What's a nice way to tell someone to stop talking to you?

In My Humble Opinion
1

Okay, so someone who was in a college club with me about 12 years ago found me on Facebook. We weren’t really friends or anything, just “in the same circle”, never really hung out outside the club meetings. I went ahead and added the guy because he seemed nice enough.

Now he pings me using Facebook messenger pretty much whenever he’s online, which is to say maybe 3-4 times a week. He never has anything NEW to say, he just wants to… shoot the breeze I guess. He’ll ask how I’m doing, what i think about this bit of news or that bit of news.

We haven’t seen each other in the intervening 12 yrs, and as mentioned didn’t really spend time together before either. I’ve tried to respond with as terse of answers as possible without being rude, when he asks how I’m doing I’ll say “fine, thanks”, or “busy, I guess”… hoping I just bore him into not wanting to keep conversing.

I don’t really use Facebook messenger for “Some weather we’re having, huh?” I use it mostly for “hey, I’m going to be about 20 minutes late but am still coming, will see you there”.

I don’t want to tell the guy to get lost, but I also just don’t have anything to say to him. I know that expression usually indicates being sore, but I literally just don’t have anything to say to the guy.

So, what’s a nice way to say “Ummm… I don’t really want you to keep sending me messages to chat”?

2

Any reason not to simply unfriend him? (As in, any chance of it coming back to bite you in the ass or be considered burning a bridge or what have you?)

3

Just don’t answer his chat messages. If he calls you on it you can easily make something up (you were only on for a little bit, had Facebook up but was in another tab, etc) and sooner or later he’ll get the hint.

Or he’ll track you down in order to make a mask out of your skin.

Either one, really.

4

If you don’t want to break with him all together, answer him back but wait like 30 minutes to an hour before you answer each of his messages. Tell him, “Oh, I’m busy online with a project for work, sorry it took me so long.”

That way he’ll get bored with messaging you

5

Can you just tell him that you only use that for work? If he persists, just ignore him.

6

Just slide the tab on the IM window over to make it look like you’re offline when he is on.

7

You can put people into groups on FB and then set your chat settings to only be available to some groups but not others.

8

OR johnspartan could track him down and make a mask out of his skin first. That’d learn the guy to stfu. I bet Skald would endorse this plan; I’m pretty sure I saw it in a subsection of the Code of Conduct for the Evil Genius Order.

Disclaimer for the humor impaired: That was a humorous aside. DO NOT MAKE MASKS OUT OF THE SKIN OF OTHER PEOPLE; YOU ALREADY HAVE ONE OF YOUR OWN.

9

Exactly. I have a “just to be nice” group for just that reason. Said group never sees when I’m online. Just put the person in the group, and, when they are online again, you’ll see that group in the chat list, and you can slide the slider to the gray side.

10

Unless the person is a social dofu, giving him the cold shoulder a couple of times should work. That and also giving uninterested responses and driving the conversation to the dead ends; no opened-ended replies, replies that are just a single word, never ask the other party a question etc. etc. etc.

11

I wouldn’t go so far out of my way to avoid someone. Just be more direct.

“I’d prefer we communicate via email.” or
“I don’t have time to chat with you.” or
“Who are you again?” :slight_smile:

There is a line between thinking about someone’s feelings, and being assertive to protect your own happiness. Since you’ve brought this situation here for opinions, I’d say it’s bothering you way too much… stand up for yourself, be assertive, be happy, move on.

12

I just say, “Sorry, I’m busy, I don’t have time to chat.” Saying no politely is an important adult skill we all have to learn.