Auto - if you’re actually sincere in what you’re saying in this post then for crying out loud, stop talking about this to the internet and start talking to a therapist, for your own sake. You’re doomed to a life of unhappiness if you persist in this kind of belief system and model of behaviour, and it won’t just fix itself (I speak from experience here).
I really don’t get why people are still trying to help Auto. The only slightly redeemable thing I’ve seen from him is his ability to own up to his behavior. Other than that, he’s lying in a bed he made all by himself and has demonstrated no desire to take any self-saving advice. He’s an adult, folks. Let him deal with this by himself. I’ll watch him hit rock-bottom with the same amused indifference I watched OJ blow his second chance. This guy is one break-up away from a four-alarm meltdown.
On another note, boy is it refreshing to hear the no-shit other side of the story. Thanks for chiming in, ooblek!
I didn’t realize we had a funniest post contest going on.
Dude, this is the part where you apologize and leave with whatever dignity you can.
Auto, by all accounts she was fooling around with you behind her boyfriend’s back and then follows you onto the dope so she can shred you in public when it didn’t work out the way she had thought it would. I was right when I said you deserve better than her. Not that she doesn’t have a few valid points about this but a public message board is not the place to have a brawl with you (and aren’t there rules about that here anyway?) Find a therapist to help you with your issues and after that try to find a woman for whom you are better suited.
Because he’s asking for it?
I consider him a friend and I’m more than happy to offer it to him in whatever way I can. He may have been acting like a jackass (though IMHO he’s just a little misguided and needs a push in the right direction), and that’s fine. He needs to be reminded to stop acting that way, then.
At his age I was far more misguided. I wish I’d had more friends willing to help. Unfortunately, most of my friends at that time were every bit as clueless as I was.
[quote=“flyboy, post:122, topic:480206”]
I really don’t get why people are still trying to help Auto. The only slightly redeemable thing I’ve seen from him is his ability to own up to his behavior.
No, he doesn’t own up to his behaviour, he spins it. He is using faux-selfdepreciation as a tool to gain sympathy and to appear soulful. He has been taking all the well-meant advice to heart, ever since he started posting on this board. It’s just that he isn’t using the advise to learn from his mistakes and improve himself, he’s using the advice to better his PR about himself without changing anything at all. As a short term strategy when meeting new people this faux maturity might work, but as a long term strategy, he is pissing people off more when they see through it. Hence the reactions to this thread.
[quote=“Truus, post:126, topic:480206”]
Not quite. He’s probably in the middle of the two when its all said and done. He’s been given a lot of good advice from other dopers, in person and online and taken some of it to heart. His problem is that he still doesn’t get that nobody can motivate him but himself. Until that light turns on all he can do is collect good advice to put to use hopefully helping him to gain the self confidence he needs. I think he means well despite his self flagellation.
Look at how he “owns” his knight in shining armour tendencies, and how he then immediately proceeds outdoing himself in that department by making a totally unnecessary call to hold the nasty e-mails to ooblek. What a way to deflect the issue. (edit: his issues and others criticism thereof)
When he came to this boards lots of people tried to help him deal with his problems with alcohol which were seriously messing up his life, and then look at the start of this thread where he is using alcohol as an excuse. Also, look how he pre-emptively uses a spot of immaturity as an excuse to make that post and then get pissy that people don’t except that excuse, later in the thread.
If ooblek is the woman in question (which, judging by Auto’s response, she is), I don’t see her account as including any kind of admission about her fooling around with him behind her BF’s back. Plus, with a join date of September, she obviously didn’t follow him here specifically to respond to the OP.
I’m not defending his behaviour. Having met him in person several times, and occasionally discussing these types of issues he’s been warned by myself and others about this type of cycle. The point though, is that he has never struck me as doing this purposefully. One can be something, and still overdo it, or let it take over one’s life. Auto IS a good guy, and he does genuinely care about both others and how they perceive him. That makes all the difference in the world between what he does, and someone who just plays a role to manipulate others. His misery comes from the fact that he genuinely feels everything that he struggles to articulate.
Plenty of people struggle with alcohol. Plenty of people have relapses. While it is a conscious choice to indulge in it, espescially knowing how one behaves while under it’s influence, sometimes the escape is hard to resist.
I’m not going to knock him for falling, but maybe it’s time, Auto to put it aside until you can be satisfied with your life.
So I’ll go with my usual advice to him.
Lay off the booze and the broads, embrace your dorkiness, do what you must to like yourself and lean on your friends when you need us.
I’m not saying he does this as a concious evil ploy to delude others. I think he is deluding himself, and making use of the advice he gets to pad these delusions with faux sensitivity and self depreciation, while remaining pretty much in limbo underneath. This makes him appear to make progress, but doesn’t actually do so. I also think he gets enabled a lot on this board in this process, especially from the womenz are bitches contingent. I really hope he won’t add being enabled here as a buzz word to use as extra fuel for this padding though.
By all accounts? Actually, by NO ONE’S account is any of this true.
Who was the first one to take this to a message board?
Auto, you need to quit with trying to get her to talk about this privately. That’s just an excuse to try to keep talking to her. It doesn’t sound like there’s anything she feels she needs to work through with you. She’s done. There’s no relationship here. Move on.
She also posted in Auto’s October “Nice Guy” thread (see post #395), although this seems to have been largely ignored by other posters at the time. She then expressed displeasure with being the subject of online gossip. She didn’t at the time seem especially upset with Auto, but I can certainly see why she would be now. He started this thread knowing she has an account here. Real “classy”.
ooblek, I don’t know if you’re interested in becoming a more active member of the SDMB, but if you are then I hope you enjoy it here. There are lots of forums and lots of different topics to discuss. I apologize for saying it sounded like you were the one who’d written the message in question rather than your boyfriend – it did sound more like something a woman would write to me, but since you say it was him then I believe you. I know you didn’t come here looking for advice, but you should have a discussion with your boyfriend about online privacy…and be more careful to protect your own accounts.
Well, now I feel bad about calling **oobleck **a ho-bag and her boyfriend a douche, even abstractly.
Although sending the email that she sent or allowed her boyfriend to send on her behalf is still a pretty shitty move. Although I see why she did it. There are better ways to tell someone to get lost if they aren’t taking your subtle hints.
And what is **Autolycus’s **deal anyway? Is he supposed to be some sort of boozing, womanizing, whoremonger or something? That’s kind of what I’m getting from some of the posts, except that apparently he isn’t happy with that lifestyle. I can also tell you from personal observation that people who indulge in that lifestyle tend not to be happy and tend not to be “nice guys”.
While this is all very entertaining, I think you might need to get some shit sorted out.
Wow - this drama goes to 11!
(Truus, what you are saying makes a lot of sense.)
Hey, “fighting ignorance since 1973,” right? If people are willing to make all their judgments off of a single source then nothing I can say will change that. Also, does it count as public humiliation if this is exactly the kind of thing he enjoys? It’s not like he hasn’t advertised any of this in group settings.
It’s one thing to get help from people when you need it. It’s an entirely different thing to collect random opinions about situations that aren’t explained in full, then using the ones that agree with half-baked justifications to boost an ego.
I stopped talking to Auto late but I still know that there are consequences for every action. I thought no one but the involved parties knew about what was went on because I didn’t go blabbing about it to anyone. But now, seeing that very few people don’t know some kind of distorted version of his crusades, I thought I’d tell him that no one’s buying it and that I’m fed up. Telling mutual friends what he did was beyond inappropriate and it definitely was the last straw. I don’t care if he was “harmlessly” trying to gather sympathies or encouragements to grab a new broad. The result is still the same of that of a malicious person and that’s why I have 100% confirmation that I made the right decision to sever ties.
Thanks Lamia, although I am not offended by anything blatantly untrue. My boyfriend is not the angry musclehead he is portrayed as. He’s a loyal and intelligent person and in hindsight, I should have trusted his opinion more.
Yuck.
Also, wow. Having the person you’re writing or complaining about come in with their (very well articulated and seemingly valid) two cents has got to be a common fear for most message board enthusiasts.
We usually make our judgements off of a single source because that’s all we usually have (and a lot of us still reserve part of our judgement with the knowledge that we’re not getting the whole story). Your participation in this thread changes everything.
Fear? Auto knew she participated on these boards, just several months ago. I’m not entirely convinced he didn’t want her to see this, just to ratchet up the drama a notch or play the pity card and show her how much she’s hurting him.