I was once in a situation, when someone was calling me foul names. Not in the sense of being derogatory, but in the sense of fear-mongering. "You're probably a thug/crook/gun-toting menace/etc." While I was aware that the fear was driven by the media portrayal of my race, and the person's lack of experience and thought towards the situation... I also knew something else, that motivated my response.
When dealing with people who call me names lightheartedly, I occasionally pretend to be that slur to give them an understanding of what I would be like, if I were really that way. For instance, when called "retarded", I might decide follow you where-ever you're going, while dragging my "bad" leg and drooling/making noises with the official retard face. If we're in a car, I will hang out of the window, with that same face, screaming at people who are jogging or waiting on the city bus. If on a bus, I will rock back & forth obnoxiously, talking to you and making you look like an ass, when you try to get away from me.
It isn't that the names bother me, I just personally see it as a legitimate opportunity to act out in public.
The way I make my decisions with people, is quite simple; I go by the rules of nature that I see able to be directly applied. In this case, self-preservation is a big and very well-known factor in how one makes decisions. Depending on how secure or insecure one feels, it is able to be told how one's emotions will influence their current behavior in situations interpreted as lacking security. Therefore, the situation made no sense to me. "You don't mean the words that you say. You can't. If you did, you'd be saving these words for when you were in safer conditions. You don't really believe I'm going to rob or hurt you."
I got silence, afterwards. Go figure, eh?
I don't get offended often, b/c of this. If your friends pick at you, they can't genuinely dislike you simply b/c they consider you to be a friend. If they do genuinely mean to harm you, they are not worth the negative energy it'd take to legitimately hurt them. I say that, while considering the limitations they've already placed on themselves. When one believes they are alone in the world, that is one thing. When one believes that they are alone in the world, and that everyone else is out to hurt them... That is a painful mindset to carry. When dealing with strangers, I simply return the energy given.
It is by self-preservation that we survive, and it is by self-preservation that we sin.
This is what makes life so complicated, and yet so simple.
