I’m autistic and I’ve learned to stop trying to play this game. Instead, I just make assholes like this explain their sideways ass comments in a straightforward fashion for the group. Forcing people to explain bigoted comments and not allowing the subject to change has now made everyone uncomfortable. Not so fucking funny anymore. I usually don’t have to do this more than once or twice within a specific group.
I also stopped playing ‘the game’ long ago and no longer put up with shitty people, but I can only do that because I’m on SSDI and don’t have to interact with people in an employment setting.
Anon here is learning the hard way that basically, to advance in almost any modern, monetarily lucrative career, and most non lucrative ones, welp, you have to play this stupid social jockeying game because that is subconsciously how most others determine your worth as an employee, as a coworker.
You can do the ‘explain why thats funny’ angle, but that just makes … you look like an asshole, a killjoy … to the people whose jobs are their lives, their selves.
It has been working for me, and I’ve been getting promoted. I also tell the truth to executive leadership against advice. I just don’t have the bandwidth to fully mask and complete the job I’m paid to do. I mask the essentials, but I’m not playing games. We have work to do.
Well damn, I am genuinely shocked that is working for you, but also very glad to hear that at least its working out well for you!
I had a job like that once.
Also autistic here. Let’s say you reply with “So why is that funny” and that person or a third person says “Don’t be so sensetive”. What’s the best way to force the explanation?
Violence is the best way to force anything. As soon as one’s strategy has devolved to forcing people into things, it’s best to just be authentic about it and own the violence.
I just say it’s either funny or it isn’t.
Humor is an authentication mechanism. It’s either funny or it isn’t, and that binary signal is the whole point of humor. It’s an indicator people are on the same page or they aren’t.
I’m not kidding. Humor is a test. You don’t ask “why wasn’t that password the right one?”. The password was either a match or it wasn’t.
Once you understand the social function of humor, the question “why is that funny?” becomes bunk.
“Well, you know, Irish cuisine has a lot of potatoes in it.”
Joke fucking explained. How do you figure the guy’s going to be on the spot, exactly?
I guess you never heard of the potato famine then, which was a type of genocide visited upon the Irish by the British. Hence the 'sudden’jump from potatoes to bombing hospitals.
That’s the source of potato jokes people crack about the Irish.
I’ve heard of it. It happened in the 1800’s on another continent. Can you explain what it has to do with eating potatoes?
“I guess I don’t know. Sorry, I didn’t mean anything by it.” With a look on his face that clearly shows confusion at why you spent two whole responses about something as insignificant (in his mind) as potatoes. Everyone else probably has similar looks.
For small talk like that you get one response on the topic. If someone said I should order potatoes because I’m Irish I’d lean so far into it, adapt an obvious accent, and say “Oh I do loove me potatoes.” If I wanted to backhand him a little I’d tack on “Except during the famine when there were no potatoes. Those were daark days” to the first statement. There’s enough humor in the accent to cover the callout mass starvation he probably unwittingly referenced.