This is something I learned a long time ago, while rooming with a good friend of mine and it has been a consistently observable phenomena with nearly everyone who I have ever spent time with in a shared space.
You (or they) look around a room (could be the bathroom, the kitchen, the living room) and there is some clutter. One person says, "this place is a mess, how come you never tidy up?"
I have taken moments like that, for example a pile of things on the living room coffee table with my old roommate, or the bathroom counter with my wife. Both could look me straight in the eye, point at the surface in question and tell me, "it's a mess, clean it up!"
I would look, agree that yes, it was cluttered a bit, but really, of the total amount of things that are on the counter or table, 30% or less of the things are mine, the remaining 70% or more are their things. So, I would ask them to hold on a moment, remove my items and then ask them, "okay, is it still a mess now?" The answer is/was almost always, "Nope, now it is fine."
I would try to explain that all that I did was remove my minority fraction of the "clutter" and to their eyes, the whole clutter was now gone. All they could then see were "things that I put there, that belong there, because I put them there". I can not however, get anyone involved in this experiment to see, accept or agree that the "entire mess was only reduced by a fraction".
Which is what I call, and shall henceforth be known as the "My stuff, your shit" rule of visual acuity. People see something that belongs to someone else and it is "why is all this shit laying about?" However, lay out items of theirs in a similar arrangement and all they see is "some of my stuff" and there is no clutter or mess.
Just another thing that I have learned in life. No, it's not meant to be helpful, it sure hasn't helped me. To this day, I still get yelled at to "clean up your crap 'cause it's making it hard for me to find my stuff". True story. Perhaps you've noticed this too? Maybe you should keep an eye open for it the next time it happens to you?
English
#Offtopic
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I shall put this theory to the test.
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This explains the first fight I had with my roommates
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Holy crap, you just explained half of the feuds in my house!
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Yes, a thousand times yes. I live in an apartment with two buds, literally the only things I have in the living room are my 50 inch tv and xbox, ok and the tv stand to I guess. I will come out and see plates and shit everywhere, I say we should clean and of course both say it's not mine. I'm going to use this Recon, thank you.
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Edited by Mofu: 11/22/2014 1:46:48 AM11/10 Too much water -ign
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OP is messy. Nah, I guess this is kinda true. But even with my own stuff I like to keep things organized instead of having all my shit spread around the place.
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10/10
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Recon, you vent in the best of ways.
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This actually explains a lot..... Great post!
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this is so insightful, looks like thesis. would be interesting to see an actual scientific work about this, with testing groups and everything.
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Recon, now I know that I'm not crazy. Thanks mate.
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Maybe remove their belongings from the very same pile, and ask if it's clean then? See if they react the same way.
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I have been enlightened
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Sounds like every argument I've had with the wife over the past 10 years.
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You should publish a thesis on this phenomenon, I'd read the shit out of it.
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True statement
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"Ever notice while rummaging through others peoples stuff, that there stuff is shit, while your shit is stuff?" -George Carlin R.I.P. [spoiler]One of the best comedians ever.[/spoiler]
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I wish I still had the picture of my Sophomore year dorm. I'm no neat freak, but my roommate didn't do laundry at all. He just put his clothes on the floor until the room looked like a Goodwill store after a tornado. I never really had a problem with it, though.
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... Wow. I'm speechless. I'm usually that person who tells others to clean up. Now I can explain to them why I want their shit gone.
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1 man trash is a another man's treasure.
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I can totally agree with this rule. Currently at Uni, one of my roommates is a total control freak, and so everything we do is messy, untidy, worthy of leaving passive-aggressive notes, etc... (Bitch stole my fridge space and then complained that my stuff was in the way. I responded in kind by bulk-buying milk and cheese.) Constantly get's mad at us for stuff on the side of the kitchen sink, and carelessly chucks it around much to the anger of everyone else. But when it's her shit (and I don't mean cluttered, items in a kitchen, I mean beer bottles in the bathroom, food waste in the sink, actual mess), it's left there, maybe for days on end until I or someone else tells her. Gotta remember this rule for later reference.
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Actually this is a good thing since once you realize this occurs, you can do less work with the same results :)
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Never had this issue, but seeing as how I end up in these shit scenarios where people are just so -blam!-ing blind to the truth, I will have this issue in the future
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What of the man who pumps the septic tank?
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I must admit, even I have been guilty of this in some sort of fashion.