I want to write about a frustrating dynamic that occurs with some of my friends, and in relationships. And I daresay those of you (who don’t go glassy-eyed halfway through) might recognize your own lives in some aspect of it.
Here it is: I am sometimes accused of always wanting/needing to be “right.” And by definition, if one defends oneself against this, it can be viewed as proof of the validity of the accusation. This is why it is so difficult to address, but I’m going to try.
Let me begin by stating for the record how it is that I view disagreements. I think they should be about whatever your disagreement is about, not about the fact that you are disagreeing. I don’t give a shit about being right. I only want my point of view to be acknowledged as understood by the other party, as I strive to do for them on my part. Then either of us can say, “you have a point” OR “I disagree” OR “That hurts me” OR whatever. What sends me over the bend is when the argument immediately becomes about the argument, usually because (in my view) the other party can’t bear that I’ve challenged or disagreed with them in the first place. Whatever I say, what they hear is that I think they are “wrong” ergo I dislike/disapprove of them.
There are some people whose opinions and actions I so disagree with that I do not like them. Our President, Pat Robertson, and Donald Rumsfeld are good examples of this. “Regular” people I know who are consistently inconsiderate, inane or insincere I generally avoid, and may actively dislike. But I do not to judge them as human beings unless they are gratuitously cruel. I don’t even think George Bush is an evil person, though I think his policies do much harm. Stupidity is not a crime, though in a President it can be criminal.
In any case, by definition, if I call someone a friend, it is because there is a base understanding—or so I like to think—that any challenge to a particular opinion is not my questioning their basic worth as a human being. I don’t disagree for the sake of disagreement. And shut up much of the time even when I do disagree. But I have one friend who—it feels to me—can be on automatic contrary pilot.
I don’t think he even realizes he is doing it, I think, even, that in his mind, he is being helpful. But often, I swear to God, he seems to challenge something I say just to challenge it. For example, we had a mutual friend for a long time that he urged me for the better part of two years to dump, asserting (rightly) he was a toxic presence in my life. Finally, when prison did that for me, they became reacquainted, and suddenly my friend started reproaching me for deciding to keep this person out of my life. Not, I truly believe, because he thinks it would be a constructive friendship. Just because he automatically plays devil’s advocate, even if it completely contradicts a position he previously held that I even came to agree with.
There are times he challenges the most innocuous detail in a story and then can’t fathom why I am so irritated. This happened the other morning, when, admittedly, I was in a mood over the resinstatement of a debt I had fair reason to believe had been forgiven. Frankly, it was a moment that I pretty obviously just needed support and understanding. I wasn’t even challenging the debt itself, and I made that clear. I was merely explaining why it had blindsided me, and instead of simply listening sympathetically, his reaction was, “why don’t you just pay it?” I had already stated I would pay it (and have). That wasn’t the point, and not what I needed to hear at the moment from a friend.
His comment set me off, and I doubt he understood why. He certainly didn’t realize how accustomed I’ve become to this from him, and how often I just let it slide. Occasionally I bring it up humorously, gently teasing him for “snarky” remarks. This is a euphemism for passive/aggressiveness, and it’s extremely difficult to get someone who’s engaging in such behavior to even understand the concept. I do know that it’s deeply rooted in issues completely unrelated to me, and try not to take it personally. This particular morning though, I was having none of it. I had been EXTREMELY supportive of this friend in two difficult situations just recently, and I pretty much swallowed a lot of considerations I had about his role in getting into the situation(s) in the first place.
I don’t know if or how often he reads the blog, he’s very rarely referred to it. Frankly, I would have just addressed him directly via email, but I’ve tried this in the past, and he feels it is a coward’s approach. Unfortunately, in my experience, trying to talk face to face more often than not has devolved into a nasty fight. But if he is reading this, at least now he at least understands there was something at play beyond my having a bad day. If he thinks I am taking unfair advantage, trying to get agreement for “my side” from you readers, let me reassure him that almost no one ever even comments, much less writes to me about specific entries. (At most one person who even knows him even reads this, to my knowledge, and already knows about the argument.)
I’m perfectly willing to examine what I might need to look at in all this that perhaps I can’t perceive. But I would really like to keep it out of a simplistic right/wrong dichotomy. It’s not about that. It’s about finding a way to understand, take note, and resolve. Being right or wrong should be confined to factual errors, not differing points of view. (Imagine how fast there’d be peace in the Middle East if each side wasn’t trying to be “right” and make the other “wrong.”)
I just received a call from my friend, apologizing for “his part in the argument.” I apologized back for my part in it, then asked him if he had any idea what else was behind it. He replied “let’s leave that for another time” i.e. let’s not discuss it at all.
I will certainly take the olive branch, and if he doesn’t read this, probably revert to cloaking my explanations in humor, just as we’ve always done. Plus ca change…
MCO 2005
