I think the most important thing here is for everyone to continue to communicate and keep an open mind. In the example above the girl could have been offended. And if she was upset then the custodian should have apologized and avoid making similar comments to this person in the future. The wrong thing to do if she had gotten upset at the comment would be to argue and tell the person they are over reacting or wrong.
People will always disagree. The important thing is to listen and make attempts to compromise.
Also I think for the most part we as a group are well ahead of the curve. I am sure these issues exist in all mixed sex social groups, but I doubt many display the level of concern and civility Iâve seen here.
I disagree. I donât think most people would consider âyou have great hairâ or âI really like that sweater youâre wearingâ to be sexist. Those are specific compliments that can and are applied universally.
Thereâs a giant gulf between âthatâs a fabulous scarfâ and a cat call.
I heard a story about a month and a half ago, and I have thought about it since then:
Without going into details, a friend of mine felt like she shouldnât smile too often at Pinburgh, because Smiling brings on unwanted conversations in between play, touching from strangers, and flirting. However, when she is focused and in her game zone everyone asks if she is sad, upset, or mad. Then they tell her to smile. Many players donât chit chat when they get closer to the end in tournaments so it should be ok when people donât reciprocate. Instead she is told that she looks miserable and must hate pinball.
I take away two things from her story:
She is probably more dedicated to this thing than I am, if she is willing to go through all of this in order to keep doing it. In other words, she must really love pinball.
Please tell me I have beautiful hair, too. While I have a few strands left.
(BTW, just for a fun tidbit: the gal I mentioned in yesterdayâs tale does indeed have beautiful, distinctive hair. In a âridiculously small worldâ story, a few years ago I identified her on a ski lift chair just ahead of me, 2000 miles away from our home, with no knowledge that she was there, just from her hair.)
Me, Iâm a quiet person because I have a bit of trouble figuring if something could be dumb or mean. Some things I think are perfectly fine to say will provoke people, and I remember when I was younger, I had some emotional breakdowns because seemingly everything that came out of my mouth would result in people yelling at me, insulting me, or somesuch. Itâs not as pronounced on a forum like this because I have more time to think about what I want to say. Itâs when Iâm expected to create a response on the spot that I have problemsâI can correct myself, but it takes me longer than normal. (My mom tells me it runs in my fatherâs side of the family, and from what I can see, sheâs right.)
Something else to consider is the culture in which one grows up. In much of the United States, you are expected to be outgoing, conversational, and glad to have company around, whereas in some other cultures (like the one I grew up in, the one from the country my parents came from), to behave like that is incredibly rude, and you are seen as intrusive and lacking regard for other peopleâs personal boundaries. Instead, you are supposed to be quiet, reserved, and speak only when asked of you. This may be why I have so much trouble, personally, as the two cultures are mutually exclusive. American culture celebrates extroversion and shuns introversion (that whole âHe was a quiet kid, always kept to himselfâ thatâs become cliche for serial killers), whereas some other cultures celebrate introversion and shun extroversion. I think this issue ought to be discussed more often due to how easily overlooked it is unless youâve been in places where extroverts are look down upon.
Look at how very oriented towards social interaction we are in the United States: Some fuel statons have attendants pumping the gas for you. At Walmart, there are greeters. At most grocery stores, there are baggers. Hand car washes outnumber machine car washes. There is almost none of this in much of Europe, and part of why Walmart flopped in Germany is because people found the greeters very annoying.
[quote=âphishrace, post:265, topic:1800, full:trueâ]I agree. A pinball machine is a very strong social lubricant. The social part is what brings us to the hobby. Thatâs why we do it. Back in the old days, when you had to go to the arcade to play, even if you went by yourself, there would always be a few other people around. So you were never really all by yourself.
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Might that be why pinball is not more popular in countries where you are socially expected to be quiet? Take Japan, for example, where pachinko is much more popular. Pachinko is a thoroughly solitary activity: If you look into a pachinko parlor, youâll find people at the machines playing the machines without saying a word, perhaps except for the occasional grunt or swear. They are fixated at their machines and donât communicate with each other. (That being said, pachinko is a gambling device, and while thereâs skill and competition, it is not popularly associated with that,but rather, as simply something to unwind after a hard dayâs work and you want to be left alone.)
I also wonder if thatâs part of the feud between pinball and video games, as video games nowadays are also mostly solitary, with players playing by themselves at home against online opponents.
(And let it be known that I am highly introverted: Nearly all of my hobbies are solitary, and I am highly uncomfortable around people I donât know. Even if I know theyâre friendly and will not judge me or belittle me, I still feel very nervous and apprehensive, and I never initiate a conversation with someone I donât know; only people who come up to chat with me first do I speak to.)
[quote=âjoe, post:294, topic:1800, full:trueâ]Righto, but I consider a statement of âI donât know how to play this gameâ from a friend to be a question. That itâs not phrased in the form of a question (Jeopardy! style) is not very relevant to me. If a majority of the community tells me that this isnât appropriate, Iâll certainly take that into consideration in the future, but as a human I donât want to be overly pedantic about sentence structure.
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I would say the proper response is to ask, âWould you like to know how to play it?â THAT is something I know almost anyone would be okay with, which I learned through sheer trial and error, through many instances of âStop helping me!â and âWell? Arenât you going to tell me?â
[quote=âmichi, post:301, topic:1800, full:trueâ]I try to find a way of talking to people such that I can talk to anyone without giving offense, no matter what the country of origin, religion, race, sex, social status, or any number of other things. The more different from myself the people I talk to are, the more I usually learn. On the other hand, if I stay silent, Iâm unlikely to learn much.
It really isnât rocket science. I listen, I pay attention to the vibe, Iâm polite, I try and think before I speak. When I disagree, I disagree respectfully, or phrase my disagreement as a question rather than an accusation. It works most of the time. When it doesnât, Iâm free to disengage rather instead of fighting a battle.
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Thereâs also the occasional case of the person who doesnât want to be spoken with at all too. But I think itâs not hard to identify those.
[quote=âpinwizj, post:309, topic:1800, full:trueâ]I hear that email/text interaction is even more complex in that respect
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Itâs way easier for me than face-to-face conversation, thatâs for sure, as Iâm given time to plan out what I want to say.
