Tell It the Way It Is

[amd1953]

If you don't like someone, you have two choices.   First, you can choose to cut them out of your life completely, never have anything to do with them as long you both live.  Ignore them in silence.   The second method is much more malicious because you set out to brand them and perhaps even ostracize them from a community or neighbourhood.   Let's use a hypothetical and say that you might be the sort of person who loves nothing better than to dig up dirt on people and then spread that newfound knowledge as gossip.   There might be something about this person that you don't like so you think everyone should know what you know.   You like to share so you tell someone else, and it mushrooms from there.   The rumours might be true and then again, they might be pure fiction.   How is anyone to know?   How will this person be judged?   Does it really matter?   Well, yes, of course it matters.   But there is not much you can do to stop human gossip.   It is, unfortunately, a fact of life.   No matter how good you believe yourself to be, there is always the possibility that someone, somewhere will choose to bring you down to their level of existence.   They are told or they discover some tasty little snippet of information, and they will use it to poison minds against you.   Perhaps these people hate themselves, perhaps they have nothing better to do than work behind the scenes and gain a bit of satisfaction from what they are doing.   Who knows?   Perhaps one day they will realise what they are doing.   One final thought.   I have never heard anyone prefix a slander by telling us how imperfect and vulnerable they are.    I will never hear anyone say, "Look, so-and-so has done this but hey, I'm not perfect myself."   It is all done to promote themselves and their hidden life agenda.   As several people have said already; it is a control and power trip that fuels their spite and hate.

Regards

amd1953

[white knight]

Hi amd

In fact the two choices are the extremes at either end that would normally only be used when you've exhausted all other avenues or their behaviour results in more than you just not liking them. In between is things like - being civil regardless of not liking them. 

If you didnt like someone at work but had to communicate with them, silence and/or cutting them out of your life is hardly ideal.

As for silence, it can be used as a weapon. It is only considered a weapon however when it is used as a tool to hurt the other person, not to only protect us. Although not intended in your post, silence used as a weapon is a form of narcissistic abuse.

https://forums.beyondblue.org.au/t5/staying-well/silence-the-bad-and-the-good/td-p/349999

I only know this as my first wife was a master at that behaviour. Not master enough to save our marriage when the time came for me to leave her though.

You mention a solid point of interest in- gossip. As a person that spent decades in law enforcement (not police) I have always sort evidence as my habit when dealing with people. I also learned this in the early 1980's when the Azaria Chamberlain disappearance case when nearly everyone in Australia (including me) embraced the theory of her mother being the culprit. She spent 3 years in jail for a crime she didnt commit. The evidence was also very wrong.

So with people we deal with daily it isnt any different. You will get many people assume the gossip is correct, if fronted with such spreading of words best to distance yourself and not condemn as you elude to. There is two sides to every story so they say. My common response to a piece of gossip is "where did you hear that". Then "I dont know about that". It's a subtle form of rejecting it.

There is cases of serious misbehaviour that deserve the silence so you can continue your life without them in it. Ignoring them doesnt have to include mentioning them at all to other people, better to allow those people to make their own mistakes.... "so you think everyone should know what you know", that doesnt have to be that way. Other people might view that person differently than we do, they might not dislike their flaws as we do. Birds of a feather...

But overall I know where you are coming from and for many of us with mental health issues it is better to drop off those that do us harm or have the potential to. At the same time try not to distance yourself by restricting people coming into our lives that could give us joy. This in and out method of filtering/rejecting/accepting is a cycle towards greater happiness.

Thankyou

TonyWK