[Urban Cragou]

I don’t mean loose acquaintances and other people, if not complete strangers, that you don’t owe that much of yourself interpersonally to. I mean within the circle of people you regard as at-least a C-grade friend (perhaps peripheral but definitely more than just an acquaintance). Are you a jaded cynic or do you just take them as they are and not give a second thought as-to what they might really think and say about you behind closed doors (e.g., out of envy; misunderstandings, rumours, aura)?

[Merry Mockmas]

It depends on what type of personality the friend has tbh.

Like if they're a gossip for example, then I wouldn't trust them with a secret.

[Urban Cragou]

Originally Posted by Mystic Mock

It depends on what type of personality the friend has tbh.

Like if they're a gossip for example, then I wouldn't trust them with a secret.

Ugh. If there’s one type of person in this life I hate with a burning passion, it’s a pathological gossip. People like that ruin lives and take people’s dignity out of their hands and crush them on loudspeaker.

[Merry Mockmas]

Originally Posted by Redway

Ugh. If there’s one type of person in this life I hate with a burning passion, it’s a pathological gossip. People like that ruin lives and take people’s dignity out of their hands and crush them on loudspeaker.

That's why you have to be careful what you tell a gossip.

[Urban Cragou]

Originally Posted by Mystic Mock

That's why you have to be careful what you tell a gossip.

It’s not even always about what you tell them. It’s about what they overhear (either from you or someone-else). We can’t always control what people hear about us, including the wrong hands (a notorious gossips).

[Merry Mockmas]

Originally Posted by Redway

It’s not even always about what you tell them. It’s about what they overhear (either from you or someone-else). We can’t always control what people hear about us, including the wrong hands (a notorious gossips).

That's true tbf.

[Oliver_W]

I don't really care if people talk about me when I'm not there - it's none of my business what other people think, etc.

I'm not an overly open person, so I'm not particularly likely to share anything with anyone I don't want spreading.

Not that there's much to say, I don't strangle hookers or anything.

[Peppermint]

Definitely depends on the person/situation, but not that many people are trustworthy in general tbf

[bots]

people are who they are. It's up to you to use your own judgement

[Christmas Dynasnow]

Winter, spring, summer or fall
All you've got to do is call

[Oliver_W]

Originally Posted by Crimson Dynamo

Winter, spring, summer or fall
All you've got to do is call

When the rain starts to fall...

[Urban Cragou]

Originally Posted by Oliver_W

I don't really care if people talk about me when I'm not there - it's none of my business what other people think, etc.

I'm not an overly open person, so I'm not particularly likely to share anything with anyone I don't want spreading.

Not that there's much to say, I don't strangle hookers or anything.

It’s good to hold in mind that the only person who has all the cards on you is you. You can reveal those cards selectively, depending on your level of proximity with the person. Some people’s mistrust or dislike of you has a tangential life of its own and has nothing to do with you as you actually are, like I always say, and sometimes it’s so confused and misplaced that it’s like they’re talking about a different person altogether, but that’s their energy to waste. I just think it’s important to hold and balance your cards well, because that is something, as you allude to, that’s within your control. People don’t need to know you or see you accurately, unfortunately, to have an opinion of you (and that goes for me; of-course I judge based on what I see and perceive, as we all do; I’d be a raging hypocrite to claim otherwise) but you can limit the amount or concrete stuff you give them to work with, even if those little tidbits seem insignificant. Some people will still use it as leverage against you.

[Thotmas]

I trust nobody and it has cost me a friendship or 2 as my lack of trust can cause me to be accusatory rather than just believing what they say lol

[Gusto Brunt]

I always exercise caution with anybody. Friends or not.

I am aware even friends can do the dirty.

[Thotmas]

Originally Posted by Redway

Ugh. If there’s one type of person in this life I hate with a burning passion, it’s a pathological gossip. People like that ruin lives and take people’s dignity out of their hands and crush them on loudspeaker.

I agree. I am not going to pretend I have not fallen into this pattern myself but now that I am older I am really trying to be careful not to gossip and not to entertain gossip coming from someone else.

The trouble is the line between sharing each others burdens and gossip which is not always easy to determine

[Urban Cragou]

I like how people you have no business trusting with your integrity in the first place think that telling you to “your face” in a virtual realm that they have a problem with you means serious business. You wouldn’t say it to my face in real life because we don’t know each-other and wouldn’t recognise each-other from a tin of Carnation-milk on the street. It’s not emboldened, just petty. Face-to-face trust (of integrity, of dignity with personal matters, of mutual respect) matters much more face-to-face when you’re not close to actually being friends with them, online or offline. I do need to be able to trust bank-workers with my financial integrity but I don’t need to trust a stranger on Instagram-threads to honour my integrity if we don’t see eye-to-eye on something. The natural instinct outside of having a kind of personal relationship with them or perceiving a tinge of affability that doesn’t compromise or change on people like a whim is not to trust. Stranger-danger.

[Urban Cragou]

Originally Posted by Ithinkiloveyoutoo

I agree. I am not going to pretend I have not fallen into this pattern myself but now that I am older I am really trying to be careful not to gossip and not to entertain gossip coming from someone else.

The trouble is the line between sharing each others burdens and gossip which is not always easy to determine

For me, the line is spreading rumours (especially about people you barely know) or really doing the dirty on someone’s dignity by broadcasting things from the rooftops, windows wide-open, about stuff that should really be kept more personal. It’s fine to talk negatively about people when you have a reason not to like them (especially if it’s based on actual experience with them). That’s fine. We all do it. Not everyone’s gonna be in our good books, nor should they be. A bit of tea to boot, also okay. But my issue is when it triangulates and spreads like wildfire, especially when the person’s relatively quiet and the type to mind their own business (in which case, why not mind your own business back?), or it concerns things that just should not be broadcast on Zoom-loudspeaker for everyone to hear, and unfortunately there are a lot of avenues that lead to that. People who blatantly and unmistakably put themselves out there are asking for that kind of gossip but people who are just in the corner minding they business and tryna get on with life? Not good. Also not comfortable with how the toxic kind of gossip (smear-campaigning, unnecessary rumours, blatantly disregarding the need for discretion and maintaining people’s personal dignity when they’re not asking for trouble) maps onto narcissism, or at the very least severe interpersonal toxicity. It’s very unhealthy. I avoid people like that like the plague, but, again, I’m not talking about normal sharing the teas, normal conversation about other people and just talking negatively about people you don’t like. That’s fine. It’s the kind of toxic gossip I’m talking about. For me, it’s not so much about what you say about someone as it is how loudly you say it and how many people you say it to unnecessarily. People have the right to say whatever they like behind (relatively) closed doors but stereotypical gossips, by their very nature, are the least discreet about it. Like I say, they do it with the windows wide open, pass the rumour-mill onto anyone with ears (including people who have never even met the gossipee), shout it from the rooftops, smear-campaign a perfectly-good person just out of jealousy or lack of conversational boundaries. That’s where the problem is for me. It’s frightening to think that some of those people work for the likes of the NHS.

[Urban Cragou]

Originally Posted by Gusto Brunt

I always exercise caution with anybody. Friends or not.

I am aware even friends can do the dirty.

They can.

[Zizu]

I have only had a handful of friends in my time but all 100% good and faithful

[Urban Cragou]

Originally Posted by Urban Cragou

For me, the line is spreading rumours (especially about people you barely know) or really doing the dirty on someone’s dignity by broadcasting things from the rooftops, windows wide-open, about stuff that should really be kept more personal. It’s fine to talk negatively about people when you have a reason not to like them (especially if it’s based on actual experience with them). That’s fine. We all do it. Not everyone’s gonna be in our good books, nor should they be. A bit of tea to boot, also okay. But my issue is when it triangulates and spreads like wildfire, especially when the person’s relatively quiet and the type to mind their own business (in which case, why not mind your own business back?), or it concerns things that just should not be broadcast on Zoom-loudspeaker for everyone to hear, and unfortunately there are a lot of avenues that lead to that. People who blatantly and unmistakably put themselves out there are asking for that kind of gossip but people who are just in the corner minding they business and tryna get on with life? Not good. Also not comfortable with how the toxic kind of gossip (smear-campaigning, unnecessary rumours, blatantly disregarding the need for discretion and maintaining people’s personal dignity when they’re not asking for trouble) maps onto narcissism, or at the very least severe interpersonal toxicity. It’s very unhealthy. I avoid people like that like the plague, but, again, I’m not talking about normal sharing the teas, normal conversation about other people and just talking negatively about people you don’t like. That’s fine. It’s the kind of toxic gossip I’m talking about. For me, it’s not so much about what you say about someone as it is how loudly you say it and how many people you say it to unnecessarily. People have the right to say whatever they like behind (relatively) closed doors but stereotypical gossips, by their very nature, are the least discreet about it. Like I say, they do it with the windows wide open, pass the rumour-mill onto anyone with ears (including people who have never even met the gossipee), shout it from the rooftops, smear-campaign a perfectly-good person just out of jealousy or lack of conversational boundaries. That’s where the problem is for me. It’s frightening to think that some of those people work for the likes of the NHS.

So in other words I’m moralising exposure, not just-plain negativity. I’m especially concerned when the person is relatively quiet, non-performative, not seeking attention and not publicly positioning themselves as a figure to be scrutinised, ridiculed or mocked. For people to then take those people’s dignity out of their hands (especially people they barely even know to begin with), a line’s been crossed. There’s a line between normal social processing and toxic gossip, and a lot of it hinges on volume rather than just-plain content. It’s not really about that for me.

Once a rumour, which may or may not have any truth in it, reaches people who have never even met the subject, let-alone had anything like a proper conversation with them, it’s reputational contamination. And I can’t stand for taking the option of people getting to know the subject first-hand for themselves out of their hands just for the sake of spreading gossip about a complete stranger. I can tolerate human messiness but not broadcast-cruelty and total lack of containment in situations where natural discretion are supposed to serve as inherent boundaries. And if they’re the type to pally up with the subject as-if they haven’t totally slandered them and tried to throw their reputation under a bus, there’s no guarantee that they won’t do the same to you, too. And that’s coercive abuse. It’s trauma, the kind some people never get over.

[Livia]

I have a couple of good friends I've known for years, sadly lost my closest friend to cancer this year... I'd have trusted him with my life. I have been badly let down by people I thought were my friend but who, when push came to shove, when I needed them most, backed the other side. It's terribly upsetting and has made me so much less trusting of people.