A Lesson in Tactfulness

[HakuroDK]

Gentlemen, please! Let's stay on task!

Cultural differences aren't relevant to this conversation as we are dealing with tact on the forums and in-game. As this section of the forums is in English, let us focus on tact as it pertains to the English speaking population for now. Cultural differences in how tact is handled, while a fascinating topic, should perhaps be relegated to another thread or a private conversation.

tact = form of hypocrisy....
Tact = form of lie

Tact = sending someone to hell giving him /her the impression to go to heaven.

Question : why on Earth should I try to place myself in the other person shoe before I say something ? why on Earth should I do that ? in saying someone needs to be tactfull you are saying that THEIR feeling are more important then mines. I am not responsible on how other people understand what I say, that is purely on them, if they decide to take it as being a hurtful mean,well no matter how I will say it it will be taken as hurtful..so best say it point blank at least it is clear and straight to the point..no misunderstandings or unspoken truth which make everything more difficult.

By having tact or in other words, being politically correct, you are just telling to people what they want to hear...rather then what you want them to hear. Kind of dumb.

Up to them if they are annoyed or not...why shoudl I care of that frankly ? why ?

Mei

I'll give you an example. I've been using tact in this entire thread and I can honestly say that I have not once lied to anyone, said something hypocritical, or "sent someone to hell" thus far. So... I don't believe you're right there.

Answer to your question: To be understanding of someone else is to know how to better deal with certain individuals in a way so that they don't see you as rude. I mean, if that is the way you wish to be perceived, then that is certainly your choice. However, as I mentioned earlier, every choice has a consequence. Everyone needs to be regarded as equally as important to yourself. If you see yourself as superior, then very few people will like you.

I mean, I could be tactless and say that "Your level of grammar is utter garbage, that makes you look like an idiot, and you need to go back to school." However, that's not fair of me to say because I don't know you. You could have a huge amount of circumstances pertaining to that subject which I could not know about nor ever know about and it would be insensitive of me to make any kind of assessment about your grammar level because of that. It would also be more tactful of me to ignore your grammar usage entirely as it is not relevant to the conversation.

The thing is, blunt truth is painful. Blunt truth is harsh. And it doesn't have to be that way in the slightest, because all that painful truth accomplishes is to cause people to feel as if you are attacking them. If you are attacking them, to them, you are a bad person who needs to be attacked back. That is what starts fights.

To say that tact is nothing but lies to cover up the truth is completely false and missing the point. Tact is a way of phrasing an otherwise harsh truth to make it not hurt so bad. It's not meant to twist the truth into a lie, it's meant to soften the blow of a harsh truth. The truth is still getting across, it just doesn't hurt so bad.