I’ve inadvertently offended people in ways I’ve never imagined would.
Example 1: There is a boy going to the same preschool as my son, and that boy’s name was Ivan. One day I was chatting with his father and I said, “Ivan is an unusual name, is he named after a relative?” The man looked at me with such anger in his eyes I was shocked. He said, in a very nasty voice, “Maybe from his ORIGINAL family it is, I wouldn’t know!” I later found out that he and his wife had adopted the boy from Russia and were very ‘touchy’ about the issue. I just don’t think of adoption as something to be embarrassed about, and I’m still not sure why he got offended.
Example 2: A woman in my neighborhood had twins, and I knew the family for years. One day I casually asked, which one of the children was born first? She drew herself up very stiff and said loudly, “I think that is a totally IRRELEVANT issue. They were born on the same day, at practically the same time, and that’s ALL there is to be said!” Hmm… it wasn’t like it was the first question I asked upon meeting them, I’d know the kids 5 years when I asked. And why is the subject taboo anyway? It’s just a silly little thing that Kid A is 3 minutes older than Kid B.
So share your stories. Ever offended someone accidentally about something you find unoffensive?
Those scenarios sound like they come out of bad movies where the offended character is obviously hiding some sort of deep emotional trauma and uses inappropriate anger to mask it until a main character steps in and empathizes, at which point the offended character will huff and scream, “You think you know me?!! You don’t know me!!!” and we get a flashback to an even worse scenario the likes of which even the main character hasn’t been subjected to. At that point, the offended character will invariably hurt somebody and then run away to privately nurse their wounds while waiting for the Final Battle.
I’d invest in Kevlar and seek martial arts training if I were you…
Those are both super-weird stories. Seriously, I wouldn’t have thought anything of asking both of those questions. Bizarre.
My boyfriend’s mother thinks my mother hates her because my boyfriend’s mother (shit, let’s just call her Val, as that’s her name) was painting the bathroom in my boyfriend’s camera shop. It’s neon green, which is a great choice as it’s a very depressing horrible bathroom despite all efforts to the contrary (and trust me, I almost died of carbon monoxide poisoning trying to fix it, so I know.) So my mom says, “Wow, that’s really bright!” trying to make conversation. And now Val thinks my mom doesn’t like her. And I made the dumbass mistake of TELLING my mother this, who then got very offended because she made dinner for Val and family the night before, etc., etc.
I’m young, and my worldview is being shaped by experiences and anecdotes such as these.
When I am slightly older, or old enough that I seem more like an adult than a college age kid, I think I’ll just never look at, talk to, talk about, elude to, or think about anybody’s kid at all ever. Everyone’s too touchy or protective. When I take my niece to the playground and I watch the other kids playing, I worry someone will see me and then go take a picture of my license plate.
Kids should be bubble wrapped and locked in basements until they’re old enough to break the door down. Safer that way.
There are definitely parents out there who have an issue that involves their kids, and they walk around all day just WAITING for someone to insult them. In cases like yours, they’re willing to stretch things just to have the chance to lash out.
MANY parents have single issues involving their kids based on their own childhoods. I deal with too many parents who were, I dunno…tortured by having someone chase them with a purple rubber band at school when they were 12. So they come in and want ALL purple rubber bands removed from the school immediately and how dare we allow such things to be kept around just lying there waiting to be used as torture devices! :rolleyes:
Back in 2004, when Hurricane Ivan hit the south, here in Western PA, we got hit with the remnants. Fortunately, we live on a hill, so all we had was a few inches of water in the basement.
Anyhoo, my aunt calls. I’m down in the basement, trying to see if there’s anything I need to take upstairs. I tell her I can’t talk, that we’ve got water in the basement, there’s flooding in the area, and I want to call my father and let him know he’ll have to take another way home. (Or something like that – I can’t remember exactly, just that I told her I couldn’t talk). I couldn’t help it, but I was tired, cranky, I wasn’t exactly in the most cheerful mood.
Well, Auntie got really pissed. She told me I was rude and selfish, and she didn’t appreciate the way I was talking to her. While she was lecturing me, I hung up on her, and went back to cleaning up.
The next day, my 87-year-old grandmother called, and asked me why I was so rude to Auntie, and that I owed her an appology. Gramma wasn’t rude, she sounded hurt that I would speak like that. WTF? We’re having a flood in the area, and you’re pissy because I couldn’t talk, and you go and whine to Gramma and put her in the middle? Gah!
My aunt, I do love her, but she always does shit like this. argh.
Years and years and years ago, I worked with a rather surly woman who really didn’t seem to like me. Gruff gruff gruff. I had no idea why, but since she had a reputation for being cantankerous, I didn’t take it personally. After about a year, I found out why.
On one of my first days there, I had gone out the back door for a moment, it closed behind me and locked automatically. In somewhat uncomfortable cold, I trudged around to the front and came back inside. As I did, I said something along the lines of “don’t let the door close on you when you go out.” You know, that mindless, friendly “lesson learned” prattle when we do something stupid. Except she really was about to leave, and heard something along the lines of “don’t let the door hit you on the ass on the way out!” :smack:
Ach. When we talked about it we laughed, and got on pretty well after that. Confused the hell out of other people in the office though.
Working retail, I had a customer complain to the supervisor about me being rude. My crime was asking if she wanted a loyalty card.
Same job, putting stock out with another worker. They took some stuff out a box and were looking where they went. I saw them looking a bit lost, knew where they went and pointed to the place. Instead of a “Oh, cheers”, I got “DON’T TELL ME HOW TO DO MY JOB!”
In a charity shop, I’d just trained a new volunteer how to use the till and let her have her first go unaided. It all went well, she was chuffed she’d done it right and smiled at the customer. The customer’s companion (I assume sister) flipped the hell out and accused the volunteer of smirking at 'em.
TruBro and his current wife were both still married (to other people) when they started dating. After his divorce, he threw a birthday party for TruNephew which TruMom and I attended. I happened to mention to one of the party goers parents that we would be over at TruNephew’s Mother’s house the next day, as we thought it was important for him to see the whole family getting along well after the divorce.
TruBro exploded in a fit of rage and threw me out of his house for mentioning the divorce.
I went to a few events and parties with a woman I was seeing. I met and talked with her closest friends, their friends, and friends of friends. Basically the entire extended social circle.
After one party we were laying in bed and I said “You know, all of your friends are smart, musically talented, good-looking, and have the most beautiful children.” She immediately jumped to their defense and was sad that didn’t like any of them.
I work in tech support, and I got a call from someone who was having trouble logging into the system.
Me: Can I get your user id so I can take a look at your account?
Him: WHAT DID YOU SAY?!?!?!?!?!?
Me: Um … I … asked for your user id? So I can take a look at your account?
Him: Oh, it’s <userid>
That’s usually a sign of insecurity. Like when you have one of those bad self-esteem days. E.g. your girl dumps you, and a few days later your buddy comments on your new haircut and you take it as an insult, because you feel like you’re unattractive so you interpret his comment as a slam on how you look.
There’s a girl I went to school with who totally hates me and flipped out on my once about how I was “always putting her down and always criticizing her.” I had no idea what she was talking about. It turned out, according to female friends we had in common, that unbeknown to me, she’d had a crush on me for a really long time. When I started dating my then-girlfriend, she’d felt really rejected, even though I had no clue she liked me.
The “always criticizing her” part? Well, that would be innocuous conversations like, if I said: “You like Wonderfalls? Ever watch Dead Like Me? If you like Wonderfalls you might enjoy that one too. It has a similar appeal.”
She heard it has: “Ugh! Wonderfalls is no where near as good as Dead Like Me. Only total losers watch Wonderfalls when they could be watching DLM. You total loser, you.”
If I said: “Hey, that’s an awesome t-shirt!”
She heard: “You have ugly pants.”
Apparently, everything I said to her, she heard through a “rat-bastard filter”
Staying at a friend’s place, I offended his wife by doing their dishes for them while they were out. Turns out that for years afterward she thought I did it because I think she’s a slob instead of to save them a little time and effort and repay their hospitality a bit.
Some years ago I stayed for several weeks (work related) at a hotel that served breakfast. Everyday, on my way out to go to work, I would get a styrofoam cup, put some coffee in it, put a plastic lid on it, and go.
One day, there were no lids in their usual place on the front (customer) counter, but I could see a stack of them on the back counter. So I politely asked the lady behind the counter if I could get a lid for my coffee cup.
She physically recoiled from me with a look of horrified disgust on her face and yelled, “NO!!” I was so nonplussed at the event I just left without trying to figure out what she thought she heard me say.
Can anyone think of a way that the words “Miss? Can I get a lid for my coffee?” might somehow be misheard/misunderstood for something vile and offensive?
Parents I know that don’t want their kids to know that don’t tell them because they don’t want the ‘older’ kid to pick on the ‘younger’ kid. They don’t want it used as ammunition in their petty arguments. It’s a bit daft.