Judgement and Opinion

Okay, my first blog is gonna be on judgment and opinion. A recent experience inspired this topic.
How would you respond if someone whom you barely know approaches you and makes some unflattering remarks on a close friend of yours? Let's say, with a sincere face, he leans towards you and remarks, pointing to your friend, ''That guy is really strange and mean. I always hear him whining!' I don't know how you would react, but I tell you how I did. I was speechless. Would you say ''Oh yeah!'' or give this poor fellow a miserable time facing him off with a tough questioning? The closer the person who is the target of the the gossip, the more miserable you would be. I hope you would never hear such a thing on, say, your spouse or your child.

When it happened to me, I completely disagreed with the remark because I knew my friend better than this person. But I couldn't face and challenge him either. That would almost be like whining. So I muttered something, neither agreeing nor disagreeing, and left immediately.
But then, what does this really mean? Everyone makes such remarks on others all the time. It only becomes embarrassing when the person who is the target of the gossip happens to be your friend. Most of the time, we are gossiping only while surrounded by the safe network of our friends so our words have little consequences. Even in the unlikely case where we are overheard, the gossip is so harmless that there is nothing to worry about.
I believe this is in general the outcome of our education. We are taught to judge, analyze, criticize (or you could say complain - what would be the difference between criticizing and complaining except that the later has some personal touch?). Of course these skills should be targeted towards solving to problems, and not towards attacking our colleagues. But, sometimes, one can't help misusing them toward abusing 'others.'
I would like to close this blog by recommending, mainly for myself, how to interpret and approach such experiences. Criticizing is a good tool, except when it is used for the wrong purpose. Though anyone can misuse it at any time, banning it is out of reach. The solution? I believe the answer is IMPERSONALIZing it. Anything becomes offensive only when it is personalized in the sense that, when we believe that the remark is inherently offensive and the person is, out of his mean attitude, directly targeting us.
What is the difference between receiving feedback on our presentation and overhearing someone gossiping about our dressing? Although in both cases people might be just saying their opinions instead of judging us, we seek the former but cringe from the later. So the difference lies in how we want to accept and interpret the experience. Just like accepting feedback is a professional way for learning, there should also be a 'professional way' for accepting gossip and interpreting it for growth. Did they say my trousers are out of fashion, or that my friend is whinny? Well then, that was a wrong opinion. My trousers might be out of fashion, but I hate shopping; and they might think my friend is whinny, but they don't know him close enough. That was just an opinion about which I don't care. I take either of these remarks as offensive only when I decide to reinterpret them as meaning something bad about me or my friend. What would that mean except that I am not certain that I am not a bad guy?