[It's obviously a joke, but this is a moment where if he doesn't offer something in return that's going to be noticed; whether it'll be seen as being cold or just as a noteworthy curiosity he's not sure, but either way he thinks it might be okay to just be honest along with a caveat.]
I studied psychology, so I'm mostly made up of condescension and unwanted advice.
[Also obviously a joke, though his next comment is not--]
And that's not something I want widely shared, for probably obvious reasons.
[He's really glad Ian understands; he thought he would, but still. Lance often feels quite guilty for not telling anyone, but--]
That's why I decided not to mention it before; in Hadriel it caused so many problems. But yeah, it wasn't just undergrad; appropriately enough I specialize in trauma counseling.
[Something that you know, should be useful here, but he absolutely doesn't want to deal with how terrible the comments and insinuations would be if people here knew that.]
Is it normal for people to suddenly feel like you're going to psychically read their minds and see all of their problems as soon as you tell them that or is that just me
[Though he really appreciates that Ian's calling them 'weird'.]
My profession normally comes up at home and I made it clear in Hadriel, so this is the first time in a long time that I've been consistently interacting with strangers as just me. Maybe there's something I'm unaware of that's still coming across, and without the explanation for it it's just causing people to draw strange conclusions.
People get uncomfortable when they're asked questions that challenge their mindset. Conversations with you make people critically think, which makes them consider & acknowledge the possible flaws in their perspective from an outside point of view, and they transplant those insecurities onto you believing you to be insinuating them.
That's my theory, anyway. Fragile egos read things in a different inflection than they're actually presented, and paint over it with malice or condescension that doesn't actually exist.
But I think you're right, though this is still a very unusual level of aggression. I mean I would expect some amount of this to be occurring, but not necessarily for people to be so willing to actively fight about it.
[It's very strange and people need to chill just slightly.]
Normally extreme defensiveness either indicates a very deep-seated emotional issue, or something they're hiding. I'm usually inclined to believe the former if it's just one person, but it's so widespread.
Yeah, I don't know if we can blame it all on emotional issues. Not with there being so many people.
Then again, that does seem to be a running theme here among most of the displaced. I think I could probably count on one hand the number of people I might consider emotionally healthy.
It was the same in Hadriel, generally; probably because of the chaos Door, like I told you about. But the way everyone acted toward each other was pretty distinctly different, and why it's so different here would be a fascinating thing to study, but right now I'm just sort of confused.
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[It's obviously a joke, but this is a moment where if he doesn't offer something in return that's going to be noticed; whether it'll be seen as being cold or just as a noteworthy curiosity he's not sure, but either way he thinks it might be okay to just be honest along with a caveat.]
I studied psychology, so I'm mostly made up of condescension and unwanted advice.
[Also obviously a joke, though his next comment is not--]
And that's not something I want widely shared, for probably obvious reasons.
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That's why I decided not to mention it before; in Hadriel it caused so many problems. But yeah, it wasn't just undergrad; appropriately enough I specialize in trauma counseling.
[Something that you know, should be useful here, but he absolutely doesn't want to deal with how terrible the comments and insinuations would be if people here knew that.]
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[ Ha ha nervous laughter ha ha jokes. ]
Kind of makes all of it a little funnier in hindsight.
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[Putting it in nice terms.]
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Most of them
You get a lot of reactions, most of them jumping to some weird conclusions about your motivation or your attitude
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[Though he really appreciates that Ian's calling them 'weird'.]
My profession normally comes up at home and I made it clear in Hadriel, so this is the first time in a long time that I've been consistently interacting with strangers as just me. Maybe there's something I'm unaware of that's still coming across, and without the explanation for it it's just causing people to draw strange conclusions.
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That's my theory, anyway. Fragile egos read things in a different inflection than they're actually presented, and paint over it with malice or condescension that doesn't actually exist.
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But I think you're right, though this is still a very unusual level of aggression. I mean I would expect some amount of this to be occurring, but not necessarily for people to be so willing to actively fight about it.
[It's very strange and people need to chill just slightly.]
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But you're right, the defensiveness in a lot of these people is off the charts sometimes.
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Normally extreme defensiveness either indicates a very deep-seated emotional issue, or something they're hiding. I'm usually inclined to believe the former if it's just one person, but it's so widespread.
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Then again, that does seem to be a running theme here among most of the displaced. I think I could probably count on one hand the number of people I might consider emotionally healthy.
Not that I'm the expert.
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[The issues. So many issues. But--]
It was the same in Hadriel, generally; probably because of the chaos Door, like I told you about. But the way everyone acted toward each other was pretty distinctly different, and why it's so different here would be a fascinating thing to study, but right now I'm just sort of confused.