Why people gets offended so quickly?

[jacmac1]

LOL naughty, naughty

[Dani]

A chat room?

Why am I starting to feel like a forum troll.... Too many posts today I think.

[bylto]

One word - Attachment.

No attachment - no offense

If I'm not attached to any viewpoint, belief etc. I can't possibly be offended by a contrary view. It's ok to have beliefs/viewpoints but attachent to them will bring suffering due to the dualistic nature of your thought life. If I'm staunchly republican, I will see the world as Republican Vs Democrat or right Vs left - note the duality, being offended here is guaranteed.

Loosen up attachments and enjoy life

[jacmac1]

One word - Attachment.

No attachment - no offense

If I'm not attached to any viewpoint, belief etc. I can't possibly be offended by a contrary view. It's ok to have beliefs/viewpoints but attachent to them will bring suffering due to the dualistic nature of your thought life. If I'm staunchly republican, I will see the world as Republican Vs Democrat or right Vs left - note the duality, being offended here is guaranteed.

Loosen up attachments and enjoy life

I think this is it - in a nutshell!

[Judy]

Oh my! Oh my! I am actually very interested in this debate as I have personal experience of being the one rubbing others on the wrong side in discussion boards. I am in real life a very polite, open and intelligent individual who happens to love debate. Discussion boards are for me a way to ask questions, get another point of view. I don’t pad my posts and am very direct. I also often play devil’s advocate or take a very peculiar stance just to get a new perspective. It doesn’t always work well with people on boards.

Also, as someone said, only 20% of communication is made of verbal input. I think a lot less than 20% actually gets through in discussion boards because, perhaps, of the ability to understand actual words and meaning and cognitive distortion from the participants. Not everybody understand text with legal precision. They take it at face value and answer a complicated question after having read it once. Their emotions, their iguana brain take over. Let’s face it, many make assumptions that an attack is being made on them, as individuals with their own beliefs.

What I find is that many people posting in spiritual/personal development boards are very narcissistic, I think. It’s the downside of this area of interest. I might take a different stand just to notice the flaws in belief systems and they immediately assume wrong will from my part, just because they see it as shaking their belief tower.

What I do when discussing in internet boards (my personal rules of behaviour):

-Immediately apologize if people get offended (even if I think they’re being complete morons.)

-Always be polite, do not insult

-Remain rational in the exposition of my question/opinion and if emotions need to be exposed, expose them as such and say that it is personal to me.

-Assume good will from others, do not get offended if a criticism about my post is made.

-If such a personal criticism or even insult is made to me, just go over the elements of my post and the other person’s post in a rational way, do not reply on the same tone and calmly state the way it made me feel, if need be.

[jacmac1]

Immediately apologize if people get offended (even if I think they're being complete morons.)

-Always be polite, do not insult

-Remain rational in the exposition of my question/opinion and if emotions need to be exposed, expose them as such and say that it is personal to me.

-Assume good will from others, do not get offended if a criticism about my post is made.

-If such a personal criticism or even insult is made to me, just go over the elements of my post and the other person's post in a rational way, do not reply on the same tone and calmly state the way it made me feel, if need be.

Doesn't this get exhausting? Because my opinion is that a person bent on seeing you as wrong or "the bad guy" doesn't bother to listen to what you're actually *saying*, that just reinterpret it and filter it through their "you're attacking me" lens.

After a while you get the feeling you're talking to yourself.

[Jill]

This thread is total irony...you gotta love it.

[Dani]

I am offended by that remark Jill!

[Angela]

Originally Posted by jacmac1

After a while you get the feeling you're talking to yourself.

That's the funny thing, Janlee, you ARE talking to yourself! *


By which I mean: if you react or are drawn to respond to a post, then that reaction or response is a wonderful mirror through which you can see yourself more clearly, if you choose. Or if you choose to bang your head against it, it may eventually shatter into a thousand slicing shards, causing pain right and left. (She said, really milking a metaphor.)

* "you" in this post is meant to signify "one;" not you or anyone else personally.