I thought this post on the FCNow blog was interesting, and it touched on a pet peeve of mine: what they call the "non-apology apology." In extreme, it looks like this:

I apologize if anything I might have said may have hurt or upset you in any way.

All those "might haves" and "mays" transfer all the responsibility away from the apologizer. It reflects someone who is not taking responsibility for what they have done/said and what their impact was. In its extreme, it is actually blaming the other person for being upset.

Sometimes people who do this are just being weasels, but often people really do mean it–they just don’t realize that the apology is not effective. People use it when they truly don’t understand why the other person is upset. It feels wierd to apologize for something when you don’t really understand how what you did or said would be upsetting to the other person.

So here’s the trick: apologies don’t require that you understand the "why." You just need to know that what you did or said hurt or upset someone. Apologize for that.

I am sorry that what I said hurt you. I want you to know that I did not mean to hurt you, but I am sorry that I did.

Once you apologize, THEN you can continue the conversation to find out why and what to do about it.  But if you give them the non-apology apology, you’ll just upset them even more, and they won’t be able to hear you.