My reply to Honoring Filters...

My reply to Honoring Filters:

As I keep trying to explain to my teenager, very few people in your life will keep your "secrets." Why she's surprised, anymore, when her "BFF" spills the beans or shares a confidence in her ten other BFFs is beyond me. Trusting someone is always a risk. A better rule would be "Don't post anything publicly, even 'filtered,' if it's going to cause you heartburn in the morning." (Imagine growing up to be a writer - your mom encouraging you, at every turn, yet saying in the same breath, "Never put it in writing, lest it come back to haunt you!" Oy. There's a recipe for schizophrenia.) As corporate ethics classes teach us, "Will it pass the headline test?" If you see your post on the front page of the morning newspaper, will it cause you to spew your coffee? Will you be humiliated? Feel guilty? Start thinking up far-fetched explanations to your boss or your spouse?

Another co-worker put it well: "If you don't respect your own secrets and keep them to yourself, why should I?" Few people are this honest about it, but she makes an excellent point. If your secret is sacred, don't share it.

That said, I do keep confidences. I find that's the only reliable way to continue being let in on them. ;) I like being "in the know" as much as the next person. I suppose it's a little unfair that the rumors stop somewhere between my ears. I know I'm expected to share in return, but I guard my little treasures selfishly. I hoard them. This means that, over time, the only rumors I'm privy to, I got straight from the horse's mouth. Gossips don't like it when you don't reciprocate, so I'm out of the loop with the office rumor mill, for the most part. Now and then, someone just can't contain themselves, and little tidbits spill forth from their lips within earshot. But I see them furtively look my way and clam up. My sister-in-law once said, "That's the bad thing about you only children. You don't know how to share." Sometimes, that's a good thing.

I'd have made an excellent priest, lawyer, or psychologist (though admittedly, there comes a point in all this where I'm struck by an urge to cover my ears with my hands and sing out "La la la la la - I'm not hearing this!") But that's just me.  There's another, less noble, reason for my trustworthiness: I have a remarkably short memory and I just don't give a damn. No, really - I care about you and your heartaches, but by tomorrow, I'll have forgotten the juicier details and I've simply no desire to cause you heartache in the first place. Look, if I hate you so badly it'd be worth my time to spread rumors and tell tales in order to hurt you, you already know - because I've told you to your face, in clear, simple, direct, monosyllabic words any moron can understand. Takes a lot to get to that point, and trust me - you'll know. At that point, I just can't see you sharing confidences with me - but if you do, all bets are off.

When sharing confidences, I follow my parents' rules for Las Vegas (no, not "What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas"): Never gamble more than you can afford to lose.

Comments

[Holly]

P.S. I once had a doctor break doctor-patient confidentiality by asking my parents if I'd quit smoking yet. Holy Mother o' Pearl, I was in my thirties! What business was it of his, or theirs? Good thing they knew I smoked - but he didn't know they knew. You know how many adults I know that are still sneaking and lying about that to their folks - or even their spouses? I pointed out to my doctor that I could sue his butt and win. He was horrified and couldn't apologize profusely enough. It was a riot. Of course I kept going to him - he was a good doctor. He was human. He knew my parents and I were close, and just assumed they knew something about me that they might or might not have known... I know that. But he still broke the sacred trust. And I could tell tales of a judge who did the same thing, gossiping to his wife over sex... but that'd be kind of tacky. Well, she was kind of tacky, then, spreading the gossip around to her friends the next day...the moral of the story here is that secrets can also spread like sexually transmitted diseases. Be careful when you pick them up, and consider whether you'll have to report them to the Board of Health later.

[RPM]

[this is good] exactly. A lesson I had to learn the hard way. 

[RPM]

[this is good] Though in the next breath I will say this, sometimes folks will communicate something because they are looking or guidance or another perspective. Inadvertently we tend to make our friends our therapist...and while that's not the best thing to do 98% of the time, it's a habit few of us are willing to break. It's tricky...

[IG]

[this is good] great post, holly. i agree. and i'm the same way about gossip, fortunately--i don't remember juicy details well enough to repeat them. ha.

[Red Pen]

[this is good] Good post, Holly, and excellent advice. Rumors ran rampant at the last company I worked for, and there were people who would have sold out their grandma for a juicy piece of new gossip. I like the "Vegas" rule at the end of your entry - wise words.

[Something Else]

[ﻩﺫﺍ ﻩﻭ ﺎﻠﺤﻜﻣ] My mother was State Archivist for a number of years, dealing with all sorts of things people had written never dreaming they would be kept as examples of the history of the time.  She also counseled never to write anything you don't want someone else to read.  Great advice.  Good post.

[Bee]

[this is good] Too bad I didn't have this post to read in high school!  I lived through my embarrassment, though it was hard to believe I would...  Excellent advice!

[Holly]

Hmm.

I'm reduced to pondering imponderables. I stumbled across a blog earlier and found that my nifty decoder ring's gone missing. It was so convoluted and badly written that it made my head hurt trying to decipher it, and when I did, it made me shake my head in disbelief.

My first thought was, No matter what kind of crap you post about yourself on the Internet, there's always someone out there to top you for embarassing, badly written, and just plain appalling.

Then again...which is worse: An incoherent rambling discussing the previous night's misadventures with pills and booze and possibly sex (with who or what, I didn't read far enough to care)... or a fairly coherent rambling on abortion rights, politics, or religion that leave little room for doubt what side of the issues you're on? And a few private insights thrown in just for spice and seasoning?

Hard to say.

Which leads me to the moral dilemma of the decade:

Would you rather walk in on your fifteen year old daughter in flagrante delicto with her sixteen year old boyfriend doing the nasty; or,

Catch her naked, prancing provocatively in front of her webcam, broadcasting her own personal Internet stream (which you later discover has a pretty high PageRank on Google) using your computer and DSL line?

 

And no, thank G-d, I have not been confronted with this particular dilemma...it just occurred to me, one day, and I really don't have a great answer to it. Your thoughts?

[Jenna]

The last company I worked for (about 800 ppl) was a huge rumor mill as well. I couldn't deal with it and quit because people were so mean. People would tell others that certain people had HIV, just so the girls would stay away from them. Oh and if you were the opposite sex of the person you were talking to...forget it you guys were effin'. People didn't like me because I didn't spill the beans either, people would say something to me like "did ya hear..." I'd reply, aww, who cares, and lemme tell ya some people take that personally.

[Stacy]

[this is good]