Doesn’t have to be about over traumatic-related things, but just in general, things you don’t like talking about. Whether it’ll bum you down, distract you or vice versa.
I don’t like talking about work, my job and how the week went. All it’ll do and has done, is make me dread of upcoming work weeks even during my time off. I hate being asked the typical question “how was your day at work?” any other time. Because the answer is just going to be unsatisfying and I get annoyed even having to answer that question. It’s not that I’m hiding anything, it’s just that it’s fucking work and it is the same damn thing every night. I put up with stupid fucking people, even dumber co-workers and I work in a system that is massively ungrateful for what you do for it.
That’s all you’ll ever need to know about it, so stop trying to get me to talk about that shit.
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I don’t like talking about anything if I don’t get a reflective silence now and then. Some people just talk and talk to hear themselves talk and never take the time to let the words sink in or just plain cook before spitting them out.
As someone who moved from the US to Canada, where I come from. I was born in a Latin American country and speak fluent Spanish so I introduce myself with that first and foremost out of spite
My blood family. Its just always the same and it frustrates me only thinking about them, their actions, their thinking, their behaviours. Calling them snakes and sociopaths is insulting to snakes!!
People. I do find things like group psychology interesting but discussing individuals is mind-numbingly uninteresting. Especially celebrity gossip but political figures are a close second.
Work or myself. The second someone tries to make a conversation about either, I just shut down and give 1 or 2 word answers. I find work incredibly boring and I don’t have anything interesting going on in my life.
Anything “deep” with parents…
“Hey dad did you know that if you go on a space ship and travel very fast then come back to earth, thousands or tens of thousands of years could pass on earth and it only feels like a few hours on the spaceship”
Dad: “Oh really? Cooool” sounds disinterested af and continues scrolling wechat
“Hey mom did you know that scientists detected that a brain has activity before the person makes a decision? Maybe we don’t have free will and the universe is deterministic!”
Mom: “Of course we have free will! Why are you overthinking everything? 日日諗埋諗埋啲咁嘅嘢，一味鑽牛角尖 (not sure how to translate this part, something like ‘Everyday you keep thinking these weird thoughts, keep going down a rabbit hole’)”
Also I can’t really mention suicide… or I’m “ungreatful for everything they’ve done for me”
Also politics:
“Why are you so worried about big things, just focus on yourself”
“If the government comes knocking and arrest you, then it’s your fault, just don’t drag us down with you” (aka: just don’t dissent)
I’m convinced the methodology on that decision study is flawed. Decision making isn’t an instantaneous process, it takes time for the mind to settle on an option. That neurological ramping up is the decision making.
This just in: New evidence suggests some people think before making a decision? We’ll tell you what this means for your weekend at 11.
Now what I want to see is if M1 neurons begin to show increased activity before someone thinks about getting up to go pee, but decides to hold it in. Because if so, it’s pretty clear that the decision making process simply involves motor neurons readying themselves in case they’re needed. But if they don’t, then it means the motor cortex is contributing to the decision making process, and that’s an actually informative result.
Religion. I have my own views and I’m not interested in taking to most about it.
Can’t say.
My problems. It’s not that I’m the strong, stoic type - because I’m not. But talking about them makes me feel sad all over again.
“Why suffer twice”…
We don’t talk about Bruno.
Silencio Bruno!
I kinda feel that way about like people just asking me how things are going because it feels like I have not been able to give a decent answer for long periods one of which I am in now. I will say I don’t talk much about the environment anymore simply because we are so far down the unstoppable decline and partially because the effects are hitting our present day so much that the effects are basically day to day and much of the reason things are like they are now. We are a finite snake eating its tail.
Politics.
Not interested in the slightest.
Something along the lines of “she heard that he said when they were somewhere and then like she said that he thought that she said that they shouldn’t say what he said when she thought they wouldn’t anyway.”
…I detest hearing about what other people did/said. I live in a tiny town and I absolutely refuse to take part in gossip. I will not spread it, and neither will I hear it.
When someone starts to gossip they’re basically just letting you know that they’re the kind of person you shouldn’t share any sensitive personal information with. I never quite figured out how these people can be so oblivious to it though. If someone talks shit of other people to me then I assume they talk shit of me to other people as well.
I’ll offer a defense of gossip. I think it’s important to be able to discuss people, especially people with authority, without those people being able to dictate the rules of the conversation. If certain topics are taboo unless the conversations are had with all parties, it gives people with power a lot of influence over how the conversation happens and if it happens at all. Gossip is how unions are started, how abusive preachers are ousted (sometimes), how people learn about and get the help they need, help that the authorities in their lives have decided, for whatever reason, they can’t have.
I also think it’s a venue for misinformation and I have my own beliefs about which conversations are better had if they include everybody (or me), but I don’t think it’s for me or anyone to just declare certain conversations or topics off limits.
I personally think the issue comes up when people say things behind each other’s backs that they wouldn’t dare say to their face. In my previous workplace there were a few people who always talked shit about our boss when he wasn’t around, but the second he showed up they’d act like everything was fine and they were best buddies.
The problem isn’t that the criticism was never valid - it’s that they showed me I can’t trust them to be genuine around me. They thought they’re damaging the reputation of my boss but it’s their own reputation that took the biggest hit.
In my experience, people who live with people who use information for abuse learn to protect information as a first course of action, because it’s hard to predict what information might be dangerous to share. In extreme cases, the only safe opinion to express is that of whoever’s in charge. It can be hard to tell what information can be safely expressed, which I think can make people quick to flatter or agree if they don’t feel safe. It may be that you feel safe to express thoughts about the boss to their face, but they didn’t. It’s a cultural divide I’ve seen both sides of. I’ve worked with people who clearly did not feel comfortable criticizing me even after I encouraged honesty, because they had had bosses before who had said the same thing and abused the privilege of trust. I have also worked with people I did not trust with certain information and I withheld it, even after discussing the matter with peers. I think the things said in confidence can sometimes be harmful and deserve to be rebutted the same as when they’re said in public, but the existence of those things doesn’t make confidential conversation per se bad.
I can’t think of a subject that I categorically dislike talking about. My dislike for conversation usually has more to do with the attitudes of the people I’m having the conversations with. Conversation requires at least a minimal agreement to take what your conversational partner says into account, otherwise it’s more of a lecture. Lots of arguments are people who have already convinced themselves of their rightness lecturing at each other, and it tends to be a repetitive recycling of old points and counterpoints. Pretty boring, rhetorically.
It can be useful to deliver a lecture, especially if it’s invited. That’s basically what venting is. I grew up being taught that if I didn’t have anything constructive to say I should just keep it to myself, and that’s still a position I find myself defaulting to, but it can be helpful to try to frame the petty grievances of daily life into words, especially if you have a sympathetic and willing audience. I don’t have a specific example to share that doesn’t reveal too much about my personal life, but I’ll just say that the insights that come from venting were surprising. I think the act of putting thoughts into words can make it easier to think about those thoughts.
For example, I don’t think I’d ever considered venting as a form of verbal journaling, but that’s kind of what it is. At least, there are some interesting similarities. I don’t know if that would have occurred to me that way if I hadn’t written my thoughts on the matter out.
- Other peoples relationships (It’s none of my business and always turns into free therapy for people who never change and never intend to)
- Work (People will never accept boundaries of what can and cannot be spoken of)
- Star Wars (we hates space opera)
