We’ve all had arguments with people that make us want to bang our head against a wall. But the most difficult arguments are the ones with dumb people or people who always think they are right, when they clearly are not. These Redditors have stories about the most idiotic and painful arguments they’ve had, from parents or bosses who don’t listen and people who can’t be proved wrong, no matter what.
1. No Other Place To Nap
When I was working one day, I had to reprimand a guy for sleeping in a freezer. He moved all the food off the shelf and took a nap. I woke him up, pulled him into the office and he denied it over and over again. Finally, he said, “Why would I sleep in a freezer?” And I just yelled, “I don't know!”
2. Find The Fan File
My cousin said that her laptop was overheating and making a buzzing sound. Her friend piped up and commented that it was most definitely a virus and that she should take it to Geek Squad to have it removed. I said, "No, it's not a virus. It's probably your fan. Your fan is messed up. It's probably just dusty, try cleaning that out."
This girl got righteously angry and told me that no, it was a virus, and she knows because she had the same issue with her laptop a few months ago and Geek Squad fixed it. This went back and forth for a bit with me insisting that a virus doesn't affect the fan function, it was literally a hardware issue, and she was talking to me like she couldn't believe how stupid I was to not realize that a virus was making my cousin's laptop fan bog down.
I finally explained to her how viruses work. Her reply was so idiotic, it’s unforgettable. She stomped her foot like a child and exploded, "It’s still a virus! The virus just deleted the file that runs the fan!" I stare at her in disbelief. "The file that runs the fan? What is that, fan.exe?" and she said, "Finally, you get it!" She was so convinced that this was the case that my cousin believed her and said she would just take the laptop in to have it checked and cleaned.
Whatever, if you want to pay out to have some smug jerk at Geek Squad "fix" your laptop, that ain't my business.
3. Mr. Know-It-All
My best friend married a partner at an investment firm. His arrogance and smugness have only intensified since I met him. But that’s not the worst part. She’s scared to leave him because he will destroy her. It’s difficult to even talk to him because he can’t grasp simple concepts and thinks I’m stupid because I didn’t go to an Ivy League school. He didn’t either, but his excuse is that he’s not from the US.
I tried explaining to him once that as long as the R estimate for COVID was above 1, then the number of cases would keep increasing. It’s exponential growth, which is something you would think someone in investing should be able to comprehend. He didn’t understand so I dumbed it down and said for every 10 people who have Covid, if they infect 11 people then the infection rate would go up even though those first 10 people got better.
I tried to explain sixth-grade math and he was looking at me like I was the stupidest person he had ever spoken to. He tried to argue that for every one person who had Covid they would have to infect at least 10 people before the infection rate increased. He was flabbergasted that he had to explain such a simple concept, even though he was incredibly wrong.
For background, I have an advanced degree in a statistical field. I have peer-reviewed publications of mathematical models I’ve developed. I’m known as one of the two Bayesian specialists at my university. He had a beginner’s Bayesian book sitting on his table when I came to visit once. He saw me eyeing it and he grabbed it and said he was trying to learn about what “his data people were doing.”
I said I had a pretty decent concept on the topic if he had any questions. He did this insulting laugh and said something so rude, it made me see red. In a super condescending tone said, “No offense, but this is way too hard for you, you wouldn’t understand,” and then walked out of the room with the book. Last week he overheard me talking to his wife about a project of mine.
He told me I didn’t know what I was doing and then tried to explain my project to me even though he didn’t actually know what I was doing and he has the statistical capabilities of a kindergartner. I finally stopped him and told him that what he was saying wasn’t correct and that stats don’t work that way. He told me I didn’t know what I was talking about and that I would never be able to find a “real job” anyway because I didn’t go to an Ivy League school.
I work for an R1 university and have government contracts and am not looking for a new job. I just turned my back to him and started talking to his wife again. The absolute arrogance of someone truly thinking they are the smartest person in the room. The worst thing is that is how he got rich. He started his first job at an investment firm bringing in clients and worked his way up.
He talks with such conviction that he sounds brilliant…if you didn’t actually know your stuff. He’s also very attractive and has made it into a Buzzfeed article because of his appearance, which he’ll never let go of, and a smooth talker, which I think makes people want to believe him. But darn, he’s so stupid it’s painful!
4. Ignorance Is Bliss
I was having an argument with my aunt and she said something which I asked her to define what it meant. Her response was utterly insane. She told me to never ask questions because it was a stupid thing to do. I rolled my eyes, left, and never talked to her again besides the obligatory exchanging of pleasantries at family gatherings.
5. Can’t Argue With A Flat Earther
I met a flat earther. He said the whole thing was a conspiracy. I tried asking him where the edge was and he said it was a ring of ice. I tried explaining that for his conspiracy to work, literally hundreds of thousands of people around the world in various space agencies would need to keep the secret yet not one has come forward with the "truth."
It didn't work. I also tried telling him we have literal photos and clips of the round earth spinning and he said it was a lie. No matter how much logic the rest of us threw at him he just refused to accept it. We all came away thinking less of him because he was being so stubborn.
6. Miss Know-It-All
I used to have a friend who would legit argue with you about your own experiences, tastes/opinions, and pretty much anything else. Some examples include: Insisting that neither my husband nor I could possibly remember September 11 because we were only 11 years old at the time. Also insisting that no one could possibly remember anything from before the age of 10.
She said that I was lying about the fact that I can remember every teacher I ever had, and have memories from as young as three years old. They tried to start an argument that polio isn’t contagious. If you liked some piece of art, clothing, home design or another purely opinion-based thing that was simply not her taste, you were wrong.
When I expressed an interest in living abroad for some of my life, she tried to sit me down and lecture me that she knew better than me about whether or not I would enjoy it. Her conclusion was that I wouldn’t. She refused to acknowledge that professional Adobe products are now only available by subscription, and insisted that I must be wrong in telling her so.
She began explaining why pattern making for clothing would be too hard for me to learn, moments after I explained to her what it was. She had never heard of it before and had no idea how clothes were made. She started an argument with me that my nephew is not adorable and that no one really finds children cute, they just pretend to.
She wouldn’t hear of the possibility that someone could go to Iceland and enjoy themselves just because her brother had a stopover at the airport there and was very bored. Sure, it was all annoying—but it was nothing compared to her worst moment. She got upset when our friend group didn’t approve of her brother calling a black man the N-word because he “needed” to make the guy really angry. There were so many more but I can’t remember them all.
Every interaction with her was an exercise in frustration. Her only tactics for debating or arguing were repeating the same stupid points over and over again after they had been combatted, making you feel like you’re emotional or unreasonable when she said something incredibly hurtful and offensive, and talking over everyone while being very condescending and rude.
7. Difficult Times
My friend's boyfriend didn't observe daylight savings time. He understood that the rest of us did. He just didn't. I said, "Ok, but if we agree to meet for dinner at 5 o'clock, we're both using my 5 o'clock, right?". I tried explaining that I observe daylight savings exactly twice a year, once when I set my clocks back and once when I set my clocks forward.
The rest of the time it's a non-entity in my life. However, by not observing daylight savings, he has to observe daylight savings at all times every day, as he constantly has to worry about converting his internal time to whatever time the rest of the world is using. I was unable to convince him of that logic, however, as he is a stupid person.
8. Phones Are Stupid
Anytime my father-in-law tries to start a discussion which is a thinly-veiled attempt to have a "gotcha!" moment against me or my wife, as soon as he starts losing, the actual specifics of the argument go out the window and he starts character attacks or makes wild accusations about what is or isn't allowed in the discussion.
He tried to support the claim that Kamala Harris can't be president because her parents weren't citizens so I pulled up the US Constitution on my phone and read the amendment for presidents and rather than engage with that, he said I was wrong and the paper that his sister read was right, and I don't really know anything, I just know whatever my phone knows.
9. Stubborn Child
In school for my new job, at the beginning, there was a woman sitting next to me. I was like 22 or 23 years old and she was easily 40 years old. At the beginning, we got along well but then—things changed. She started to desperately search for similarities and it got annoying. Then she always asked me about stuff the teachers said while the teachers still talked.
She basically wanted a live translation from me but without changing the language. Of course, this resulted in both of us not being able to listen anymore. No way to explain to her that she should just listen herself and at least try to understand. I would've happily tried to help her afterward when I had time to hear it myself.
First clue was that she was not so bright. I was incredibly over her but still stayed nice. Then we were supposed to work in pairs on a small but not easy task. Of course, she didn't understand a word. I explained one thing to her for the umpteenth time. Sometimes it's cursed, you just don't get one thing. But then she proceeded to tell me I was wrong.
Which was fine if she could only tell me why. But no, it was a matter of, "I have no clue what's up with that. I don't understand it in the slightest but I just know you're wrong about it just because". I was not wrong. I re-read it 10 times in our sources, found different sources, and tried to break it down to basically elementary school levels.
She stopped listening to me and just continued to argue that I was wrong. Remember, that woman was more than 15 years older than me and around 40 years old. I lost my patience, stopped talking to her, and just presented the task by myself. She did not admit anything after the fact. Shortly after, she changed seats after a different incident, and not long after that she dropped out. Surprise, surprise.
10. The Apple Guy Who Discovered Gravity
Both my friends were incredibly smart but one of them refused to believe that gravity actually exists. He was convinced that if "the apple guy" didn't discover gravity we as a society would have the ability to play with brainpower. I stopped trying to talk him out of this but the other friend was almost foaming at the mouth with rage over this conversation.
11. The Government Got Her Mind
Fresh out of college, I lived with a few people who I didn’t really know before moving in. One of the roommates was this slightly older guy who was dating a woman similar in age. She was over our place one day and somehow contrails came up, except she referred to them as chemtrails. You see, I was really minding my business watching something on the TV.
I had just graduated with a degree in atmospheric science and there’s no way I’m going to share living space with someone who refers to contrails as chemtrails. So I say, “You mean contrails, no?” She didn’t, she meant chemtrails because the government is spraying us all with some mind-controlling substances or whatever she claimed it to be.
So I explained to her the reason why airplanes produce a contrail, which was easy to do considering how much of my time and money went on learning about the dynamics of the atmosphere. She didn’t believe that some younger woman could possibly know more than her, which is when she pulled out her trump card. “I live right next to an airport, so I can see that when they first take off there’s no trail. It’s not until they get to a certain height that they switch it on.”
This was literally right after I had explained how pressure and temperature affect humidity and condensation and how pressure and temperature are much lower at higher altitudes. I realized then that I could not convince this person that they were wrong. Luckily he and she moved into another place together not long after.
12. Unforgettable
After talking to a stoner friend about how having weed impairs your brain's formation of memories, he had the perfect one-liner. He said: "That doesn't happen to me, I don't remember forgetting anything."
13. Veggies Will Cure It All
This was so infuriating, I’ll never forget it. I opened up about my inability to have children and how frustrated I am with people recommending things that won’t work for me because the problem isn’t infertility. A woman started up about how I should try going vegan to cure my infertility. I reminded her that wasn’t the issue.
She pressed on, saying she didn’t believe in miracles but for her, it was like hitting a switch. She’s had two babies since going vegan and she couldn’t be happier, maybe I should try it. I said no. She got offended that I refused to even consider. I’m not infertile. Trying to carry a baby would destroy my body Breaking Dawn-style.
Plus, I’m on two medications that corrupt my eggs like a computer virus, so I really cannot have children.
14. Know Your Math
I had an argument with my garage door installer. He was installing the motor and I noticed that it was 1/4 horsepower. I immediately told him that I had ordered the bigger motor. He said that this was the biggest. I then proceeded to tell him that I ordered the 1/2 horsepower engine. He told me that one is too small and this one is bigger.
What in the world?! I asked, “How do you figure that?” He said everybody knows that 4 is bigger than 2 in the most sarcastic voice. There was no convincing him that 1/2 was bigger than 1/4. I finally just had to call his boss.
15. Living In A Castle Is Hard
My mom’s reasoning is that if every room is open, the hot air has places to circulate so it will be hotter. Now keep in mind we only used about five rooms in our 12 room house, so my logic was that if we close the rooms we aren't using then we would only have to heat the rooms we use and then we don't have to keep it in the mid-60s during winter.
Well one week she went on a vacation and left the house to me so I decided to test that theory and wouldn't you believe it, not only was the house warmer but the heating bill was also lower for that week. She of course was having none of it, so she opened up all the rooms again, then it got cold and the heating bill went up.
16. Their Loss
I have a dumb relative who always thinks she knows better. Years ago she wanted me to help her with some sort of device that lets her call long distance without paying for long-distance on landline using the internet. But the problem is she had a dial-up connection, which is super slow. I tried explaining to her several times how she would have to upgrade her internet first for anything to be effective.
But she kept saying she heard this product will fix all of that and insisted on buying it. I even told her what will happen, which is, it's probably a scam and they'll give some useless part like a router and you would have wasted your time and mine, and money. She didn't listen and went through because she always thinks she's smart.
Well, a few weeks go by and she gets the device and of course, it's just a random router when she wants me to install it. Everything I said to her earlier comes true. She just ignores what I say and moves on to something else that will work better. Rinse and repeat. This is how dumb people usually are in my experience. They think they know better than you.
When things don't go according to plan, they either make an excuse and it's never their fault, and/or move on to another thing with the same stupid thinking.
17. Being Respectful
Someone told me she deleted pictures she took of a tree because she had a feeling the tree would be offended by having its picture taken out of fear its soul might be taken. Even if we assume souls exist, that trees have souls, emotions, memory, thought, the ability to communicate and eyes to see what you are doing, how would they have any idea what a photo is?
Or know that your phone can take photos? Or a religion and complex thought to believe in souls? Like just what?
18. True Sparta Fan
A friend of mine and I were having a fun argument about classic history. We were talking about Alexander and whether or not the western Mediterranean was ever going to be a possibility. We're knee-deep in the discussion when our co-worker comes up and starts spouting off that Alexander only conquered as much as he did because of his Spartan army.
Everything we said after that just fueled this man's love for Sparta and his need to tell us about his romanticized version of the place. Sparta wasn't a part of the Macedonian army? That doesn't invalidate his point about Alexander's conquests, no, it just meant that Sparta was so badass that they couldn't be conquered.
Sparta's regular army dwindled by a factor of ten between the Peloponnesian wars and the days of Alexander? They just got ten times as tough, haven't you seen 300?! The conversation slowly devolved until we were just talking about Sparta. It became him trying to defend his bizarre utopia for nearly the rest of our shift.
He stayed firm through boy love, economic recession, lack of army technology, and religious fervor. Only the fact that Sparta was de facto run by a small group of wealthy women seemed to disturb him. I feel like I was gaining some ground with my buddy, but to this day I think Sparta dude still gets off to 300 as a nightly ritual.
19. Bad Influence
I had a dad in a skatepark go on an extended rant and attempt to fight me because I lost my cool and swore loudly when his son, who didn't know park etiquette and was getting in everyone's way for two hours at this point, cut in front of me at high-speed causing me to nearly break my wrist. The most irritating part? The guy was drinking in broad daylight, smoking, threatening assault, and not paying any attention to his son at all prior.
Somehow I'm the jerk because "you're supposed to be a good influence on the kids." Mate, I come to a skatepark to skate, not babysit every kid there because their parents haven't taught them how a skatepark works. You’re supposed to be a good influence on the kid, you're his freaking dad. Bringing him to a park he has no idea how to use, not taking steps to help him learn, drinking in public, and trying to start fights is not being a good influence.
20. I’m Done
A customer presented a coupon from a franchise store that had, "Franchise location ____ only" on it very plainly. Cue, "Sorry, this is a franchise coupon, we're corporate-owned and can't take it, but I can give you this very similar deal that is only two dollars more." She didn't understand. After three or four attempts of saying it in different ways, I finally told her "I'm sorry you're not understanding what I'm telling you, but I can't do this. Do you want the option I mentioned or not?"
She started again with, "Why can't you-!" and I just walked away.
21. Flushed It Down
I watched Michio Kaku give a speech at a conference. He was talking about technology and how cheap and easy things are getting to make. He talked about how we will someday in the not so distant future have technology as thin as a sheet of paper, that will have all the workings of some of our most advanced technology of today, but that we will just basically throw away like it's actually a sheet of paper.
He went on to talk about how our toilets will someday collect information on the waste that our bodies produce, eventually getting to a point where we can detect cancer. I got back from the conference and was over at some friend's house making some dinner and I was talking to a girl I was dating at the time. I was telling her about the conference, what Kaku was talking about and eventually explained the toilets. Her reply was unbelievable.
She said, "That's freaking stupid. Cancer won't be able to be detected from your waste by a toilet." I was like, “so you don't think that in another 50 years, with the rate that technology is progressing, that we won't have toilets that will be able to tell us if we have cancer cells in our bodies?” She told me that if I believed that, that I was a stupid person.
And went on further to clarify that I was not just being ignorant in this situation, but that I was a stupid person, incapable of intelligent thought. I don't get set off by much. But this led to a screaming match over the phone that ended with me hanging up my phone. My humiliation didn’t end there. I then remembered that I'm standing in my friend's kitchen, with him and his wife staring at me from the living room, me fuming, and holding a wooden spoon in my hand.
I just looked at them and said, "She wouldn't believe that toilets will be able to detect cancer."
22. Can’t Decide
My parents and I decided to go out to eat, so we stopped at our favorite pizza parlor. They also served sandwiches, which I really liked, and pasta. Well, I wanted a sandwich, my mother wanted pasta, and my dad wanted pizza. In the end, we had none, as we got into a heated argument at the table before storming out, leaving the crowd there quite perplexed, I'm sure.
Why we all didn't just get what we wanted rather than force everyone else to get the same things, I have no idea.
23. Paint It Red
I was making paint at a hardware store to pay for college. A co-worker completely messed up a customer's order by making the wrong color. Me being the competent one, I take a glance at the color and notice that there is still room in the can to make it the proper color. I manually shoot the remaining tint into the bucket and the idiot co-worker walks by and notices I'm fixing her mistake.
In front of the customer, she states that I do not have the authority to manually operate the tint machine, which I mean, at that point we had been coworkers for two years so I have no idea where she got that notion. I nod and say “I got it” and assure her that everything is fine. She continues being belligerent in front of the customer and I continue stating “I got it” with various levels of screw off and eye glare.
The paint comes out of the shaker perfectly fine and I reassure the customer that his wife won't see any difference in color. I leave the paint booth and my boss is walking towards me and I mutter, "Have fun with this one" while I use the restroom. My boss chews us both out for arguing in front of a customer, which looking back I don't disagree with. But at least I got some form of retribution. She got demoted to cashier.
24. Didn’t See That Coming
In the long-ago times before smartphones, I was working on a school project on Marco Polo and mentioned some random Marco Polo facts to a friend. She agreed that they were interesting and added, "It's extra impressive because, you know, he was blind." I felt like, at this point, one of my books probably would have mentioned if he was blind so I asked her where she heard that. Her explanation was so hilarious, I still laugh to this day.
She told me that he must have been because why else would we close our eyes when playing the game? It started out gently as I tried to explain that Marco Polo was not blind but I didn't actually know why we closed our eyes while playing Marco Polo. I have since looked it up and allegedly it's because Marco Polo didn't have a freaking clue about where he was going.
It escalated into a full-on screaming match about whether or not Marco Polo was, in fact, blind. He wasn't, by the way.
25. He’s A Bright One
I had an argument about how light travels through space. It seems like a scientific argument on the surface. While the context was scientific, the content was far from it. My younger brother was arguing about the age of the universe with me. I told him it was 13.8 billion years old and he told me it was 6000. I explained to him that if the universe was only 6,000 years old, we would not be able to see stars more than 6,000 lightyears away.
And because we can see stars billions of lightyears away the universe must be at least that old. Now I expected his argument to be, "How do we know those stars are billions of lightyears away? How do we know they aren't closer?" and I had a good follow-up for that. But no, he went with, "well that's because the light from those stars was placed closer to Earth when it was created, so we could see them." I had no follow-up for that.
He took my speechlessness as a victory. You might think by "younger brother" I mean a boy who is 10 or 11 years old. No, he's 24.
26. A Pass For Free Stuff
Way back when I was a phone service advisor for a credit card company, this lady called in confused about a piece of mail we had sent her. She said, "I don't understand why you sent me a bill. I paid for the TV at the store with my card." I replied, “Yes, ma'am. Now, this is the bill for using your credit card.” “But I used my credit card. Why would I have to pay again?"
This went on for about a good hour. This poor excuse for an adult believed that a credit card was just an all-access pass to buy anything you wanted for free. That was a devastating job.
27. That’s A Hard Shell To Crack
My friend was convinced that selfish was pronounced shellfish. I wrote the word out, sounded it out and it was like I was saying the sun was blue. She just wouldn't have it. I don’t know if she was screwing with me, but 2-3 years after that whole argument we got in a different argument about her basically being a brat and she has the most jaw-dropping reply.
She said: "Sorry, I was being shellfish." I couldn't stay mad at that moron.
28. Put A Brake On That Thought
My brother made the statement that when you pressed the top of the accelerator pedal, you went faster, as opposed to the bottom. It took me four hours to explain to him that it doesn't matter where on the pedal you press, however far down it is determines what speed you're going to be traveling at.
29. Mr. Hobbit The Science Guy
I had an argument about whether or not Lord of the Rings is a sci-fi movie. There were 3-4 people out of 10 vehemently claiming that because the laws of physics were mostly obeyed, the movies had scientific elements and are to be considered sci-fi films. We were practically screaming at each other for the better part of two hours.
30. Phone Stuff
I had an argument with someone about whether or not electricity runs through phone lines. After a while, I asked her, "Well then, what do you think runs through phone lines?" She replied, "Phone Stuff."
31. Like Mother Like Daughter
I had an ex argue with me over which would weigh more, a pound of bricks or a pound of feathers. We went back and forth forever while I tried to explain it to her. It did not help when her mother chimed in with, "What about a pound of wet feathers?!" The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.
32. Light Show
A friend tried to put aluminum foil in the microwave, I, and literally every other person we asked, from friends to complete strangers, tried to explain that it does not end well. They strongly believed, and I quote, "It just makes a little light show in the microwave." My friend wanted to put food on top of aluminum foil, then put it in the microwave for 30-60 seconds.
33. The Animal Whisperer
I was vegan for a few years and joined a club-type organization. We would swap recipes, talk about new products and just hang out. Most of the people were pretty awesome, but like everything, some were a bit loony. There was this one girl, who thought all animals could choose to be vegan. In her opinion, a wolf could just decide one day, "I want to avoid animal products."
So she would talk about wanting to go speak to wild animals about the benefits of a vegan diet. I tried to tell her that animals really couldn't just go vegan and she suggested that we feed them soy-based meat alternatives. We all tried to help her understand that animals can't and she refused to believe us. She eventually stopped coming to the get-togethers.
Thankfully, she refused to own pets, so no animals directly suffered from her beliefs. They just had to listen to her talk when she went out converting.
34. Challenging Authority
I'm a union leader so I have had my share of arguing with stupid people and it's not always the employer. Though I've had moments with the employer the most memorable are with my members. I have a couple of members that I like to refer to as having the "what if" personality. When on their back foot they'll ask you what if this happens or if that happens.
Do they have a policy for this or what about this? It's like you're talking to an adult version of the two-year-old child who is constantly asking why. They turn what could be a five-minute conversation into a two-week-long conversation. My best experience of this was with a guy who would constantly come up with an extremely unlikely scenario and wanted the employer to have a policy written up detailing how he should respond in each case.
I kinda just gave up arguing with him as each item turned into a multiple-hour session of me patiently trying to explain to him that the employer doesn't have to tell you specifically how to do your job as a tradesmen. That the earthquake has a 1 in a billion chance of happening here is not an OHS issue and that a generalized emergency response plan is an acceptable level of planning for that event.
You should know how to do your typical work tasks that are related to your trade safely. I informed him that if he's concerned about it then he has to follow the OHS process. In Canada, we have a process for handling OHS concerns. Essentially it starts with the supervisor, then it goes to a local OHS committee, and then it goes to the site manager, and then if there is still no resolution it goes to the federal/provincial level for their final say.
This guy pushed it all the way through, with each step denying his concerns, only for the federally-appointed safety officer to inform him that his employer was going above and beyond. That my member's concern wasn't valid. He didn't accept that as an answer but he couldn't take it any further other than them to just keep rephrasing his question.
The employer eventually found a way to lay him off because of lack of work. I wonder why they did that? In Canada, you also have the right to refuse to do unsafe work but this guy wouldn't refuse to do the work because he felt safe enough to do it. But would still push his concerns up the chain.
35. Not The Right Fit
I had a computer science teacher who didn't know anything about technology. We got into arguments because she insisted that a degree in creative writing would be the best way to prepare yourself for an IT job rather than a degree in computer science.
36. One Man’s Trash Is Another Man’s Trash
My family has this deceptive maneuver where they slowly change the argument to something they can make you wrong about, picking the one detail they know can turn the argument in their favor and slowly pivot the conversation away from what the real argument is about and into a situation where now they’re right and I'm the one who’s wrong for asking them to stop trying to give us their junk.
All I want is for them to ask before dropping stuff off in our house because we don’t have room for their old flower pots. We don't want them, but just ask us first. Well, that got out of hand. In that situation, they make you feel like a jerk because beggars can’t be choosers and we should just be happy that we’re getting stuff for free.
But we didn’t beg for anything and they just brought this trash over because they didn’t have the room for it. What makes them think we do? Their house is twice as big. Ok. I’ll stop.
37. A For Effort
A friend of mine in school was convinced that he could find a triangle whose angles wouldn't add up to 180 degrees after learning the rule in class. I just couldn't get him to understand that if he finds some shape that doesn't fit the definition of a triangle, then by definition he has not found a triangle.
38. Two-Faced
My mom yells, "But there's two sides!", quite literally like a toddler whenever you defend yourself. If you're always advocating for the devil, you might be the devil.
39. Temper Tantrum
I know someone who legitimately stood up in the middle of a meeting about her child harassment, in the child protection offices, and yelled at everyone that the child deserved to be jabbed because she did not know how to play the game Operation. At that moment in reality, there wasn't anything I, the child protection officer, her boyfriend, brother, and sister, or the grandparents or father could say to her.
I don't think there are words in existence appropriate for that situation. I could only say, "What the actual heck?"
40. Work Harder, Not Smarter
A conversation with an OPS manager went something like this, "We should reorganize the warehouse racks so that the cases with the greatest velocity are at the top." The reply: "Excuse me, but do you perhaps mean 'mass' or even 'volume'?" Their retort: "No, I mean velocity. Don't insult my intelligence again." The argument continued: "Okay, but none of these boxes are moving at the moment. Their velocity is 0 - across the board."
It finished with: "You and I are going to talk with HR." The same ops manager a couple of weeks later said: "What do you think you're doing?" "Just moving boxes. It's the only thing that we do in this warehouse." The manager said: "You're not on process. One Best Way is that we pick up, label, then move one box at a time."
I said: "You're saying that if I label 5 of these boxes, each of them less than 1lbs., then move them to this cart all at once, I will be performing my job at a slower pace than if I did each and every one individually?" They said: "Yes. You are expected to be on process and this is the best process." I replied: "I don't quite see how the wasted energy of turning back and forth between the pallet and the cart more than necessary results in more efficient work. Could you give me a demonstration?"
They said, "No. It's your job to move boxes, not mine." Finally, I said: "I... Fine. In my honor, I will henceforth move every single box with the exact process you just detailed." A few days later he and my area manager pulled me aside because my production had dropped by 43%, which honestly is a testament to how hard I was trying to actually make his "process" work. Walmart is a horrible place to work.
41. Fight Like An Adult
My mom’s entire argument tactic was to interrupt the other person as soon as they open their mouth. It didn’t matter if you were calm, reasonable, and respectful. The moment sound came out of you, she would come in with greater volume. She usually didn’t have much to say, so she would literally repeat herself just to interrupt you.
Even if you paused and let her speak, if she was out of stuff to say, she would wait quietly until you try to talk again then interrupt you with something she already said. She wasn’t even subtle about what she was doing. She was prideful about how great of a debater she was. She thought this childish and disrespectful thing actually made her strong and respectable.
I don’t think she ever realized that she didn’t actually win any arguments but simply wore the other person down until they gave up on a constructive adult conversation with her.
42. Human Repellent
I am dealing with a housemate with a wickedly bad temper. Her boyfriend is an old friend of mine and I wanted to help them out since they were living in her mom's house last year. I did not know her well at all. Everything she’s subjected me to has made me regret ever trying to help. She wields her temper like it's a weapon, and any time you try to express what you or someone else is feeling, she immediately argues and invalidates you.
She has told her partner she is going to kill herself in order to win arguments. Often times the things she is spouting as an argument are projections of her behavior or projections of her temper. She does not respect the boundaries of others, but demands that her boundaries be respected and any conversation to find compromise and even ground is met with anger.
Her lack of control over her words, once she's triggered, are some of the meanest, most vitriolic things I've ever heard from anyone. My partner, who was her friend and got her a job at her work, also had her own falling out with this person and now won't come over to my house due to fear of this person's behavior. I am exhausted. I probably have to deal with this for another 2 months.
43. Very Idiotic Person
I deal with entitled wealthy investors every day. The only thing worse than arguing with a stupid person is a stupid wealthy person who thinks they are important.
44. Can’t Let You Win
My mom cuts me off when I speak and when I know I start to win she starts mocking me in a voice that makes me sound stupid. It's really degrading and hurts my feelings but I can’t do anything but just walk away. Now that I think about it, I really don’t have the best parents.
45. Fly Out Of My Life
I have a lot of birds, budgies, cockatiels, lovebirds, cockatoos, canaries, hummingbirds, etc. I study birds and I built an aviary for each species of bird on the second floor of my house. Each bird has its own aviary and I take care of them. Most of the birds in my aviary are tamed. All of my budgies are tamed, all of my cockatiels are tamed except for the really young ones.
Half of my lovebirds are tamed, the majority of my cockatoos are tamed and my hummingbirds and canaries are in the process of being tamed. So three months ago my mom wanted to visit me for my birthday and went to my house. I cut her out of my life three years ago for protecting a man who had assaulted me, so I tried to never talk to her again.
She found out where I live because of my brother and went to my house. She came inside my home and we talked for a bit, then I showed her my aviaries and my birds and she started telling me that I was maltreating them and that these birds should be on the streets. Keep in mind these are budgies, canaries, cockatiels, and hummingbirds, animals that probably wouldn’t survive due to cats, especially budgies and cockatiels.
I calmly explained to her what would happen if one of my birds escaped and we kept talking. Later she brought up the discussion again and started calling me an animal abuser and a piece of trash. I told her what would happen if a cat saw a budgie and thought of attacking it. We started arguing and she said I should let them go. But the worst was yet to come. She then ran to my budgies’ aviary and opened the doors.
I just watched as half of my birds flew to my arms, some flew towards my room and got inside my bathroom and half of my birds just freaked out and stayed inside the aviary. I stopped her when she tried to open the cockatoos and the hummingbirds' aviary and I kicked her out. All of my budgies were like, “What in the world just happened?”
I spent an hour and a half finding everyone and getting them back to the aviary. She never contacted me again. The next morning the authorities showed up saying a woman had called telling them I was mistreating my birds and they went inside to look at my birds. They ended up covered in bird poop, because I opened my budgies’ aviary door and they had the birds all over their head and shoulders! We got a good laugh and they left.
46. All Began With A Bag Of Cheetos
I had a massive year-plus-long argument with my old roommate over Cheetos. I bought a bag of hot Cheetos because I hadn't had them since elementary school and had a taste for them. So I put the unopened bag into my designated cabinet and went on my way. A few days later I decided that I'm going to eat my Cheetos. I open the cabinet and notice the bag is opened and empty.
Someone has eaten my Cheetos and stuck the empty bag back in the cabinet. So I confront my roommate calmly and say, "Hey man, could you please not eat my food?" Roommate blows up and starts screaming that he needs it and he's starving. He's unemployed at the time and I guess he ran out of food stamps for the month. I pointed out that he was welcome to share my cereal or fruit but eating all of my snacks was inappropriate.
Lots of screaming and door slamming ensues. Well, that was just the beginning of my nightmare. The rest of the time I lived there he would take my wet clothes out of the washing machine and throw them on the floor, purposely slam stuff while I'm sleeping, take my food out of the fridge and leave it on the counter to go bad, etc. And we would regularly continue these screaming matches over this $2 bag of Cheetos.
I don't even live there anymore and he still tells my boyfriend I'm controlling and he should break up with me. I also forgot to change my address for my bank after I moved and my new debit card got sent there and he keeps denying that he has it. I never even ended up buying another bag of Cheetos since then. A bag of Cheetos has caused the biggest ongoing argument I have ever been in.
47. Snap Back
Long ago, over 20 years ago, I had a lovely beat-my-head-against-the-wall discussion with a young lady who had no children of her own, and no experience raising children with disabilities. What she said was so chilling, it made my blood boil. She proceeded to tell me that my wife and I needed to be firmer and more strict with our autistic son so that he would "snap out of it" and start talking and stop "acting autistic."
I cannot remember how exactly I phrased my response as it was in Spanish, not my native language, but it was basically a polite version of "pound sand, you have no idea what you are talking about."
48. Someone Take Her On A Road Trip
Someone argued that "You can't drive to Canada from New York because New York is a state and Canada is a different country!" She was quite insistent. However, I knew I was correct because at the moment of that argument I was in my car on my way to Montreal.
Sources: Reddit, ,
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