Why not to say Why!

Avoid asking ‘Why’

So, I offer to take you out for a meal at the local Italian restaurant and I mention that their pizzas are fabulous. You tell me you really don’t like pizza and ask about the pasta dishes. That’s fine. Maybe I should (oh yes, shouldn’t say should either by the way, as it implies that either you or the other is wrong) just accept that you don’t like pizza, knowing you have your reasons, and move the conversation to the delights of pasta, which I know that you do like. No, I don’t, oh dear. I ask you why. Why don’t you like pizza? If I asked you instead, which pasta dishes do you like we would probably have a lovely conversation about stuff you like and the interaction would be most mouth wateringly pleasant. Though I do not do I? Curious to my detriment, because I like pizza, I wonder how anybody cannot like the freshly made, fabulously tempting Italian delicacy. Why don’t you like pizza?

You may say it’s because it’s just like having cheese on toast and you could do that yourself without my having to pay a premium for it in a fancy restaurant. The way they toss the dough about stretching the gluten mass of bland chewing gum-like substance and twirling it into the bacteria ridden air just to show off is truly uncalled for. You might tell me that you absolutely hate anchovies and why do they have to share the planet with you anyway and the way the rubbery cheese just sticks to the roof of your mouth and coalesces in your stomach into one huge ball of goo as the stodgy mass slowly pushes its way through your twenty two feet of intestine only to seemingly get stuck in your colon and cause you to spend the whole night straining in the bathroom. Okay, I get it. You don’t like pasta, I would think to myself, good grief, I only asked.

That’s it, you see, I asked. I asked why. Why didn’t I just leave it? Why didn’t we just talk about pasta or, better still, go for a juicy steak. Oh, there I go again, asking why. Apologies to my vegetarian readers, gosh you can’t please everyone all of the time can you?

Of course, I exaggerate. Unless we were very close friends, family or spouses perhaps, I would probably only ever know your surface structure. You would keep all that paragraph locked away in your deep structure (particularly the bathroom scenario, just too much information thanks) and I would just recognise by your voice tone, body language and the look of dread in your eyes that pizza is a no-no.

The questions in the meta model do not have any ‘why’ questions. When you ask someone a ‘why’ question, often they feel they have to defend what they have said or done, make excuses or rationalise their behaviour. Asking why is like saying you don’t understand, or that you do not accept that someone else doesn’t like what you like, for example.

Another thing can happen here though, be warned. If someone really wants to tell you their opinion and you don’t offer any curiosity as to their preference, it is amazing how the information is offered anyway. The way we communicate with each other is truly fascinating and if you hold back on the ‘whys’ you are used to asking and your friend suddenly recognises the absence of them, they may think you no longer care.

So, what would you do instead? There is an interesting question; how do you ask questions without using why? Let’s examine that in the next part. Why? Now, behave, okay?