Same diff; as the end result is no different - they tend to consume all the air in a room, making everyone else around them feel as badly as they do.
The sad part is that many energy leeches don’t even consciously know that’s what they are, and then they end up even more unhappy because people will actively avoid them, and they often don’t understand why.
Yeah, I get that. But, you weren’t like, tempted to the dark side.
This is a funny conversation for me, because I understand that need, but with depression and anxiety, I also end up in the simultaneous situation of hoping I am wrong.
One of the things that changed that was (ironically) losing my religion. It’s led me to a space where I can accept that sometimes there is no “right” or “wrong”, but “what works for you as an individual?” This does not apply to all questions, mind. But I have very much learned that details are important.
Maybe it’s because where I see the need to be right can lead. #NotAll________ behaviour can be seen through this lense. People cling to that, because they simultaneously see the problems (racism, sexism, abuse, assault) but can’t admit that a) they engage in that behaviour on some level, too (because that would be wrong) and b) they’ve been on the side of wrong for quite some time, now. Those who don’t have power don’t feel the same need to be “right”, because they know that in that game, facts don’t matter.
Which, for me, brings up another question. If I get into an argument over something, is it because I need to be “right” or because I want not just to have my facts straight, but also to be heard and acknowledged? Those are two massively different issues.
The only thing I know I am right about is that it’s a complicated question. 
…because the people that control your life from the position of Wrong are not going to run your interior life? What’s wrong with being right and pressing your point every once in a while? Or daily in substitution or in concert with beerse?
Wait, this is your thread, not mine. But maybe there’s a bit of congruence.
I made a big dent in a friend’s OUTRAGE that the mentally challenged and senile were allowed to vote by pointing out that Rump and Clinton could vote too, and he was none too pleased with either of their usefulness. That night at the bar I laid out my frame for the immigration “crisis” all around the world and he tested and prodded me in all the dog-whistley ways for a minute, and I think I passed.
Passed in the sense that he began divorcing himself from just repeating Fox NewShit/alt-right memes shortly afterward. He began expressing frustration about just repeating shit and we began keeping each other honest. A lot of nostalgia from him about New Deal Democrats and Bobby Kennedy.
Over the years, I’ve determined that ‘right’ is usually ‘right to me, right now’. May not be right to me in a few years, nor is it necessarily right to other people, nor is it really the important thing, a lot of times.
To follow on with the examples about voting, back in the Year of the Dimpled and Hanging Chads, I was amazed that there could be any significant confusion over voting - it seems like the simplest thing. I watched the recordings of people at the entrance and exit. So many people standing in line waiting to vote, who said they didn’t know who was running, they’d just vote for whoever their friend voted for, or whoever an ad told them to vote for or whatever. People coming out of the polls saying they had no idea who they’d just voted for. People citing comedians or comic strips or political ad sound bites as their reasons for voting.
Seemed pretty obviously ‘right’ to me at the time that people should be required to take a basic IQ and literacy test and know who the candidates were in order to vote. After all, if they can’t follow the basic voting instructions and have no idea what they’re voting for, they’re not really qualified to make those decisions, right? Obviously.
Of course, IQ tests (and tests in general) are quite problematic, illiterate or blind people, people whose native language is different, or who might be discriminated against by a test are still members of society who deserve a say in the things that affect their lives. Disenfranchising people on the basis of a test now seems every bit as wrong to me as it seemed right back then. But back then, I was in school, and basic competency tests as a prerequisite seemed natural and right. Even on the job, no one was allowed to operate dangerous equipment unless they could pass the safety test, never mind designating other people who they knew nothing about to operate the dangerous equipment for them.
So, almost a lifetime later, while I realize that the solution I believed right at the time was in fact wrong, I still think there was a grain of truth in there regarding problems with our system. Nowadays I feel the more important things are in getting at those bits of truth, and why/how the obviously right things aren’t necessarily right, than the right or wrong. It’s a more interesting world, but also a messier one, and sometimes a bit bleak, compared to simply and clearly being ‘right’.
Some random thoughts on being right.
If you ever see two people arguing over anything, it is very likely that both must be convinced that they are in some way right. Since it isn’t always possible for both people to be right and it is always possible for both to be wrong then the only way to re conciliate such incongruity is to say that regardless of what turns out to be the truth, both people must at least feel convinced that they are right.
And that’s the problem with being right, unless we’re dealing with something factual I don’t believe we can know if we are right, all we can do is show our work, as in lay out our case for believing as we do in good faith and accept that being right is ever so slightly beyond our reach
Not that it is impossible to be right about anything, but if even when one is wrong it’s still possible to convince others that we are right then it seems that being right is not something we humans have fully mastered.
That doesn’t mean that trying to prove we’re right is futile but I do believe that unless we understand that feeling like we are right is not the same thing as being objectively right, it is too easy to be dishonest in argument and we can too easily start talking at someone rather than with them.
This is why I don’t bother proving I’m right in argument, I limit myself to showing how I believe as I do and when I find myself disagreeing with somebody I instead try to reconcile what I believe with what the other person believes. I don’t try to prove I’m right, I instead try to show how what I believe makes sense even when we may have different worldviews. This means that many times I only partially convince people to accept my view point as valid, and I believe that it is much more useful to move the needle a little bit most of the times than rarely ever prove I’m right.
I don’t want or need to be right all the time, it just happens.
It’s a curse, really… 
This is very much what my conservative friend was saying. On the surface – who doesn’t want an informed electorate? But we don’t have a perfect world, and the solutions given so far by the right are hypocritical attempts to keep the left from winning elections. As with SO many things, the real answer is much more complex and difficult to deal with.
And that’s one of the problems of trying to be right – the right answer may be incredibly complicated, whereas the wrong answer is just a soundbite or bullet point.
Understanding that the right answer is not a bumper sticker slogan is at least closer to being right, even if it’s not completely right by itself.
Yet I’m accused of lying or flip-flopping whenever I explain that both the problem and the solution are very complicated…
two thoughts.
this is a terrible mode for learning. letting alone reaching consensus.
despite being how i was raised, it’s not the only mode of conversation. i know people who can fluently speak about their perspective without implying it’s right or wrong.
that mode can be learned ( i think. i hope. ) but like dancing, it does require at least some participation by all parties.
( add conversation and consensus skills to the list of things other than dead presidents to learn about in grade school. )
people ( americans? ) love to muddy the waters between 1 & 2.
should all people regardless of economic status be able to see a doctor?
answer: yes. no wiggle room.
which doctor? how often? how do we pay for it?
answer: ???. let’s find good enough answers together. the answer might change over time. and that’s okay.
the problem - as i see it - is that overton has pushed the fight ( all the fights ) towards the “question” of human rights and away from the “what do we do about this need?”
so maybe more consensus conversations should happen. and maybe some conversations shouldn’t happen at all.
Consensus is difficult without compromise and cooperation, and the latter has been thrown out the window by lots of people, but especially on the right (IMHO) – witness the Freedom (sic) Caucus in congress.