Don't imagine I'm too familiar

I was recently at the "Is Life Meaningless?" debate held between the UWA Christian Union and the UWA Atheist and Skeptic Society.

I'm going to completely gloss over the entire point of the debate to bring up something I noticed that I thought was interesting -

The two debaters were named Ben and Daniel. Most people who know Daniel are aware that he prefers not to be called "Dan".

However, Ben would always refer to him by that name. Every time he said "Dan" I sort of cringed a little.

The cynic in me wants to say that Ben wanted to look familiar or friendly towards Daniel by using the shortened form of the name, and the irony was that by using it he was showing anyone who knew Daniel that he barely knew Daniel at all.



Incidentally, Daniel has a far better blog than mine, so if you don't already read it please do. You can find it at http://goodreasonblog.blogspot.com.au/