This thread is gold. ^^ So many insightful comments...it's hard to know what to add.
I guess I would say: you may never 'intuit' the right and wrong decisions, but you can definitely reflect, learn and gain experience to draw from when you talk to other people.
And forums like this are a good place to do that-- my life might look very different right now if all my teenage clown-posting had been done on, say, Twitter, rather than here and the other small communities I was in.
Social interaction is a skill (yes, even on the internet), and people need safe places to learn that skill. And even though people will still argue with you and misunderstand you on forums, at least you don't have an audience of hundreds to millions just waiting to choose a side and pounce on the 'badguy'. Take full advantage of these relatively minor consequences~
I've heard people try to rationalize things this way before...and the problem with 'I don't get it; I would never get mad at someone for this' is that it's not about you. ^^; You're talking to another person, not a copy of yourself...if you want to understand why they're upset, you need to understand the way they think, not just review your understanding of the way you think.
Like, everyone learns the Golden Rule: 'treat others the way you want to be treated', but part of growing up is learning that this is more of a conceptual piece of advice, not a literal one. Even if you wouldn't mind someone talking to you or treating you a certain way, if someone else DOES mind and doesn't want you to, you still need to take that in and consider their feelings...just like you would want someone to do for you, if they treated you in a way you didn't appreciate. You would want them to try to understand why you think these words or actions aren't okay, so extend that courtesy to others.
As other people have said, knowing how to do this this can come from experience: i.e., if you inadvertently make enough people mad, theoretically you should start seeing the patterns of why they become angry:
Are they telling you not to make assumptions? Maybe you don't know as much as you think you do, and need to start asking more questions in conversations, instead of pre-emptively drawing conclusions.
Are they accusing you of wasting their time? Maybe they feel you're not listening to them, and/or asking for help that you don't actually want-- I've learned from experience that you can get rid of a lot of this by simply learning to spot people who "get it" and focus on them.
If someone offers help and seems to come really close to the answer you want, first acknowledge that (people like to be appreciated) and then ask them for their thoughts on the missing details.
If someone offers help and seems to have no idea what you're trying to ask for...they probably don't need a response from you. 9 times out of 10, trying to critique their response and 'teach' them how to help you will either offend them or waste your time.
To give one last example: are they calling you an outright bad person, or something along those lines...? They may be trying to bully you; that's always a possibility. But another large possibility to keep in mind is that you're just dismissing something or someone they care deeply about...maybe something a lot of people you aren't aware of care deeply about. This can be something big, like an ethnic/cultural concept or a historical event...or it can be something more personal, like a type of trauma or a relationship issue.
It's easy to walk into a conversation and say that these things don't matter or don't need to be considered if you haven't heard of them before...and then suddenly get hit with a firestorm of anger from people who have much deeper knowledge or a closer connection.
But the most important thing to take away from those instances, whether you feel comfortable/safe to continue the conversation or not, whether you're going to change your mind about what you said or not, is that someone cares, and that's something you need to consider going forward.
Whether it means not saying certain things to certain people, whether it means not speaking at all on certain subjects or in certain discussions, whether it means sincerely apologizing and/or trying to learn and do better...you need to change your behavior in some way.
Otherwise you'll just end up needlessly antagonizing people...and even if it's accidental, even if you're somehow not noticing or understanding the anger of the people you're talking to (which can happen...), people will assume that you're starting fights on purpose. The longer you go on assuming you'll eventually 'get it' if you keep on smashing your face into that brick wall, the fewer people you'll have left to help you when you finally decide to stop.
Like...you don't need to 'get it'. You don't have to 'naturally intuit' the art of conversation. The scientific method exists; other ways of actively learning exist. Try these different things, actually make an attempt to gather information and teach yourself how to get along with other people. Analyze people's responses to you, so you don't repeat mistakes. You should see results if you actually go after them.
...I give this kind of advice a lot (particularly to people who read neurodivergent to me), and people seem really resistant to it...I guess because it's not 'natural', and therefore it must be morally wrong?? But I don't feel that way about it. ._. Whether you learn to be friendly and interact successfully through 'intuition' or careful practice and self-training...in the end, you're still caring for people and showing consideration. Why should it matter how you get there?
