I don’t know what you mean, but I think I see a lot of people “being polite” but failing at one of these when it would be really useful for them.
For example, you can be polite while internally becoming more suspicious and angry at the other person (#3 and #4) which starts coming out in body language and the direction of conversation. Eventually you politely end the conversation in a bad mood and thinking the other person is a jerk, when you could’ve accomplished a lot more with a different internal response.
Maybe the other person is a jerk and is on an obnoxious power trip at your expense. If you don’t get suspicious and (internally) angry you’re just setting yourself up as a victim.
Generic advice doesn’t apply everywhere. A default “nod and slowly back away” response isn’t bad but is not always useful.
Optimally, you’d be have an understanding of the options available, how you work internally, and how other people respond so you could choose the appropriate level of anger, etc. Thus it’s better to explore suggestions and see how they work than to naively apply them in all situations.
So it’s just unrolling the basic “don’t be an asshole, be polite instead” advice?
I don’t know what you mean, but I think I see a lot of people “being polite” but failing at one of these when it would be really useful for them.
For example, you can be polite while internally becoming more suspicious and angry at the other person (#3 and #4) which starts coming out in body language and the direction of conversation. Eventually you politely end the conversation in a bad mood and thinking the other person is a jerk, when you could’ve accomplished a lot more with a different internal response.
Maybe the other person is a jerk and is on an obnoxious power trip at your expense. If you don’t get suspicious and (internally) angry you’re just setting yourself up as a victim.
Generic advice doesn’t apply everywhere. A default “nod and slowly back away” response isn’t bad but is not always useful.
Agreed on the 2nd paragraph.
Optimally, you’d be have an understanding of the options available, how you work internally, and how other people respond so you could choose the appropriate level of anger, etc. Thus it’s better to explore suggestions and see how they work than to naively apply them in all situations.