Comments on: La Fille-Lumiere

By: sumac

sumac — Wed, 26 Sep 2012 22:16:22 +0000

In reply to A Friend.

Yes, you get to set the record straight. That’s usually better for everyone — if it really gets straight.

You hurt Yasmina’s feelings when she thought you were calling her a charity case – someone whose pitiful state makes other people do her favors. And she hurt your feelings by saying you thought and (more or less) said that she was a charity case.

But which view would Yasmina prefer: that you called her a charity case and now you’re sorry, or that you didn’t call her a charity case, but you expressed yourself badly – and you’re sorry for that? Clarity is good.

You’re right that trying to justify yourself can go wrong. So you have to be careful. If you insist that no one else would have interpreted your remarks the way she did (and so the fault is hers), that’s not going to help.

“You’re lucky to have a friend who will sell you his car at a good price.” The car-seller is Yasmina’s friend, but I’m guessing that’s not why he sells his old cars at a fair price. I guess he just thinks it’s the right thing to do. Yasmina’s lucky to be his friend because he’s a good person, even if she never buys a car from him. Just like you’re lucky Yasmina is your friend (for reasons you know).

I know there’ve been times when someone thought I said something horrible, when it had never crossed my mind. (Luckily for my self-esteem, no examples come to mind.)

Sometimes when we’re trying to defend ourselves, our innocence gets in the way. We’re so vehement about our good heart that we don’t pay enough attention to the misunderstanding. “I didn’t say that! I would never say that! How can you think I would say that?!” Righteousness can make us insensitive.

Paris Hilton is hollering “I love gay people! Hugely! I support gay people! Hugely! How can you think otherwise just because I said they’re disgusting and disease-riddled?!” She should stop focusing on Paris the enormous gay-friend, and focus on Paris who actually said those things. It doesn’t really look like a case of poor word choice. (“When I said ‘disgusting’ I meant ‘delightful’ and when I said ‘most of them probably have AIDS’ I meant ‘most of them probably have three times my IQ.’”)

You didn’t say anything like that, but you’d probably both be happier if you got it straightened out.

By: A Friend

A Friend — Tue, 25 Sep 2012 22:31:14 +0000

Years ago a friend of mine told me something I said hurt her feelings. Here’s the context: My friend–I’ll call her Yasmina–had purchased another friend’s car when that friend bought a new one. Some years before, that same friend sold Yasmina his car when he bought a new one. So Yasmina had bought two used cars from the same friend, and on both occasions the friend sold it to her at a very good price. When Yasmina told me she had bought her friend’s used car the second time, I said, “you’re lucky to have a friend who will sell you his car at a good price.” She told me that hurt her feelings (never mind that she waited 5 years to tell me this; apparently it infuriated her so much she was too angry to confront me) because she thought I was inferring that she was a “charity case.” I was shocked to hear this, because nothing could have been further from the truth. I meant exactly what I said, that she was lucky to have a friend from whom she could buy a car at a good price, as well as trust that the car was in good condition because she knows this person takes good care of his car. I bought a used car from a friend who gave me a good price as well as all the service records for the car, and I felt lucky that I knew exactly what I was getting, plus lucky that I didn’t have to look high and low for a good used car.

Unfortunately Yasmina was not very articulate about explaining why my comment made her feel bad. She didn’t actually use the words “charity case” (someone else used those words when I told the story to him), but she said, “you would not be living the lifestyle you live if you weren’t married to someone who already owns a house and earns a good living.” (Yasmina is single, by the way.) She is absolutely right, and for that I feel very lucky indeed. I don’t feel like a “charity case.” But, she used my situation to illustrate how she felt. Apparently my comment made her defensive, as though she had to justify buying a used car rather than a new one, or that she has to rely on friends to provide her with items that are expensive by giving her a “deal.”

anyhow, I did apologize profusely for having hurt her feelings. I didn’t apologize for making the comment, because I did not then and still do not feel that the comment itself was hurtful. What was hurtful was Yasmina’s interpretation of the comment. At the time, I was careful not to try and defend myself too vigorously, because I know that trying to justify your motives for doing something that hurts someone else is not a good apology, as in the Paris Hilton example. and yet, here I am, years after this exchange took place, still feeling resentful that I didn’t have an opportunity to defend my intentions, which were good.

So my question is, what do you do when you say or do something that is interpreted by another person as hurtful, when you didn’t mean it that way? It’s obvious that you must try to understand where the hurt person is coming from, and have empathy for them even if you didn’t mean what you said or did in the way they interpreted it, and apologize for having said/done something that caused the hurt person pain. But is that it? Don’t you get to set the record straight and explain your motivations so the person will understand that you were not trying hurt them, or even think of them in a hurtful way?

By: sumac

sumac — Fri, 21 Sep 2012 17:39:18 +0000

Yeah, starting out with the I AM A GOOD PERSON! A HUGE SUPPORTER! thing doesn’t work.

Maybe if she had a chance to get out more and see more of the world — no, not so far.