The emotional border between doing good research and playing “gotcha”

That border is not always easy to find, let alone to hold. It takes a lot of self-detachment, and it isn’t always done perfectly.

Thick skins are required, especially the closer one gets, or the longer one has known, the issues, people, events, stances, standpoints, politics and so forth involved.

It’s easy for people who get touched by the analysis of this research to get touchy; and it’s easy for outsiders to claim that you’re not digging enough.