survey: beliefs and friendships

[gusl]

Sigh. Life would sure be easier if people interpreted me more charitably, or literally... instead of thinking that I have an agenda.

How important is it to you that your friends have beliefs in common with you?

Comments

[radiantsun.livejournal.com]

You mean like athiesm? Or beliefs about how the world is run? Or beliefs about what friendship is?

I'd say there is a range of importance on the belief depending on how important it is to them. I.e. it is very important to me that we share some of the same beleifs about what friendship is, for example if I believe in honesty and she believes friends lie for each other, than there is a major incongruence in our belief system that will inevitably lead to conflict.

[gustavolacerda.livejournal.com]

Let's say, for instance, beliefs about political ideology or about questions of morality that wouldn't need show up in the context of the friendship. ...Or whether you share the same philosophy (e.g. objectivism).

Liars are out of the game, as far as I'm concerned. Assume everyone can trust each other.

[radiantsun.livejournal.com]

Oh like athiesm. I think it depends, for me, on how dogmatically the other person holds their view and whether or not I agree with it and how often it comes up in conversation.

[rdore.livejournal.com]

really, I think for me it's more important how someone takes the crazy things I tend to say. For example, I like to make jokes about the pope, because I think the pope is funny. I have several friends who are catholic, but they all know that I mean no harm, and just have a fairly irreverant sense of humor. I guess my point is I don't make distinctions about beliefs as long as they don't get in the way of friendly interaction. In fact, I wouldn't want to have friends who believe the same thing as me too much, because I like to be forced to think about any issue from different angles. (Not that I even know what I believe on many issues to begin with.)

[literalgirl.livejournal.com]

Wanting to be understood as one speaks - literally - is always a desire of mine. I have more TROUBLE because people insist on assuming everyone is like they are, IOW, loaded with hidden subtext. It is exhausting. And because my Aspie brain doesn't speak subtext, I can never figure out WHY they'd ever think something I said meant entirely something else, unless they take the time to discuss it with me before they fly off into their whirlwind of "invented reality".

My friends don't have to believe everything I believe, but they need to be tolerant when I don't believe what *they* believe. :-)

[dkmnow.livejournal.com]

::strikes pose::

"Hi! I like you, and I'm going to do you a favor by making you my friend. Is it okay with you if I ignore your words, and instead, reply directly to my own unconscious reactionary interpretation of whatever subtext I compulsively project onto everything you say and do? What do you mean, 'no'? Why do you hate me? What makes you think you're better than the rest of us? I can't believe I ever tried to be your friend!"

:-p

[literalgirl.livejournal.com]

LOL!! Yep, that about sums it up!

[gustavolacerda.livejournal.com]

:-)

is this your own text? seems like a classic thing you might see in Asperger's groups.

[dkmnow.livejournal.com]

Heh. No, I just pounded it out.

But yeah, the result was such a cluster-cliché that re-reading it is giving me flashbacks!

:-O

[dkmnow.livejournal.com]

How important is it to you that your friends have beliefs in common with you?

There are more important things in life.

But it is quite a time-saver!