For a while I thought being clear about “hey I don’t think you’re doing this on purpose” was gunna be helpful but it turns out that people will still take everything as a personal attack anyway!
I think they hear that stuff and their PTSD from HR speak and people not saying what they fuckin’ mean kicks in. “Of course this is informal (and also I’ll bring it up to deny you a raise)” or whatever else to that effect in their lives.
And sometimes we do fuck it up and think we’re being nice and honest but could probably dial it back a little.
By now I think, that many people are stuck in emotional kindergarten level and it’s only about who is to blame
If I talk for example about climate change, everybody reacts with “but look at China/Africa/India!! We need to buy new cars while they are driving all the old stuff. We’re getting cheated [somehow by having cleaner air?] and they are all at fault!”
Like, I don’t really think that you are responsibly alone for that stuff and I don’t really care who is as fault, but we need to solve a problem that affects all of us.
Ok, of you’re the CEO of Exxon you’re probably to blame. But come on, I wanna talk about solutions and not play a blame game
(“You” obviously doesn’t mean you, but my hypothetical talk partner)
For a while I thought being clear about “hey I don’t think you’re doing this on purpose” was gunna be helpful but it turns out that people will still take everything as a personal attack anyway!
I think they hear that stuff and their PTSD from HR speak and people not saying what they fuckin’ mean kicks in. “Of course this is informal (and also I’ll bring it up to deny you a raise)” or whatever else to that effect in their lives.
And sometimes we do fuck it up and think we’re being nice and honest but could probably dial it back a little.
By now I think, that many people are stuck in emotional kindergarten level and it’s only about who is to blame
If I talk for example about climate change, everybody reacts with “but look at China/Africa/India!! We need to buy new cars while they are driving all the old stuff. We’re getting cheated [somehow by having cleaner air?] and they are all at fault!”
Like, I don’t really think that you are responsibly alone for that stuff and I don’t really care who is as fault, but we need to solve a problem that affects all of us.
Ok, of you’re the CEO of Exxon you’re probably to blame. But come on, I wanna talk about solutions and not play a blame game
(“You” obviously doesn’t mean you, but my hypothetical talk partner)