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taryneast comments on How to understand people better - Less Wrong
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Yep, TimS, begging Alice to explain to him how he can treat her better while she refuses to say anything helpful whatsoever is an example of the man simply trying to selfishly "dominate the conversation". (???)
Let me build on this hypothetical example to explain why.
Bob has clearly done something wrong. Alice is currently in a highly emotional state and recognises that she is likely not able to talk reasonably about what has happened without either becoming very angry or extremely upset and crying.
Therefore she really doesn't want to talk about it right now.
Bobs insistence on demanding all the answers right now is not helping her highly emotional state and is, in fact, just adding to her feelings of anger and panic... given that clearly he did something wrong, she believes he has no right to currently dominate the timing of when she discusses this highly sensitive issue (whatever it is).
But right now, she is too emotionally fraught even to be able to say that without shouting... so she just blocks.
The best thing for Bob to do is to courteously withdraw for a little while until Alice calms down... then to return at a later date when she's clearly had some time to reflect... and ask then.
I don't mean to indict Alice, but maybe evolution gave her these sincere emotions to make her behavior achieve the same results as a power play. "Understandable" is how "self-serving" feels from the inside. Of course that also applies to the actions of males, including this comment of mine ;-)