If you have any elderly relatives who you love but with whom you have experienced a sometimes contentious relationship that occasionally spills out into the present day, you have experienced the following, at least once, if not frequently.
You tell them something. They say, “What?”, or mis-repeat what you just said.
You repeat yourself, louder. They say, “What?”, or mis-repeat what you just said.
You repeat yourself, even louder. This goes on for multiple repetitions, each one a little louder, until, just to be heard, you are almost yelling.
At which point they take offense at the volume, the volume they invited you to use, and say, “Don’t yell at us!” or, “I can’t talk to you, you get out of control,” or, “I don’t like the way you’re speaking to me.”
And then it becomes an argument over your “tone.”
Now, it very well might be that frustration did show in your voice. But the fact of the matter is that the conversation did begin with you trying to be heard, and your “tone” was a function of continuing to attempt to be heard, after multiple failures.
The argument over “tone” derails completely whatever you were originally trying to communicate.
“Tone” can be just the result of having no other means of getting your message across.
And this, folks, is also why complaining about “tone” is such a blinkered thing, when you’re talking about social issues, about rhetoric coming from people who have spent generations trying to get people to listen. Talking about race alone, there were as far back as the days of slavery black leaders who wrote highly eloquent, highly civilized think-pieces, to try to get your attention. When you didn’t listen, they repeated themselves. And then others said what they had said, and then others, and others after that, going on for centuries, and if their voices became more strident, more forceful, less polite, more frustrated, angrier, and so on, it is because they saw by then that mere repetition was not working.
Think “Black Lives Matter” goes “too far?” Think feminists have gotten a little shrill? Think you’re being yelled at by gay people? Want to protest that they’re all acting a little bit angry?
That is because what you’re hearing is the part of the conversation that comes after the indoor voice proved inadequate.
Comment By: Annelies van der Leeden
September 18th, 2016 at 3:17 pm
Succinctly or simplified? The example of the elderly relative is not parallel to an activist adressing a potentially brand new listener. When you set the tone as an activist you have to address those who already may have heard you, (and are ignoring you and are not going to listen anyway) and those who still may be open to your message, and who may be alienated by a too strident tone.
Comment By: Adam-Troy Castro
September 18th, 2016 at 3:17 pm
I did not say that the tone was the best possible selling strategy. I said that this is where it comes from.
Comment By: Annelies van der Leeden
September 18th, 2016 at 4:19 pm
Check
Comment By: Dave Meyer
September 18th, 2016 at 5:18 pm
So, Trump isn’t going too far, then? (said partly in jest but also recognizing a correlation between perception of tone and perception of the speaker to begin with)
Comment By: Janice Murray
September 18th, 2016 at 6:17 pm
Brilliant.
Comment By: Amy Bisson
September 18th, 2016 at 8:18 pm
So very well said.
Comment By: Patrick RichardsFink
September 18th, 2016 at 10:17 pm
Nail. Head. Bang.
Comment By: Jason Bennion
March 27th, 2018 at 1:17 pm
I live in Utah, where the dominant religious majority has a big problem with cursing. I have been in many, many conversations where the point of what I’m saying has been lost because someone is so preoccupied with how I express myself. It’s really irritating.