Nothing can wrap up an argument like a lack of knowledge. If you find yourself in a situation where the discussion is getting out of hand, it's easier to just admit you don't know much about the subject and ask for the other person to fill you in. Or, you can plow ahead like a thick headed bull like in the stories below.
Reddit user, u/Gourd_Gamer, wanted to know the no-win situations when they asked:
Self-Defeating Argument
Coworker would constantly preach against GMOs, parabens, only use oils when sick, etc. She told me I was going to get cancer from my deodorant, and the corn I bought was 'mutant'.
Then she'd go outside and smoke 3 cigarettes every two hours.
Lizzie McGuire's Cartoon Self Is A Totally Reliable Source
An old roommate of mine was trying to say we were blackmailing her when we were asking her to take out her trash, etc. She said "Watch the Lizzie McGuire Movie; there's blackmail in there and it's obvious that's what you're doing to me."
I believe it goes without saying that she never clean up after herself nor did she understand that movie....
Just Walk Away
My cousins are flat earthers.
When lack of evidence is just proof of a conspiracy, it's best to just disengage. You can't break into that prison - they have to break out.
Someone who is dating my roommate considers herself to be environmentally conscious. She claimed that napkins were bad for the environment and they increase one's carbon footprint. She ranted about it to me in my own home, even though I don't even buy napkins.
Maybe a week or so later, she noticed I use a re-usable coffee filter and berated me for not using disposable paper filters. I told her that using a re-usable filter cuts down on the amount of waste that we produce when brewing coffee -- so, not only do I not contribute to filling up landfills with paper filters, but I also save money from not buying them in the first place and just cleaning the plastic one.
She told me that since paper filters are biodegradable, there is no reason for me to refrain from using them.
But napkins are made of paper.
Napkins. Are made. Of paper.
She literally just wanted stand on a soap box and hear herself talk. She derives pleasure from telling others that they are wrong, regardless of whether or not they are actually wrong. There is no winning an argument with her.
You Know You Need To Work, Right?
We had a new assistant at work who was not fitting in with the team. I sat her down and talked to her about expectations and reviewed the responsibilities of the position several times. In one last effort to help her, I thought I'd see which parts of the job she liked. I asked her, "What skill do you think is your strongest skill?" And she said, "Delegating."
Not Knowledgeable About How Bodies Work
After asking them to go home because they were quite clearly sick with a cold, being told "don't be stupid, there's no such thing as colds, it's just allergies to the cold weather."
He Was Called "The Master Of Horror" Forever
He had an aversion to Stephen King. Thought Stephen King only wrote gory trash with no redeeming value. That everyone who read Stephen King had mental issues.
And his favourite movie was The Shawshank Redemption.
Even after I showed the credits both on IMBD and Wikipedia he refused to believe that that degenerate Stephen King was in any way, shape or form involved with his dearly beloved film.
When You Can't Believe Video Evidence...
One of my brother in laws said he liked Jay Z and put on Nothing but a G thang by Snoop dog and Dr. Dre. When I told him it was Dr.Dre and not Jay Z he called me a liar and that I was too young to know.
Showed him the youtube video and googled it.
To this day he still says it was Jay Z
Just Two?
A grandma, who spent her career cleaning hospitals, insisted that a woman only had two holes down there. I explained that there would be three (anus, urethra and vagina) cause how would a woman pee with a tampon in?
She claimed the would have to take it off. Finally called the hospital spoke to an ER doctor who was kind enough to quell the matter while on speaker phone. After her hung up she wasn't very convinced.
This Is Medically Proven!
I was just in the hospital for a small operation and my roommate is the stupidest person I have ever met.
You are supposed to be sober for an operation. He comes in late and drank some coffee and water in the morning. I then said he endangers himself because his stomach is supposed to be empty in case he has to throw up. He then said:
"If I drink a coffee now my stomach will be empty"
In the end I convinced him that this is not the case and made him talk to the doctors. He ended up being operated on in the afternoon.
*ultimate face-palm
From a friend in college, who when confronted with evidence that he was wrong stated:
"Don't cloud the issue with trivial facts."
Not To Be Political...BUT....
I'm not going to go "political soap box" here, but just about every die-hard Trump supporters hits this moment. I have several conservative friends, so it's not like I can't get along with people that hold different views, but when you see and hear people spew hate dialect that isn't based anywhere in reality, you kinda want to ask where they heard this or tell them the truth. Any Alt-Right talking point is a good jump off area, haha!
One woman, completely unprompted, started complaining about illegal Mexicans having more rights than US citizens, and when I tried to push for her sources, she said she just "knows people", and that we need that wall ASAP! Then came the magic sentence starter of "Well, I'm not racist, BUT....", and it confirmed she was a bigoted idiot. Anything more than a smile and a nod would lead to me being dragged down to her level, and being beaten with her expertise of being a PoS.
"I'm A Genius..."
I had a coworker within their first couple days ask me to hold up a monitor while they screwed it in with thumb screws. I said "here, let me show you how to do it by yourself. "
Their reply was: "No, No, I have done this ten thousand times. I am a genius, just hold it." If they said anything after that I wasn't listening anymore. I was actually in shock a little bit.
Change Is Constant
I was arguing with my cousin about evolution.
He said "how can an animal just change?" He still wouldn't believe me even when I i told him that there were skeletons of these animals before evolution and his response was "They're probably different animals."
The Duds Keep On Coming
I work in indoor hydroponic agriculture, one of the guys I used to work with believed that removing leaves helped the fruit grow bigger. He went ahead and stripped entire room. When confronted, he proceeded to voice that it diverted nutrients to the fruit... I looked at him like what the f-ck?
Did you miss out on 5th grade science class? Leaves are solar panels and nutrient storage, only time you defo a plant is when the canopy becomes too dense and light doesn't fully penetrate the canopy.
He now works at another facility, he also came out with this gem. "The Earth has to be flat because we perceive everything as curved because our eyes are round." That was my favorite.
We Need To Teach What "Objective" Means
People who say stuff like "ok, that's your opinion, but I have my own" when discussing about objective facts, like science issues, meaning of words...
Edit: A lot of people seem confused with my wording. I'm adding a couple of examples of what I mean:
Science: "Water boils at 70°C, that's my opinion"
Words: "In my opinion, the Spanish word 'hola' means 'dog'"
So basically, facts which are either true or false and not open to opinions.
It...Uh...Doesn't...Huh?
When I was arguing with someone about why milk doesn't go in first when making a cup of tea (a very English debate) and his argument was "when you add boiling water to cold milk, you're warming it up, but when you add cold milk to boiling water, you're cooling it down, and I don't want cold tea".
I tried to explain how the end temperature will be exactly the same regardless but he was already celebrating his self-awarded victory.
Right....Dummy.
A co-worker went on a rant about how all teachers are lazy and only work from 8-3 while taking loads of holiday time while doing minimal work. I come from a family of teachers, so I could see the time put in at home, the lost weekends, the days of doing work till 7pm, the last two weeks of every summer holiday spent in school prepping the classroom for the next year, buying materials out of their own pocket because the school budget wouldn't cover it...
My co-workers responser?
"Well, I'm a parent so I know more about it than you do."
I nearly flipped my lid.
Forming a connection with someone is a challenge.
And then there's these folks, who felt the need to call it quits over something that, honestly, didn't even matter that much.
Reddit user, u/High_Sleep3694, wanted to hear why you turned someone down when they asked:
What was the pettiest reason you refused to date someone?
Loud, Observable Traits
There are some traits people carry with them like a sad, old piece of rotting luggage, flopping it down on the table for everyone to gawk upon before the appetizers re served. You either are okay with it or, as these people quickly decided, bail out before it gets you.
That Would Irritate Any Decent Human
My mom stopped dating a guy because he unfastened and refastened the velcro on his shoes throughout an entire movie.
What A Dummy. Everyone Knows They're Limes.
When I found out that he thought lemons were unripened oranges
I Guess I Don't See A Big Problem With This One
All The Words In Every Text He Sent Were Capitalised. Trust Me, It Got ANNOYING.
Learn Something!
He was awful in a trivia game we were playing. I mean, really bad, like it was his first day pretending to be a human on Earth and the aliens hadn't briefed him sufficiently.
The Littlest Things Can Turn You Off
Some stuff you can overlook, like maybe the way they hold their spoon and fork.
Other things are impossible to overlook, like...the way they hold their spoon and fork.
Goes both ways.
Her Name Is Anne, Guys.
Everytime I touched her, I would smell of egg. Like holding hands, egg.. Hug her, my shirt would smell of egg.
Strangest bit was, she didn't smell like that whatsoever.
Also, when I broke it off, the egg smelling stopped. So IDK.
Just. Let. Me. CHEW.
Every time I took a bite of food he asked me a question, after which he stared at me while I finished chewing.
The date went on like this for an hour, he had a supernatural sense of poor timing.
Wearing Your D-Bag Flag
He wore a Bluetooth piece in his ear. The constant blue light blinking from the side of his head was too much for me. Another guy would text "dame" instead of "damn". It wasn't a typo either, it was every time.
The Pettiest Of The Petty
Then there's these reasons, where the person must have been having a bad day or maybe they hadn't had dinner yet, when they looked at what the other person was saying or doing or existing and thought, nice and loud in their mind, "Nope."
Just FINISH Your Thought
Every single text of her ended with '...'
I just couldn't do it man
Look At That Shimmer
His hair was prettier than mine.
Now THIS is petty. Love it.
You Can Never See Past The Name
She had the same name as my mom.
I went out with someone who has the same name as my cat. I brought him back to my house and the second I got home I greeted my cat and the guy looked at me and I knew right then and there that I couldn't do this.
Keep it up.
You'll find your true partner someday.
And don't ever feel bad if you break up with them over something silly or petty. People need to fix how they hold their spoons and forks, anyway.
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There's nothing quite like a good urban legend to put a chill into your bones. One of my favorites? The story about the babysitter and the man upstairs. You know the one. The creepy phone calls begin. The words, "Have you checked on the children?" Unnerving stuff. It's that story that gave us movies like Black Christmas and When a Stranger Calls. I still get a chill up my spine when I think about that story.
It's not just murderers either. Monsters, spirits... Urban legends––and folklore as a whole––have for time immemorial been a part of our consciousness.
After Redditor BeardedDragonzRMine asked the online community, "What monster/urban legend is in your town?" people shared their stories.
"When I was in middle school..."
The Jersey Devil. When I was in middle school my grade went on a trip to a camp in the Pine Barrens where the jersey devil presumably is. I cried when my parents said they didn't want me to go.
The Pine Barrens is a freaky place.
Don't believe me? Watch that one episode of The Sopranos.
"She's the mistress..."
La Llorona. She's the mistress of a Spanish conquistador. When he left her to return to his wife, she went mad from grief and drowned the two children she had out of wedlock with him and killed herself. She arrived at the entrance to Heaven and God asked her what she did with her children. She lied and said she didn't know. So God doomed her to forever wander the Earth looking for their bodies.
This one is a classic.
And there has yet to be a good movie made about her.
"If you're canoeing..."
We have a river that's popular for canoes and paddle boats. Some kids stole a paddle boat one night from the rental place, flipped it over, and drowned.
If you're canoeing on the river and see what looks like an abandoned teal-colored paddle boat with a boat rental decal stuck in the weeds on the river bank, don't approach it. If you report the sighting to the boat rental place they won't bother sending someone out to recover it, because they know the boat won't be there when they arrive.
"He grew up in the Everglades..."
My hometown has the Skunk Ape. A distant cousin to the Sasquatch. He grew up in the Everglades and had long matted, moss-covered fur. Stinks like a skunk. Has been seen crossing back roads in the middle of the night and disappearing into the darkness
Not something I'd want to run into at night.
I've seen enough horror films to know that the one rule is to keep driving.
"All of my neighbors..."
I live in West Africa near a rainforest. All of my neighbors believe there is a "giant pangolin" that lives in the forest (bigger than a man). There have even been some cryptozoologists that have come out to try to find it.
"Rumors of a murderous faceless man..."
Charlie No-Face.
Rumors of a murderous faceless man roaming the streets at night were based on a real-life person who'd suffered an extreme accident that destroyed his face. He wasn't, as it turns out, a murderer; he walked at night because he wanted to get fresh air and be left alone.
Well, that ended well.
No reason to spread a rumor about the guy if all he wanted was to enjoy a walk by himself!
"People that cross the bridge..."
I live in St. Petersburg, Florida and the urban legend here has to do with the Skyway Bridge. There have been about 200 suicides. People that cross the bridge claim to see a blonde woman standing in the middle of the road and even sitting in the backseats of their cars. Caring people that got out of their car to help the woman claim that she vanished into thin air. I have crossed the bridge a couple of times and have not seen any sort of thing. I guess she was one of the people that took their own lives by jumping off the 200-foot drop into the water or died when the bridge collapsed ages ago.
"A headless French soldier..."
A headless French soldier from the Napoleonic time is said to ride in our local forest at night. It is an older legend.
"Here in southern Wisconsin..."
Here in southern Wisconsin, we have the Beast of Bray Road, a large canid/werewolf creature that's been sighted several times.
This one has had a crappy movie about it.
The SyFy channel is great like that.
"Years and years ago..."
The White Lady. Years and years ago this woman's daughter got kidnapped by a man and disappeared into the woods of one of our parks. She went out with her dog, searching and searching but never found her. Eventually, the White Lady disappeared as well. For hundreds of years, people claimed to see her ghost and the dog's ghost wandering the park at night. And any man would get chased into the lake by her ghost. Four years ago we had a major windstorm that did a lot of tree damage and this actually happened Scary coincidence?
Creeped out yet?
If not, get to reading. The Dúllahan, a scary headless creature from Irish folklore, beckons. I personally wouldn't want to run into the berbelangs, vampirish creatures that feature in Filipino culture and that are said to dig up graves to feast on corpses.
Have some of your stories to share? Feel free to tell us about them in the comments below!
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People Confess Which Things They Should Have Grown Out Of By Now But Totally Haven't
You can pry my Pokemon games out of my cold, dead hands. Can't help it, guys––I love them. I love the games. I even check out the show from time to time (if you've never watched Twilight Wings, you're missing out). I'm not a competitive player, by the way. I don't really care about training an unstoppable team. I just enjoy a fun and engaging story. (I feel the same way about the Final Fantasy games. Perhaps I should have grown out of it, according to the people out there who can't let other people just enjoy things.
After Redditor Rare_Dragonfruit1885 asked the online community, "Be honest, what's something you should have grown out of by this age, but haven't?" people told us what things and habits they still love.
"I can't sleep soundly..."
Sleeping with my favorite stuffed animal. I can't sleep soundly without my little guy.
I still have my favorite stuffed animal, personally.
And while I don't sleep with it (all the time), it's nice to have it there.
"No."
Whenever I get asked what my hobbies or interest are. I always say video games and always get the typical "Aren't you a little too old to be playing them?"
No. No, I am not. It's my way of winding down after a busy and often stressful day at work. Why is it any different from binging an entire series on Netflix or reading an entire book in a day? I hate the fact that it's 2021 and there are people out there that still portray video games as a childish hobby.
Video games are art!
If you've never played Final Fantasy VII or Chrono Trigger (I realize I've naming some older stuff here) and you still think video games are just for children, then you're missing out.
"I'm 28..."
I'm 28 and love finding painted rocks. I say we go rock hunting and paint rocks for my kids but I definitely get the most enjoyment from it.
"I collect a variety of plushie brands..."
Plushies, I collect a variety of plushie brands, and my boyfriend, who works in a toy store, indulges me. I'd never owned a Squishmallow until I met him but now I have a small horde and every time he gets a batch at work I get first dibs.
"My boyfriend got me a bear..."
Teddy bears. My boyfriend got me a bear for Valentine's Day and I sleep with it every night I'm not with him and sometimes I just have it with me while watching a movie. I'm 21 this year.
"I'll admit..."
Ghosts and the paranormal. I'll admit even at age 26, I still find it so utterly fascinating.
Utterly fascinating, indeed.
Do I believe in it? Nah, not really. Do I love reading about it? Of course. I also won't turn down a good supernatural horror film.
"It's sometimes nice..."
I like to read my old childhood books sometimes.
Babysitters Club, Goosebumps, The Mouse and the Motorcycle, Fudge. It's sometimes nice to go through a story that's not traumatic and full of death and sadness.
I also still like building with LEGO. It's therapeutic and relaxing.
"Most people I interact with..."
Writing and reading fanfiction. Most people I interact with within the fandom are much younger so I just keep to myself.
"At 57..."
As a never-married, childfree old crone, it'd have to be doing whatever I want to whenever I want. "You'll get bored of life without having children!" REALLY?!? At 57 I'm still finding new, fun, interesting things to see/experience/learn and I'm well satisfied.
Amen to that.
There's a lot of freedom in not having children, not to disparage people who choose not to have them at all.
"I'm also just a creature of habit..."
Chocolate milk. I'm 30, and I just enjoy having a nice cup of chocolate milk with or after dinner. My wife used to give me sh!t about it, but now I think she finds it kinda cute. I'm also just a creature of habit, so my daily things are predictable.
The lesson to be learned here is quite simple.
Let people enjoy things! This shouldn't be so difficult. "Professionalism" is a mask we put on during the work week. Let people be happy doing and exploring what they love.
Have some of your own contributions? Feel free to tell us about them in the comments below!
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There's a show on Hulu called A Teacher that made me think about the repercussions of a teacher having an illicit affair with a seventeen-year-old student.
While the controversial topic is justifiably subject to condemnation, the show delicately depicted each characters' emotional turmoil and their families in the aftermath.
While many in these types of forbidden relationships don't end well, Redditor Sadebiru was curious to hear from those familiar with the situation and asked:
"[Serious] Redditors who slept with their teachers, what was the fallout after it happened?"

Consequences
These Redditors faced immediate disciplinary consequences for their involvement in their respective intimacies, but one suffered emotional trauma for years.
The Trauma Of Being Used
"My English teacher used me as a sperm donor. She slept with me until she got pregnant and then stopped. She didn't even bother to switch schools so I wouldn't know. This was about 50 years ago and it still crosses my mind and bothers me. So the fallout on my side was being mentally messed up for about 4 years and not being able to have a normal sexual relationship for a long time."
– readit2U
Predatory Soccer Coach
"I had a very inappropriate relationship with the assistant soccer coach. His contract was not renewed the next year and I was the subject of gossip, obviously, and labeled the school sl*t by my classmates. It was a very small private school so there was literally no way to keep anything secret. It was only later on I realized he'd taken advantage of me and was, obviously, a sicko who knew I'd fall for the flattery of an older guy the rest of the girls on the team thought was cute."
Sleeping With The P.E. Teacher
"My cousin Adrian slept with the physical education teacher. It was in the mid 1980s, and it right near the end of the school year. She was immediately transferred and he lost his school reference and was suspended for the remainder of the year, which was like four weeks from memory."
"he was no angel. He was an absolute player and he said he has no ill feelings about the whole thing at all. It didn't affect his schooling any further after that and he said he absolutely seduced her, it wasn't the other way around."
Left "Morally Conflicted" About Taking Action
"It was horrible. I was groomed by my English teacher. He said all the right things and I thought I was emotionally mature enough to handle it. I was not."
"I realized when I was 19 how messed up it was and very quietly told the bishop and the Victims of Sexual Misconduct Councilor (catholic school). My worst fear was that it was going to be a big public scandal and I didn't want my family's name dragged through the mud. So he permanently lost his teaching license."
"He is now dating a woman and I want to reach out to her so bad to her to ask if she knows, but at the same time I want that chapter of my life to end. I'm very morally conflicted."
– DeezMags
No Fallout
Instead of suffering a fallout per se, the following Redditors reflected fondly back on their romantic affairs.
Consenting Adults
"Nothing since I was 6 years out of high school by that point."
"We became friends a couple years after I graduated, eventually I told her I had something of a crush on her, she thought it was cute and flattering and sat on it for a while. One day she invites me out and we meet up, have a good time, we leave. Later that night she texts me when I'm work says she's got feelings too and wants to pursue it."
"We go on a couple more dates, see a movie (The Watch for those wondering), make out in her car afterwards like a couple horny teenagers. We do the deed that night, good times."
"Anyway, the age gap was something she couldn't get over, I was 25 and she was 48, different places in our lives with different goals. We still chat though."
The Chinese Teacher
"She was my Chinese teacher at a Confucius Institute, and is almost 10 years older than me, but I always had a minor crush on her."
"When her contract was about to expire and had to leave my country, we went out to dinner. She was leaving for one last trip before returning to China, so this would be the last time I would see her. I decided to take a shot and told her about my crush. We slept together that night."
"There wasn't really a fallout. We are still in contact, but don't really talk about that night."
Good Memory
The following academic flings were either highly erotic or wound up being blissful.
"Too Riskey To Continue"
"A few people found out and gave me sh*t about it, but really not a big deal for me personally. It was obviously more difficult for her. Rumours got back to other teachers who were not cool with it and she had some awkward conversations to navigate with the headteacher. She admitted we saw each other outside of school but denied anything sexual, which they did not seem to believe. She was told never to be alone with me and had restrictions placed on her ability to act as a chaperone on school trips etc."
"It didn't last as it was obvious it was too risky to continue but there was no bad feeling between us."
The French Teacher
"I slept with my French teacher about 5 years after leaving school, she was just as as I'd always imagined."
"Afternoon Office Nookie"
"It was in college, we slept together before we knew I was in her class. It was one of those lecture only classes with like 200 students in it so it wasn't a big deal."
"No fallout beyond some late afternoon office nookie now and then."
"She would text me pictures of what she was wearing under her outfit that day. I miss being young."
"The Best Thing That Ever Happened"
"I started dating the grad student that was teaching one of my undergrad classes, although because I took time off before going to uni and he started early I was actually older than him."
"The uni had rules against the sort of thing, of course. We weren't found out until the spring quarter, at which time we were told to cease and desist, but by the time this happened we were engaged."
"The administration were happy for us (and we were all friends there, the department was like one big family), so instead they told us that for the rest of the year my exams and juries would have to be handled by another professor and that our class sessions would be recorded to be sure there was no funny business or nepotism."
"20 years on, we're still married - it was the best thing that ever happened to either of us!"
In rare cases, some students have glorified their dalliances with teachers and bragged about their conquests among their peers.
Some – as those participating in this thread – expressed the absence of fallout or lack of emotional trauma.
But let's make one thing clear: a teacher having sexual relations with a minor student is considered illegal by the law and court opinion in most states, and children under the age of 18 cannot give consent to sexual conduct.
An improper relationship with a student can lead to a criminal conviction and imprisonment.