Tag: secretive | A Banana Peeled

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Opting in vs. opting out

Posted on October 1, 2023 by Minna Hong • 0 Comments

In my life, I’m a very private person, edging towards secretive. I am where secrets go to die, and people know they can tell me things. I will talk about things with Kathleen, but she is also a steel trap. And Ian. Another steel trap. Other than that, though, I won’t talk about something someone tells me without their specific consent.

I am always an opt-in person. I hate websites that make me opt-out. I was just on one that has gotten worse and worse every year. And it maks you opt-out of getting emails and other bullshit. I know why websites do that, obviously. It’s inertia. They know that it’s easier for people to mindlessly click through than to unclick the checked boxes. That’s Marketing 101–and it’s Psychology 101 as well. Make it as hard as possible for people to opt-out. Or more effort, I should say.

In real life, I liken it to people who are an open book. You can ask them anything, and they’ll tell you what you want to know. Guileless is the word. I have no issue with that as long as it’s limited to their own shit. But, this is the problem with people like that–they are often open with your shit as well. I have had this problem with a close friend in that anything you tell her is going to be told to other people unless you specifically say it’s a secret.

In addition, she likes to be in on all conversations (as we all do, but she does to a bigger extent), so she’l throw something into the conversation even if it’s not hers to be throw in. She does it without thinking, and I’ve had to have a chat or two with her about it. I’ve also realized that I have to be careful what I tell her. If I tell her it’s private, she will keep it to herself, but I have to specifically tell her.

It took me longer than it should have for me to realize that because if someone tells me something, I keep it to myself unless they say it’s OK to share. It’s not my news so why would I tell someone else about it? It’s interesting to me to see the wide gulf between the two. I mean, there are gradients, obviously, but my friend and I are on the far ends of the spectrum.

I know that my nature is in part becuase my father is very secretive himself–maladaptively so. I have said this a million times, but one example has stuck in my mind all my life. It was when I was a teenager. A friend of my parents (a woman) called and asked for my father. I said that he was playing tennis with another friend. When my parents came back, I told my father about the phone call. He freaked out and yelled at me for telling the friend thta he was playing tennis with another (female, very attractive) friend.

I had no idea why he was so upset. If you think about it dispassionately, it was not a big deal. He and my mother were playing tennis with a friend. Another friend wanted to talk to him. I told the second friend he was out with the first. Nothing underhanded there, right?

The Keeper of the Family Secrets

Posted on January 23, 2017 by Minna Hong • 0 Comments

In my family, secrets are king. Currently, I am in possession of three major family secrets. Two were told to me by a family member, and one, I discovered unwittingly. One of them, I thought was an open secret in that I thought my extended family knew about it (it’s not a secret concerning my nuclear family, but a cousin of mine), but I recently found out I was wrong. It’s a full-blown secret, except, there are some family members who know about it (excluding me, obviously), but they just don’t talk about it. This is common in my family, and growing up, I just took it as normal. There are open secrets that you don’t mention, but you know everyone else knows about them. Even as adults, my brother and I don’t talk about them. I mentioned one of them in an oblique way several years ago, and we exchanged knowing glances. That was it, and we moved on to another subject.

Not only do we have major secrets, but my father is very big on saving face. He can’t abide appearing foolish or lesser than in anyone’s eyes, which meant that he was constantly on the lookout for any perceived improprieties. The one that sticks out in my mind the most is when he and my mom were out playing tennis with some friends. Another friend of theirs called and asked to speak to him. I said he was out playing tennis. No big deal, right? When my parents came home and I told my father about the call, he flipped out. He was pissed that I had told the second friend he was out playing tennis with other friends because he thought she would be upset that she wasn’t invited. Never mind that she didn’t live in our city or that you don’t have to invite all your friends to every activity you plan. In my father’s eyes, I had committed a grave sin, and I’ve never forgotten the lesson I learned that day: Don’t tell anyone anything. I know it sounds ridiculous, but his overreaction to my action wasn’t just a one time thing.

He always thought he was right, and what’s more, he couldn’t fathom another way of thinking. I learned at a very early age that my mother’s life at home revolved around making sure my father wasn’t upset. That meant not telling him anything she thought he couldn’t handle. Again, it was hard to tell what would upset him and what wouldn’t. Simply asking him to finish up his bath (he takes up to an hour-long baths. He falls asleep in the bathtub) could elicit the silent treatment. We had a decades-long battle in which he would tell me to put on a sweater or coat because he was cold. He did not take kindly to my response of, “But I’m not cold.” He thought because he was cold, I had to be cold, too. He took it as a personal offense when I refused to put on a sweater or a coat. Side note: I was diagnosed with Grave’s Disease when I was fourteen, which means I had an overactive thyroid. One of the symptoms is never feeling cold. In other words, I had a medical reason to back up my non-coldness, not that it would have satisfied my father.