When people come to you with gossip...Do you ask...

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Sigmund

Sigmund

Waiting in Uber.
Jan 3, 2010
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In your mirror.
Good hump evening! (Yay! The weekend is in sight.)

I'm one-hundred-seventy-nine (179) years old (ha) and it never ceases to amaze me ...

When a family member, co-worker etc, sidles up to me and says "Do you know what so-and-so said about you? "

They proceed to tell me all the dish and I listen. Intently. When they finish talking (doesn't matter what they said) I ask, "And what did YOU say?"

Just wondering.


 
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Lepplady

Lepplady

Chillin' since 2006
Nov 30, 2006
12,498
65,639
Red Stick
If anybody comes to me with gossip, I listen to it with a grain of salt, and then I do two things:
First, I go to whoever the gossip is about and ask. I don't believe something just because I hear it.
Secondly, I remind myself that if somebody will talk smack TO you about somebody else, they'll gossip ABOUT you, too.
 
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Sigmund

Sigmund

Waiting in Uber.
Jan 3, 2010
13,979
44,046
In your mirror.
Lepplady said:
If anybody comes to me with gossip, I listen to it with a grain of salt, and then I do two things:
First, I go to whoever the gossip is about and ask. I don't believe something just because I hear it.
Secondly, I remind myself that if somebody will talk smack TO you about somebody else, they'll gossip ABOUT you, too.
Click to expand...

Thank you! (That's what I was trying to say. The part I bolded.)

Peace.
 
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hipmamajen

hipmamajen

Rebel Rebel, your face is a mess.
Apr 4, 2008
4,650
6,090
Colorado
I had a painful situation a few years back in my small homeschool community. There was a group break up, and drama, etc. I was determined to take the high road, because when you don't you just get too much sewage on yourself.

Apparently we were not all playing by the same rules, because I was hearing stories about all of the truly nasty things I'd done for *years* afterwards from new-to-me people in our little community. The other group had fallen apart, partially because of the poisonous atmosphere, so their ex-members were on the move looking for new support groups.

These were people who had no real knowledge of me ahead of time, so it wasn't like they were supposed to have defended my honor. This was a situation where we met later and they were shocked to find that I didn't eat babies for elevenses...or worse. (In my defense, the split happened over a weird personal issue between the people who left. Not because of my baby-eating habits.)

The absolute rock bottom was when I met a lady, and asked if she'd found a place for herself in town, and suggested the group I was running, among others. She singled my group out and said, "I don't think I want to have anything to do with those guys, all I know is that their leader Jen is a real b1tch!"

After THAT awkward conversation, "Um, I'm Jen. And I'm pretty sure I know how you heard about me, and it's okay..." she ended up hanging around we're still friends.

Gossip goes farther than you think, and generally makes you look worse than the person you're spreading stories about.
 
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KingAHolic

KingAHolic

Banned
Feb 3, 2015
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Old Dominion
Most people I know don't even start because they know I won't say anything.

If it's someone I don't know that well they might try, but normally I just listen and try to get through it and when they are done try to say something related enough to change the subject (e.g. "you know I think such and such is about to his wife" and then I'll say, speaking of "such and such", I saw their neighbor at the market the other day, their oldest son just graduated from high school.."
 
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Spideyman

Spideyman

Uber Member
Jul 10, 2006
46,336
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79
Just north of Duma Key
Example of gossip via the Tao

From the movie “Doubt”

A woman was gossiping with a friend about a man she hardly knew – I know none of you have ever done this – that night she had a dream. A great hand appeared over her and pointed down at her. She was immediately seized with an overwhelming sense of guilt. The next day she went to confession. She got the old parish priest, Father O’Rourke, and she told him the whole thing.

‘Is gossiping a sin?’ she asked the old man. ‘Was that the hand of God Almighty pointing a finger at me? Should I be asking your absolution? Father, tell me, have I done something wrong?’

‘Yes!’ Father O’Rourke answered her. ‘Yes, you ignorant, badly broughtup female! You have borne false witness against your neighbor, you have played fast and loose with his reputation, and you should be heartily ashamed!’

So the woman said she was sorry and asked for forgiveness.

‘Not so fast!’ says O’Rourke. ‘I want you to go home, take a pillow up on your roof, cut it open with a knife, and return here to me!’

So the woman went home, took a pillow off her bed, a knife from the drawer, went up the fire escape to the roof, and stabbed the pillow. Then she went back to the old parish priest as instructed.

‘Did you gut the pillow with the knife?’ he says.

‘Yes, Father.’

‘And what was the result?’

‘Feathers,’ she said.

‘Feathers?’ he repeated.

‘Feathers everywhere, Father!’

‘Now I want you to go back and gather up every last feather that flew out on the wind!’

‘Well,’ she said, ‘it can’t be done. I don’t know where they went. The wind took them all over.’

‘And that,’ said Father O’Rourke, ‘is GOSSIP!
 
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