Exactly. Maybe I should force the issue in the future and just assume it is a normal pairing.
How it feels to me is that the other person is being coy and only partially revealing their life to me, which puts me in the position of making a faux pas no matter what I say. They aren’t having a conversation in good faith and they put all the work on me.
If they don’t want to get into it, say friend, if they want to go over the top then they can say ‘the dude I’m banging.’ Saying partner is disingenuous and really is self serving.
Basically, I want to be polite and courteous. By using the word partner the other person makes it impossible for me to be polite or courteous.
So, again, I can assume a normal pairing, or just abruptly end the conversation right there.
I mean, I assume it’s a normal pairing unless I’m told otherwise, statistically I’d be right the vast majority of the time.
Fair enough, there are people out there who try to deliberately trick you into saying something they can be outraged about. That’s certainly not why I use it, it’s just a word that works and I don’t care to go into the personal details of my life with anyone anyway.
“Friend” is just as ambiguous though.
I don’t see why you can’t be polite and courteous if someone used partner, for me it’s just a sign that I should avoid conversation about their personal life in general, I don’t find anything wrong with that. Not everyone likes sharing the details of who they’re with, how long they’ve been together, etc, especially if you’re someone they’ve just met.
Exactly. Maybe I should force the issue in the future and just assume it is a normal pairing.
How it feels to me is that the other person is being coy and only partially revealing their life to me, which puts me in the position of making a faux pas no matter what I say. They aren’t having a conversation in good faith and they put all the work on me.
If they don’t want to get into it, say friend, if they want to go over the top then they can say ‘the dude I’m banging.’ Saying partner is disingenuous and really is self serving.
Basically, I want to be polite and courteous. By using the word partner the other person makes it impossible for me to be polite or courteous.
So, again, I can assume a normal pairing, or just abruptly end the conversation right there.
I mean, I assume it’s a normal pairing unless I’m told otherwise, statistically I’d be right the vast majority of the time.
Fair enough, there are people out there who try to deliberately trick you into saying something they can be outraged about. That’s certainly not why I use it, it’s just a word that works and I don’t care to go into the personal details of my life with anyone anyway.
“Friend” is just as ambiguous though.
I don’t see why you can’t be polite and courteous if someone used partner, for me it’s just a sign that I should avoid conversation about their personal life in general, I don’t find anything wrong with that. Not everyone likes sharing the details of who they’re with, how long they’ve been together, etc, especially if you’re someone they’ve just met.
Friend is ambiguous, but doesn’t imply romantic interests.