Are you "mean" by nature?

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OK, I have a problem that seems pretty basic to human interaction. Dealing with it screws everything up.

When things go badly, either just with me alone or when someone else does something poorly and I have to deal with it, my first impulse is to yell at them. I did a lot of yelling as a kid.

Somewhere I thought that this isn't right and I stopped. But then I had nowhere to put that angry energy. I knew that I was holding other people to standards that were too high and I knew I had to be willing to forgive. And I am! But I can't turn on a dime and it takes time until I can let the anger go.

I also realized it was considered rude to express myself in a negative way. So I accepted that other people are allowed to get mad, but I'm not allowed to get mad. Whenever I do show anger now -- very rarely, like once or twice a year (particularly when someone is endangering their life by touching a hot stove, etc.) -- the other person gets really mad at me. I get punished. So I just don't do it except in dire circumstances.

But then I learned you can't be passive aggressive. That's rude, too. I also really don't want to make other people feel bad (I wish they could just accept that I'm angry and move on but so far they do not). So I have to remove ALL traces of anger from my voice and word choice. This task totally freaks me out and I suddenly use a Southern drawl (I grew up in the South but can't do the accent if I try to and never spoke that way as a kid). I think my subconscious has decided I can mask the anger by adding diphthongs or saying "y'all" or "sweetie."

It's super weird. But I just want to scream. So, it's either Southern Belle or harpy. There seems to be no in-between.

Weirdly, the more social pressure to conform -- those people who DEMAND I say hello in the halls and stop to chat about their water-skiing trip -- bring out the same anxiety that can lead into the same Southern Belle response. I think the unconscious social scripting just comes out whenever I feel compelled to perform socially and am not prepared.

So this means that me being me = "mean" but I don't want to be mean, because I don't want to hurt other people. I just want to express myself. Honestly, I just wish they would let me vent. Hitting pillows and screaming in cars still means I have to pretend to not be bothered while I get to a pillow or deal with the thing that caused the situation. I can take deep breaths and count to ten, but I still don't get it -- why can't I just be honest? I really, really wish other people were just honest. But we are all just playing games and hiding our true feelings. It makes me, well, MAD that I'm not allowed to get mad.

(Hey, here I am asking a basic question about human nature and I'm 37 and have a grown-up job. Yay, me.)

Edit: Even stranger, when I'm not angry people describe me as overly passive. But I don't *feel* passive. I think NTs just read aspies all wrong.

Sounds a lot like my feelings when I was a bit younger.

It's an anger management problem I guess, rather than a meanness problem. ASDers start out by being blunt (honest), and that makes us think we can't show anger. I went for years worrying that I was being forced to bottle my anger, I thought I'd probably end up flipping and killing somebody.

But it's a matter of refining the expression of anger into socially-acceptable forms. It takes a long time to get used to doing that, the "right" ways seem like pussyfooting around the truth, but people seem to work out the truth from the understatements quite well. You've only got to say "Dude!" and it conveys a lot more than that one simple word.

I started out not knowing that there was anything between submissive and assertive, because my parents were like that. Once I'd seen assertiveness and learned how to do it, I didn't feel angry so often, because I felt I was making my wishes known and starting to get people to co-operate with me better. It took a long time and it's still not perfect.

One problem is that if you do this in some competitive groups, they'll not want to let go of their obedient servant, so you could get resistance even if your ways of asserting yourself are reasonable.

I like to think that any conflict can be solved in a gentlemanly way. I don't seem to need to vent much these days, I've always been scared of what my anger might do, so I developed strong self-control over it, so it's easy for me to avoid flying off the handle at the annoying things that happen to me these days, as they aren't usually that severe. I tend to anticipate things that can go wrong, so it's not usually a shock when they do, and I tend to have already got some idea of what I'm going to say to fix it.

I don't know if that's mean by nature so much as it is a communication problem. Someone mean by nature would simply enjoy causing damage or not care about the effects their choices have on others.

It turns out I'm pregnant (which will make miscarriage #17 or something either later today or in a few days, so no congratulations), so I was particularly bitchy when I wrote that post. Perhaps the ladies out there know what I'm talking about. Anyway.

Thanks for the thoughtful responses. I've read them and I'll read them again carefully a few more times.

The trouble is having a meltdown means you aren't going to be performing well socially. I get meltdowns when I get angry, so I usually pick the doormat method -- it's safer for everyone. But as you all point out, it's maladaptive. It's easy to be assertive when you don't care -- I do it well in role playing games with friends around a kitchen table. But I lose my words when emotion is involved.

It reminds me of the advanced driving class I took once: in an accident, your fingers lock up as you lose your fine motor skills due to adrenaline, so you have to put your hands on the steering wheel so you can still move it if you expect a crisis to happen. I (and a lot of ASD folks I think) lose fine social skills the moment adrenaline jumps in, which it does a lot in social situations.

It sounds like I need to get out of the situation, calm down, and deal with my emotions first and then the situation. And stay away from all living creatures when I'm dealing with a major influx of hormones!

Some people on this forum are not only mean by nature, they think that it's the only proper way to be.

Fortunately I can only think of a few like that.

@OP

People think I'm 'mean spirited', an 'a**hole', 'negative', etc. Do you know why? Because I tell it like it is, and people don't want to hear it. It's so easy for people to tell you you're being rude because then they make you look like the one in the wrong to everyone else, and people use the idea of 'rudeness' in order to force people into a state in which they feel more comfortable in dealing with.
In short, people claim rudeness because they feel insecure, offended, and 'put in the spotlight' by someone who isn't afraid to call them on their bullsh*t. It's a social tool to get people to sympathize with those who are not necessarily in the right, and the only reason it works is because the vast majority of society is wrapped around the idea of hiding one's true self in favor of bullsh*tting those around them. They call this tactic "socializing" and they dress it up to make it look like the proper way to interact with other people. But honestly, there'd be a hell of a lot less stupid people if that were not the case, mainly because they'd be afraid of what society would say about them when they do stupid things.
In my experience, there are 3 primary social groups:

The Sheep: Who will blindly follow anything and everything that their friends (and sometimes those they don't even know) do and say, because they're incapable of forming an independent thought.

The Herders: Who use the sheep to make themselves look important, purely out of association and control. These are also people who gather others in their own quest for power, and prey on the fact that people will blindly follow them.

The Independents: Who see the bigger picture in society and who'd rather not play a part in it's intricate web of crap. These are most generally the realists in society.

There are also subgroups, but I'm not going into any of those at the moment.

I certainly have gone through periods of lots of yelling. But, I don't think in my heart of hearts was I intending to be mean. Rooted partly in bad communication skills I was sensory overloading and blowing off steam. There was no internal desire to hurt anyone.

One should "tell it like it is"--but one should also use tact and diplomacy when doing so.

I have a very "blunt" manner and although it is never intentional there are times when what I ask or say has been considered as mean by others.

Being mean isn't in my nature and the thought of someone being hurt by what I have said to them upsets me enormously.

Being mean is not my nature but being blunt is. Some people mistake those two.

For example:

Recently my mom was nagging me because I didn't bring enough money to a shop we were going to together although she told me to.
My fault, I get it. But if she told me which shop we go to and if she was not hurrying me up I would be able to figure out I need more. I had literally 2 mins from acknowledging we go to shop to get ready. Good enough that I was able to successfully deal with the sudden plan change.
Anyway, at shop I wanted to buy a sweater too expensive for the money I had with me and asked her if she can lend me some money. Then she started nagging me about how I never listen to her and that I should have bring my own money as she told me to. She didn't listen that I was thinking we are going to a grocery shop and I had enough money for food but not enough for clothes. So I told her: "You still didn't return the 350PLN I lent you 2 months ago so I didn't have to bring my own money when I go with you because you still owe me money". For some reason she got offended by that and started to angrily whisper to me that I "shouldn't yell for whore shop that she lent me money". I got confused. I was not yelling, I was using normal tone of voice. Perhaps I should have whisper it? Is owing money to someone a taboo topic? For me it was just a logical argument in our discussion.

Another one:

We were visiting a moms friend. She got a 2 years old daughter. We were sitting by a table and drawing for the girl while the girl was scribbling with us.
Suddenly the woman said:
- I wonder when she is going to learn to draw circles, she can't do it yet.
I looked at the girl(which was just drawing some random lines) and answered:
- No surprise here, she is still too small.
The woman continued.
- Well, of course. I just wonder when she is going to learn to draw one. A circle is apparently a hard thing to draw. Kids have lots of problems with that.
I looked at the drawing the woman did. I found something that was supposed be a circle (a character's head) but was off. And looking at my mom's drawing I seen another weird circle.
- I guess you are right. Circles are not easy to draw. Even adults have problem with that. Look at the one you draw. Is it even a circle? It's more like an screwed ellipse. And it's not even finished, the lines don't connect. And the one my mom drawn is more like a rounded square than a circle.
My mom and the woman reacted as if I slapped them. Fortunately my mom didn't lose her control and explained to her friend that she shouldn't take it personally because it is just who I am.

I'm being honest when I say that the real reason I don't contribute much here or anywhere is that I'm afraid I will be excluded because many people have mistaken my being blunt for meanness.

It's happened all too often in conversations irl; I've been asked for an opinion, given it, people then stand back and the conversation comes to a standstill.

Later I've asked why or what did I say that was so wrong the reply is I've been too blunt or told someone the truth about something they don't want to face.

Never have I given away anyone's confidences, it's something I wouldn't consider under any circumstances either even when those same people who have previously confided in me begin to ignore me.

yeah, i have seven younger siblings and i can be a real jerk to them when i'm angry. yelling, hitting, criticizing, etc. i don't mean to, it just happens. i love them a lot, but i'm really mean when i'm mad at them and i hate it.

i'm also really blunt with what i say to other people, like i'm unable to lie. if someone asks me what i think of something, i'm brutally honest with them, especially when i'm mad.

although i think it's not as much that i'm "mean" by nature but "angry" by nature, and i'm mean when i'm angry. :/

Kind of. People tend to piss me off really easily. Hell, lots of things tend to piss me off easily, but people are the worst. Thankfully, I'm now living in a situation where people don't bother me much, except through emails or Facebook messages. I can always mute my phone if I feel like ignoring them though.