Most hated conversations

[Robert D. Robot]

How about loud conversations involving "too much information" told to a perfect stranger in the pair of bus seats just behind you? I traveled over Christmas on a long bus trip and got to hear (among other stuff) a young woman go on and on about how she was going home for Christmas and needed to tell her father that she was pregnant and had held off telling him because he would have driven all the way to her town to kill the boyfriend, but she loves her boyfriend, but her father has lung cancer and the drive would have killed him and ......

Maybe there is safety/comfort in loudly telling a complete stranger who you will never see again such a private story, but on a bus everyone around has to suffer through it whether they want to hear a soap opera or not (maybe I should have brought an Ipod...). If you do ask them to talk a little more quietly, you are looked at like you are trying to sell them insurance on a boat that they do not own.

 

[Amaris]

It depends entirely on the party in question. I don't like discussing religion or politics wth family, for example.

 

[RoJoHen]

As a bartender, I tend to overhear a lot of people's conversations, and a lot of them are annoying as hell. The most annoying to me, though, is when I hear a bunch of dudes talking about the slutty chicks that they've banged. I'm not a prude by any means, but there are some things that I just don't want to hear about. Sometimes they even try to get me involved in the conversations and ask me about the slutty chicks that I've banged, and I simply have no desire to share that kind of information.

 

[auntiehill]

1) Family Heritage. I don't care about your family heritage, and who married whom over 100 years ago and how close their old house is. Hubby's crazy-ass sister is obsessed with it. She will talk for HOURS about her family genealogy, which no one, not ever her own family, gives a flying fuck about.

2). Cell phones. I don't care what your phone can do; I barely care what mine can do. Get your damn phone out of my face and when we're together, look at me and not your phone, thank you.

3). Religion. No, I haven't found Jesus. I'm not religious. I'm an atheist. Please don't tell me that I'm going to hell, or that my soul is lost, or try to get me to join your Church, or I might be tempted to tell you what I think about your particular superstition, in great detail. I keep my mouth shut so as not to offend you; please do me that same courtesy.

4) Your crazy-ass conspiracy theories about this group or that ethnicity, or that politician or WHATEVER it is you don't like, and how it's ruining everything, is to blame for everything and everything in the entire world would be better without it. You're just making yourself out to be an incredible idiot, not to mention being really hateful/bigoted/paranoid, and no one wants to hear it. Stop drinking the Kool-Aid and try to have a civil conversation.

5). Sports. Don't care. No interest. Please be quiet.

 

[RoJoHen]

With sports, I don't care if people talk about them, but I personally have no interest in them. People assume that because a) I'm a guy and b) I'm a bartender that I follow every sport and know everything that has happened with every team this season. People get really confused when they find out that I just don't care.

 

[Spot's Meow]

I am in my mid-20s but am by far the youngest in my office. I am surrounded by mostly 50+ individuals, which normally doesn't really make any difference, but certain popular conversation topics come up that I just can't relate to at all.

1. Aging parents - It sounds terrible to be annoyed by this, but I hear all day long about the various homes that their parents have been moved to, what happened on their last visit, the new numbers from the doctor, the new medications, etc. I care that my co-workers have to handle this burden, but at the same time I just don't want to hear about it. It's depressing, and I really have nothing to offer to the conversation because I cannot relate at all.

2. Your travels - So I have some coworkers who enjoy traveling, and go out on trips almost every weekend. I don't care. I DON'T CARE. It doesn't matter to me where you went, how romantic it was, how you went to these wineries, the cute local restaurant you ate at, the nice old lady you met, the picnic you had on the riverbank. I really couldn't care less; I didn't ask, don't tell me.

2. Facebook games - This is a strange new phenomenon that occurs at family gatherings with those folks you aren't very close to. Now that everyone and their grandma has a Facebook page, they obsessively play games like Mafia Wars, City Farm Neighborville, etc. and recruit all of their distant relatives to do so as well. So, now at these awkward family gatherings we sit around in silence for a while until someone says, "so how about that new Villeville game?" and then everyone else chimes in about how they found so many star powers and their sparkle unicorn is almost ready to mate and that timed holiday quest was just a killer. Do I even have to explain why I am over this conversation?

3. Kid's sports - Now usually, I actually like it when my coworkers discuss their kids, because most of their children are my age, so I feel like I can relate to the situations or offer another perspective. However, certain coworkers really like to harp on the various after school activities and sports their child is involved in. What makes you think I care about the rude comment your son's water polo coach made at last week's tournament? What makes you think I care that your son even plays water polo? This annoyingly seeps into a certain coworkers requests for time off, when she will send out an email to the unit letting us know the details of why she'll be gone, down to the team's current placement in the league and how this game will be SO IMPORTANT and she HAS TO BE THERE TO SUPPORT HER CHILD. And then it will show up on the shared calendar with some long description. Ugh! Just put "Vacation day" please! Anything else is more than I care about. Oh, and I'm also sick of hearing about dance conventions.

4. Menopause - I understand why the women around me want to discuss their shared experience, but I do not yet share that experience. Sorry, but I don't much care about how many hot flashes you had last night. Some day I'm sure I will, but that day is not now.

 

[teya]

Gaming.

Seriously, people. The last game I played was Tetris in 1990.

Not interested, don't care.

And the next person who tries to entice me into some game on FB is getting defriended.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

Gaming.

Seriously, people. The last game I played was Tetris in 1990.

Not interested, don't care.

And the next person who tries to entice me into some game on FB is getting defriended.

Facebook games are terrible, anyway.

 

[auntiehill]

Facebook is terrible, period.

 

[lurok]

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

I am spared any discussion of sports but I'd imagine for many males it's quite inescapable. No one in my family has ever paid any attention to the topic.

As to kids.. this is what I use to dislodge people from talking about their home renovations. I'd rather hear all about what their kid is doing because it's people. I've noticed though that while some people will talk about their kid's personalities (interesting to me) others will just trot out a laundry list of achievements or even go into excruciating detail about their teachers and exams.

To be fair, I don't really like talking about my life in general. I will listen to everyone else's problems, but I'm not that big on talking about myself. It's not like I hate my life or something, it's more that I don't have a lot to complain about, and I think the details of my life aren't that interesting. So, I hate it when people try to draw more out of me than "I'm doing fine."

That's what I'm like. And sometimes you know they are trying to draw you out because they suspect you must be not fine LOL.. but in my case they are usually wrong.

 

[Mary Ann]

Families I've only just met who insist on explaining the intricacies of their blended families. "Well, Billy is my partner's son by his first marriage, and Suzie is mine by my second marriage, and Bobby is all ours". I DON'T CARE. Just say "These are our children" and leave it at that. I'll probably never see you again...at least, I hope not.

Along the same lines, I hate people who ask personal questions about a child's parentage. I have personal reasons for hating this. First of all, my Dutch, blue-eyed, fair-skinned parents adopted my two older brothers, who have Greek heritage. None of us will ever forget the horrible woman who asked my mother point-blank where she got the two darker kids from. Also, my two oldest children are 12 months apart, and look nothing alike. When they were young and I was pushing them around in a double pushchair I had people ask me if they were both mine. The ultimate over-the-line question was whether they both had the same father. I pointed at one of the kids and said perfectly straight-faced that this child was the milkman's. I understand that people may be curious, but asking such unsolicited questions is so bloody rude.

 

[Miss Chicken]

I am not usually annoyed by many topics because I find that I can usually steer a conversation away from a topic.

For instance, one friend was rambling on about car racing - a topic I am not interested at all. After listening to him for a while I asked him what did racing car drivers do when they needed to pee during a race. That question led to talking about what early solo aviators used to do during long flights. That led to talk about plane crashes, the Andes Survivors and other survival stories.

However two things I can't stand is my son talking about his Facebook games first thing in the morning. I like to have ME time between about 6 and 8am, I often wake up grumpy so can't handle early morning conversation.

The other thing I can't stand is my sisters phoning me up and talking about my brother and how he is not looking after my mother's house. My mother's will lets my brother lives in the house so long as it is his primary residence and he maintains it and pays all expenses. If he doesn't the house is to be sold and we all get a quarter share of the proceeds. So my sisters are phoning up saying that the house is being neglected, is dirty and smelly etc. I keep telling them I don't give a shit about my brother or the house. I wish my mother had left it to him outright.

This has been going on for about 18 months. Before that my sisters rarely phoned me , now I am getting a phone call about once a week. I have had no contact with my brother since we scattered my mother's ashes. That suits me fine (and I assume it suits my brother as well).

 

[Grey]

Sports. Small talk. This:

Anything Hollywood/gossip related. Unless you know the person, why are you discussing their personal life?

But I hate hate hate conversations about facebook!

I quit facebook over a year ago, for many reasons, but my entire family (several generations) have since joined and every single one of them feels the need to talk about facebook to me since I'm "missing out" and all.

So I get to hear about the following fascinating tidbits:

-How FIL's ex-student from 20 years ago bought a new car
-How many babies MIL's aunt's children's cousin's new wife just had
-Babies
-Farm/city/derpville (Villeville, lol Spot's Meow)
-Pictures of an old field trip student's new cat
-Status updates read to me slowly
-Status updates from people I've never met and never will
-Pictures (all 103 of them) from some family friend's family reunion across the country
-A gathering some 2nd cousin or other is having in another state
-How much drinking/partying so-and-so keeps posting about

AHHHHHHH! Shut it already! I quit that noise for a reason!

 

[RoJoHen]

I am a big Facebook whore. I love me some Facebook, but even I keep the Facebook talk out of real life conversation, unless I happen to see something that is relevant to a conversation I'm already having.

 

[RandyS]

I don't care whatsoever about sports.

I could not agree more. At the recent Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners, this is ALL my cousins would talk about. Of course, they do this every year.

And they wonder why they don't see me the rest of the time.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

I am a big Facebook whore. I love me some Facebook, but even I keep the Facebook talk out of real life conversation, unless I happen to see something that is relevant to a conversation I'm already having.

I loves me some facebook drama. And I am not ashamed.

 

[Mary Ann]

I like Facebook because hardly any of my family members use it. The people on my friends list are people with whom I actually want to stay in touch, and consist mainly of far-flung friends. It means there isn't much drama to entertain me, but that's better in the long run.

 

[Grey]

I like Facebook because hardly any of my family members use it.

Yeaahhh. Kinda changes the dynamic a bit.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

1) Politics. There is WAY too much vitriol, and the fact is people simply do not know how to have civil, respectful disagreement as ladies/gentlemen anymore. All it takes is one line for the insults to start flying. Especially when you're in an environment where a lot of groupthink is going on (and believe me, both sides are capable of creating and maintaining such environments), and you happen to go against the party line. Until people learn how to debate civilly again, then I want no part of it. Keep your nasty resentments and superiority complexes to yourself.



There are other topics I hate...I'll add them later.