[JohnBooty]

Judging somebody's intent is great - but consider how much better it works on some scales than others.

Suppose you and I are close friends. We've known each other for years. We understand each others' intents pretty well. Last year I totally forgot your birthday - and you didn't get mad, because you know I was busy with a family emergency and my intent wasn't to make you feel like crap. Similarly, sometimes you make extremely tasteless jokes: jokes about murder or maybe even racial issues. I laugh at them because I have a similar sense of humor and I understand your intent very well: I know you're a caring human being and they're just jokes, for crying out loud.

And that's how friendships are supposed to work. We understand each other and don't get bothered over the small stuff.

But how well does that work with people that don't know each other well? A heck of a lot less well. You can't possibly know everybody's intents. The guy on the bus? The guy handing out leaflets? The loudmouth in your university lecture hall?

I used to joke about a lot of things that I don't joke about any more, at least in public. In my mind when I made those jokes, I was actually parodying the kinds of people who earnestly believed really shitty things. But to people that didn't know me well, I was at times indistinguishable from the actual bad guys. I felt I had a choice: be more selective with my humor, or hide behind the old "but my intentions were good!!!!!" excuse.

[ZenoArrow]

Sadly I know the judgement side of the equation too, and it's natural to tone down your behaviour in some situations, but aside from that you can't stop people misunderstanding you, but you can try to understand them.

Learning to gauge intent is easy enough to summarise... 1. Listen to the words, then take your time to consider why they were said. 2. Give people the benefit of the doubt to start. It's not always accurate, but it'll lead you the right intention most of the time.

One further point, when people misjudge you, it can be easy to adjust your behaviour so you validate their opinion, don't do that. It's easy to say, but I promise you'll be better off if you're comfortable with your own intentions, regardless of how they've been interpreted. A little extra patience can sometimes let people catch on, but otherwise no need to dwell on it.