Comment by kstenerud
7 years ago
I think a large part of this involves personal insecurities. I remember saying truthful things in very shitty ways during my younger years. But I also had a lot to prove, having just started out in life as an adult.
Somehow as I grew older (starting in my mid-30s I suppose), I became more and more aware of how I was affecting other people with my choice of words, and I had less and less reasons to "defeat" people in conversation. When victory is no longer the objective in a discussion, you tend relax, and can choose your words more carefully.
Similar experience here. I thought of us all more in terms of whether I & they were "doing it right", but I try now to see others as individuals of infinite worth, and remembering that things can be OK in the end, so I can hopefully think more about them as a person who (like me) is still learning, and has a unique background of experiences good & bad, likes/dislikes, choices, habits, ideals & dreams, and tremendous potential. I made notes on this for myself to review periodically (helpful for me at least), which I have also posted (at a simple site): http://lukecall.net/e-9223372036854745184.html .
I love "others as individuals of infinite worth"
The reality is that, unlike yourself, most people replace "learning new things" with "actively avoiding learning new things" at some point after leaving high school. Correcting one of these people can snap them out of their self-imposed rut just long enough to correct a bad habit.
I think there is some truth to what you say, but you would be more productive if you approached the "problem" from a place of empathy, like the article discusses.
A lot changes after high school/college which frankly makes learning more difficult.The nature of brain development changes, people acquire new priorities like jobs, children, and family. Additionally, they have more cognitive inertia to work against.
If you are implying that harsh attacks are required to snap them out of a deep set belief, and I don't agree and have never seen it work in the real world.
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That might be true sometimes, but my experience is that more often it just alienates them (or lowers their confidence), which reduces chances of future success working together. I've found that certain mental habits I try to cultivate help me to say what is needed, if/when needed, in a way to move forward more and back less.
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> Somehow as I grew older (starting in my mid-30s I suppose), I became more and more aware of how I was affecting other people with my choice of words, and I had less and less reasons to "defeat" people in conversation. When victory is no longer the objective in a discussion, you tend relax, and can choose your words more carefully.
Without trying to invalidate what it is you're saying: Would it be false to say that, you have also realized that how you say things will have consequences on your personal reputation and may be subconsciously taking them into consideration as well?
Most definitely this would be a part of it, but only when dealing with people with whom you'll have recurring interactions, or within your tribe (where word gets around).
Online this tends to disappear (at least to our perception). When there's no face-to-face interaction, we seem to lose that reputation instinct rather quickly...
There’s nothing wrong with being known as the type of person you want to be. It’s a side effect of being a version of you that you like. Of being able to live with yourself.
Not OP but 100% no for me. The difference here really is motivational difference of empathy vs selfishness. I think if you've learned the latter there's still much to be gained, even if the actions in this specific case are the same.
I think this pokes at the heart of what it means to be mature. To become more aware of how what we do and say impacts other people and their perception of us.
Social-positively mature. One can be mature and stable in their decisions, obligations, ideas, etc, but give much less damn about how others feel. There are people‘s people and things’ people, the latter usually discriminated for not thinking about someone’s insecurities. I met strangers on the internet who could rip off everyone insecure around and then discuss a topic freely being sure that the opponents who remained are strong persons not changing their minds or truths, not playing logical tricks when being offended. It is somewhat beautiful when a group of commenters almost kills itself only to continue in peace. The world that triggers on a minuscle misstatements has to learn from them, don’t you think?
I would say that a heart of being mature is when you don’t care how someone says something, but that is out of trend right now.
you hit the nail in the head. I cannot resonate with this enough. The more and more I realise, I dont have to win a conversation, the more relaxed it gets.
Yes, I experienced something like that as well. I don’t feel I have anything to prove anymore; listening and choosing my words more carefully comes as a very natural approach to conversation now. I’m also a lot less interested in convincing people of things, though. It’s not important to me for others to see things as I do anymore.
> I remember saying truthful things in very shitty ways during my younger years
People prefer to be deceived than proven wrong.
That's why young people are often thought of as shitty, because they have far less sovrastructures.
The more people age the more they think that when they where young they were shitty and insecure, because they need to justify becoming conformists (they prefer to deceive themselves)
Interesting, I find the opposite conclusion.
I think it mostly has to do with other people's insecurities. If I say something like, "veganism is unhealthy" (because of lack of B12... yes I'm aware there are nuances), some vegans interpret that as a statement of opinion, rather than a statement of fact, or even as an attack on their lifestyle choices, because they are so involved with their egos.
I try to follow Paul Graham's dictum "keep your identity small", the saying "strong opinions weakly held" and/or I've extremely strong self-confidence (compared to most people), so I seem to be way less personally affected by statements like these (though I'm sure I have other triggers)...
Granted I'm only 30 so maybe that will change in a few years, but for the time being I've started to moderate my stated opinions to spare other people's feelings (though I still think it would be better if they grew more emotionally mature, but I realize that's unlikely to happen), to improve social relations and, frankly, also because it's getting more and more dangerous out there, with political correctness and/or China-driven character assassinations.
When you say things like, "Veganism is unhealthy," the issue is that it simply leaves no room in the conversation for the other person. Even just a slight change ("I understand that veganism is unhealthy") will almost certainly elicit a different response.
If you feel like you're often pushing people's buttons to the point of censoring yourself, maybe take a step back and see if you can communicate more kindly.
> "Veganism is unhealthy," the issue is that it simply leaves no room in the conversation for the other person.
Smoking is unhealthy, there's no possible conversation.
It is, if you prefer to smoke, it's your choice, no amount of reasoning is gonna change that.
Disclaimer: I'm a smoker, a not very involved one, but still one.
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> I think it mostly has to do with other people's insecurities. If I say something like, "veganism is unhealthy" (because of lack of B12... yes I'm aware there are nuances), some vegans interpret that as a statement of opinion, rather than a statement of fact, or even as an attack on their lifestyle choices, because they are so involved with their egos.
I'll bite. It's true that a vegan diet can be unhealthy, and that it's wise to supplement with B12, but that doesn't mean a vegan diet is unhealthy.
This is like saying "an omnivorous diet is unhealthy because you don't eat enough vegetables". Sure, some people with omnivorous diets need to eat more vegetables, but that's not true of all people who eat omnivorous diets.
I'm not sure whether you would benefit from increasing your precision or accuracy, but the "veganism is unhealthy" line is plain wrong.
You know, when it comes to "Being kind" on hnews, I have the least patience for these pedantic/off-topic replies that completely distract from the central thesis of the parent post. In this case, the vegan stuff was an example and you know it, but felt it appropriate to waste our time with your reply anyways.
I find these kinds of posts so, so, so tiring. The only saving grace is that the collapse thread button is so useful.
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(1) Heme-iron is really the only good way to get iron and it's only in meat (2) You're not really going to get carnitine from vegetables (3) You're going to have a really hard time eating enough calories and having balanced ratios of macro-nutrients. Beans and rice which have protein also have tons of carbs and no fat. Good luck with that.
I've seen literally dozens and dozens of videos and posts of really really malnourished people advocating veganism. It's pretty much too hard to execute for the average person.
But “veganism is unhealthy” is an opinion. Your parenthetical about the lack of B12 indicates that you know this, and that the topic is more nuanced. If you don’t normally qualify that statement, why did you choose to do so here?
Frankly, I don’t believe that you don’t mean it as an attack on the lifestyle choices of others, and I’m not surprised that people get defensive.
> But “veganism is unhealthy” is an opinion
No, it is not.
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Imagine that I start off a conversation with you along the lines of 'meat is murder', or 'taxation is theft'.
Both of those statements have some element of truth to them, but they're obviously incendiary, as is your 'veganism is unhealthy'.
For the most part it sounds like you're just lacking tact. I used to be that guy too. Probably still am, to some extent.
> Both of those statements have some element of truth to them,
No, they don't.
They are supercharged propaganda.
> but they're obviously incendiary, as is your 'veganism is unhealthy'.
Not at all.
Saying veganism is unhealthy is stating an opinion shared by many nutrition expert, it says nothing about vegans, it is just what it is.
meat is murder contains a judgement: if meat is murder, you are a murderer, if taxation is theft, who collects taxes is a thief.
I can accept "you eat corpses" because it's true, I don't eat animals alive, they are already dead when I eat them, but it is also imprecise, because I eat just bits of the corpses, not the entire carcass.
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You seem like the prime example of someone who has to win the conversation.
Purposefully harsh wordings that require parenthesized nuance even here are hardly the listeners fault. If there's a breakdown in communication because you're being pithy and sharp that's a problem you can choose to fix.
Are you open to the possibility that even your deeply held beliefs, like “veganism is unhealthy” could be wrong? I have very frequently blundered into defending a false assertion for far longer than I should have, especially in work settings where you never know when you might meet someone much, much more well informed about a subject than yourself.
That burned me a lot when I was younger. Intellectual humility has never failed to serve me. I wish I was more humble about my strongly held opinions (that I thought were facts) when I was younger.
Maybe because you're mentioning one group specifically. Any diet can be unhealthy. The fact that Vegans need to be a bit more careful doesn't make it inherently more unhealthy.
No, it's just an example. Probably a poor example. In reality I don't often meet vegans, but people get upset for all kinds of reasons / statements, most commonly for political ones which are to be avoided on HN (and real life) (and are quite easy to avoid, if you want to).
Another (non-political) one that comes up fairly often, is that I don't think it's reasonable to congratulate people when they decide to get married... it's a decision after all, nothing to do with achievement and/or luck (for most people I know at least, who aren't extremely lonely to the extent that finding anyone that tolerates them is an achievement... in which case, "congratulations" would be more in order), and if anything, they should be warned (as many marriages end in failure). But if you say that, you're the asshole.
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> Any diet can be unhealthy
Yes, exactly, so if I say "eating candies is unhealthy" I don't think there's gonna be any group jumping at my throat.
Maybe is because candy lovers are not insecure cultists.
They know it's a matter of taste and personal belief, not something with a more profound meaning.
> “as a statement of opinion, rather than a statement of fact”
I think your prior statement about ‘nuances’ discounts this as a fact. Perhaps your strong opinions are not entirely facts?