hm.

[evile]

following a link from a friend-of-friend's LJ, I am led once again to The Usual Error. here's an exerpt:


“I’m just saying” is another poison dart. You can make any sort of inflammatory or insulting comment, but as long as you repeatedly say, “I’m just saying,” it is difficult to socially justify calling you on your rudeness or meanness. “I’m just saying” is often accompanied by a defensive gesture of palms facing outward, nonverbally reinforcing the message of “Don’t blame me! I said something, but I just said it, so that means I don’t have to take any responsibility for it!” Being socially acceptable doesn’t make it right or good to verbally hurt others.

Read More.

Comments

[wyndhover.livejournal.com]

What do you think? :)

[bramblekite.livejournal.com]

I'm too tired to think much right now.

Just found it...interesting.

Humor is a big thing in my family, we 'jokingly' say a lot of true things we'd never discuss seriously or at length.

I didn't really think of it as pathological...I mean, hey, at least we're sharing our feelings directly to one another, somehow.

So, joking or teasing has always felt 'ok' to me.

"just sayin'" otoh smacks [to me] of passive agressive bullshit, someone who doesn't have the tits to say something directly to one's face...but really, it's no better or worse than joking/teasing.

*sigh*

[bramblekite.livejournal.com]

"in my opinion" seems self-important & didactic.

"just sayin'" seems like someone wanting to take a mean-spirited pot-shot without accepting the consequences of being a mean-spirited pot-shot-taker. And, gee, it works, because when someone is 'just sayin' and you take offense, it ends up making YOU look bad. neat.

[bramblekite.livejournal.com]

I guess my folks didn't use "bless your heart" like that. It was more of a verbal shorthand for "I recognize a shortcoming and I love the person anyway"

"Bless her heart, she can't balance a checkbook to save her life but she'd write a check for any charity that came knockin' at her door," Or "Bless her heart, she's always late, she'd be late to her own funeral"

I guess I don't read meanness into that, but I suppose it could be used that way.

It's always interesting to see what words or turns of phrase can go right past one person and hit another right in the heart. I guess it's partially what you grow up with, and also what turns of phrase you may associate with a certain person...you just tend to put that person's personality into their 'pet words' or 'catchprases' even if someone else is saying them.

[made-of-paradox.livejournal.com]

Depending on context and who's using it, "Bless her heart!" can be just about the worst insult deliverable, actually. It doesn't have to be that way, though, which makes it somewhat confusing.

[bramblekite.livejournal.com]

Same with "I love you/him/her, but [insert negative judgement here]" I suppose.

I try never ever to say or think 'I love you, but"

Thinking and words shape feelings and reality. I'm not going to take away from Love by adding a judgement at the end.

[made-of-paradox.livejournal.com]

In some of my 'net circles, though, "in my opinion" (usually abbreviated "IMO") is a way of saying, "This is what I think, this is where I'm coming from, and you don't have to agree with me."

Sure beats the hell out of the "You shouldn't" that took one of those forums halfway to hell in a matter of hours....

[bramblekite.livejournal.com]

The very brief time I was in therapy, I learned the phrase "stop 'should'ing on yourself" [and, yes, it's meant to sound like 'stop shitting on yourself']

which I have tried hard to do. the word 'should' is ...very controlling, shaming and guilt inducing. You should do this, you should do that, you should know better, they should do such-and-such without having to be asked, bla bla. It's all very...judgemental and harmful.

I try to replace 'should' with 'would like'. Turning a sentence like "I should exercise tonight," into "I would like to exercise tonight," and that takes the judgment and guilt tripping OUT of it, and reinforces the idea that this is something I WANT to do, not something I am MAKING myself do from a sense of fear, obligation, guilt, or negative-self-judgement.

[made-of-paradox.livejournal.com]

"Shoulding" doesn't go over well there. "In that situation, I would" goes over a lot better. Telling someone else how to live their life tends to get hackles up, in general, and "you should" is about as far into it as anyone takes it there. (And then people react badly. Go figure.)

[made-of-paradox.livejournal.com]

A lot of what I do is based on, "Well, if I don't do this now, it's going to have very unpleasant consequences with me later. And I may be able to look at a clock or calendar and see exactly when that will be!" But I have the choice to hand shit to my future self, and generally choose not to. Generally. At least in some areas of my life. And knowing that my future self isn't going to be handed shit from that particular day, anyway, makes for some reasonable motivation a good chunk of the time.