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>Thus you can often find communities of people with disabilities I find it odd to immediately distill this down to "group A with disabilities" and "group B wit

>Thus you can often find communities of people with disabilities I find it odd to immediately distill this down to "group A with disabilities" and "group B without". Both groups have problems, maybe just different ones. I also don't see what is insulting about making a sincere attempt to help, whether it ends up being helpful or not.

WJW 2y ago
The insulting bit comes when people with an insufficient understanding of the problem come in and offer "solutions" that anyone could have dreamed up in 5 minutes, thereby implying that the new person either thinks the group with the problem is stupid for not coming up with such an obvious solution themselves. It's often the grown-up equivalent of a child learning about a longstanding religious conflict and offering "why don't they just all be friends instead" as a solution.
- andrelaszlo 2y ago
  Why can't they (we) though? :(
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- WalterBright 2y ago
  There are exceptions, though. For example, my advice is always welcome and apropos.
kayodelycaon 2y ago
> I also don't see what is insulting about making a sincere attempt to help, whether it ends up being helpful or not. It's the equivalent of people wanting to escort you across a road without getting run over. They don't think you're capable of understanding the risks of crossing a road. Or giving someone in a wheelchair tips on how to walk normally. Or your completely tech illiterate grandparent telling you how to write code. (Yes, this has happened to me.) A lot of people I've dealt with have no interest understanding the problem. They just want to do the easy thing that feels good to them. When what they expect doesn't happen, they feel bad and expect me to make them feel better. Similarly, this pattern always happens around food. It's not uncommon I can't eat any of the food at a social event. I'm used to that and I'm not bothered by it. But everyone else feels bad for me and decides to tell me so. No matter how much I say I'm fine, they keep apologizing because they feel guilty. Of course, I can't tell them to stop making their feelings my problem.
- lostlogin 2y ago
  > It's not uncommon I can't eat any of the food at a social event. I'm used to that and I'm not bothered by it. But everyone else feels bad for me and decides to tell me so. Being vegetarian seems to generate this problem.
  - headstorm 2y ago
    I think that celiac disease diagnosis is far more limiting than being vegetarian for social events, based on my experience.
- PopAlongKid 2y ago
  I don't consider any of your extreme examples as "a sincere attempt to help". Maybe I should rephrase it as "sincere, reasonable attempt to help". I guess there is also a distinction to be made between problems to be solved, and currently acceptable, non-problematic situations where you receive unsolicited advice on how to improve it.
  - kayodelycaon 2y ago
    The problem with unsolicited advice is: 1. I didn't ask for it. 2. They didn't bother to understand the problem. 3. Now I am socially obligated to talk to them. 4. I have stop everything I'm thinking about to figure out how to respond to them in a way that doesn't make them feel bad. This seems grossly unfair to me. Social norms that don't come naturally to me. They are allowed say anything they want and I'm not allowed to reject it.
    - lazide 2y ago
      You could also go the ‘autistic’ route - Frown, and walk away while they’re talking. Or Deeply analyze why they’re wrong and they know it. In front of them, where they can hear you do it. You’ll get hate, but what else is new? You could also just lie, say ‘oh that’s good advice’ and then ignore it like most normal people. Or, figure out what painful personal failure they are trying to warn you about from their side, with no real solution they’ve been able to figure out. And see if there is some lesson you can learn from it. Wait, am I giving unsolicited advice now?
mft_ 2y ago
Insulting is a emotional judgement, and j=such judgements may be specific to certain communities who are especially disadvantaged, or maybe receive such 'advice' very regularly? --- To take the emotions out, I had witnessed an interesting exchange a while back. A startup dealing with removing plastic from the oceans posted on LinkedIn about their work, and highlighted the difficulty of sorting the different types of plastic (so they could be subsequently dealt with appropriately). Their current method was simply humans sorting the plastic manually, by sight. An LinkedIn acqaintance thought he had a solution for them, and tried to get in touch with the startup. He was gently but firmly rebuffed, and was very upset that the organisation didn't "give him anyone senior" to deal with. His ego was bruised. The funny thing was, the startup was totally correct. This guy is a marketing consultant with (I know) zero domain knowledge of anything related to plastics, recycling, computer vision, robotics, etc. He was just an arrogant guy who absolutely didn't understand anything relevant in the problem space.. and yet still thought he needed to get involved and offer his opinions and ideas. Was his approach insulting? Not in this case, but potentially so, in more sensitive areas. More than anything, it was a powerful example of the Dunning-Kreuger effect in action. :)
terr-dav 2y ago
"Communities of people with disabilities" sounds like a self-identified group whose members share common experiences of dealing with people without disabilities. "Immediately distilling it down to..." is an interesting way to describe someone sharing an example while making a broader point. Whether something is insulting depends on the particular interaction and how the recipient of the 'help' feels about and perceives the attempt to help. I've been learning the importance of consent in any intervention. Without consent, my attempts to help a person may be perceived as an act of taking control, overriding the other person's will. > Both groups have problems, maybe just different ones. So my problem might be a lack of perspective that is characteristic of privilege, and their problem might be me; sincerely, innocently & naively making their situation worse.

WJW 2y ago

The insulting bit comes when people with an insufficient understanding of the problem come in and offer "solutions" that anyone could have dreamed up in 5 minutes, thereby implying that the new person either thinks the group with the problem is stupid for not coming up with such an obvious solution themselves. It's often the grown-up equivalent of a child learning about a longstanding religious conflict and offering "why don't they just all be friends instead" as a solution.

andrelaszlo 2y ago
Why can't they (we) though? :(
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
WalterBright 2y ago
There are exceptions, though. For example, my advice is always welcome and apropos.

kayodelycaon 2y ago

> I also don't see what is insulting about making a sincere attempt to help, whether it ends up being helpful or not. It's the equivalent of people wanting to escort you across a road without getting run over. They don't think you're capable of understanding the risks of crossing a road. Or giving someone in a wheelchair tips on how to walk normally. Or your completely tech illiterate grandparent telling you how to write code. (Yes, this has happened to me.) A lot of people I've dealt with have no interest understanding the problem. They just want to do the easy thing that feels good to them. When what they expect doesn't happen, they feel bad and expect me to make them feel better. Similarly, this pattern always happens around food. It's not uncommon I can't eat any of the food at a social event. I'm used to that and I'm not bothered by it. But everyone else feels bad for me and decides to tell me so. No matter how much I say I'm fine, they keep apologizing because they feel guilty. Of course, I can't tell them to stop making their feelings my problem.

lostlogin 2y ago
> It's not uncommon I can't eat any of the food at a social event. I'm used to that and I'm not bothered by it. But everyone else feels bad for me and decides to tell me so. Being vegetarian seems to generate this problem.
- headstorm 2y ago
  I think that celiac disease diagnosis is far more limiting than being vegetarian for social events, based on my experience.
PopAlongKid 2y ago
I don't consider any of your extreme examples as "a sincere attempt to help". Maybe I should rephrase it as "sincere, reasonable attempt to help". I guess there is also a distinction to be made between problems to be solved, and currently acceptable, non-problematic situations where you receive unsolicited advice on how to improve it.
- kayodelycaon 2y ago
  The problem with unsolicited advice is: 1. I didn't ask for it. 2. They didn't bother to understand the problem. 3. Now I am socially obligated to talk to them. 4. I have stop everything I'm thinking about to figure out how to respond to them in a way that doesn't make them feel bad. This seems grossly unfair to me. Social norms that don't come naturally to me. They are allowed say anything they want and I'm not allowed to reject it.
  - lazide 2y ago
    You could also go the ‘autistic’ route - Frown, and walk away while they’re talking. Or Deeply analyze why they’re wrong and they know it. In front of them, where they can hear you do it. You’ll get hate, but what else is new? You could also just lie, say ‘oh that’s good advice’ and then ignore it like most normal people. Or, figure out what painful personal failure they are trying to warn you about from their side, with no real solution they’ve been able to figure out. And see if there is some lesson you can learn from it. Wait, am I giving unsolicited advice now?

mft_ 2y ago

Insulting is a emotional judgement, and j=such judgements may be specific to certain communities who are especially disadvantaged, or maybe receive such 'advice' very regularly? --- To take the emotions out, I had witnessed an interesting exchange a while back. A startup dealing with removing plastic from the oceans posted on LinkedIn about their work, and highlighted the difficulty of sorting the different types of plastic (so they could be subsequently dealt with appropriately). Their current method was simply humans sorting the plastic manually, by sight. An LinkedIn acqaintance thought he had a solution for them, and tried to get in touch with the startup. He was gently but firmly rebuffed, and was very upset that the organisation didn't "give him anyone senior" to deal with. His ego was bruised. The funny thing was, the startup was totally correct. This guy is a marketing consultant with (I know) zero domain knowledge of anything related to plastics, recycling, computer vision, robotics, etc. He was just an arrogant guy who absolutely didn't understand anything relevant in the problem space.. and yet still thought he needed to get involved and offer his opinions and ideas. Was his approach insulting? Not in this case, but potentially so, in more sensitive areas. More than anything, it was a powerful example of the Dunning-Kreuger effect in action. :)

terr-dav 2y ago

"Communities of people with disabilities" sounds like a self-identified group whose members share common experiences of dealing with people without disabilities. "Immediately distilling it down to..." is an interesting way to describe someone sharing an example while making a broader point. Whether something is insulting depends on the particular interaction and how the recipient of the 'help' feels about and perceives the attempt to help. I've been learning the importance of consent in any intervention. Without consent, my attempts to help a person may be perceived as an act of taking control, overriding the other person's will. > Both groups have problems, maybe just different ones. So my problem might be a lack of perspective that is characteristic of privilege, and their problem might be me; sincerely, innocently & naively making their situation worse.