One-sided stories

[Ghost of the dead horse]

I'd like to hear the other side.

I.e. suppose some douchebag is spoiling their life and that of everyone around them, and another person tries to get some sense in their numb skull. The douchebag will come up with a story that they are being "controlled" by some "control freak", getting sympathies.

We have too many stories of some "other person" being unreasonable. Is there any formula to reverse engineer some common complaints, and to extract some truth from them?

I.e. what kind of story might really be behind testimonials like ..

-S/he's control freak
-S/he won't shut up
-S/he stalks me
-S/he's unreliable
-People harass me for no reason at all
-I'm being treated with prejudice at my workplace

Ok, I usually listen people with sympathy and initially believe what they tell. I only now got the idea what's it like to only hear the other side. Why do we believe stuff like this? The behavior being mentioned is easily discerned as unwanted, it's easy to condemn. We hate the said behavior too much to question it. However, if we take all the stories we are being told, it doesn't add up.

Okay, there can't be a single answer for anything. For what I know, people believe in being reasonable and fair. I'm just concentrating on the cases when the popular one-sided stories are wrong.

What I think is that..

Idea: -S/he's control freak
Why it might not be so: the first person is greatly neglecting their responsibilities, and somebody is trying to teach them.
Idea: -S/he won't shut up
Why it might not be so: the first person is unable to communicate properly his/her disinterest in the communication. Shyness, anxiety, laziness, whatever.
Idea: -S/he stalks me
Why it might not be so: paranoia, not able to confront the other person, etc
Idea: -S/he's unreliable
Why it might not be so: unreasonable expectations
Idea: -People harass me for no reason at all
Why it might not be so: The first person might be an ass without knowing it
Idea: -I'm being treated with prejudice at my workplace
Why it might not be so: poor work performance, theft

So. I'm not to tell that everything that people complain about is wrong. I just want to get into the stories that people use to get others on their side.

 

[Costrin]

A wizard did it.

 

[Jeffster]

A wizard did it.

Thank you Lucy Lawless!

 

[Frosty]

Hmm, well I think that if you first try to show sympathy towards what someone is saying all the wile keeping note of everything that they say that contradicts itself you can later pull information out of them by reminding them of what they said before by asking more clarifying questions. Keep asking for more clarification. And while you are asking these questions subtly suggest different meanings behind what could have happened. If you change the mindset that someone has towards a certain problem then you are better able to get a different filter for the same image.