Excuse Me

You know, I find myself interrupting people, not because I'm "manterrupting", but because I just seem to do it. I actually dislike interrupting people, in part because I myself hate being interrupted. But the fact is, my mind often goes a million miles a minute, with all sorts of thoughts popping into my head, and when talking to someone else, I often find myself impulsively wanting to say what happens to have popped into my mind RIGHT then. Otherwise it might well be lost to the wind in the next few moments. It has nothing to do with my gender, or their gender, and I don't love when it happens. But the fact is, people interrupt. And talk over each other, especially people who are more familiar and comfortable with each other.

On the same token, I also often find myself explaining (NOT "mansplaining") things to people. Not because I think they're idiots, or know less than me, and certainly never because of their gender. I am a lover and seeker of knowledge myself, and thus I love to share knowledge with people. If I knew that they already knew what I'm explaining, I wouldn't WANT to be explaining it, and have felt that way after the fact when LEARNING they already knew. But I'm not psychic, if you are having a conversation with someone and have no idea if they know about ____ subject, and you enthusiastically want to tell them about it, you just start talking. Unmaliciously.

I am not saying that these things don't occur in society, though I DO and WILL constantly proclaim that those terms are ignorant, counter-productive and unnecessary. But I AM saying, that just because a man interrupts or talks over you, or explains something to you, doesn't automatically mean he's some entitled, misogynist, "privileged" monster. I've known (and experienced) MANY women who have interrupted, talked over, or explained things already known, to me OR to others.

And as I've stated in the past, if you actually bother looking at the psychology and sociology of little boys (AND many girls), they grow up interrupting and talking over and explaining to each other, all the time. That is simply how they learn to communicate. I could certainly see and understand how this happening, in a professional environment, and certainly done in a blatantly rude way, could be angering or frustrating. But tackling this with anger and bitterness and rudeness, is counterproductive, and isn't going to help fix or improve anything. Some people, granted, are just assholes. But I'm willing to bet that MANY people in your life who interrupt you, talk over you, or explain things to you you already know about, AREN'T doing so maliciously, and AREN'T trying to belittle you or "assert dominance" over you. They're just doing it, impulsively. And confronting them about it, with empathy, understanding, and patience, might very well be a far more effective communicating tool, to help yourself be better heard, and to help THEM to better understand you and better communicate with you, than being rude and shitty to someone because they do these things.

Being an asshole because you feel someone else is being an asshole, has never in the history of humanity, stopped anyone from being an asshole. Negative does not negate Negative. Be the Change you want to see in the world, and in other people.