I notice a lot of posts on this forum are just Vents

Post Reply New Topic

OP never used the word vent, and I don't think the OP was talking about venting posts. OP was very specific.

I notice a LOT of threads get hijacked, often almost immediately.

EDIT: I reread the OP's post. While I do still think that threads get hijacked too often, I very much acknowledge the serial complainers on the board.

God helps those who help themselves. Often times people know what they have to do, but it's hard, and they don't want to do it.

Except in their title, I notice a lot of posts on this forum are just Vents.

I haven’t been on this forum very long, but this issue hasn’t really bothered me so far.

It’s difficult on this forum format to give back and forth feedback, you can’t comment directly under comments such as you can on sites like Reddit, so I appreciate its hard for OP to reply to everyone.

Also I think sometimes it’s easy to give wrong/irrelevant advice. A few times I’ve replied to something then realised later it wasn’t really what OP was asking.

If you press the quote button at the top right side of someone's post, it will allow you to respond to that post directly and that is how you respond to a specific post. So by using the quote button, you can have a specific back and forth conversation with one person that everyone can see. You can also use the private messaging feature to converse with someone privately.

It seems to me that people who post the same "vent" over and over again may be:

• Hoping for a solution that actually works.
• Hoping for approval of a decision they have already made.
• Hoping for attention and/or sympathy while in a situation they have deemed intractable.
• Hoping for confirmation of their fears, feelings, and/or opinions.
• Hoping for justification of their anger, hostility, and possible violent actions.
• Hoping for rescue.

Maybe some combination of the above?  Could be anyone's guess.

My take on this. There are definitely people here that repeatedly keep complaining about the same problems while ignoring or brush aside the advice they get. Sometimes it's hard to tell if they are trolling or only highly disfunctional and caught in an irrational way of thinking. I don't think there's a way to change they way these people think and act except to give advice and then ignore further venting and complaining until they have actually tried the advice given.

Some people here face truly awful life situations. Venting is all they can do.

I agree

There's nothing wrong with venting as long as it's not presented as a request for advice.

I did this a bit or at least it look to others like I was doing that a lot. Members on other forums thought I was trolling & I eventually left due to the negative hostility being directed at me It appeared to others that I was just complaining, venting, & blaming but I was really trying to sort things out in my mind. It sometimes took a bit of time for me to process the responses I received. It may of appeared that I was immediately dismissing or rejecting advice but I was still trying to figure out how I could apply it. I kinda needed a step by step guide. To make an analogy, it felt to me like I was being told that I needed to put something together without being given an instruction booklet. I needed smaller baby step directions that most others would not have needed.

Thank you so much for sharing this. So many people judge unfairly because they don't understand that we might be processing information differently than they do. I sometimes do this similarly to the way you described. When people judge me with their own understanding, it really hurts me. I understand that it might seem annoying to others but if that is how our brains work, we can't really do much about that.

I'm sorry...

technically this thread is venting

the opportunity for deep discussion is always open but rarely taken up. there are several thousand WP members who read these posts but it's always the same 20-30 who post and probably a smaller subset who post regularly.

I need to give credit to this forum because members here have generally been a lot more understanding & a high majority have been at least tolerant about that; not always but that's probably at least partly my fault for generalizing too much without specifying that I know there's lots of exceptions. It probably helps that we tend to have similar life struggles, issues, & quirks so even if others cant really help they at least understand my situation & why I'm discouraged & frustrated. In some ways I've made made lots of progress since joining but in other ways I'm still stuck in the same rut but at least not quite as bitter about it

I know it may sound like I'm blaming NTs here but I'm not trying to. Looking back I get why they were frustrated with me. It sometimes even annoys me on here when posters keep starting their same types of threads, especially in L&D. I sometimes tell myself to stay out of certain threads because I think I'll find it too draining. I feel bad for the posters & want to help but I may not have advice or anything to contribute except what I told them a month or so before.

Speaking only for myself, I'm autistic and most of the time I can't tell whether it's presented as a request for advice or not.

I am not sure I can tell that either. But I don't usually vent myself, so when someone tell me about their problems I try to help them with a solution if I can beacuse that's the respons I would want from them. I would hate if someone responded to me with: "Oh! I can feel your pain. I hope it works out for you in the end. Bye and good luck!"