This was the question our fearless professor asked us in class today.

Dictionary.com defines wisdom as: the quality or state of being wise; knowledge of what is true or right coupled with just judgment as to action; sagacity, discernment, or insight.

He also asked what is intelligence and does that differ from wisdom?

What is wisdom to me? Wisdom is something that comes with time, investment in life and knowledge collected over a lifetime. Wisdom is the practical application or pragmatic application of truth and goodness. For something to be wise, it has to follow that it is true. And that it comes from a place of goodness, and that wisdom can be applied to everyday life.

Intelligence, is over rated. The collection of information from study, life and experience, but all that knowledge is useless, if it goes no where. You can be smart and you can be intelligent, but you don’t necessarily become wise because of a degree or age. Intelligence is not the same as wisdom.

Who is wise? and Why? Who do you think is wise? and why?

I was asked if I felt that I was wise, on paper I indicated that I might be because I have 40 years of life experience and a few years of HIV under my belt. What I offer my readers is a lot of wisdom. Years of tried and true practice of action, faith and experience. Ask any sick person, young or old, and you will find that they are wise beyond their years. For those of us who faced the barrel of a gun and certain death and lived to tell the story, are wise.

I believe that men and women who survived atrocities are wise people. People like Elie Wiesel and every other man – woman and child who survived the Holocaust. I don’t know very many really wise men, as in Wise Men, but I believe that every one of us who shares their experience, strength and hope with one another is wise. Alcoholics come a dime a dozen, I know very few wise and sober men and women, I can count them on one hand.

Someone who has survived a life and is willing to give freely of that life is wise. Someone who is content to being who they are, living outside the ego, those who really know who they are and can help us move forward in our own lives is wise. This discussion will continue over the next few weeks as class moves forward.

In other Blog News:

I was very angry to learn that a fellow Blogger has taken down his Blog because of assholes who had to go and muddy the water on a young vibrant and loving father of two young boys. Copper was one of the most important young wise men I knew because of who he is and what he brought to my readers and the Blog Sphere as a whole. I am saddened that he has gone from us and I condemn all those who had to go and fuck it up for the rest of us.

This from Joe My God:

In Tuesday’s post about gay parenting, many of you weighed in on this growing phenomenon and what it means in the larger picture of our rapidly changing gay culture. Overwhelmingly, you expressed support for gay parents, with small minority expressing strong distaste for gay people who desire to have children. A few commenters directed readers to a blog called Cooper’s Corridor (a site unknown to me) for insight into the life of good gay dad.

Late in the day, Cooper’s Corridor disappeared.

With his permission, here is Cooper’s explanation:

I have deleted my blog. I’m very sad that I have felt the necessity to do this, because I loved the Corridor and feel it had a unique voice of its own. I started getting many hundreds of hits on my blog and multiple e-mails, some very nice, but others full of vitriol and judgement. Yet others poked fun at me. I feel threatened. I won’t expose my sons to that kind of scrutiny, so I ended it right then and there. I’ll continue writing privately, but never again will I expose my heart and soul and those of my children to public consumption. It may seem like an over-reaction, and although it hurts terribly, I feel I had no choice. It’s a sad world we live in when gay men denigrate and deliberately choose to hurt others.

I feel awful. I have pleaded time and time again for a civil tone in the comments of JMG. With a weekly comment volume in the thousands, I don’t have the time to moderate or even read many of the comments and I depend on our (mostly) thoughtful and smart community of JMG participants to keep the peace. And it works, mostly. Reviewing the comment thread of the post in question, with a handful of exceptions, there’s really not too much there that is very offensive.

But the idea that an apparently great blogger and fantastic gay father could be silenced by nasty JMG readers, even if they were directed to his blog by commenters and not me….well, that really fucking bothers me.

I offer my embarrassed apologies to Cooper.