The Newly Departed thread: announcements (departures)

[Angrboda]

I think there's a difference between just making a snarky comment and intentionally provoking someone.  I think you may be reading an intent which doesn't exist there.  Determining intent from behavior is often hard, but I don't see MH's comments as anything other than innocent.  If you're saying one should avoid making snarky comments around Hammy because they might provoke him, then perhaps Shell has a point about you.

Making a snarky comment at someone like Ham for no reason IS provoking him though lol. We all know how he reacts to stuff like that, so why do it is my point. No one has anything to gain from that, except maybe some forum drama to talk about for the next 2 days.

Oh bullshit. People make snarky comments for all sorts of reasons having nothing to do with wanting to provoke such reactions. And that snarky comments cause Hammy to react is not an indicator that those comments were intended to provoke. People have all sorts of reasons for their comments and the manner in which they are delivered which have nothing to do with attempting to elicit such reactions. So, no, I don't see your point other than to malign the motives and behavior of other people in defense of Hammy and his behavior. I don't think that's much of a point.

[Minimalist]

Snarky?

[Shell B]

Let's talk about how the side of my face feels like it's being crushed by a giant troll hand.

I'm sorry... 

My mom has peripheral neuropathy, my sister has multiple sclerosis, and my best friend has rheumatoid arthritis. Those autoimmune disease that plague women are nasty...
Have you figured out what your management care is going to be?

They're trying to get me on something like gabapentin to see how that helps. My neuro's office is so fucking slow, though. I might need to start seeing someone else.

[Catholic_Lady]

Making a snarky comment at someone like Ham for no reason IS provoking him though lol. We all know how he reacts to stuff like that, so why do it is my point. No one has anything to gain from that, except maybe some forum drama to talk about for the next 2 days.

Oh bullshit. People make snarky comments for all sorts of reasons having nothing to do with wanting to provoke such reactions. And that snarky comments cause Hammy to react is not an indicator that those comments were intended to provoke. People have all sorts of reasons for their comments and the manner in which they are delivered which have nothing to do with attempting to elicit such reactions. So, no, I don't see your point other than to malign the motives and behavior of other people in defense of Hammy and his behavior. I don't think that's much of a point.

Ok, well that was just my advice. If when Ham is back, people want to keep poking at him for whatever weird reason, they are free to do so. But we already know what happens when they do, so I don't think anyone should be surprised when he loses his shit about it.

[Shell B]

I'd be surprised if he survives very long if he comes back with the same attitudes as before. I'd actually be surprised if he comes back soon at all. My perception is that this one hurt his ego enough to send him away for awhile. I can't really blame him there. I'd be pretty bummed about several pages talking about how crappy I've been. I'd have self-reflected long before it got that bad, though, so I don't know.

[emjay]

MJ. I see your point, but in Hammy's defence, when he insults people, by his own admission, he cannot feel or understand why it's insulting.

Our point is that it still a thread killer when he does it. And he carries his grievances over multiple threads.
He knows what he's doing. It is intentional. As Shell and Joods said: being on the spectrum does not manifest as asshole, unless you also want to come across as that. Which he chooses to. He's also on the NPD spectrum.

Yes, well I understand your point there... it seems to me only prudent that if you don't understand grey areas and how certain words could affect people... it makes sense not to use those words... ie to err on the side of caution... and that's the advice I give him.

As to the second thing, that seems to me to be an obsessional need for closure... ie if he says x and someone else says y, then z, then he may still obsessively be trying to get x addressed, often more literally than most people would read it... and in your example, dragging that x across from thread to thread; even if the other person thinks they've addressed it, they may not have in his view. You see that as intentional but I see that as obsessional. Does it have a bad effect?, maybe, but I don't see it as intentional.

[Catholic_Lady]

I was talking to him quite a bit earlier today. He seems to jump back and forth between agreeing with me that he needs to be better at controlling his behavior, and saying people provoked him first and he needs to react by defending himself. He did tell me that it's incredibly hard for him to just ignore comments and let things go, etc, which I already knew. He said that he can do it for a while until he feels like he just can't anymore. It definitely seems like a compulsive thing. Not saying that it can't be controlled, just saying that it's harder for him to do so than it is for the average person.

[brewer]

I was talking to him quite a bit earlier today. He seems to jump back and forth between agreeing with me that he needs to be better at controlling his behavior, and saying people provoked him first and he needs to react by defending himself. He did tell me that it's incredibly hard for him to just ignore comments and let things go, etc, which I already knew. He said that he can do it for a while until he feels like he just can't anymore. It definitely seems like a compulsive thing. Not saying that it can't be controlled, just saying that it's harder for him to do so than it is for the average person.

What do you think would have happened if I flat out told him that he was wrong (which he was) and that he got it backwards?

I think I know,...............BOOM!

The sarcasm gave him a chance that he didn't take.

[emjay]

I was talking to him quite a bit earlier today. He seems to jump back and forth between agreeing with me that he needs to be better at controlling his behavior, and saying people provoked him first and he needs to react by defending himself. He did tell me that it's incredibly hard for him to just ignore comments and let things go, etc, which I already knew. He said that he can do it for a while until he feels like he just can't anymore. It definitely seems like a compulsive thing. Not saying that it can't be controlled, just saying that it's harder for him to do so than it is for the average person.

Yeah. Well my advice to him is not to play the blame game... I don't want to play it... or in the terminology being used here, 'enable' it... and for his sake I don't think he should either... because that's just incidental and external. Ie there'll always be arguments and other unpleasant external situations in life but blaming externally never deals with the underlying problems. Ie we can't control our circumstances only our response... mindfulness etc.

[Catholic_Lady]

Right. I stressed very much that he can't control other people's behavior, only his own.