The 5 Most Obnoxious Ways People Screw Up Apologies

Then there's the indignant whine of "But I said I was sorry!" This has never worked. Not once has another person said, "Oh, gosh, so you did, I'll just jam an icepick into my skull to shut down my own emotional center." You're trying to rob them of any emotional reaction, and then getting upset when they turn out not to be Vulcan.

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Dammit, Jim, my son told you not to use the master bedroom. The sheets are covered in green body paint!

The proper format is admission, apology, accepting consequences. These premature apologizers are trying to avoid the last part, the emotional equivalent of a 5-year-old hiding in his room after breaking something. Apologizing is about the person you've wronged, not you. Shouting "sorry" first is like bathing an area in foam extinguisher before throwing a petrol bomb -- it might help a bit, but all you're really doing is warning people that something bad is about to happen and that it's your fault. You have to be involved in the process and be aware of how they feel. Just saying "sorry" is like saying "foreplay" while playing Xbox and expecting your partner to be stiff and/or wet when you decide to put down the controller.

Constant repetition is how you make any words utterly meaningless, which is an accurate statement about this kind of apology. If you've wronged someone and apologized, your control of this situation has ended. The whole point of an apology is acknowledging that the other person's feelings exist. If the wronged party is angry but silent, that means your apology has worked as intended. They're upset, but they accept that you're sorry, and now they just want some time to deal with that. They don't need an idiot repeatedly clicking "refresh" on their emotional state until they get the reward they want.

It's psychopathic behavior. It reveals how they think the hundreds of other people present aren't real, just highly detailed wallpaper that covers the unimportant parts of their lives like a video game background.

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"No, it's cool, I think everybody else just freezes when I'm on my mobile. I'm like Zach Morris, but less sympathetic."

There is no way to avoid this hate. It is deserved. The only possible reaction is to turn off the phone and if at all possible die quietly of shame. The absolute worst thing to do is loudly apologize, because that's more noise, and now everyone not only hates you but can pick you out of a crowd and recognize your voice in a darkened alley. Where you'd better hope they don't find you.

Apologizing for the interruption turns the apology into part of the crime, reversing the request for forgiveness into a hatred turbocharger. Apologizing for making noise by making more noise proves that the person doesn't understand either word. They've just been taught to shout "sorry" after screwing up, something they do so often that it now happens without any conscious thought, like the rest of their lives. All the apologist achieves is proving that the human race doesn't have latent psychic powers, because if we did, the concentrated hatred-glare would cause them to burst into flames. And they would die as they had lived: hated, and interrupting a movie.

They're adding the apology to the crime, and every neuron spent spewing "sorry"s is another not employed to make the decision. And they clearly didn't have enough to resolve that imponderable conundrum in the first place. They couldn't give a less sincere apology without engraving it on a bullet. Apologies are meant to be about other people, but these fence posts simply cannot imagine the third option of "If I can't make a decision, maybe my own nonexistent preference is less important than the lives of everyone waiting for me."

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"On the one hand, there's me. The other hand is also used to masturbate."

This person is mugging you, but instead of money, they're stealing time, which you can't make more of. And they're always the kind of people you could easily flatten if they went for your wallet. But misplaced politeness arms them to steal precious life from everyone they know.

If you find yourself about to apologize for taking too long to make a decision, say the first choice. Instantly. If they were so close, it doesn't really matter which you pick, and more importantly, you no longer deserve to get the best possible choice. That was a prize for people capable of making decisions. And if you're in charge of collecting the responses for any casual vote, just count "um"s as spoiled ballots. It doesn't mean "Pause everything and wait for me, the most important member of the group"; it means "Leave me, I'll only slow you down."

The idea of "winning" an argument is the exact opposite of apologizing, and also why apologies are necessary. You can convince the other person in a discussion. When things move to argument mode, your personality is just a barnacle clinging on to the back of a huge white whale of territorial instincts and posturing, and the whale only wants to kill that bastard Ahab. Once things escalate to the argument stage, you really are in WarGames: The only winning move is not to play.

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This knows more about human emotions than you.

Get into a yelling match and you've handed over the controls of your modern brain to the monkey that lives one inch below your skin. And that monkey might now have access to an improved vocabulary and an impressive arsenal of psychological weapons, but its tactics haven't changed: screech loudly and fling shit at the opponent.

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Every time you've ever yelled, except he has an excuse.

If you're going to do anything, do it properly. Either apologize and stop talking, or down a Scotch, smash the bottle, set fire to the table and leap out the window. Either way, they'll admire your honesty and know better than to keep arguing with you, and you'll get some peace.

Luke also has a website, tumbles and responds to every single tweet.

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