Am I a weirdo? If someone tells me to calm down it kinda wakes me up and makes me think about why I'm getting worked up. It doesn't always calm me down if I think I'm right to be frustrated, but if I'm being unreasonable it usually will get me to take pause.
In the game "Death Road to Canada", if you have a character with low intelligence, you get the option to say "Cool it!" when talking to people you meet along the way.
That dialogue option always makes them angry and either stop talking to you or attack you outright.
This is particularly poignant as an autistic person. Being told to calm down when there's fucking nuclear reaction levels of anxiety going on in your brain is a level of condescension that would set off even the calmest motherfucker on the planet if they could experience this for even 5 fucking seconds.
I'm not a woman, but I can at least partially relate to how awful it is to be told to calm down. Shit suuuuuuuucks.
I'm a dude and being told to calm down seems like the male equivalent of calling someone hysterical. I have only ever seen someone told to calm down when the person is being calm, but doesn't like something and might be making a face. It is a condescending denial of emotion just like telling someone not to get upset before giving them bad news.
Just let me get upset and verbally express my frustration or disappointment!
I disagree. I told my wife to "calm down" once, and it worked perfectly. She went from emotional to very calm and focused.
It might have been at the incongruity that I would actually dare say that, or just the time for her incandescent rage to move to fully focusing on me, but she DID calm down (for 2-3 seconds).
If you say it in the same tone of voice that Muhammad Ali used to tell Joe Frazier to sit down during that television chat show altercation, and while slowly unzipping your trousers in a manner similar to when a cop places his hand on his holstered Glock, it works pretty well.
Can you start breathing deeply and count to ten on your fingers / quietly announce “I’m counting breaths” partway through? Maybe motion for them to join…