I've had to coach people and help them understand the entitlement involved in demanding that everyone adjust and adhere to their personal preferences and communication style. In my experience, it's about seeking to understand the person and adapt accordingly. Not everyone is willing to do that.
I'm not saying that there's no space for direct communication and that everyone needs to be formal and socially polite during every interaction. But I've met many people who act like you describe John does who very much do not appreciate getting it back, implying some level of awareness that their directness is hurtful on occasion.
I've only met a few direct people who can take it as well.
It makes me want to reframe this a little with your statement 'understand the person and adapt accordingly.' As someone who has learned their social skills later, I think it's usually more of a responsibility of the abrasive person to adapt their communication style and know when it is best used.
Specifically, I think abrasive and direct works great in high trust environments. It has served me well as well. It does sometimes relate to autism for me, ymmv.
Anyway the reason why it doesn't work outside of high trust environments is that people have feelings, and their feelings matter. Ultimately you do have a responsibility to try and be considerate. So like, for me I try to separate the high trust and low trust environments in my life, and keep the part of me that's direct and abrasive (often among peers in technical context) less vocal in the low trust environment.
When I intentionally want to push back in a low trust environment, I try to check in more with the person, look to where they seem uncomfortable, and double check I understand what their insecurities might be in a certain context as that often increases defensiveness.
Sometimes in low trust environments I might not notice, or I might identify it as low trust and just not care. In those contexts yeah I'll be the disgruntled aspie ;) but in other contexts I want to connect to people and really think through the impact of my words not the righteousness.
You’re right that direct and/or abrasive communication is better received in high trust relationships or environments. So the goal should always be to try and take steps to cultivate that.
In my experience, some people are legitimate assholes. but many are simply misunderstood and what I’ve learned throughout my life is that you’ll learn a lot and gain a lot simply by looking past your initial emotional response and approach things with an open mind.
If I’m kinda sensitive but also hyper-ambitious, I acknowledge that Facebook has
1. Some of the highest pay in the industry. 2. Ultra-competitive environment. 3. Low moral principles.
Seems like the strategy would be to use every lever at your disposal to manipulate your environment, rather than leave and risk getting paid less.
If I understand the hypothetical you've proposed, my advice would be for you to adapt and learn to be less sensitive rather than have you believe that you can manipulate the environment, or worse, directly manipulate people.
It's possible that you could be a positive influence for change, so I don't want to completed discount any effort there, but I also think it's worth being realistic about what you can actually affect.
But like it works for Musk and Trump, and probably hundreds of other leaders today, why not take their example? (Assuming again, your highly ambitious and competitive, I’m more pro social, so I’d take your route)
This is legitimately something I’ve been asking myself lately, we talk about a world that values one thing ( rationality, respect, pro social behavior) but reward another (pettiness, vindictive, selfishness). Why do we pretend?
Also, and maybe the most important point, John Carmack is 100% trying to manipulate his environment and people, that’s why he’s so successful!
The world is literally run by people who are good at manipulating people and their environment. That’s what an entrepreneur is, that’s what a politician is, that’s what an artist is. Your argument seems to mostly be people shouldn’t try to manipulate the world in a way that I don’t like.
I mean maybe, but maybe Carmac is just an ass hole... He can be a "legend" in the software development world and also just not be a super great person socially. The two things aren't mutually exclusive.
I don't disagree with you entirely, but being "direct" isn't a get-out-of-jail-free card for poor interpersonal skills. It's not always about "fragile egos" or "entitlement", it's about basic professionalism and communication.
