interrupt me one more time

June 18, 2018 12:16 PM

I ask a bunch of men, "Have you ever interrupted a woman?"

Sure, they say.
But not just women.
I interrupt men, too.
I interrupt everybody.
That's not because they're women.
It's just because I'm impatient/I want to win the debate/that's just how I talk.
I really don't think it's a sexist thing I do.
Yes, it's rude, but it's not sexist.
You don't know me.
I really do listen to women a lot.


(Katie pounds a seltzer water, crushes the can on her forehead)


Previously.
Previouslier.

posted by Too-Ticky (39 comments total)

Also previously
posted by Emmy Rae at 12:35 PM on June 18, 2018 [1 favorite]

I have had (and continue, though hopefully less so) a habit of interrupting people. I honestly (though perhaps mistakenly) believe that I interrupt men as often as women. This is something I've been working on and believe I've improved a great deal over the years.

But it's telling that it was only ever men who felt comfortable enough to correct me or stop me when I was interrupting them. The sexism often isn't in the interruption, but in the social context where only men seem permitted to tell someone off when they're interrupted.
posted by tclark at 12:38 PM on June 18, 2018 [8 favorites]

And people who have power seem to have this idea that oppressors attack the oppressed. So as long as you're not jabbing the less fortunate with a pitchfork, you're not an oppressor. Whew. That's a relief. But oppressors don't jab. They smother. They simply unfurl, expand into every inch they can find. They stretch out on top of people they don't really see. And most of the time they're miffed because the mattress is lumpy.

OOOOOF. yeah.

there are apparently monsters in human form that walk among us and consider interruption to be a normal part of the way they communicate. It seems like for them it really is that they just naturally interrupt everybody.

When women interrupt me it is usually with enthusiasm for what I just said, and maybe to finish my thought, with nonverbal cues and checks to make sure I’m still in agreement.

When men interrupt me, it is more likely to be in order to change the subject entirely, with no indication that they were listening to anything I was saying in the first place.

I think this piece gets to a crucial point— the men who studiously avoid interrupting more powerful men are often the same men who speak over every woman they encounter in personal and professional environments. Their “church” membership actually ends up being contextual, based on perceived power dynamics.
posted by a fiendish thingy at 12:39 PM on June 18, 2018 [49 favorites]

God damn is this relevant.

I’m typing this from an ambulance in London where I’ve just discovers I’m allergic to morphine so I apologize if I’m a bit incoherent. I’m angry bout a few things right now.

My traveling companion is a man. I asked him to please not try to answer any questions about my medical history before we even saw the paramedics. How many times did he interrupt me to provide incorrect information?

I’m asking because I lost count.
posted by bilabial at 12:50 PM on June 18, 2018 [93 favorites]

The standout comment from the Previously thread I linked (I was looking at it today for some reason) was this one from Kutsuwamushi. Seems to tie in with this piece.
posted by Emmy Rae at 12:58 PM on June 18, 2018 [3 favorites]

Yeah, there's definitely a difference between interruption qua interruption and backchannel-y overlapping speech that's being used to affirm the primary speaker. It's been a while, but I think one of the major distinctions is that in the second case, the primary speaker keeps their turn. The second person isn't taking the podium, just doing a rather more elaborate version of nodding in agreement -- basically showing that they are absorbing what the primary speaker is saying and are on board with it. Except in cases of significant culture clash, I would hazard that it's pretty obvious when someone is doing one vs. the other. "Do you do this to your boss" -- or, hell, "Do you do this to a male supervisor" -- is a pretty stark litmus test.
posted by inconstant at 1:04 PM on June 18, 2018 [9 favorites]

I love this writing.

This Because if she doesn't do it right, she will be punished for it. And if she can't help this person order his chicken parm while he's speaking backwards in a language last uttered when Christ himself walked the earth, she will be punished for it. And if anyone feels that she is displaying frustration or impatience while nostril-deep in a hot bubbling vat of frustration and impatience, she will be punished for it. Punished how? At least patronized, forced to apologize, or financially stiffed by the customer, and possibly reprimanded or disciplined by her manager.

Reminded me of this I am not following my gut and cutting them thinner. If I had, I suspect the results would have been better. But for most of us, going off book isn’t an option.

Her essay on Nontoxic Masculinity is a good contrasting piece:

You know what, kid?
Fuck that guy.
Yeah, I said it.
He's emotionally constipated and he's probably gonna die real soon.

Walk with me into the future, my child.
There is nothing wrong with you, your feelings, or your tears.
There is no reason to fight with your body.
You are perfect exactly as you are.
Your feelings will not hurt you, and they can't break anything. Feel them.
Fuck your grandpa.
And fuck your daddy, too, if he talks like your grandpa.

I'm sorry that women feel responsible for delivering these messages. More men should be stepping up this articulately. Or at all.
posted by Gorgik at 1:30 PM on June 18, 2018 [20 favorites]

Your personal affection for women exists alongside your unconscious domination of women in the same way that you can have both nostalgia for the movie Babe and a bottomless hunger for bacon.

that just put words to a discomfort I've been feeling in a relationship in a way I haven't been able to.
posted by BekahVee at 1:39 PM on June 18, 2018 [49 favorites]

That was one hell of an essay. Thank you for sharing.
posted by Caduceus at 1:47 PM on June 18, 2018

He's emotionally constipated and he's probably gonna die real soon.

Just world fallacy?
posted by biffa at 1:48 PM on June 18, 2018

Now he's telling his friends not to eat at that restaurant anymore. They ask if the food was bad. "It's not about the food," he says. "It's just not comfortable," he says.

Yep, that's me with a lot of dudes I know. And the women I know usually find my experience to be evidence enough to avoid them. So that's me + many of our mutual female acquaintances avoiding The Guy Who Can't Help But Interrupt.
posted by Emmy Rae at 1:49 PM on June 18, 2018 [6 favorites]

I am a "enthusiastic" interrupter and sentence finisher which is super annoying and a really hard habit to break, and I think I have a handle on avoiding negative/destructive interrupting and feel I've always had a more (for values of) femme conversational style.

But I have some good folks I can check in with about that for feedback, so I am going to do this.
posted by loquacious at 1:53 PM on June 18, 2018 [1 favorite]

He's emotionally constipated and he's probably gonna die real soon.

Just world fallacy?

She's 'speaking' of the boy's grandfather
posted by Gorgik at 1:55 PM on June 18, 2018

Yep, that's me with a lot of dudes I know. And the women I know usually find my experience to be evidence enough to avoid them.

Oh man, I was JUST talking with a friend about this-- it's like a whisper Yelp network, of the "establishments" (dudes) that are just best to avoid. Because he MEANS well, but, you know. Life is short. Being around someone like that costs you something-- time, energy, self-esteem. Better to just avoid.

There are men I have known who think of me as reserved and un-opinionated (ha ha!), because I'm not willing to verbally wrestle them for the right to exist in shared conversations. They get to monologue as much as they want, and never actually meet me. Very often, when I hear women of my acquaintance described by men as "quiet"-- especially women I would describe as intensely funny and clever conversationalists-- I just think "oh, you've been cut off. Got it."
posted by a fiendish thingy at 2:03 PM on June 18, 2018 [52 favorites]

Has this diner ever THOUGHT about HOW to order chicken parm?

Uh, that's a hard no.

Funnily enough, as a former waiter, I think about this to no end. I am always chagrined when a server has to ask me for an option that I should've remembered (it embarrasses me when I'm asked "And how would you like your eggs?" for example). I usually get somewhat agitated when my dining companions hem and haw while ordering, leaving the server standing there stupidly.

Of course, this HARDLY disproves the premise of the article. I just found it funny how flat that example fell for me.
posted by TypographicalError at 2:14 PM on June 18, 2018 [1 favorite]

TypographicalError: If anything, your experience reinforces the point, doesn't it? You, as a former waiter, have thought about the problem of how to politely and efficiently communicate your order to your server because you've been on the other end of that exchange. Your dining companions haven't considered that problem, because they haven't had to.

They're not bad people, but if they demonstrated more empathy and thoughtfulness they could make the server's day better.
posted by JDHarper at 2:43 PM on June 18, 2018 [7 favorites]

Too-Ticky, thanks for posting. That was terrific, though I'd always thought "The Full Chris Package" would involve a heart-shaped whirlpool tub. Could you please add a "KatieAnthony" tag?
posted by Iris Gambol at 3:12 PM on June 18, 2018 [2 favorites]

So the article seems to say that women interrupt other women and that's fine and natural, and men interrupt other men and that's fine and natural, but when women are in a conversation with men those women have been socialized to believe there is a power imbalance, so if the man tries to own his space in the conversation he will crowd the women out and smother them. And the answer to this is not to help women reject that power imbalance and claim their space, but rather to get men to feel as uncomfortable in the conversation as the women do.

I can get behind the message that interrupting people is rude so try not to be such an impatient conversationalist. I can get behind the idea of getting people to stop thinking of other people as shrill when they own their space. I don't get the idea that if a man doesn't think talking to a woman is a chore he needs to worry and fret over then he's doing it wrong.
posted by willnot at 5:01 PM on June 18, 2018 [4 favorites]

This essay made more sense than anything I’ve read by men on the topic. Thank you for sharing it.
posted by crysflame at 5:16 PM on June 18, 2018 [1 favorite]

Back in high school, someone told me I had this odd habit of not finishing sentences. Honestly, it's likely because I'm so used to being interrupted that I don't regularly have an ending point in mind when I start talking. There's enough entropic redundancy in English language that this should work in theory, and it does as long as your conversant is playing game.
posted by pwnguin at 6:25 PM on June 18, 2018 [5 favorites]

Yes, you can love women and hurt them.

Your personal affection for women exists alongside your unconscious domination of women in the same way that you can have both nostalgia for the movie Babe and a bottomless hunger for bacon.

You, interrupter, are a 30-foot-wall that surrounds me in conversation. Every time I take a step, there you are, in my way. And while I'm staring at the wall that will cost me blood to break through, I say, "It's so cramped in here, I want to scream," and you look out at the enormous field you sit in and think, "Look how much space there is! I don't know what her problem is."

Walls don't know they're walls, is what I'm saying. They don't live inside themselves.

Ohhh this essay was a great read, thank you for sharing.
posted by lesser weasel at 7:01 PM on June 18, 2018 [6 favorites]

I don't get the idea that if a man doesn't think talking to a woman is a chore he needs to worry and fret over then he's doing it wrong.

I don’t get the idea that giving some consideration to how women feel during a conversation is a chore.
posted by jesourie at 10:52 PM on June 18, 2018 [20 favorites]

Has anyone had any success changing their interrupting habit? Any hints?
posted by lubujackson at 11:30 PM on June 18, 2018 [1 favorite]

Practice giving away the conversational stick. It isn’t the same as not interrupting in the first place, but if you explicitly say “I think Alice had a comment about this. Alice?” And then *listen to see if Alice says what you thought she was going to*, you’ll see first off if you’re guessing wrong, you’ll get to hear what Alice thinks, and you’ll make sure Alice gets the credit for what she says (work credit is obvious, but there's also social credit for telling a funny story, being compassionate, etc).

Also- apologize when you catch yourself doing it. This isn’t always immediately possible, but the faster you do it the better.

I’m female, and I do both kinds of interrupting. I work in a male-dominated field and for years felt I had to interrupt to get heard. Sometimes I still have to, but I’ve got more seniority now so I have been trying to curb it and replace with better habits, making sure those who are junior to me get adequate time to speak and get recognized for their ideas. I’ve also had to learn how not to interrupt a romantic partner; I was carrying my bad work habits over in to interpersonal relations and it sucked. Apologizing right away helped because I got faster at realizing I had done it and sometimes now that’s fast enough to listen instead of talking.

Ah, yes, also learn about active listening, and try to get really damn good at it.
posted by nat at 1:12 AM on June 19, 2018 [19 favorites]

Any hints?

Some of this might help.
posted by Too-Ticky at 2:01 AM on June 19, 2018

Has anyone had any success changing their interrupting habit? Any hints?

So, I had an epically long screed full of heart-wrenching personal detail about how I am working towards not interrupting women. It was hilarious and touching and I expect it would have reduced you to tears and garenered favourites like a Pastabagel comment. It was bordering on the divine.

And then nat said what I wanted to say, but you know, better.

And the feeling I have now, the feeling that it is such a fucking tragedy that my comment would not be heard, that you poor people of metafilter would not hear my god-like wisdom is the actual point. Know that feeling, know when you must simply be heard. Recognise and be vigiliant for that feeling.

Then stop.

Ask a woman what she thinks.

And shut the fuck up.
posted by fullerine at 2:03 AM on June 19, 2018 [13 favorites]

When women interrupt me it is usually with enthusiasm for what I just said, and maybe to finish my thought, with nonverbal cues and checks to make sure I’m still in agreement.

When men interrupt me, it is more likely to be in order to change the subject entirely, with no indication that they were listening to anything I was saying in the first place.

THIS THIS THIS THIS THIS. I tend to finish people's sentences for them with a vocalized question mark at the end, to make sure we're still on the same page, get more information, and/or demonstrate that I'm invested in their story, e.g.:

PERSON: So I see her coming out of the break room and she's super pissed off--
ME: Because of the thing with the pudding?

All of my female friends and some of my male friends will then answer, in their next statement, whether I am right about the thing with the pudding. My boyfriend, however, will continue with whatever his next sentence was going to be, and maybe I will discover in context whether the pudding was to blame, or maybe I will go to my grave without ever finding out.

THIS DRIVES ME BONKER BANANAS. I've tried explaining to him that I only enjoy conversations where I get to have meaningful input; he usually responds that he & his guy friends have amazing conversations where each of them just shouts the ideas he most cares about whenever he feels like it, and maybe I should try that instead. Then we get into a big ol' fighty fight.

Gonna link him this piece; it's fantastic and I loved it.
posted by taquito sunrise at 2:15 AM on June 19, 2018 [11 favorites]

I tend to finish people's sentences for them with a vocalized question mark at the end, to make sure we're still on the same page, get more information, and/or demonstrate that I'm invested in their story, e.g.:
PERSON: So I see her coming out of the break room and she's super pissed off--
ME: Because of the thing with the pudding?

taquito sunrise: FWIW I'm a woman and frankly this would drive me nuts and feel like one of the worst kinds of interrupting. I want to be allowed to finish my thought/story. Then you can feel free to ask every question you have. But jumping in with questions like this both interrupts my thought process and often derails the entire conversation so much that I never get to finish.
posted by mkuhnell at 4:29 AM on June 19, 2018 [8 favorites]

women have been socialized to believe there is a power imbalance

There is a power imbalance. It's not imaginary.
posted by harriet vane at 5:50 AM on June 19, 2018 [31 favorites]

mkuhnell: "taquito sunrise: FWIW I'm a woman and frankly this would drive me nuts and feel like one of the worst kinds of interrupting. I want to be allowed to finish my thought/story. Then you can feel free to ask every question you have. But jumping in with questions like this both interrupts my thought process and often derails the entire conversation so much that I never get to finish."

Whenever I've seen anyone learn about active listening for the first time, this is the complaint that they always give. In my experience, people work themselves into a conversational flow where questions like these are natural and even though you'd think it'd feel like a huge interruption in the abstract, in the moment it's often inconsequential or helpful. A quick interjection of "because of the pudding?" followed by a quick verbal/nonverbal affirmation is usually going to go unnoticed in the flow.
posted by TypographicalError at 10:16 AM on June 19, 2018 [7 favorites]

So the article seems to say that ...

Not to get all smarmy "FTFY," but quoting the whole thing twice would just be kind of bulky, so here's what I think you missed:

... women interrupt other women and that's fine and natural, and men interrupt other men and that's fine and natural, but when women are in a conversation with men those women and those men have been socialized to believe there is a power imbalance, so if the man tries to own his space in the conversation he will crowd the women out and smother them. And the answer to this is not to help when women reject that power imbalance and claim their space they are punished, but rather to get so we need men to feel as uncomfortable in the conversation as the women do. understand what is happening and why, because women cannot (and should not) be expected to fix their oppression all on their own.
posted by solotoro at 11:30 AM on June 19, 2018 [8 favorites]

This year was the year I started saying "I'm still talking." Not coincidentally, it's also the year the mister and I really started working on the power imbalance in our marriage, so I've gotten a lot of use of that phrase.
posted by Ruki at 11:57 AM on June 19, 2018 [7 favorites]

TypographicalError, that just hasn't been my experience.
posted by mkuhnell at 12:50 PM on June 19, 2018 [2 favorites]

taquito sunrise: FWIW I'm a woman and frankly this would drive me nuts and feel like one of the worst kinds of interrupting. I want to be allowed to finish my thought/story.

Totally willing to believe this is a stylistic preference that supersedes gender. I do feel like I could do better than the pudding example to explain what I'm talking about, though:

PERSON: So that makes twelve hammers I'm carrying around. Then I walk into the garage and find five more hammers, and I'm like, well, might as well pick these up--
ME: So at this point your arms are just full of hammers--
PERSON: I'm like, hanging them off of my thumbs! Then Josh walks in with a box of hammers--
ME: Don't tell me he tried to give you more hammers--
PERSON: HE TRIED TO DUMP THE BOX OUT ON MY ARMS! And I'm like, Josh!

It's fair if you want me to just shut up and let you tell your hammer story in peace. If I were telling the hammer story, however, and you just let me talk without interjecting, I'd assume you'd stopped paying attention because I was boring the crap out of you, and would wrap up the story prematurely with something like "Anyway, it was a lot of hammers; how's your Arduino project going?"

All of my female friends (I am not sure about my male friends?) share this preference, and will build pauses into their stories where the other person is expected to say "Wow" or "What an asshole" or "That's a lot of nuts!" There's a level of trust involved with doing this -- you have to feel secure that the other person is invested in helping you tell your story, and is not going to interpret your pause as "Oh good, the words have stopped coming out of your mouthhole, MY TURN TO LECTURE!" (Which is one of my least favorite flavors of interrupting -- I wasn't done!)

(Also want to mention that in addition to the style preference I have auditory processing + ADHD issues, and being allowed to interject or having someone check in with me during lectures helps keep me up to speed. Often this makes the difference between a situation where you enjoy being heard & I enjoy hearing you, and one where you are put off by my blank expression while I try to turn the syllables you said five sentences ago into comprehensible English words while keeping the buffer open for the syllables you're saying now. Usually I can only keep this up for a few sentences before I start freaking out about not having understood anything you've said.)

Anyway, that's a lot of words regarding how I feel about things as someone with my conversation preference. What would you appreciate as someone with yours to help us bridge the gap between communication styles while speaking face-to-face?
posted by taquito sunrise at 3:25 PM on June 19, 2018 [16 favorites]

Back in high school, someone told me I had this odd habit of not finishing sentences. Honestly, it's likely because I'm so used to being interrupted that I don't regularly have an ending point in mind when I start talking

You suddenly explained a behavior my mother exhibits that drives me crazy. She often trails off and doesn't finish her sentences, often leaving out the direct object. It annoys me to no end. But looking at it now, I wonder how much of this was conditioned into her over her life. I can't remember many conversations between my parents, but I wonder just how much interrupting my dad used to do.

In the context of the article, this is something that I try to be conscientious about when talking with someone. Given half a chance, I will run over everything that a person has to say while going on about things I find interesting. Men have no problem stopping me. Women, generally do not. So when I catch myself going on and dominating the conversation or explaining things in detail yet again, I stop. I listen. Every once and a while I end up hearing inanities . But usually, I learn something new. About how someone approaches the world if not the topic itself.

I sometimes find myself interrupting, apologizing, and then asking the person to finish. I can't say that I've cured myself of the desire to mansplain or dominate or interrupt. But I am trying to be aware and make up for it when needed.

Here's the thing: what I do is simple human decency. I don't want an award. I want all men to do the same thing. I want this to be normal. I want men to stop and think before speaking.

I have no idea how to teach this to other people. I do know that if I have a son (or a child that is viewed as male), this is something I will drive into them. But beyond that, I don't know.
posted by Hactar at 7:48 PM on June 19, 2018 [4 favorites]

I want all men to do the same thing. I want this to be normal.

Wouldn't it be even better if men *could* cure themselves of the desire to mansplain or dominate or interrupt... and better still if they never developed that desire in the first place? I see no reason not to aim higher.
posted by Too-Ticky at 3:56 AM on June 20, 2018 [1 favorite]

This gets So. Much. Better(worse).

I’m in a hospital. I am in an isolated room because I have c diff. I’m still dehydrated. My pain is wildly uncontrolled. My every 4-6 hours doses of codeine and paracetamol are coming together every SEVEN hours. My hand has been burning every time something new is pushed into the iv. I have been very vocal and asking someone to check on why it’s so painful. They always interrupt to tell me it’s just a little discomfort. It wasn’t so bad this morning I screamed which made my guts hurt more.

And I’ve been asking for stronger pain medication. I know I had a morphine reaction and I understand maybe they don’t want to try synthetic opioid but I’m in a hospital, they can give a tiny dose. Or they can give a non opioid like toporol.

Sonthe doctrs come in after board rounds and the guy asks me why he should give me what I’m asking for. I respond ‘because it fucking hurts,

And he interrupts me to tell me to watch my language.

That’s right, I had more explanation ready. I was not done talking. I wanted to say that the stress of pain isn’t helping me clear this infection. I wanted to say that I’m tired and have not been able to nap in the daytime because I’m on a roller coaster of pain from 7 to 10. That I’ve been asking for better pain care since yesterday morning. That two pain medications together means they wear off together.

He interrupted me. He interrupted me to Fucking tone police me. He interrupted me while I was answering a question I ration he asked me. It seems he wasn’t asking that question in good faith. It seems he could have more easily just said, i’m
posted by bilabial at 7:57 AM on June 20, 2018 [13 favorites]

bilabial, i'm so sorry that you're going through all of that. I am incandescently angry for you that a medical professional couldn't read the room well enough to understand that YOU ARE IN PAIN, that using 'bad' language is an indicator of just HOW MUCH pain you're in, and how badly they're mis-managing it. Tone policing sucks; OBLIVIOUS tone policing is even worse.
posted by hanov3r at 8:44 AM on June 20, 2018

When I picked up my son, or my ex- dropped him off, I'd ask my son How was your day? How was the trip? What did you do? and my ex- would always answer for him, no matter how many times I said I'm asking him how he feels and I'm so freaking glad that man left me. He broke my heart, it hurt a lot, but with perspective, it wa sthe best gift he ever gave me.
posted by theora55 at 12:00 PM on June 25, 2018 [2 favorites]