Ask Lemmy

I know you're trolling but this has been a real point of disagreement between me and my wife. I was raised to think that arguing means making arguments to convince someone, irregardless of the volume of those arguments. My wife was raised to think that arguing means yelling, usually about stuff that should have been hammered out months ago.

Every once in a while I'll accidentally refer to a heated conversation I had with my wife as "remember when we had that argument about ______" and my wife will look at me with this confused and hurt expression as if I had accused her of spousal abuse, because when she hears the word "argument" she thinks of how her parents would argue. Other times when we visit my parents my mom or dad will make a passing comment about how we "argue so much" or "are always going at it" since we're always negotiating and debating and discussing, and then I'll have to quickly reassure my wife that I love her and she's a good person and that my parents also love her and think she's a good person and remind her that my parents meant "debating or negotiating" since they don't consider screaming matches to be arguing.

It's sometimes difficult to remember that many people think arguing means "screaming at each other until one person retreats" because thats what so many parents do. Not saying my parents are saints ofc, but when they had screaming arguments they would retreat, process the arguments, and come back to say "I'm sorry I screamed at you, and also you were right about X and Y, but let's talk about Z more etc" which is what I thought a normal parent argument was.