another attempt at evil
Since you're not convinced so far by the LtEHB story, here's an earlier example.
My family had this incredibly dorky, Flanders-ish game called "The Ungame", which did away with all that nasty competitiveness that's built into most board games and instead just had a never ending path around the board, with no good or bad points. You did stop for questions sometimes, though, and they were all open-ended things designed to promote communication personal expression. To make things even better, my family had the Christian version.
If you read the first amazon review, written by the creator, you'd guess that I would hate this game, and I would now, but I used to like it, for some forgotten or repressed reason. Maybe I just liked hearing other people's answers. I would still be interested in eavesdropping on people I know playing it; I just couldn't participate myself.
Anyway, one day I really wanted to play this game, so I begged everyone to choose the Ungame over all the other games we had. I don't remember how old I was, probably somewhere between 8 and 11. We played happily enough for a while and then I got a card asking me to say something nice about each person playing the game. It sounds simple enough, but I completely froze. I couldn't think of a single nice thing to say about anyone in my family. After a long, uncomfortable and increasingly panicked silence, my mum got understandably upset. I don't remember what she said, but it included pointed reference to the fact that I was the one who wanted to play the game in the first place. She was obviously hurt and eventually ended up threatening to send me to my room if I didn't hurry up and answer the question. After even more painful silence I managed to mumble that my little brother was cute. Another awful silence later and I went to my room and never played the game again.
I had flashbacks to that game when I was in my senior year of high school and my class went on a retreat. One night, my big group of friends, about 20 people all together, crammed into one tiny room after lights out. Someone came up with the idea that we should all go around and say something we liked about each person in the room. Luckily, the meme began fairly close but, travelling away from me, so I had plenty of time to panic and plot my escape. I spent half the time trying to come up with a subtle and inoffensive way to leave the room before it got to my turn, without it being obvious that I was trying to avoid having to say anything nice about anyone, and the other half trying desperately to think of things to say, so that I'd be prepared.
It wasn't any easier, though, especially since, despite them officially being my friends, I really wasn't at all close to any of them. I barely ever spoke when we sat in a group to have lunch. I never called anyone at home, and nobody called me, without a specific reason. I probably knew a lot more about them than they did about me, from listening to their conversation, but I was still too panicked to think of anything nice.
I did pause from my panicking to listen to what people said about me (I was trying to listen to the rest, too). Most things were obviously fairly generic, but I was still amazed that people could think of nice things to say about me, and actually seemed to like me (I'd pretty much been assuming that they just tolerated me hanging around the outskirts of the group, since I didn't make much noise and could fairly easily be ignored).
So, of course, I felt even more worried that I couldn't think of nice things to say about anyone.
Luckily, I was saved by one of the teachers noticing the noise and busting us for being awake after lights out. I've never been so happy to get in trouble in my life (also, the look on his face, as we trooped out of the tiny room single file, like clowns out of a volkswagen, was pretty hilarious).
Doesn't that count as evil, that I can never think of anything genuinely nice to say, even about people I like?
7 Comments:
It sounds like you were too panicked and under pressure to think of nice things, rather than that you didn't like anything about any of these people.
Or maybe you just got unlucky with the sort of people you were surrounded by as a teenager. I know a few people who I can't think of anything nice to say about (except for back-handed compliments like "She's very... focused" or "He always feels comfortable speaking his mind" but they aren't the sort of thing that occur to you under pressure).
I hate those sorts of games with a white-hot passion. I always feel manipulated and resentful, plus I can think of nothing to say. Really, I can't bear to think of anything to say, because even if I meant it, whatever I'd answer would sound forced and canned. Feh.
So if not being able to play those games makes one evil, then you'd better make up some Phantom the Evil Heartless Bitch trading cards.
Another evil heartless bitch here :) I hate those games, for exactly the reasons Phantom lists. At best, you sound insincere (and if so, why bother?). I can't stand being put on the spot that way and usually find a way to avoid participating, which of course leads to everyone thinking I'm a bad sport or a snob. Oh well.
Yeah, I hate those games too. I'm always amazed when anyone has anything nice to say about me, and I get panicked enough about coming up with the "right" nice thing to say about someone - how do I know what will/won't offend someone? And such games usually are manipulative - I was in a similar situation once (different purpose, but same kind of structure), and it was explicit that we *didn't* have to speak up - that commenting was voluntary. But I ended up being the only person who didn't say anything, and as more and more people spoke, and it became clear that I was the only one not speaking, I felt an incredibly pressure to say something (and in fact, a number of people explicitly pressured me to), at the same time that I was determined not to, since it was supposed to be voluntary. Yuck. I HATE situations like that. So I don't think it's evil not to be able to come up with anything, though I can understand why you felt bad about it (not that you *should*, mind you, but I understand why you felt that way).
oh no... I love those games!! I'm usually the person who suggests playing them, but my version of being evil is wanting to play the games because I want to hear all of the nice things people say about ME, so it's a big plot to get affirmation. I didn't realize others hated the game so much, but what people say here makes sense.
I began to comment a while ago and got interrupted, so now I'm just echoing the "I hate those games" comments. Also, I'm very sorry to inform you that you've lost all credibility in the "I'm evil" department.
I have never even heard of such a game. Does that mean no one ever liked me enough to suggest playing it? In any case, it sounds like a game I wouldn't much want to play either.
And not being able to come up with something to say under pressure does not make you evil. I wouldn't even say you were evil if you couldn't think of nice things to say about your family even without the pressure--that would more indicate that they might be evil, wouldn't it?
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