@weirdoslam Please keep tone policing out of my mentions.

@noelle jfc? “tone policing”? i’m just honestly concerned about helping ya triumph over ur condition (which i myself have been in many times before) just as much as u do 🙁

@weirdoslam If this is the sort of thing that helped you, I'm so glad it did! But it's not helpful to everyone, and for a lot of us hearing advice that /doesn't/ help us just makes us feel bad for not being helped by it.

I understand it's hard not to Try To Help, but this is one of the cases where acknowledging someone's emotions helps a lot more than trying to talk someone around into feeling something else, if that makes sense?

@TheShyIon yeah i get you. but also i can’t know if my advise can help or not until i suggest it. if it doesn’t and i can’t think of anything else i’ll be sure to back off after that for the simple fact of That’s All I Know, Sorry

@TheShyIon a lot of people gave advise to her and i’m very unsure that *none* of the many of them wouldn’t work at all for her 🙁

@weirdoslam There are certain depression brainstates where advice at all can be hurtful, simply because one isn't in a good mental place to put such things into action.

If you want /my/ advice on the subject—asking first or putting an "advice" cw on the response can do a lot to minimize accidental harm.

@noelle #noadvice shouldn't ever even be needed.

@ratbaby @noelle for real

@ratbaby you know what bugs me is like

do you know how much stress would be avoided if people just, like, asked first

why is everyone so bad at asking if people want things

@InspectorCaracal yeah its really easy. just ask for that consent cause otherwise, when you're in that state of mind, it feels like a lecture.

@InspectorCaracal @ratbaby Your toot points out what's one part of the problem: you're using questions rhetorically.

Okay, sometimes rhetorical questions are easy to spot, even for an autist like me.

But sometimes it is really hard to know that if someone asks a question, they really are not expecting to get answers.

So please everyone, make your own part and don't use rhetorical questions when you're really just venting out.

@Stoori @ratbaby I'm not sure how you extrapolated from my using rhetorical questions there to my getting annoyed about people answering rhetorical questions...?

@ratbaby @Stoori I mean, I am particularly perplexed by the conclusion because it doesn't actually bother me at all.

@InspectorCaracal @ratbaby Ah well, your toot was a response to the topic so I thought to reply to the end instead of branching the chain. Sorry for the inconvenience.

@Stoori It's okay, it was just a pretty specific tangent and I got confused how you made the connection.

I do want to point out that answering rhetorical questions and giving advice aren't really the same thing, though, because one is giving information and the other is telling someone what they should do. At least that's how it seems to work in my experience? I've found people get more upset about being told what to do than being given information they didn't want.

@InspectorCaracal Yes, rhetorical questions are not the whole picture, just one part of the problem of unsolicited advice. But they may be the most obvious group of ”false positives”.

For example, questions like ”why do people do this?” can be rhetorical venting or legitimate pondering, and if it's venting, getting a proper answer may sound like splaining on being apologetic, whereas the person answering may think that they're just giving information the other doesn't have.

@Stoori Oh, I know, I'm usually the one answering them.

@noelle second best trend would be CWing unsolicited advice as such because then you get to feel like you are Doing Good and people get to ignore your unwanted input

@noelle sorry if i was doing this btw. i find often to empathise with someone's situation in a way that tries to be validating i end up sharing my own experiences and things i've attempted. but the whole Unknowability Of The Other thing multiplied by low-bandwidth text means it's a gamble whether it will even be meaningful to anyone in any way

@jk I do this too, as an attempt to build understanding. It's kind of hard not to sometimes...but the positive experiences stemming from doing it seem to outweigh the negative, as long as the goal isn't to just talk about yourself.

@noelle I'm frequently pretty good at this, and then I'll have an interaction where I look back on it and think, "they didn't need my goddamn opinion, I'm an ass"

@noelle this is absolutely something I had to learn.

@noelle I managed to see this toot right after doing exactly that. Oops. 😖

@noelle I think you're already upset when you posted this, so I'm thinking twice whether I should reply this— but I disagree. Some people might really need help, in a shit situation atm, confused, in need of some company and could've been better off if someone at least gave them advice, even if it doesn't solve the actual problem. Some people sucks at asking for help or at communicating.

@noelle if they didn't want the advice, you can apologize (and please don't bitch about the other person being ungrateful). If they open up more, that's great. Sometimes advices doesn't need to solve problems, sometimes it can just be more of a knock on the head.

I commented this so people don't generalize, if you can help out, do so. And I respect @noelle side, some don't need an advice and just wanted to let stuff out

@jaan_paul @noelle I agree with Jaan. I've found unexpected help without explicitly asking for it and given advice the same way. Rather than transfer expectations onto others and require them to read your mind, or go through a process of asking if you're asking for help, how about signaling your intention to vent in the first place with a "venting" CW?

@tomasino @jaan_paul @noelle you could just ask them and remove any ambiguity

@jaan_paul @noelle Yes, this is my experience... If someone is venting they should say so. It is difficult to know their intentions otherwise. If not they are inviting people to discuss.

I have seen people venting.. then get upset because no answers.

If you post something publicly you should also be prepared to talk about it. If not... then just say so.

@noelle This is good for face-to-face too. Or telephone, or writing letters...

@noelle It took me about five years of annoying my wife to really learn this. 😅

People need to hear "That sucks." Not, "Your problem is your fault because you're not doing this easy thing."

Perhaps I could give you some pointers on how to best handle this situation.

1) haha, JK

@noelle

@noelle This is good advice for life in general. Now when my wife is talking about something I explicitly ask "Do you want me to try to help you fix this, or do you just want a hug?" She does the same for me.

But doing it in the fediverse would be a good start.

@noelle A post giving advice on how to not give advice. Meta.

@noelle
I hate it when people do that because it makes me feel pressured to take their advice. I know they just want to feel like they helped, but it's not helpful.

@noelle This is sage advice for all of life, not just Mastodon. Sometimes a hug and/or a sympathetic ear can do far more good than a lecture.

@noelle
Yeah, I totally agree. Often even just asking 'do you want me to give you advice or just listen?' Is often better than giving advice unprompted.

@noelle Spot on. "That sucks" is the correct response. (He said, giving unsolicited advice... )