People Might Talk

During times of my college days, I have experienced social interactions that I had not commonly done in my earlier years. I talk and interact like normal people and I am used to it. How do I find out that I have experienced this so-called 'normal' interaction now, but not before? Well, simply put, I have been led to believe that I now know how people think. I now understand how people do a certain thing when they expect us to think that it was not what they intend.

I am now aware that people have certain social obligations they have to maintain. I need to know what people want from me in order to keep me and them related in a way -- maybe in a business way, maybe they just think I give good advice, maybe they think I'm funny -- and in order to do so I have to, somehow, care. I have to care what they feel about what I say to them, I have to care what they have to say to me.

That means I gotta listen to people whining about their bad days, their uncaring romance interests, or simply their burdening piles of homework. Don't get me wrong, I had always listened since my early school years, I was always the listener, but on those days it was because I don't talk much. I listened, but I couldn't bother to give any advice so that's probably why I don't have much friends. Right now, I am aware that when people talk to me, I have to give some kind of reaction. Nod, agree, say comforting stuff, possibly the same way you want people to react to you if you were to be in their position. This is probably also why I didn't make much friends in the past - I had never thought to be in their position and never did want to get any reaction (thus, not talking to people).

That means when people talk to me about other people, I have to listen as well. Probably not much, but as I began my journey on the normal-people-interaction steps, I've heard shit I don't think I'm supposed to. I thought this kind of things can only happen in the movies (although most of my kind of movies's people-shit-talking happens in front of the said people and followed by gun shootings afterwards), but apparently people do talk about people. Not necessarily talk bad things like "look at his face, so ugly!" (goddamn, are you 9 year old white boy?) -- or maybe more realistic "he talks funny" and then impersonation of his kind of talk. Do believe me, this thing actually happens.

One of my lecturer has this habit of nervously playing with the board marker whenever he explains to us about the stuffs he just wrote on the board. I notice this myself, but then one thing I did not notice was that he frequently says "ok" as he writes. Some classmates posted something about statistic of him "saying OK 67 times in the class today" in a class social media group. That is when I realized, people do notice unique things about people and apparently there are people taking interest in it because they notice the same thing. The 'statistic' received positive (by positive, I meant interested parties) reactions from other classmates.

The thing is that I'm not a saint when it comes to this case. I think bad about people more than you could possibly care about -- and right now I don't think you care, anyway. My hypothesis about shit-talking-about-people is that because people have habits. Through their habits, they will notice if there was anything weird out of ordinary. And they will feel the need to share the discovery of this extraordinary thing.


To bring an analogy, it's like seeing a blue leaf in a normal tree (unrealistic example, but I can't think of anything else right now). People are used to green leaf, and when they find this thing exists, they're stunned. They would then tell people about this and conversation could lead itself from there.
"I just saw a blue leaf in a perfectly normal tree."
"Really? I did too! Isn't that on the tree near that coffee shop on 3rd Street?"
"Yeah, it is! I wonder what sort of strange things going on there?"
---
The best thing about that leaf is that it won't take being called weird personally.

My point is that this 'shit-talking' is usually unintended. It's... I would dare say, normal. People just find something about people unusual, and they just happen to find someone who notice the same thing. They bond from there, because they somehow think alike. People talking shit about your favorite bands? That's probably because their music taste is different from you and they don't find screaming during verses as attractive as you do.



The next time you notice people talk shit about you... well, it's your decision to be mad or not. The only fact remains is that they find you different from them. If you're okay with being different, then don't be so mad at them. If you're not okay with being different, consider that as a critique from them and then you can change that.

The next time you realize you're shit talking about people, do aware that you're doing it because you think they are different from you. Probably some people also are talking about you because you have different opinion from them.
Because people are so different to one another, what this shit-talking thing do to us are finding us people who think similar to us so that we can make us some friends who think alike.

Maybe I thought of the phrase 'shit-talking' different from you, but my point stays the same nonetheless.