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  • mashedtatersmashedtaters Member Posts: 2,266
    edited November 2016
    @TStael

    I have posted again with the aim of answering your question below, before I move on.
    TStael said:

    My reticent does not exclude dose of extroverted, but I am thankful I do not suffer from any condition that attrackts gazes of others all the time. If you don't mind my asking: how much does this bother you?

    Here is the blog post:

    https://eppalive.wordpress.com/2016/11/12/feeling-the-stares/
    JuliusBorisovRavenslightTStael
  • RavenslightRavenslight Member Posts: 1,609
    First I’d like to thank chimaera for bringing up the question of how to follow your blog. I didn’t know that one could just use an email. Works great!

    Second, your latest blog gave my soul a lift this morning, thank you for that. :)
    JuliusBorisovRelSundanmashedtaters
  • SkatanSkatan Member, Moderator Posts: 5,352
    I hadn't read since your first blog entry, so now I read'em all in a row (I'm at work, what else should I do with my time?).

    Don't want to write something that will come across as overly enthusiastic ("Oh boy you are so human despite your inhuman condition!") or involuntarily condescending ("Wow, even though you have this.. syndrom.. you are still almost like me"), so I'm just gonna say that I hear you, I see you, and now I will also see others like you as the people they are. Also, now I know what I should ask them (or avoid asking/joking) if I encounter any of those five ppl per one million.

    RelSundanmashedtatersgorgonzolaTStael
  • TStaelTStael Member Posts: 861
    Interesting read, mashedtaters - thx! :smile:

    Just to be a bit lighthearted, also resting one's feet and enjoying how wonderfully Parisians or Milanese dress in a street café, this needs must not be rude sort of staring, gääh! :tongue:

    That said, I am glad I can be "invisible" because I am just unextraordinary looking, either way. I am sort of guessing not many can bring themselves to at least look you in the eyes, and nod, to signal they don't want to be rude, even if they cannot really help but notice you?

    You do not directly mention size of your home town, but is it me going overboard when I fear that someone like you could meet with real danger of being even harmed as suspected robber in cities such as NY or LA, if walking into a bank?


    As Gary Larson, cartoonist put it, in scene of amoeba-couple fighting, the hubby in front of a telly, his wife lamenting: "Stimulus response! Stimulus response! Don't you ever think!"

    Often we don't, I would guess, but respond to deep-seated impulses and biases that are sometimes even outright harmful for kind human interaction in our day and age.

    Only this weekend in a larger coversation about internet bullying/populism, when I admitted to my dear friend that I sometimes catch my brain producing tribal or judgemental impulses, she was quite dismissive in fact, or a bit shocked, becasue she likes the way I treat others. But it does not mean I'd never have to transcend "stimulus / response" - and think.

    This was kind of a painful admission because there is an internal sense of shame afterwards, and shame is an inhibition to frankness. I see that frankness analogous to air in a compost heap to produce fruitful earth instead of a rotting mess.

    In context of this thread, it is being able to admit to mashedtaters wihtout too much shame that my inhibitons and fear of doing a faux pas, and simply lack of experience, might make me fail from my ideal response which is polite and inclusive, should I meet his peer. And to keep on exchanging views frankly and positively to minimise the risk of that eventuality.


    At least with curious children, they are just observing something they've never experienced, but unless they've been socialised to reject difference upfront, that curious look is not dehumanising yet.

    Do you ever accost these children?

    I appreciate it does kind of shift the burden on you, but as from my personal formative experience, i think it could help sow seeds of acceptance of difference, in this case people looking different. (In my case any space for homophobia to take root was annihiliated from my soul at age of about five or six by just seeing two familiy friends become enamoured. I simply asked if they'd be getting married now because I was aware I had not seen such a couple before. Now they could in FI, not then.) Our society bombards every man and woman with unrealistic ideals, and that our looks are very important - and children grow to internalise that, unfortuantely.



    PS. Cartoon embedded in this article, :love: Larson!

    https://legalba.com/2011/10/10/amoebic-management-its-just-stimulus-response/
    RavenslightmashedtatersSkatanGrammarsalad
  • mashedtatersmashedtaters Member Posts: 2,266
    @TStael

    Yes, I have been stopped by police on several occasions, and even almost arrested. That is a topic for a later blog post, however.

    As far as explaining to children, I need to be careful because their parents are usually around and they are usually suspicious of me. My wife usually says something to anyone who asks on my behalf though.

    Thanks for you insightful encouragement!
    RavenslightTStaelCrevsDaak
  • RavenslightRavenslight Member Posts: 1,609
    @mashedtaters said:
    Yes, I have been stopped by police on several occasions, and even almost arrested. That is a topic for a later blog post, however.

    This statement gave me a pang of panic in the pit of my stomach. I can understand how police might be suspicious of someone dressed in the way that you must be. But If they were suspicious enough to ask you to remove pieces of clothing…

    My mind is bombarded with questions. Would they make him remove his coat to make sure he wasn’t carrying something he shouldn’t be? Or his hat so that they could check his ID picture against his face? What might be an inconvenient or irritating experience for someone else could be life threatening for him.

    I look forward to reading your upcoming blog post on this subject.
    TStaelmashedtaters
  • TStaelTStael Member Posts: 861
    edited November 2016

    @TStael

    Yes, I have been stopped by police on several occasions, and even almost arrested. That is a topic for a later blog post, however.

    As far as explaining to children, I need to be careful because their parents are usually around and they are usually suspicious of me. My wife usually says something to anyone who asks on my behalf though.

    Thanks for you insightful encouragement!

    Goodness me - that's just horrendous mashedtaters, and I hope you keep your chin up in that special place!

    I am frankly very sorry you have to respond in this way, I am! Just shocked on your behalf. Because I am reading between the lines that these parents are fearing the way you dress is maybe linked to you harming children, which would be really foolish from a purported "cunning predator."

    This is a very poor consolation, because it needs must not have to be offered but... I've read a few opinion pieces in Finnish papers where some ordinary men have felt deeply offended of their gender-profiling. Once one was re-seated in an aeroplane not to sit next to an unaccampanied child-traveller - what the heck!! And some ordinary father gave a sad testimonial that coming to meet his child at preschool, just loitering for the programme to finish attracted suspicious looks.

    I perso do not want children, and I must admit it is in part due to way the world is changing: more suspicious, less humanely connected, more selfish, less based on objective merit. I was quite young when Berlin wall fell, but I still remember the optimism and sense of unity that followed from it for our continent at least, maybe for the world. I remember introduction of Euro.

    I admit I come from a "soft place" - rural Finland - in terms of security if not always acceptance of difference. I very vividly recall that when I moved back from Scottsdale AZ to Europe, Basel CH - I rejoiced seeing again young siblings walking hand-in-hand to school: elder maybe nine, the younger seven. It was return to a world of lesser fear and greater trust, is all.

    What I want to say: it should not be like this, but it is not you - just times that are suspicious and uncertain, where I think we would need more human connection and less wholesale suspicion.

    I very strongly believe children would meet you without fear if given the chance, and even from these constrained glimples, hopefully they will just observe. And from the slightest references I like your wife a lot! :smile:


    I look fwd to your blog thou it will be harrowing reading! Maybe, just maybe a security person will read it, and think how to balance it - without you having to wear a great big : "I am a desease sufferer" placard around your neck!


    PS. A significantly dear love of mine had diabetes, and had of course the diabetes bracelet, but the insulin-shock made that admirable person totally different - argumentative, weird, hard to handle to an ingnorant outside eye. Drunk or a psyciatric patient, to boil it down. It is not one or two diabetes sufferes that have been taken unto sobering cell because that behaviour was assumed drunken and disorderly behavior.

    Want to say: it is hard, when there is but a "small sign," and hope of goodwill and not assuming the worst.



    Edit: had to correct the spelling of the OP moniker in the first paragraph - told him he pulls no punches to fenno-ugrians at least!
    Post edited by TStael on
    mashedtatersCrevsDaakRavenslight
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 0
    edited December 2016
    The user and all related content has been deleted.
    RavenslightmashedtatersCrevsDaak
  • GrammarsaladGrammarsalad Member Posts: 2,582
    edited December 2016
    Just starting your blog now. I'm reading an entry on consistency and interest. I can relate a little. I get migraines triggered by environmental stimuli. If someone sits next to me on the train while wearing the wrong perfume, I'm in agony for about three days, give or take. So, there is a bit of anxiety any time i get a whiff, or think i get a whiff, of such an offensive substance.

    There are substances that i can tolerate sometimes, but not other times. If I'm exposed to one of the really bad ones, then I'm more vulnerable to these other substances. For example, I can handle the smell of burnt food on many days, but it's like breathing in daggers on one of my sensitive days

    I describe it like an abrasion on the skin. Sure, if your skin is unbroken, you can rub your hand across sandpaper without issue (maybe it'll tickle). But tear off some of that skin first, and it's a different, more painful experience that you really want to avoid. I have to explain this constantly to the same people over and over and over and over again.

    Of course, this is nothing like EEP. I'm sorry that you have to go through this. I hope it gives you a little bit of comfort knowing that you have some random dude on the internet as an ally
    RelSundanCrevsDaakmashedtaters
  • RelSundanRelSundan Member Posts: 918
    We are all allies here @Grammarsalad :)
    GrammarsaladCrevsDaakmashedtaters
  • mashedtatersmashedtaters Member Posts: 2,266

    Just starting your blog now. I'm reading an entry on consistency and interest. I can relate a little. I get migraines triggered by environmental stimuli. If someone sits next to me on the train while wearing the wrong perfume, I'm in agony for about three days, give or take. So, there is a bit of anxiety any time i get a whiff, or think i get a whiff, of such an offensive substance.

    There are substances that i can tolerate sometimes, but not other times. If I'm exposed to one of the really bad ones, then I'm more vulnerable to these other substances. For example, I can handle the smell of burnt food on many days, but it's like breathing in daggers on one of my sensitive days

    I describe it like an abrasion on the skin. Sure, if your skin is unbroken, you can rub your hand across sandpaper without issue (maybe it'll tickle). But tear off some of that skin first, and it's a different, more painful experience that you really want to avoid. I have to explain this constantly to the same people over and over and over and over again.

    Of course, this is nothing like EEP. I'm sorry that you have to go through this. I hope it gives you a little bit of comfort knowing that you have some random dude on the internet as an ally

    You have my empathy for your condition, @Grammarsalad . It can bring a lot of difficult emotions to the surface when trying to explain what is perceived as intermittent or inconsistent personal issues.
    Now that we are joined in alliance, let's conquer. :smile:
    CrevsDaakGrammarsaladGod
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