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You've conflated several things. If you feel bad, that's just a fact; your self-perception is the only determiner of that. That is not necessarily the same as

You've conflated several things. If you feel bad, that's just a fact; your self-perception is the only determiner of that. That is not necessarily the same as a situation being bad. And even that is open to interpretation: food hitting the floor is going to be perceived very differently between two people if one of them believes in the 5 second rule. And I'm not even trying to say that feelings shouldn't be re-examined --- I would say the opposite, actually. But in an inter-subjective, inter-personal relationship, (which is the definition of human relationships) who is the arbiter of reality? It's the one-sidedness that betrays something. In a relationship, if someone says something that is taken offensively, even if they didn't mean it as such, if they cared about the other person (in the most basic form) they would still apologize and seek to clarify themselves. But the person who doesn't want to do that, they either have the intent of being offensive, in which case any defense along the lines of 'you just didn't understand me' is merely a shield for their own act of purposeful offensiveness, or the speaker is refusing to engage in any flavor of basic human interaction and is either effectively talking to an empty room or trying to force (or is deluded by) the notion that all other human consciousnesses mirror their own.

imgabe 5y ago
The arbiter of what someone's intentions were is that person. Who else would know what they are thinking inside their own head? People do not owe you an apology because you misinterpret their intentions. In fact, if you accuse someone of bad intentions where there were none, basic decency would suggest that the accuser is the one who owes an apology. Of course, it's possible that someone lies about what their intentions are, in which case, sure demand an apology all you want. But it's not likely to be fruitful to continue interacting with someone who's deliberately trolling you.

imgabe 5y ago

The arbiter of what someone's intentions were is that person. Who else would know what they are thinking inside their own head? People do not owe you an apology because you misinterpret their intentions. In fact, if you accuse someone of bad intentions where there were none, basic decency would suggest that the accuser is the one who owes an apology. Of course, it's possible that someone lies about what their intentions are, in which case, sure demand an apology all you want. But it's not likely to be fruitful to continue interacting with someone who's deliberately trolling you.