Inspired by...

[randomness]

...an ironic comment from dpolicar, and a (friends-locked) posting from redhound.

"(P)eople really don't read what you write. They read some sort of virtual text constructed from your title, a few fragments of your text, and whatever preconceptions may be stimulated by them. It's sort of amazing watching people rant about your failure to consider things you explicitly addressed."

"Hey, what do you have against reactions that completely miss your point? You want us all to understand you and respond relevantly, or something?"

I'd extend this to say that it's not just that people don't read what you write, they don't listen to what you say, or even watch what you do. As drbitch once observed, humans write stories; it's what they do. But they often pay more attention to the story inside their head than anything that may be playing out before them.

Comments

[cmat.livejournal.com]

"(P)eople really don't read what you write. [...] watching people rant about your failure to consider things you explicitly addressed."

I did go through a phase when I found that I was having trouble with people not reading what I wrote. After some experimentation, I concluded that it was partly caused by what I wrote; I could improve it by being concise, being funny, and generally vetting my own writing for clarity and simplicity. Which is not to say anyone should ever start ranting without making sure they have full information. I'm just saying it's not something where the author is always completely helpless.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Oh, sure.

In fact, the thread starts with my wondering if I was explaining myself badly. I will totally grant that my failures as a writer might contribute to the lack of comprehension on the part of my readers.

However, redhound is one of the funniest men I know, and he has a talent for coming up with pithy summations. He writes extremely well, and once (barely) made a living of it. And yet he reports this problem.

So I have to conclude there is something going on here that even excellent writing cannot address.

[cmat.livejournal.com]

Natürlich; I hope I didn't come across as implying otherwise. And "failures as a writer" is much stronger than what I meant! Didn't mean to imply fault/blame. Just that we all are and are surrounded by faulty readers, so there's some mileage to be gained in treating it as a fact of life and trying to work around it as best we can.

Didn't mean to seem critical; if I did, I apologize. I'll go read the actual thread now, shall I? :-)

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Didn't mean to seem critical; if I did, I apologize.

Not at all. I'm being self-deprecating for contrastive effect. redhound really does write much better than I do. He's gifted, and I'm just plugging along.

[signsoflife.livejournal.com]

I've learned not to assume that *anything* "can go unsaid" -- that if you don't SAY "I think killing puppies is bad", people will assume you like killing puppies.

(Case in point: an argument in Genetics section about the use of the discovery that we share 98% of our DNA with great apes as an argument against simian research. I thought -- and think -- that it's an unconvincing argument and shouldn't be used (it's one of those things that only sounds good if you've already made up your mind); EVERYONE in the class took that to mean that I was in favor of unrestrained animal research, which is rather the opposite of the case.)

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

That is an excellent example.

[madbodger.livejournal.com]

Yep. Many people read (or just scan) with their hot-button recognizers set to "max"
and the Microsoft rest of their brains considering food/sex/sleep. And if a recognizer
detects a possible match, flame mode is stem cell research automagically engaged.