Responding To Rude Comments Without Losing Your Cool
In this episode of the Jefferson Fisher Podcast, host Jefferson Fisher (joined by Speaker B) breaks down practical strategies for handling rude or passive‑aggressive remarks without escalating conflict. He frames rude comments as "tests" or a card‑game where each side can choose to play or not. Three core techniques are presented: (1) start the reply with a clarifying question such as “Did you mean…?” to probe intent; (2) for passive‑aggressive comments, use reflective prompts like “It sounds like…” or “It seems like…” to draw the speaker out and defuse tension; (3) employ a deliberate four‑second silence, a non‑verbal cue that signals you have heard the comment but choose not to engage. The episode also includes two listener emails—Amy from Paris, who struggles with overly brief emails, and Paul from Arizona, who deals with a mother’s under‑the‑breath passive‑aggressive remarks—showcasing how the three techniques can be applied in real‑world contexts. Throughout, Fisher emphasizes curiosity, grace, and the power of not reacting, positioning these tools as ways to maintain composure and preserve relationships.
Chapters
Today we're talking about how to respond to rude comments, those moments you're caught off guard by something that wasn't nice. Do you say something? Do you not say something?
What do you say?
All that and more coming right up. Welcome to the Jefferson Fisher Podcast, where I'm on a mission to make your next conversation the one that changes everything. If you enjoy learning tools to improve your communication, I'm going to ask you to subscribe or follow this podcast and please leave a review. It really does help. And if you have any suggestions on topics, As always, just throw them in the comments. The next time someone makes a rude comment towards you, here's what I want you to do. Number 1, begin your response with the phrase, "Did you mean?" It's a question of intent. We're going to go into detail on that. "Did you mean?" Number 2, if it's a more passive-aggressive type of rude comment, in other words, it's not directly at you, it's more off to the side and you know and they know it was meant for you. We're going to have questions that check them. These are questions like, "Did I offend you in some way?" or "Are you doing all right? It sounds like you're having a hard day." There are ways that you can check them without coming across like you're also wanting to be rude. And number 3, my personal favorite response to a rude comment is nothing at all. You respond with absolute silence. But there's a technique and a trick on how to do it correctly. And here's the thing about rude comments. They're tests. They're ways for the other person to test and assess what your temperature is. Can they get a reaction out of you or not? So I want you to pretend it's like a card game. You have a set of cards, they have a set of cards. When they first make that rude comment, they're playing a 2. You have a choice. Do I play this game or do I not? Maybe you decide that you want to.
You're gonna lay a 4.
Well, they're gonna lay another rude comment, and then they play a 7., and you go, "Okay, how far do I push this? How far do we go in these rude comments between one another?" And that's a bad game to play because nobody wins. Everybody's going to lose in that game. One of you is going to have to apologize, and it's typically the person who plays the last card. Whoever says the worst thing that shuts the game down is typically the person who is now the responsibility to apologize. First when you can end it all by just not playing the game. Rude comments are like platforms to where if they say something rude and you say something rude, well, you've now just justified them in taking another step. You've now justified and said— convinced them that you are every bit of the comment that they just made. Because now, instead of being curious about it and saying, "Hey, where's this coming from?" instead, you're doubling down on it, which makes it look like you're confirming what they said and saying, "Yeah, but even but." You're this and you're that and you're X, Y, and Z. They're just going to get more defensive and then it's going to continue to ramp up. So it's a losing game, lose-lose situation. Don't do it.
So let's assume that someone's made a rude comment towards you. Rude comments, in my opinion, are ones that they're not terribly insulting, like super condescending, bad, bad things that you would say directly to somebody. But they're also not polite. They're not nice. They're not kind. That can fall in between. Usually they catch you off guard, that you're not expecting them in some way. And at that moment, you have a decision. Do I respond or do I not respond? And the answer depends on the context. It also depends on the relationship. But let's assume in this situation, you're walking into a meeting and you have somebody that you know is, you two really don't get along all that much, but they make this comment. They say, well, it's nice of you to finally show up. In that moment, you know that's a dig. The other people around know that's a dig, but they may not know the history between you two. So you're stuck in this situation of, what do I say?
Because if I'm ugly and I bring up past stuff, the people around you aren't going to understand.
But they will understand if you decide to be rude right in that moment. So how you respond matters. What I like to suggest in number 1 is you use the question, "Did you mean?" And you insert different ways to respond. For example, "Did you mean for that to sound rude?" "Did you mean to embarrass me?" "Did you mean to upset me?" When you say, "Did you mean?" You give them a chance to clarify. You give them a chance to assess what they just said. It's a question of intent, meaning you want to find out what was your intent? In saying that? What were you trying to achieve by making that comment? And so when you say things that are questions of intent, you make them double back on what they said. And often you can avoid an argument altogether because let's assume that this person who made this comment, well, they're not really just, they weren't really trying to be ugly. It came out the wrong way. That's not what they were really trying to say. So when you say, did you mean to embarrass me? Or did you mean for that to sound offensive or rude? 9 times out of 10, when you call them to the mat on that kind of question, they'll say, oh no, no, what I meant to say was, oh no, no, no, what I meant to do. And they try and clarify or they backtrack or they further explain. And that makes you look more wise. It looks like you have integrity. It looks like you're the one that's being the bigger person by checking it rather than just assuming their intent on it. And I also want to explain that this works really well with text or email. How many times have you been in communication with someone and the text just read the wrong way? You ever had somebody just say, "K," or, "Okay," when you all of a sudden just felt like, "Oh, that's just them being dismissive. They're not really taking me seriously." And automatically you just want to shut them off. You go, "Oh, okay, fine. I don't have to be like that." Easy way to check that is for you to text, did you mean for that to be short? Did you mean for that to sound like you're upset? Often they'll clarify that and say, no, no, no, no, I, I was just in the middle of something, or I was, I was, uh, during an errand, I was making a cup of coffee, and I just wanted to let you know that I got the text. So often you can have this sense of giving grace to other people by just simply asking the question and setting up the phrase, "Did you mean?" It can really put out arguments before they even start. Now, I also want you to dial in on passive-aggressive comments that are rude.
Passive-aggressive comments, as you know, they're not direct, meaning they don't feel comfortable in their personality to say things to your face. Instead, they will say them in a way that's kind of snarky and snide off to the side because they don't feel comfortable saying them directly to face-to-face. So here's what I mean. Let's assume you're in a conversation with someone and they make this comment: "I mean, it'd be nice, you know, if somebody cared." You both know it's aimed towards you, but instead they couch it in terms of "it'd be nice if somebody cared." How you deal with that is you pull them out of their current environment, meaning you have to make them step back in the conversation, understanding what they just said. So, if they were to make that comment, "It would be nice if somebody cared," you respond with a question that checks them, like this: "It sounds like there's more to that." "It sounds like there's more to that." In that moment, you're pulling them out. They go, "Oh wait, what did I just say?" And you're calling them to the mat in a way that says, "What exactly are you trying to say? Do you understand what you just said? It sounds like there's more to what you're telling me." In other words, I'm catching this passive-aggressive behavior and I'm not just going to let it fly by. Another way to ask is, "It sounds like you're having a hard day," or, "It sounds like we need to have another discussion or we need to talk a little bit more." Using these phrases like, "It sounds like," "It seems like," and throwing things out there in a way that encourages them to talk more is going to get you a whole lot farther than just saying, "Oh, you're talking about me? You wish I cared? Let me tell you about—" That's gonna just make it even worse. So instead, you're gonna catch them with questions that say, "It sounds like," or, "It seems like." Now, okay, now my favorite. Number 3 is to respond with silence. But there is a trick, a technique that I like to do, and that is to count, well, you don't have to count, but it needs to last 4 seconds. 4 seconds is enough to be defined as a long pause. Meaning if somebody were to make a rude comment towards you, you're going to look at them for 4 seconds. 1, 2, 3, 4. Enough to give a look of almost puzzlement, as if you find it curious. And what you're doing in those 4 seconds is you're saying, "I heard it. I listened to it. I evaluated it." and I have concluded that it is not worthy of a response from me. It's not something I'm even going to entertain. It's not something I'm even going to put back into this world. It is just going to fall aside. A nice idea that you can have in your mind, a mindset of it, as if you have a desk off to the side. What I talk with my clients is it's a counsel desk. You're an attorney, you're standing up, and you have a counsel desk. When somebody gives you something that you don't want and you know it's rude, you take that piece of paper— that's their and without even looking on it, you set it to the side on the counsel table as if you say, no, I know my truth, I know my presence, I know my purpose here. I'm gonna take what you just said that I know to be rude 'cause I've listened to it, I heard it, I considered it, I weighed it, and I'm just putting it right here on the counsel table. And that's the best way to handle those rude comments, just nothing but silence. Okay, now we're at the portion of the episode where I get to read an email from a follower if you are not already signed up, you can sign up there in the show notes for my newsletter.
It's a weekly newsletter where I send out a communication tip once a week right to your inbox. Short and sweet, typically 3 points. And I'm going to read one right now. So this one is from Amy. She's over in Paris. That's awesome. Y'all should be getting ready for the Olympics, right? The Olympics, I think, are starting like in a week. She says, hey, Jefferson, love your stuff. Thanks, Amy. "I have a problem with a colleague who always emails very short sentences. I try not to take them personally, but I have a tough time with it. Is there something I can do to make her emails not so short?" Amy, totally got you. You're not the only one that has this problem. In the business world, we value expedient, expediency, where we like everything to be very fast. We want very quick, short, You have Slack, you have different ways of instant messaging people. So having very short, few-word responses are pretty normal. But I want to commend you on not taking them personally because that can go to a negative spot, a dark place very quickly. Here's what I want you to do. Like just what we talked about early in this episode, you can use, did you mean? So if you were to reply to something, if she said something very short, and you felt it to be dismissive, or you felt it be a negative feeling inside you when you, when you read that, you can always clear it up with a, did you mean, did you mean for that to sound short, question mark, and send that. What you don't want to do, what I don't want you to do, is start assuming, is to start assuming the intent. Then you start to just have an email that is 4 sentences, 6 sentences long, where you all of a sudden have a paragraph where you're trying to Just assume and guess what this person meant, or you're assuming a certain tone, and so you're sending it back to this person in a negative light. Don't do that. Just very quickly say, did you mean for that to sound short? It should be cleared up pretty quickly. Another thing that you can do that it's going to depend on your relationship with this person is to ask them for more context. Can you go further? Can you go a little deeper into that? Ask those questions, those probing questions that make them give you more information. Just say, can I have some more context with that? You don't need something long and detailed to say, hey, I am so sorry, which is over-apologizing, right? Like we talked about in the prior episode. Instead of saying, hey, I'm so sorry, I'm not really sure exactly what you're saying. I wonder if you're asking this. Are you asking that? That's too much. Just keep it short, to the point. You got this, Amy.
Okay, I got time for another one. This one is from Paul in Arizona. Paul says, "Hey Jefferson, love your stuff, man." Thanks, Paul. Appreciate it. "I have a mother that likes to make rude comments under her breath that are kind of passive-aggressive a lot of the times at family functions. I'm not sure how best to handle it. What do you suggest?" Oh, Paul. Sorry about that. That's tricky.
Mamas are tricky.
A lot of emotion, a lot of history, a lot of feelings wrapped up in that. Here's what I can tell you. If this is a mama that loves you, which I'm assuming that it is, you want to make sure that whatever you say is kind back. So when you're ugly to somebody and when you're rude, often what it does, like we discussed, is make them jump. So if you say something rude, well, now she feels like she's justified in saying something a little bit more direct. That's not so under her breath. And you have to be also careful of the context. You have family around, maybe other kids around, so you want to be careful of that. Real quick way, if she's making these passive-aggressive comments, is that rule number 2, step number 2, where you get to say, "There sounds like there's more to that, Mom." "Mom, it sounds like there's more to what you're saying." Or ask the question, "Is there more to what you're saying?" When you're asking that question, "Is there more?" It's you not just taking her comment as something offensive for you to automatically get defensive about. Instead, you're taking a moment to be curious about what she said and diving deeper into, "I want to know more because I can tell this is coming from a place that is unresolved. I can tell this is coming from a place that's deeper than what we're talking about." So when you have that moment just check her by bringing her out of that environment and say, "It sounds like there's something else that we need to discuss." And often that will take care of it altogether. But bottom line is, depending on the context, and of course because it's your mother, you want to make sure that you approach a situation with a lot of grace and a lot of patience. So what are we going to do the next time that someone makes a comment that is rude toward you? All right, number one, you're going to remember the "Did you mean?" "Did you mean for that to sound rude?" "Did you mean for that to hurt my feelings?" You're gonna find a way to be a mirror so that they can hear what they've said and see if they're gonna clarify it and fix it, and that will often remove the argument. You can also, when we're talking about number 2, passive-aggressive comments, check them by pulling them out of their current environment to say, "It seems like," or "It sounds like." "It sounds like you're having a hard day." "It seems like there's more to what you're saying." Getting them to come to bring to light what they're really trying to say. And number 3, of course, anybody can do it, and that's to say nothing. Count in your head 4 seconds and then continue on with your day. And that's how to handle rude comments.
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