Schizoid Paradox Community Group
If you would like company who understands that 5 minutes is all you can take, or knows that if you go away for months at a time it doesn't mean you don't like us. If ((hugs)) confound you, but you have a question or would like to share a good book.... we now have a place. Welcome.
Questions that begin with the phrase "Do you want to ..." are so common that we scarcely give them a second thought. I have learned that it usually proceeds an invitation, like "Do you want to go see a movie with me?", where the companionship clause is often implicit. Why is that?
But the construction can also be used as a thinly disguised manipulation, as in "Do you want to do something that I will not ask you to, because I want to preclude any personal responsibility or obligation for your effort on my behalf?" My 2nd wife was a master of this method.
Here is a real-life example:
Her: Do you want to close the window?
Me: No, not really.
Her: What do you mean? Why don't you ever do anything I ask you to?
Me: Well, first, that isn't true, and second, you didn't ask me to close the window.
Her: Of course I did!
Me: No, you asked me if I wanted to close the window, which isn't the same thing.
(She had projected on me her desire to have the window closed.)
Me: Also, I didn't hear the word 'please' anywhere in the question.
Her: You don't have to say 'please' if it's family.
(This was apparently the rule in her family. It certainly had never been so in mine.)
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I need some plot development ideas for a book I'm writing. Here's the lead in:------@1630 she texted me, asking for gas money. "Are u at work? I have to work in a couple hours I don't have any gas barely I was wondering if u had 20$ by chance haven't been able to get any massages in I'm sorry to ask was just seeing"She agreed to meet me at the townhouse @1730. I asked her to call me before...
The statement "Do <X>!" is clearly a command, or a demand for action. People who are not in a subordinate relationship with the command source will often respond ambivalently or negatively to this. The simplest denial ("no") is usually considered curt, if not rude. The simplest polite denial begins with an apology and ends with a formal, if not always acceptable, excuse, e.g. "Sorry, I can't."
People who want to control others outside of a master-servant relationship will usually try to soften the demand, in the hope of not eliciting a refusal. The question "Do you want to <x>?" is not an explicit request for action, but is unfortunately often proffered as one, one that is likely to produce an immediate breakdown in communication rapport. Narcissists often use this form to avoid taking ownership of their needs, and thereby incurring a debt of service that they do not wish to repay. When a denial of service is the result, the frustrated narcissist is often triggered to respond abusively.
A slightly less abusive request could be framed thus: "Do you want to do <x> for me?" Adding some linguistic sugar ("please") transforms a query or vague demand into a clear request for action. Even so, this form of request is only appropriate in the context of an established relationship, or an emergency situation. While using the phrase "Do you want to .." avoids, to some degree, the accumulation of a debt of service, it opens the door to a minimally-justified refusal.
A much more effective request could be structured this way: "Will you please do <x>?" If <x> is a task that is normally the responsibility of the person asked, no debt of service is incurred. If <x> is normally the responsibility of the person asking, a debt of service is incurred, and so the terminal phrase "for me" acknowledges this.
Original question: If someone asks you kindly to if you want to do something for them and you say “No, I don’t want”, is it rude?