Thursday, November 05, 2009

Snark attack

So an ex-neighbor of mine at the old house sent out a snarky email to a neighborhood email list about us. I replied to the entire list with maximum cheerfulness and a side of snark (aggressively ignoring that he meant to be a meany, I mean)...

...and he took offence.

Which leads me to ask of you, my friends, what causes people to get offended when the person they are trying to attack takes the middle road of neither ignoring nor lashing out? Is it because responding with good humor makes the attacker look ridiculous?

Your thoughts?

10 comments:

Madeleine said...

I think he gave up his right to be offended when he sent the snarky email to a large list.

Madeleine said...

And yes, you are probably correct that your reply made him look mean-spirited, which makes him defensive and grouchy.

Rebecca said...

Yea - I think it's because it makes them look ridiculous, realizing that they never should have written what they did.

What a crappy thing to have to deal with :(

Liz Miller said...

More funny than crappy. The guy hates us 'cause 8 years ago we asked him to ask his kid to slow down when driving through the neighborhood.

susan said...

That's just odd. Way to go, you.

Jenn said...

Ha! He just got upset because his late-night anonymous internet rantings were actually linked to, um, REAL PEOPLE who then replied thus making him aware that it wasn't all taking place in his small little pea-brain.

Unknown said...

Other people are dumb.

You wouldn't believe how often that sentence comes in handy.

kathy a. said...

oh, good response! sounds like it was effective, too.

these kinds of passive-aggressive things are icky. if you ignore, you lose. if you respond as the person hopes, with a touch of anger, you lose: it just proves you are bad. so good cheer must have driven him insane; it was not part of the master plan.

ccw said...

Wow, 8 years later he feels the need to lash out at your family via a snippy e-mail. I think he might be helped better by a therapist.

Good for you for not ignoring nor attacking him. I agree with the others, he's probably mad because it just made him look like an ass.

Miche said...

Wow.