human nature?

[kellinator]

Expanded from my last post...

Why is it that we gravitate to people who treat us poorly and frequently ignore people who treat us well? I'm not just talking about a romantic context, either. Think of the really nice person at work. The one who always asks how you're doing, bakes you cookies. In other words, the one who drives everyone crazy. In your school days, were the popular kids the nice kids? In my school, they usually weren't. That was reserved for the rich kids, the good-looking kids, the athletic kids. Why do we want to invest time and energy in people who obviously aren't interested in doing the same for us?

I'd love it if somebody could prove me wrong here, that people don't actually do this all the time, but I don't have that much faith in human nature.

Comments

[stevietee.livejournal.com]

Same reason that the crazies and extremists control our political discourse -- they're the loudest and most forceful about their beliefs.

I mean, it's much easier to yell, "BABY MURDERERS!!" than calmly discuss "Well, abortion should definitely be legal, but regulated like any other surgical procedure and the women should receive counselling before and after, if they choose to have the procedure, and the procedure itself should not be ENCOURAGED but also not DIScouraged... blah blah blah..."

If you're in the middle of the road, you're going to get run over.

[sujata.livejournal.com]

I think it's because we see ourselves mirrored in the welcome or rebuke with which others greet us. And because we are social animals (primates), we are programmed to crave welcome rather than rebuke. So, if we are greeted with rebuke, we ignore those who welcome us and devote our attention and energy to ingratiating ourselves with the one who rebuked rather than welcomed us.

That's the philosophically scientific answer..

But I prefer the cynical answer: Homo sapiens sapiens is a misnomer, by two "sapiens." ;-)

[gmslegion.livejournal.com]

Why do we want to invest time and energy in people who obviously aren't interested in doing the same for us?

On those occasions I've done this, it's because I did not see the "obviously" or I really hoped they'd find the "interested."

But yeah, you're right. If you took a straw poll 'round my office, I guarantee you'd get a unanimous report that a fellow called W., who has some mild mental disability, is the nicest, sweetest, most spectacularly giving person in the office by leagues. He really is a super guy...

...but I swear, I'm really damned tired of him giving me agonizingly long reports of progress from Falcons training camp twice a day. *groannnn*!

[dreamthrum.livejournal.com]

"There is no such thing as a problem without a gift for you in is hands. You seek problems because you need their gifts."
- Richard Bach, Illusions:The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah

I think many times we focus on those people/problems rather than gravitating towards them. They are the ones that nag you and stay in your head. I also think that there is a horrible trend these days to focus on only the negative aspects in life. It is one of my biggest irritations when I realize that someones pettiness has taken up a second of my thought ... just isn't worth it.

I have gravitated towards 'some' people who have treated me poorly, but for the most party I have found the world to be full of kind, loving people who are there for me ... and who I recognize in return.

[mschristine.livejournal.com]

I agree there is some truth to it, but I know when I've needed help that people have come to my aid pretty readily. I think when you are younger that may be more true, that people pick friends and partners for more shallow reasons (of course some stay shallow thier whole lives) But I have seen evidence that as you age people are more appreciative of kindness

[azurelunatic]

Hm. At my workplace, most of the nice ones are my friends already.

And the obnoxious one is the one we gossip about in the ladies' room. I've perfected my "get Mr. Bitter to leave me the fuck alone" field by simply Not Talking To Him and not acknowledging his existence. But quite a few other people think he's funny, if not nice.

[katyakoshka.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure I don't do that.

I'll bet that the more emotionally invested one was in hs popularity, either as a beneficiary or an outsider, the more one ingratiates the unpleasant and ignores the decent -- not consciously, but as a survival method, or suchlike.

Didn't play that game much in highschool, myself. Perhaps my school was too diverse, socially -- too many groups to really have one cohesive in-crowd. People who were from the same honors/college-bound track as I was knew me, and we generally got along. They tended to be the ASB types. I wasn't part of that sub-in-crowd, but I wasn't shunned either. Then I left a year early because I liked college better anyhow.

Maybe it's a matter of learning to not care whether everyone likes you -- I figure the people deserving of my friendship will find me deserving of theirs. If someone doesn't like me... they don't like me.

[hotcoffeems.livejournal.com]

I don't know. I've thought aboutthis a lot, in my own life.

I'd say, no, we don't do that, but I've spent too much time in my life desperately seeking approval from people who weren't going to give it. I suspect we do it because we do sometimes need validation from others that we perceive as worthwhile that we too are worthwhile people.

From another viewpoint, the truth is also that sometimes when we get desperate, it's visible to others. And such desperation is not usually appealling to any but predators. I reckon it's because when I've known someone desperately seeking that friendship/approval, I worry about what's behind it. Also...coming on too strong, this is usually a desperate person thing to do. And what looks like "treating someone badly" is sometimes actually "I need you to back off, and this seems to be the only way to accomplish it." We don't always know how to handle everyone optimally. And some people who look pretty groovy have different value systems (sometimes really superficial ones) when choosing to associate with people.

But it would be nice to sit at the cool kid table on occasion, right? To not have to ask, either.

I went to two high schools: at one, the popular kids were assholes. At the other, they *generally* were genuinely nice kids. The difference? I think it's because at the second school, there was a lot less money/social class difference among the student body. A few were jackoffs, but most people knew they were jackoffs, and they were only peripherally popular. Heck, I had a number of good friends among the "power elite" there, which was surprising -- they were good kids. Less money seemed to be the difference.

[streamweaver.livejournal.com]

Sorry I can't post something either funny or profound here.

I will say that I don't think this is always the case at all. There are people who maintain healthy relationships out there with their friends and SOs.

I think it's a much more complext issue than this however. There are whole other issues with people trying to force love out of folks, or people slapping away love then abusing the same people for not giving it to them. Really the topic is as wide as human experience.

[phyrra.livejournal.com]

I dunno, I was one of those outcasts in high school. Picked on, made fun of, you name it. I always disdained the popular kids who made fun of me and instead laughed at them for being such sheep. I befriended geeks instead, and have been happier for it.

[serendipitymet.livejournal.com]

most people just love the challenge of it, no matter what they say about hating "drama"

[10dimensions.livejournal.com]

Because if we have a low opinion of ourselves we mistrust anyone who doesn't. If they're nice to us, there must be something wrong with them. But if we can make the assholes like us, then by gaining worth in their eyes we can gain some in our own. That's why you see so much of it in high school...no one is emotionally mature at that age, everyone is looking to everyone else on how to act, looking to their peers for validation.

I've been there, although not with an asshole but with someone who was a nice person. But I wanted so badly to be "best" friends with someone...I thought if I could just have a "best friend" then it would erase all the snubbings of my youth. So I went out of my way to be the very best friend I could be...always calling this person, always trying to do things for them. I poured my energy and emotions into trying to make things come about how I wanted them to, instead of just letting things develop naturally if they were going to.

And of course it backfired. Because it was never about that person, it was about me trying to find my worth in another person, wanting them to give me something that they could never give me in the first place. Constantly needing reassurance and looking to another person to prop up the way you feel about yourself is emotionally draining on that person. When you cling that hard to someone, in the end you just push them further away. Even a best friend can't hold up your self-esteem for you. And when you're giving it all away like that, you lessen the value of what you're giving.

It doesn't matter how many other people like you. It doesn't matter how many time your friends reassure you that yes, you're really okay, and yes, we really like you. None of that will be worth anything until you belief it within yourself, for yourself.

Everyone has insecure moments. Everyone needs reassurance sometimes. Everyone gets nervous in certain situations, or has times when they feel they don't belong. And everyone makes the occasional bad choice about who to call a friend. That's human, and there's nothing abnormal about that. But if you don't have a basic core belief in your own self-worth, those moments will eat you alive.

[wintersweet.livejournal.com]

I grew out of that after junior high, thank god. I think it stems from low self-esteem or something.

[ariedana.livejournal.com]

I think that some of us want to see the best in people. We care for their potential as human beings. And maybe we see the good things they do and use that to compensate for the bad. Even if someone's a jerk 29 days a month, they can compensate by being great on the 30th. And that's what gets people into bad situations, and even abuse, because humans are willing to put up with a lot just to be right about someone.

[ilexx.livejournal.com]

hmmmm. maybe it's a pre-thirties thing? because i would completely agree with you except that there's me and mike, a complete freak of nature relationship in regards to this rule. and i think that had we met before we were thirty and thirty-one, we would never have at all bothered giving each other a second glance. BECAUSE of the very rule of which you speak! maybe it's a wisdom thing? idunno. but i know older people fall under that rule, too. meh.