*I hope this is an okay subreddit for this topic. If not, let me know.*
Hi, my family recently got into a fight. My mom was speeding on the drive home from someplace, and when we got home, my dad brought it up. My mom literally turned the cold shoulder and flat out ignored him, because they’re always fighting about it. I tried not to get involved, but I felt the same way as Dad and was pissed about her treating him like that, so I jumped on his side.
Sometimes when family fights like this happen, I try to convey to my mom or whoever what I think went wrong. I know it’s not my responsibility to analyze them and I know that I’m not always right, but sometimes I feel like fights happen because one of us has a closed mind and is unwilling to consider the other person’s feelings.
So what I normally do is I’ll run outside and sit in the backyard, dumping my brain out and ranting into my phone’s notes. I always like getting it out of my head. But when I try to talk to the person I ranted about, no matter if I bring it up at therapy, try to blurt out a quick thought, or sit down at home with them, it goes in one ear and out the other. This is what you’d naturally expect to happen – no parent takes it seriously when their teenage son tries to lecture them on their poor conduct (from their point of view, of course).
But what I always say is that I feel like I have the key to make things better. I don’t think I’m always right or better than anyone else, but sometimes I feel like if my advice were taken – or at least considered fairly, it would help the situation.
So that’s the dilemma I’ve fought myself in again and again lately. A big fight breaks out, and I listen for a while, then run outside and write down my raw thoughts. But I know I can’t shafr them, so I’m left with an overgrowing list of solutions to our problems sitting on my phone while I try to forget all of it exists. It’s frustrating, because I know that my perspective is valuable and has at least some truth to it – but I can’t share it because it’s just shrugged off by my family.
After the big fight about speeding, I decided that I needed to do something about this. But I don’t know what to do, and it’s beginning to feel like the best course of action is to shut my mouth and pretend my advice isn’t there. I’m truly at a loss.
So, what’s the best thing to do? Is it really just to keep quiet? I know that it’s best to not be tok extreme, and to not be shrugged off, I need to heavily supercoat my thoughts and make concessions. But even when I try to do that, it doesn’t work. So if anybody could help me out with their opinion, that would be much welcome. For reference, here’s the notes I wrote on my phone about the fight (and yes, they’re very unfiltered, crude, and harsh):
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Mom, have you EVER stopped to consider your actions? You drive over the speed limit, breaking the law and putting yourself, your family, and other innocent people in danger. Then when your son and HUSBAND, for God’s sake (nevermind the law and all the safety requirements about driving) tell you you’re doing it, you refuse to acknowledge it – for what, ego? Arrogance? Even when you know damn well that speeding isn’t fair to anyone because it causes reckless car crashes and can kill people, you choose to selfishly ignore the risks. And you say it’s not a big deal – you’re right, it’s a minor safety violation. A minor safety violation that you have an extremely bad habit for doing, and refuse to acknowledge. Why do you need to speed? So you can get to your destination a minute faster? A minor violation is justified when the benefit outweighs the cost. When there is no benefit – nobody is going to get her from you driving at a normal speed like you’re supposed to – it’s just blind ignorance and selfishness. Yeah, “everyone” does it. Well, are you everyone? Who cares what other people do, are you willing to recklessly put other people in danger so you can get to your destination faster?
But nevermind the ignorance and danger you pose to people. The real cancerous problem is your refusal to admit it – again, for no reason I can fathom beside arrogance and the insistence to be right. I mean, in your mind you know that speeding is wrong – I’m sure of that. So why do you have to do vehemently detest that when your son or husband tells you? The only physiological reason for arguing that something that you clearly know is wrong is fine is that you are subconsciously defending your ego.
And it’s shit. It’s the most arrogant, ass thing to ignore people and block out what they say. Why do you speed again – what’s that you said, “because”? Is that what the man you’ve married for over 20 years, who genuinely feels concerned for his safety and is just looking for validation, deserves? Is being right and not being flexible really worth it? Do you really have to polarize, and die on that hill and bring down everyone else with you? When you yourself know that this hill lies on immoral ground and you are in fact not entirely in the right?
I think the problem here is a pride issue. When someone makes you feel insulted by complaining and pestering so passionately, which can indeed feel like an exaggeration, it makes you fight or fight. And you fight, yelling and ignoring and refusing to back down. But the irony is, all the pestering and complaining and exaggerating only comes from your previous ignorance. When someone tells a person something and they are ignored, they get more and more drastic to try and be heard. So when one of us tells you you are speeding, and you flat out shrug it off, we get more desperate and more radical. And in turn, you get more assertive of your position, as you feel you are being attacked. It’s a neverending loop of escalating polarization.
All you need to do is acknowledge the problem, and it will make everything better. Everyone is human, and after all, it is just a “minor” infraction. Nobody is attacking you, it’s just the natural human mechanism of escalation that makes both sides more desperate and more polarized. So all you have to do is put aside your ego, forget your position, put all the fighting and arguing aside, and acknowledge it. Just say “Speeding is bad. I’ll try to work on it.” Of course, the root issue is that you have a habit of speeding. But this issue has calloused over to so much more than that. And in order to work on fixing problems, we first have to tackle the elephant and heal all the polarization until the situation can be reduced back to something rational and unemotion. All that matters is that you admit that there’s an issue, no matter the details or importance, and then the radical stigma can fade away and real progress toward improvement can be made.
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