When were you wrong about something?

I'm an engineer. It's my job to be wrong until I'm right.

Yes, but all that schooling helps you to be wrong fewer times consecutively than an average person would be on matters that are within the narrow confines of your field... during regular working hours.
- during regular working hours.
  
  And generally after a couple cups of coffee, and before 4, and not during lunch, and not on Fridays.
I'm bookmarking this

I thought I was wrong, once. But I was mistaken.

My grandfather used to say this all the time. He was such a humble man, too, so it always got a good "dad joke" chuckle. Glad to see it's still out there.
- I picked it up from an episode of Deep Space Nine. Good times.
I'm always right, especially when I'm wrong.

I'm wrong all the time. My amazing ADHD lets me finish stories in my head when someone starts talking, and it never goes the adventurous amazing way my brain told me it was going to go.

Oh goodness, 24 years ago I was uninformed, narrowminded and had been brought up sheltered and rather conservative. So I used to be hugely trans- and homophobic. I wasn't actively hurting or confronting anyone, but I was definitely a big part of the problem.

It actually was webcomics that deprogrammed me. That showed me a world I simply did not know but quickly felt empathy for. Those were normal, lovely people who simply existed differently from me, they weren't a threat and they had so many struggles pushed on them only for being different.

Today I'm far-left, progressive, super empathetic, happy that a lesbian friend calls me "one of the good ones" and that I, as a huuuuuge white cis guy, can be an ally and create a safe space around me for everyone who needs it.

When I was a kid, I disliked trans people for the sole reason that as a biological woman I get periods and they didn’t, so my dumb shit brain thought they had it better.

I was also against gay people, but mostly because fortunately the people I were around were accepting people.

At least I had the excuse of being an insecure child; I can’t understand why some people are so hateful as adults though (I mean I never denied that I can also be hateful but at least I judge people based on moral principles and not BS)

I was wrong thinking that having access to information would change the world for the better.

My childish self honestly had no idea that so many people would rebel against their fellow man and common sense rather than learn and accept that they had some wrong information about something.

My hopeful naivety kept me blind to the idea that people are fundamentally stupid, and will fight to the bitter end to die like the dogs they are rather than take one step as a human being that has the tiniest little flaw.

And that includes myself.

I'm wrong all the time.

Just yesterday I was talking to a friend, mentioning that it is insane how it was only a few years ago that a province in my country removed the rule that all government buildings need to have a christian cross on the wall.

Turns out the conservatives successfully fought that change and it's still mandatory.

It's impossible to be correct 100% of the time

This sounds like Bavaria :D
- Correct!

In 1992 I thought the GOP was being hyperbolic about Bill Clinton's history of sexual predation. Im not proud of that.

In 1992 I thought the GOP cared about extra marital sexual activity. They do not.

For years I drove past a sign for Eastport on my way in to the city centre. No-one every mentions Eastport on the news. I decided it must be the single most boring suburb in the city.

Last year I realised the sign actually reads like this:

East

Port

And things finally clicked.

I didn't realize "banal" was pronounced "ban all" and cluelessly described something as "b-anal"

Well that must have been a pain in the butt
- Now start pronouncing the word "testicles" like it is an ancient Greek name with a long second e sound. You will NEVER stop.
I didn’t realize “banal” was pronounced “ban all”

😶

I was today years old...
It is rather banal to be anal about pronunciation like that.
Both pronunciations are okay :)

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/banal

I've been a short-tempered bitch with people when I really shouldn't have been. Haven't been that way in years, but in my youth it happened several times. There's also been moments I've looked back on in my youth and realized I had some views that were the result of institutionalized racism that I didn't even realize were racist until I'd educated myself years later and realized my poor judgement.

Can you provide examples of your former views?
- I'll step up. I was raised in the south by... well, okay by the kind of racist white people that say they are not racist even though they don't like people of other colors inside of their field of vision.
  
  I am not white myself, and so I got preferential treatment. I was "one of the good ones".
  
  Plus, as a Native American, I kind of had like this weird, beneficent racism thing where they were like, oh, he can talk to horses, and he can hear it in the trees, and see it in the wind, all of that stupid shit.
  
  Anyway, I didn't really mind people of color, black people, I would talk to them and be friendly with them because I didn't have any reason not to be, right?
  
  But sometime around when I was 18 years old, I suddenly realized that I would change my way of speaking when I was around black people. I would say things like, "yo, dog, what's up?" Instead of, "hey man, how's it going?"
  
  And I realized now that that is ingratiating behavior. I wanted the other people I was around to feel more comfortable with me, and so I was imitating what I assumed was their speech pattern.
  
  But I also realized that I was pigeonholing them into acting a particular way. I was maintaining the concept that "Black people talk like black people" instead of "people just talk".
  
  Once I realized I was doing that, I dropped the act and started continuing to be myself when I was around people of different races.
  
  And you know, I made better friends that way. People liked me more and they responded more favorably to me, which to me feels like justification that I made the right decision.
- I guess I should have said my past "ignorance" instead of my past "views", because it's really just assumptions I made based on stereotypes and because I was indeed ignorant. I can remember being in high school (a VERY white high school, we legit had no POCs at all) in my teens and one of my classmates went on vacation to China, and when she got back I asked her didn't everyone there look the same?? Because all Asians look alike, right?? (please note my sarcasm there)
  
  I remember when I first joined the Army, meeting a black girl my age who loved Metallica and this blew my mind because I'd never known any black people who liked any sort of rock, because they only like rap, right?? (/s). Or when I assumed that trying to manage my own very curly hair was somehow relatable to a black person having to manage THEIR curly hair (it isn't, at all).
  
  It was never anything outwardly damaging, it was just little ignorant thoughts like that, where I was able to look back on them and be like whoa, I was really wrong/ignorant/racist to assume that. But I also think that that's part of growing up in America, unfortunately, you don't realize what's behind thoughts like that, and yes, I think EVERYONE has those moments of ignorance and covert racism. The trick is to recognize them, learn from them, move on, and not make them again.

I'm remodeling a house and I've learned that my initial idea is always wrong and it will take me 3 days to accept the right answer.

My ex often got frustrated with me because I spend so much time in the planning phase, like learning about things, researching the various options, and making sure that everything is fully prepped and laid out before I start on a project.

Despite all of that, I have yet to have a project go to plan, Except for the one that I came up with off the top of my head.

I was redoing my flooring, and I have like a half third story that's open, and there's a lot of exposed transition space between the straight drop-off and the end of the flooring.

It was gonna look really bad to just put L-shaped brackets down to cover over the transition, So, spur of the moment, I realized that I could put a longer flat piece that had a beveled edge on it, and then the L bracket on top of that, and it is probably one of the nicest features in my house.

I am wrong about almost every major decision I make on my life. I am never wrong about trivia though

Part of keeping an open mind is realizing when you were wrong. Most recently, I have realized that liberalism, at least as practiced in the USA has no future, no possible way to defeat the rise of far right politics, and no real plan to even try. It's an inherently unstable system that only worked because of the post-World War 2 economic boom and the ripple effects of that boom. Now that things are evening out again, American liberals are just sticking their heads in the sand imagining that it's the 1990s and that all things can be fixed with a healthy stock market, when that wasn't even really the case back then and it's becoming more and more obviously false as time goes on.

We need something drastic to change and fast, or we're just completely fucked with Trumpism. Socialists and other left-leaning groups are the only ones that realize we need to fight hard and fight now, and establish alternative centers of power to corporations and the government, instead of just hoping that the corporations will be good or that the government will stop itself from doing bad things. I don't even think a fully socialist economy will even work at least in the short term(not opposed to it in principle, I just think we need hybrid economies short term to ease into it), but if I have to pick between that and whatever the fuck the Trumpists are trying to make, it's an easy choice.

I recently thought geese just ate bugs in the grass and even said so, but apparently they graze on the grass. I admitted my mistake when I found out a couple days later.

I've never had a geese-observation opportunity but now I know they eat grass and the bugs in it, so thanks!

I thought the cat wanted to be pet— it did not.

I bet it did want to be petted but its a cat... so those things change pretty quickly and most of the time your gonna be the last to know

Omg last night at pool league. 9-ball playoffs. I, possibly the best player on our team, called a timeout to “help” the worst player on our team, and gave solid advice on what shot to take, but failed to understand her skill level and failed to give additional helpful details (like how hard to hit it). She missed the shot and set up her opponent for an easy win and we ultimately lost the tournament by one point. Sigh. Big ole goof and totally my fault.

Practice makes perfect I bet she’ll remember the shot next time and come at it with a higher skill level ^^

Several times as viewable here on the Fediverse; this account, my P.D. account, accidentally posted a comment to the wrong post as viewable in the modlogs😣, CCing lemmy.ca admins and P.D. admins.

Making mistakes all the time is painful; hopefully I've repeated less of them as time continues or so I hope anyways...

I....

...oh God..

..assumed some salvia divinorum extract (20x ~~fuck~~) was weak, as I had vaped it, with minimal effect. I was instructed to use a torch lighter to properly get it to temperature. I predicted a moderate boost in strength.

...

Alright, here's a rhetorical question. Have you ever closed a door multiple times without opening it? I have. I also saw 3D space below 3D space, and multiple time points at once.

My room mates said I was banging on things loudly.

Oops.

Anyways, I'd 100% do it again. I was scared out of my mind, and thought I was sober at that (you literally can't imagine), but it was absolute comedy gold in retrospect. I also kind of went in blind. That's what I get for being negligent--a good memory.

I now smoke plain leaf bowls pretty regularly.

I am an unethically resilient force to be reckoned with and I didn't ask for this. I'm not complaining, though. I love the funny chaos leaf.

I also used to be an orange man endorser. Ew.

A link to my salvia post. It's missing details. I had a bit of amnesia.

It got me, even after I knew how strong it was. It still got me.

I thought trumps handler wouldn’t let him actually do tariffs

It's "Revved up like a deuce."

Not "Wrapped like a dou..." well you know.

First heard that song in 1981... Learned the correct lyrics in 2020. 39 years of being wrong, but I think I'm in good company.

Also learned that the version that most people know is actually a cover done by Manfred Mann in 1976. The original artist is Bruce Springsteen and he recorded it in 1973.

I used to think the lyrics in The Go Gos "Our Lips are Sealed" were "Honest Lucille."