Part of a long, rambling post Robert put up the other day on his blog really made me nod and say "yes". Because, you know what, yes. Because it touches on something I've been arguing for years.

Despite what I had to say in the last post about on-the-job word ninnies, I am about the job at the job, and my actual response to other people's reaction to the way I talk is...I tone it down when I know I'm around somebody the swearing will bother.

I hold back on the trucker talk, you hold back on the Jesus talk, and we don't jump down each other's throats when some of it slips out.

If you can't do that, hold it in for other people, you're a jackass and you'll just keep getting in trouble and wondering why. If you run to HR whenever somebody's else's Stuff That Irritates You comes out, everybody around you will hate you, you will not get that tolerance when you need it, and...you probably won't figure out why, either.

See, that top bit? That's what I do, too. No, not here in my journal space, though I may and have if asked by someone sincerely, but if you know me in-the-flesh, you know it and know I won't poke at it, whatever "it" happens to be for you.

But it's really about this:

If you can't do that, hold it in for other people, you're a jackass and you'll just keep getting in trouble and wondering why.

I want everyone to look at that, and instead of going, "Yeah, see? That's what people need to do!" also look at the other half of that, which is:

If you run to HR whenever somebody's else's Stuff That Irritates You comes out, everybody around you will hate you, you will not get that tolerance when you need it, and...you probably won't figure out why, either.

People need to do that, too. And the nuance here is what I think the various critics who have shook their finger at me about these things, and various anti-racism (or anti-whatever) activists and leftist "oppression" and "correction" and "privilege" experts, just don't get. Those folks end up being the hated, clueless git who can't get the tolerance they keep demanding when they actually need it, precisely because...well, they can't figure it out.

(Which is amusing, because Robert is talking about the right-wingers who don't get it, either.)

But it's not that hard TO figure out, so I leave it to anyone who is in the "doesn't get it" boat, or the "I deserve not to be tweaked by my issues" boat, who can't figure out the balance between those to work out for themselves (ie: those who have a horse to ride about privilege and invisible knapsacks and cultural racism/sexism/discrimination and "welcoming" environments and so forth).

And we're not really talking about a business environment or HR here, which I hope we all get. It becomes an analogy for the bigger social environment. Really, they're running to the media, or the government, or their friends, or anyone who will listen to them for five seconds every day complain about how bad everyone else is for upsetting them and how they all better just stop because they're bad people, especially if they don't.

And we're talking about how those people hear that criticism of that behavior and think it means they have to just shut-up all the time and get run roughshod over and so forth and OMG-more-oppression-oppression-oppression. Which is why I said they don't get it.