-- mediation --

"facilitating interaction to help people in conflict hear each other"

Since I was a kid I think that I've always had a negative impression of people who try to be peacemakers. The reason was because I knew them by a different name, "meddlers". I even still think of those who try to mediate conflicts as meddlers. And, I don't have a very good view of meddlers. And, while mediation has been presented as an important art of democracy, I still disagree with the idea that people should mediate other people's problems. That bad impression of "peacemakers" has always stuck with me and I don't think it's going to disappear very soon.

Granted, I'm sure that mediation has a place in the arts of democracy. That place would be also known as, "to be used as little as possible". I suppose I'm honestly not giving mediation enough credit though and you're probably thinking that I'm just shrugging this off altogether and I guess in a way, I am. But, I have such a bad impression of people who are meddlers that I can't look towards someone who is a mediator as not being a meddler.

I dislike people who stick their noses into other people's business. Everyone should just keep to themselves and solve their own problems without judging other people to the point where they think they can solve someone else's problem better than they can. Though a fresh perspective could be useful, I think that no one knows a problem as well as those involved, therefore no one could propose a solution better than those involved as well.