What are some careless things said that have killed a conversation for you?

ALostInquirer@lemm.ee to Ask Lemmy@lemmy.world – 107 points –

Whether it's foot in mouth, a sudden heavy subject, or some utter nonsense that you don't know how to process, what's something that's come up in an otherwise alright conversation that's stopped it dead in its track for both of you?

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I was hitting it off with my new neighbor and he said something like I'm glad you're cool like one of us [40 something white heterosexual cis men] because we're under attack nudge nudge wink wink. I'm good, later man.

I always hate that assumption that I must be racist because I share the same skin tone as a racist.

I worked with a guy that seemed pretty laid back and alright. He was my supervisor at the time and just out of the blue after knowing him a couple months just the most racist shit said and I was speechless.

I was hanging with a girl that was pretty chill. We had hung a few times over the few months we had met, and had a nice platonic thing going.

She came over and we started to watch some documentary, and in it, there was an abusive man of African descent. She straight up said, "I think there's something genetic with them that causes them to have a short temper and behave like that".

Yeah, we never hung out again.

"I think there's something genetic with them that causes them to have a short temper and behave like that"

I wonder if it's the same genetic trait shared by police officers... 🤔

Nah, that’s just tiny peepee anger. They finally can be the asshole bully they always were.

I reconnected with an old friend I hadn't seen in years. He was a bit of a conspiracy nut and was telling me about a new crazy one he had just heard about. I ended up jokingly asking him if he thought vaccines caused autism too. He just kind of deflated and walked away. We haven't spoken since. I later learned that his son had just been diagnosed as severely autistic. Oops.

Sooo ... did they think it was the vaccines do you think? Obviously a touch situation for a parent, depending on the severity of the autism though, and a sensitive topic ... but it seems like they may actually have thought their vaccines did it to their child, felt a lot of pain over it, and figured you'd not be able to understand ...?

That's one of the more insidious parts of that whole "conspiracy" (more like grift, but that's splitting hairs...)

It's got to be hard enough raising a severely autistic kid without piling on the guilt that you may have caused it through well-intentioned actions. Even if you don't really believe it, it's pretty fucked to have to live with a shred of "what if...?" all because of one lying asshole and a bunch of easily-manipulated idiots.

Yea ... I hadn't thought about that aspect of the conspiracy theory before (which in hindsight feels dumb). Thanks!

Just to be clear, I wasn't implying you were in the wrong necessarily, so hopefully it didn't come across that way!

There was this girl at my office who I thought was kind of nice and I think she thought I was kind of nice too. Then one day she said something totally out of the blue about how the Jews control everything. Last time I ever l spoke to her unless it was strictly professional.

This reminds me of the episode of Nathan For You where he records a first date that a couple go on and it just looks like a cute bowling date and then at the end of the episode while the credits roll he reveals the audio of the date and that the girl was going off about 9/11 conspiracy theories the whole time.

They even control a space laser and shoot it at innocent flies. This is how fireflies are created.

I really thought this was a joke conspiracy theory until I learned people actually believe in Jews controlling everything.

Add that to the list of "things right-wingers are irrationally afraid of, but actually sound kind of awesome"

(I mean the fireflies thing, not the Jews controlling everything thing)

I admit, I made the fireflies up this morning.

I hardly can fathom the fear and disinformation bubble you must be in that you actually believe this nonsense. I mean, I come from the country of conspiracy theories (Germans are actually quite good at inventing this), and I love a good story to laugh about.

We were celebrating my birthday at a nice restaurant. My cousin, who had just had her first child 2 months before, was there.

I asked when he was eligible to be vaccinated (this was pre-Covid, so just talking routine infant vaccinations).

She said she wasn’t sure if she was because she read on FB that….

I had had some good wine. I had heard enough. It was my birthday and I regret nothing, but we didn’t speak for a very long while after I went into “are you fucking kidding me” mode.

When the Covid vaccines came out, my wife and I immediately got them. A couple of weeks later, our kids had a patch of various sicknesses, nothing major just some mild infections. I told our kindergarten teacher that I was annoyed about that and she tells, she read, that we are shedding the vaccine and that's why our kids are sick now. I went full "are you fucking kidding me" mode and felt really bad for a long time after that.

It was on a wedding. I was talking to a dude who got seated at our table. Somehow he managed to change the subject to gender and such, him not understanding why we need these new pronouns and such. I could already tell, that this conversation was heading in a bad direction. Then he said something like "I don't care if people are gay, but at least some years ago, they would hide at home and be embarrassed about it!" That was the point when I turned around without another word and simply walked away. He didn't understand what he did wrong. But I didn't want to make a scene at the wedding. Also I am certain that it has no use discussing anything with people like that.

Damn. I'd ALMOST respect his honesty. Most of those assholes come up with some "legitimate reason" as to why only people like themselves deserve freedom.

What honesty? I'm not seeing it. "I'm not homophobic but they should 'at least' be embarrassed and in hiding at home for it" is... not very honest: making that judgment isn't "not caring".

As opposed to hiding behind religion or quoting that one passage in the bible, the dude straight up said that he thinks gay people are icky. That level of honesty is rarely found in these discussions.

I have family members who are covered in tattoos, wearing blended fabrics, worship football, and will quote that passage as to why being gay is wrong. It infuriates me to no end.

One day I am in power of a movie company and I will make a movie about Jesus' second coming and he's gonna quote the bible while him and Peter burn the souls of bigots with napalm throwers...

If you can work in a seemingly minor subplot where they save somebody in an early part and bring them along to be their scribe but who later has a villain reveal scene as the Antichrist for a final showdown, I'm sold. Could be a sequel setup too.

Did they say they weren't homophobic?

The "I don't care if people are gay" has to be intended that way. It's like "I'm not racist, but..."

I was working at a gas station. Aside from a few long term employees, the turnaround was fairly high. Mostly kids from the local school trying to earn some money during vacations. One time they hired this dude who was usually working construction but needed something during the winter. Super nice dude, always helpful and already had experience with cash registers. But given I've grown up around sociopaths, there was this tingle in the back of my head that there was something off about this guy.
During your shift you have to keep copies of all receipts and separate trucks from regular cars. At the end, you comb through them and make sure none of the truck receipts slipped into the regular pile, wrap a paper around them and put date and your signature on it.
One day a bit of work piled up and I was stuck with other duties before finishing my shift. As I was finally about to finish, I noticed my reciepts were gone. I asked them whether he placed them somewhere else. He said he already did my receipts for me (wasn't uncommon and like I said super nice guy).
I go to the breakroom and see the pile of receipts with paper wrapped around and my signature on them???
I ask him if he signed it with my signature. He casually responds with, "Yeah, I know how to do all the signatures from all the coworkers here.", and I think to myself "Yep, there it is". I coumbed through the receipts again, clocked out and went home. And coincidentally never worked a shift with the guy again. And a few weeks later he got fired. He got caught refunding customer money to his own bank account (he had experience with registers).

At an inspection for a rental property the agent, mid small talk, said "and I'm glad it's people like you (white, cishet couple) checking this place out, the owner is not keen to lease the place to people who aren't white".

The manager of my apartment complex said something similar. She was off to show an apartment that was vacant and came back with something like,"Well we had some of those other types look earlier, but I'm just going to send in this person's application." I had known her for years. Bit of a gut punch.

Anytime I'm talking to my music teacher and he brings up Donald Trump. Happens at least 3x a week during the school year.

I don't know why porygon is in need of justice, but I agree, I fuckin love porygon 😤

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denn%C5%8D_Senshi_Porygon

AFAIK, Porygon was never shown in the anime again because of this episode, and it wasn't even Prygon who caused the issues.

I remember this being one of those rumors we always heard about as kids before the internet was readily available.

Of course I had to find the clip on YouTube. Turns out I’m not epileptic. It is an uncomfortable effect though and I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like it elsewhere.

Honestly, I think while it definitely taught a few kids about epilepsy, it wasn't thousands like the rumors/story/media says. I think a few kids went to the hospital with seizures, and it ended up on the news, which made a bunch of parents tell their kids about the Pokemon episode that made kids sick. Kids, being impressionable, would think "oh shit, I saw that episode, I'm gonna get sick"

TLDR, the episode made a few kids sick, and it was good that it was pulled, but the majority of reports were likely hysteria, at least IMO

Oh man, if you think that effect is uncomfortable (which it absolutely is), you should see the final boss of Balan Wonderworld before they patched the effect. It’s astonishing. I can’t find a video of the fight to link to you, unfortunately… I want to see it again, but the one I had saved was taken down.

Ooooh, I think I was aware of that at one point, but didn't make the connection.

I'm joining your picket line, that shits fucked up. Justice for my boi porygon 😤

Talking to a former coworker who was a bit older, but always pretty friendly and cool in a refreshing way. He brings up the new young girl they just hired, and her “perky little tits and tight ass”. I guess it’s not crazy to say you find a girl attractive, but it just felt particularly creepy how he said it. I also just hate when I start becoming friends with a new person and I find out they’re a little pervy, and then they feel like they can start making pervy comments around me because now we’re bros.

Edit: wanted to add the inevitable “she hot?” that appears whenever any female ever comes up in discussion about anything. I can’t fucking stand that question.

Edit: wanted to add the inevitable “she hot?” that appears whenever any female ever comes up in discussion about anything. I can’t fucking stand that question.

Ever go complete dad-joke on them and respond with, "Couldn't tell ya, I didn't have a thermometer on me!"?

Really though, this is why I try to practice obfuscating gender when talking about others, as it makes stuff like that come up less often. A hidden perk of using they/them more.

Holy crap, dad-joking a response is brilliant. I am going to try that!

A lady I went on a date with said that she thought that The Joe Rogan Experience was funny

I was dating a guy who said he didn't think the state should be allowed to step in and separate couples when there is domestic violence.

Relationship ender.

Also a friend who said in the early days of Trump, that he had "a point" about some things. I won't have a discussion with anyone who won't see through a narcissist. It's not safe.

I think he would enjoy Chechnya, the state is forcing reunification of divorced couples.

Yeah, as some people have mentioned, when you get people doing the nudge nudge testing the racist/sexist/homophobic waters.

Was talking to a guy at work about upcoming holidays off, and he launches into: "Why do we have a Martin Luther King day anyways?!". Nope.