Comment on When asked a question, what is your first reaction, to answer the question or to defend yourself?
RightHandOfIkaros@lemmy.world 8 months ago
It depends on the question.
If the question seems to come from a place of genuine curiosity or if the person seems to be asking in good faith I usually try to answer the question to the best of my ability (and sometimes I might still try to answer even if its clear the pwrson is not asking in good faith).
If the question is obviously coming from a place of bad faith or is obvious the person asking doesn’t actually want an answer, sometimes I will still try to answer but most of the time I won’t even bother.
If the question is accusatory in nature, I will obviously want to defend myself if I am innocent of the accusation.
spiderwort@lemm.ee 8 months ago
Do you have something to hide?
RightHandOfIkaros@lemmy.world 8 months ago
I suppose I do have things to hide, but I don’t make an active attempt to try to hide anything I do or have.
As a side note, this is what I would consider a “bad faith question.” This is a question that you are asking as an attempt to hit me with some “gotcha” moment. If I answer “No,” then you say I am being defensive. If I say “Yes,” then you say I am lying. I may be dumb but I wasn’t born yesterday.
You don’t actually want to know what things I have to hide if I had any, and you likely don’t care. A person would respect other’s privacy and not ask out of that principle anyways, even if you were curious.
spiderwort@lemm.ee 8 months ago
Or maybe it’s an example of a “gotcha question”, asked to introduce the subject of such. Because there is ambiguity there. Or maybe I’m feeling my way along and checking to see where your answers switch from “responsive” to “defensive”.
Some people straightman it to the death, so the line is hard to find. Which could be called defensive from the start.
RightHandOfIkaros@lemmy.world 8 months ago
Honestly, this just sounds like you are a pseudointellectual that thinks you’re much more intelligent than you actually are. I have had conversations with people that respond similarly to you, and this conversation has gone far enough for me to recognize that it will be a waste of my time. I don’t care what you do with your time, but I won’t allow you to waste more of mine than you already have.
spiderwort@lemm.ee 8 months ago
“Do you have anything to hide” is just crass. I wouldn’t have replied to it.