to think blocking/ghosting someone who's done nothing 'wrong' is cowardly/childish?

[bringincrazyback]

(Just to preface this: I’m not talking about stalking/harassing/otherwise distressing scenarios. Those are exactly what blocking and ghosting are for. I’m talking about situations where a dating/friendship setup simply isn’t working out for someone any more. Also, I have never been blocked myself, or at least not to my knowledge, so I don’t have a personal axe to grind here.)

I feel like we're seeing an increasing amount of ‘then block’ or ‘unfriend, block and move on’ type sentiments dispensed on MN as advice on how to end a relationship/stop dating someone/draw a line under a friendship where the other person hasn’t really done anything ‘wrong’ as such. Not sure if this is just an MN thing, but I think it’s often overkill, and can be quite childish and cowardly tbh. (And that’s before I even get started on the ‘tell them every last thing that annoys you about them, then block’ type posts which go way beyond cowardly imo.)

Have we really all lost the art of having an open/matter-of-fact conversation, telling someone we're just not feeling it but all the best for the future, and... simply leaving it there?

If the other person acts aggressively or in a harassing way, or starts stalking, or simply won't leave it, that's the time to block. Some people seem to view blocking as part and parcel of deciding to stop seeing someone, and it's just cowardly imo, like the online equivalent of sticking fingers in one's ears and going 'la, la, la, not listening'. And just as juvenile.

Has this really become the rule book on how to leave someone behind? And if so, is it just me who thinks this is a depressing/unhelpful trend?

I have ghosted my friend of 20 years. I haven’t blocked them though.

It’s not what I wanted but I was disappointed so many times by them that when it happened the last time I decided enough was enough. I won’t settle for people treating me like I am disposable unless it suits them.
It’s been about a month now and they haven’t reached out anyway.

I’m not shy of confrontation. I spoke to the friend I ghosted multiple times about what was bothering me. They would apologise and then revert straight back so in the end I didn’t think there was any need to try and speak about it any further.

I've never felt the need to block anyone either and probably wouldn't notice if I'd been blocked but I can see a situation where someone does it to preserve their own sanity.

E.g. a man who's not exactly done anything wrong but is keeping you on tenterhooks waiting for messages with no real intent. Better to remove the temptation to message him and the possibility that he might text you iyswim rather than be constantly checking your phone.

That said I have ghosted a friend. She probably has no idea why, but it's because as we've got older our moral compass seems to have diverged completely. I've become more wishy washy liberal, or maybe less tolerant of nasty extreme views, and she can spend ages ranting about immigrants and benefit cheats. I have told her I don't want to talk about those things but she didn't stop, so I've distanced myself.

This thread has really got me thinking. I blocked an old friend this week (which I’ve never done before) and have been feeling really guilty about it and wondering whether it was childish and avoidant of me. However, this person had been really horrible to me, and I just didn’t want to listen to any more of his nasty comments (second time in a month or so that he’s laid into me).

I did give him an explanation first and told him my reasons and said I didn’t think it was good for us to be in contact anymore. Looking back tho, I think he misinterpreted something I said, and maybe I over-reacted. It won’t have been nice for him to have been blocked. It’s been good reading this thread and different opinions.

Edited to say I now wish I’d had a grown up conversation with him!

I wouldn't be hanging around for an hour while someone cried and tried to justify their offensive comments.

I had a friendship with someone that just was getting less and less satisfying, I didn't like her values or her approach to others. She didn't seem that interested in me, but frequently wanted to talk over problems or ask advice. I just thought, am I going to keep meeting for coffees out of duty forever? So I stopped initiating them, went to a few more, but turned some down too, responded less. The last message was a cordial 'I've got a lot on' kind of message. Yes I contemplated more direct feedback, but does she need to know I don't like her values? Is that better for her self esteem? I could have said I'm not great at friendship, which is true, but not the reason. Yes it's going to be awkward when we inevitably bump into each other, but I will say hi and talk if she wants to.
I have had two people fade me out too, quite suddenly - no hard feelings on my part, maybe I was sharing views they didn't agree with, or talking too much, or someone told them something about me, or I wasn't making enough effort, or we didn't have enough in common any more. I think well of them both, it's life.

I do think it’s a bit different now than when I was growing up. It used to be you could only write/email to a desktop or call the landline which you wouldn’t really do after 9/10pm unless it was urgent and you could ignore and simply look like you were out, or say you were planning to watch something on tv that’s starting soon.

Now everyone’s in your pocket all the time and there’s fewer things you can politely put anyone off for. TV can be paused and with WhatsApp etc it’s way easier for acquaintances to send requests to meet up that in person would be easier to brush off. If you need to put hard boundaries in to protect your own bandwidth I can see why.

Depends on the circumstances I think

I've had a group of 3 "friends" randomly remove me on social media before, one was a close friend of 11 years and I was devastated and didn't understand why. It was very painful.

I think if one of them had tried to talk to me the outcome would have been different tbh but they didn't value our relationship in the same way I did. Unpleasant but true.