@Felthry From what I understand its that people seem to imagine apologising as some act of one-sided repentance rather than a dialogue. Doing otherwise is I guess seen in bad faith.

It doesn't really sit right with us either TBH, because in situations where you feel both parties have done wrong the 'ideal' approach still seems to be "only bring up what you did wrong", which doesn't actually guarantee things get resolved. :/

@Felthry having told someone off for this in the past, here's my take: explanations of actions, when done poorly, can very easily come across as "here's why what I did actually makes perfect sense and is fine". It can also cause further hurt if it reveals that the offending party doesn't actually understand why their actions were harmful.

@Felthry i’m in the same boat – being on the spectrum, i’m aware misreads are bound to happen and i’m more likely to step on people’s toes because of them. so i also tend to want to explain why i did what i did. (like you – i want to add that ‘why it made sense at the time’, and also as a reassurance that it wasn’t done out of malice)

but apparently, it’s also a common thing for bad actors to do to centre the discussion back on themselves. usually to sidestep needing to address that they did something wrong to begin with, and then to establish that they actually didn’t do anything wrong at all. (a la ‘i’m just being rational/objective/whatever and you’re just an emotional brainwashed sjw eejit who gets wrongly bent out of shape as a hobby. look at me, poor victim of political correctness gone mad!’)

it’s really nontrivial to navigate. i found it helpful to focus on putting a good apology first, and frame my explanation in terms of misreads & ‘my bad.’