Originally from: Farmtalking
                        
Hi Joyce!

I'm amused to see you think I'm 'too trusting and not suspicious
enough of all the ulterior motives that abound.'

In fact I 'trust' absolutely no one!

Like all of us I've been badly let down and in receipt of broken promises many times but I love people and will always try to give them the chance to do right by me and/or anyone else, whether or not they have broken their promises and let me/us down in the past.

We all deserve a second chance and sometimes many more than that before we can get it right, including me!

I doubt any of us have never broken a promise or got something wrong or made a mistake. What is important to us all is that we be forgiven and be given the chance to make amends!

What we may consider 'ulterior motives' may be motives others consider worthwhile and the right thing to do.

If we disagree with them we need to –
(a) know where they're coming from and try to see things from their point of view (b) be as certain as we possibly can be of the alternatives we recommend © keep an open door and welcome dialogue at all times and probably most important of all (d) be willing to learn and change our minds and opinions.

Sometimes we are all in danger of what I was once accused of -'Using a sledge hammer to crack a nut'!

FMD, BSE – and it looks as though the NSP will be – are IMO all examples of that! In our haste to eradicate these diseases we move too fast and fail to look at the problems from every angle.

By the same token it is so easy for us to use the sledgehammer of 'suspicion and mistrust' to dismiss and close our minds to everything proposed by politicians, scientists and even the vets!

The point I've been trying to make is that we must try to work together to come to the right conclusions, which is not a question of trust or suspicion but more of a willingness to forgive past mistakes and a determination to search for the best way forward together and hopefully one on which we can all agree!