins a sentence with, “If you are mature,” that is verbal violence, plain and simple.

Anyone who accuses you of making “personal attacks” is, in fact, attacking you and the attack is, in point of fact, personal.

Trying to back-load that accusation onto the opposition while pretending to elevate your own high-mindedness is a dirty trick. What you are doing is belittling the opposition.

Most people who use the mayor’s dirty trick aren’t malicious, just incompetent. They tend to be in denial about their own aggressive behavior, so chastising them just flips them into non-communicative silence. I’ve known cocker spaniels with larger communicative repertoires.

In fact, one good radical stunt is always far more effective than a thousand syllogisms laden with overwhelming factual evidence.

Let’s get out the vote April 5.

Virginia Allen

Ames