Sensitivity

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

You know, I am tired of sensitivity getting a bad rap. There are a lot of things that sensitivity gets blamed for, and people say that people are too “sensitive”.

Ok, when someone is being a narcissistic twat that can’t handle anything, this is not sensitive. It’s about as insensitive as one can be.

Let’s use hippies as our example. I can’t stand many hippies, though I do like going to festivals that they tend to frequent because they are in the middle of the woods, and I like being in the middle of the woods with lots of people with drums and good food and nice homegrown pot and all that. They are fun.

However, there are the hippy scourges, who do not bathe, and are always talking about free hugs.

Hugs do not equal love. Half the time someone is giving a hug, it’s all about them. It can be due to their insecurity and an obsessive need to be liked. It can be out of a desire to touch people, but it doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with sensitivity.

If the fucking hippy were sensitive, they’d know that I don’t want to hug them right now. I wouldn’t have to feel awkward at all because I offended the dumbass that didn’t look outside of their own feelings to see if the person they were assaulting shared such feelings. That my friends is INSENSITIVITY, not sensitivity.

In fact, most truly sensitive people are very well liked, because a sensitive person knows how you are feeling, and reacts to that, and accomodates it, and finds ways to make you feel good, so that you’ll WANT to make them feel good too. It’s a reciprocal relationship.

On to another pet peeve about the perception of sensitivity. Oftentimes people need and want to be bitched. They want someone to tell them no. Sometimes people need to be told to pull themselves up by the bootstraps and get their shit together. It is INSENSITIVE to accomodate their ludicrous requests when they really need to be taught some survival skills. When one is trapped inside their own ego, it is not possible for them to be sensitive. Sensitivity comes with SENSING the world around oneself, not by constantly navalgazing and looking for people to support you crutch because you’re too much of a wuss to handle things yourself.

All in all sensitivity is a GOOD trait. You can never be TOO sensitive. You can be a narcissistic asshole who wants everyone to accomodate their every little hiccup, but that’s not being sensitive. Sensitive is the person who knows that when someone is cranky it’s because they are dehydrated. Sensitive is the person who knows that all it would take to make someone happier is give them a soft pillow to sit on. Sensitive is not crying about your lot in life and expecting everyone to accomodate your “sensitivity”.

This has been a public service announcement from the bureau of sensitivity.

Erek

2

Sensitivity to yourself must go hand in hand with sensitivity to others. Otherwise it’s only going to produce an insensitive person. That’s obvious.

Sensitivity to others requires more than just knowing when they need “to be bitched” or told they’re “too much of a wuss.” A lot of these people seriously lack self-esteem and will respond by hurting themselves or others. That, sadly, is not so obvious.

3

I agree with most of your OP, but I disagree that you can’t be too sensitive. I would say that I am most definitely too sensitive; there comes a point where responding to every little twinge of everyone around you is actually detrimental to your own health. I have learned to not overidentify with every single emotion of everyone around me, and I feel much better for it.

Regarding sensitivity preventing you from hugging someone if they don’t want to be hugged (for example) - you’re dead on about that. A truly sensitive person has no problem seeing if someone else is uncomfortable or not thrilled about what’s going on.

4

Grow a sack and shut the fuck up.

5

And, yes, that was a joke.

6

Sounds like the OP needs a hug.

7

Pussy.

8

Sounds like someone has a case of the Mondays.

9

I don’t expect other people to be clairvoyant or experts on my motives or feelings. I am responsible for making my feelings clear if there are any misunderstandings.

Usually when someone is accused of being “too sensitive,” no one is blaming that person for being too tuned in to how others feel. More often people accused of being too sensitive are blamed for taking things too seriously or having their feelings hurt too easily. That’s a totally different situation.

mswas, could you be more specific about what you consider a “hippie” to be? The definition had some meaning for me in the 60’s and 70’s, but I’m not sure if I related to what a 21st Century hippie is. Thanks.

10

Now that is one of my HUGE complaints too. I fucking hate that huggy wuggy shit with a fucking passion. It’s all about the huggy wuggy, and it’s fuck all whether you feel comfortable with it or not. A sensitive person would acknowledge my unwillingness/discomfort, and would respect my need for “personal space”. Did I mention, I fucking hate, loathe and despise that phony fucking huggy fake affection crap?

This is not a whoosh. I really feel this way.

11

Doesn’t always work even then. I’ve had people still insist after I told them “Stay The Hell Away.”

12

Years ago I spent a lot of energy wondering about what women want in a man (unlike now, when it’s perfectly clear :rolleyes: ).

“Why can’t men be more sensitive?” was the cry. But when men showed any emotion other than anger, it was always “Don’t be so sensitive! That’s such a turnoff.”

Gah? How could this complete contradiction exist? Until it occurred to me – there must be more than one kind of sensitivity. So maybe before we continue this discussion, we should define some different types. Let’s start with:

Type A: Anything anyone says hurts my feelings, and I cry.

Type B: I’m aware that anything I say might hurt the feelings of others, so I don’t say those things.

More or less accurate?

13

I dunno, seems like part of Type B’s self-restraint will be spent on holding back from punching Type A’s lights out and stealing his lunch money.

14

How about a grammatical analysis of sensitivity?

Subject sensitivity: I am very sensitive, and anything you say that can be remotely construed as negative towards me is going to ruin my day.

Direct object sensitivity: I am extremely sensitive of how you are feeling and how things are likely to affect you. I can make a pretty good guess about what would make you feel better.

Indirect object sensitivity: I am extremely sensitive on behalf of people who are not involved in this conversation. I do grammatical and lexical tapdances whenever I speak to avoid offending these people who are not present. I will shame you if you don’t, also.

15

I just love that little fragment of a sentence. It would make a gret sig -

Help! I’m trapped inside my ego!

16

Agreed!

One thing I’ve never gotten is that people hate Alan Alda because “He’s too sensitive.” He never struck me as being emotionally fragile. Self-effacing, maybe, but not the type to cry at the drop of a hat. Nor has he struck me as being overly touchy-feely. Yes, he is sensitive to women’s issues and environmental issues, but I don’t think of those as unattractive qualities.

So what’s the deal with not liking him?

17

Personally, I don’t like Alan Alda not because I think he’s sensitive, but because I don’t like any of the characters he’s played.

About sensitivity, there’s a secret fourth group of over-sensitive people that only one person I know falls into, and I often think it’s the absolute worst one - the person who’s so “sensitive” to others’ pain that everyone else’s personal tragedy turns into their own. I have several specific examples of this, but the following is most prominent in my mind: said oversensitive person learned that her close friend had stage four breast cancer. Her friend was very sick from the cancer and from all the chemo treatments. This oversensitive person was so convinced her friend was going to die and so “sensitive” to her friend’s pain that her friend, still suffering from cancer, was forced to comfort the oversensitive jerk each and every time they spoke. The oversensitive woman would sob and say things like, “But you might die!” to a woman who at that time had very poor chances of living and really needed a friend to lean on. Somehow, the woman with cancer did recover. For some reason, she’s still friends with the oversensitive person, but I haven’t been able to figure out why.

This particularly virulent form of “sensitivity” pisses me off like no other.

18

Would spraying them with Lemon-scented bathroom cleaner be considered insensitive?

19

I completely understand this particular social circle and the very paricular pseudo-sensitivity we’re most at prey to.

I’m also a festival-goer, and often call myself a “hippie chick” or a “neohippie”. What do these terms mean, taken thirty years out of context? There’s such a large spectrum of people, ranging from passing-as-Muggle, who are mostly “normal” in dress and daily activities who like to attend one or two pagan festivals or Rainbow Gatherings a year for cool artwork and bonfires, to the diehard counter-culture rebels who own nothing but a backpack of tie-dyes and bajas, who live wandering from one eco-hostel to another, doing oddjobs or massage therapy for cash to buy tofu and kale, spending most of their time high as a kite (or humorlessly sober, and often will switch from one to the other with no warning.) There is a range of spirituality which does not correspond to the lifestlyes, either. Some of the most truly passionate and spiritual people I know pass for “Muggles” and some of the waaaaay-out there Gaiaheads don’t know their spirit from spit. While most hippiefolk are of some non-mainstream neo-pagan religion or another, there are also Christian hippies, agnostic hippies, and atheist hippies. There is a general support for environmentalist causes, but the degree, again, varies - some are building composting toilets and watering their own gardens with greywater, and others try to remember to buy the recycled printer paper at OfficeMax.

One of the best and most annoying things about festival is that there are such a wide range of folks attending. There’s a illusion perpetuated by the festival administration that we’re all of like mind and spirit, when in fact we’re not.We each find other hippiefolk just as weird and annoying as you do.

One very common “hippietype” is the all loving, all encompassing, earth-is-god-and-god-is-love-and-I-LOVE-YOU-MAN!!! type who professes great spiritual awareness. This spiritual awareness is often tantric in nature (although there are bona fide tantric spiritualists, the vast majority of “tantrika” and “tantric masters” are looking to get laid a lot with no guilt) but, paradoxically it would seem, don’t bathe. The rationalle is that all is sacred and bodies are sacred, and The Man has convinced us that we smell bad so we buy their scented products out of shame and fear. Patchoulli oil and love is all you need, baby! (I’m not saying this is false, I’m saying take a shower. Even with just plain water, Dude! Take a freakin’ shower!)

Anyhow, in their zealousness to prove to the world how advanced and loving they are, they like to hug. A lot. And not a quick, polite hug. Great massive bearhugs of itchy dredlocks and tear-inducing patchoulli fog. It seems that the longer the hug, the more “spirituality points” one gets. These things can go on for minutes.

As the OP surmises, these people have nothing to do with genuine sensitivity (or spirituality). They are full of sound and fury, signifying nothing but their wounded children underneath. They are much more concerned with the outward display of Love than the true seeking of it. They piss me off, too.

Don’t get me wrong - I love to hug - I even love to hug strangers if the urge is mutual. I love big, warm, long bearhugs. But it’s pretty easy to know if someone wants a hug. And, if by chance you guess wrong and you’re now in a hug with someone who doesn’t want to be, it’s *very *easy to tell. They stiffen, and their body weight shifts back on their heels. They may get twitchy. A true, “I’m enjoying this soooo much” hug is one of mush and relaxation. People’s bodies start to conform to one another, and the weight is all inward, to the center. It feels totally different, and not just in some ephemeral “energetic” sense. Physically, it feels different.

Although I agree with **featherlou **that one CAN be too sensitive to other people’s vibes and can become overwhelmed by it. But, in a culture which makes a great deal of noise about “psychic vampirism” and being “an empath” , there’s also a lot of fakers. A lot of drama queens who will make the moment be about them, rather than the person who needs assistance (or simply to be left alone.)

20

He’s patently East Coast. He has a whiny voice. He played a heroic, articulate, funny anti-military character (Hawkeye) on a show (MASH*) that many conservatives condemned for its irreverence. His old man, I believe, was implicated in pinko causes during the blacklist. Need I go on?