Angry Letters

Every now and then I feel a professionally responsibility to send an angry letter.  I try not to give in to anger casually, so ideally this is when other attempts to conjole and convince have failed badly enough over serious issues to cause me to doubt that the recipient and I share the same values.

I often try to modify the behavior of others; I am a teacher so that's a given. It's harder when you try to do so with others who do not share your values---there's far less of a common ground.

Almost always my angry letters have a nontrivial audience, including at least one other person beside the target but not a large enough audience to make the recipient(s) feel cornered. In my experience people behave differently in front of witnesses.

I was taught long ago that it is not enough to be angry; you must be angry enough to make things better. This is nontrivial and requires an anger that is pure, as free as possible of ego and other distractions.

It is draining, the times that I have done this.  I can revise such letters in perpetuity and must set myself an arbitrary deadline to send the letter and move on to the next stage. There must always be a next stage; it can't just be venting.