good thread on the constructive role of meanness as part of group↔️individual trust-dancing
5 tweets · May 2024 · 35 likes · 1 retweets · read on Twitter
good thread on the constructive role of meanness as part of group↔️individual trust-dancing
worth noting there's a huge difference between active punishment (shaming, etc) and something more like simple exclusion but sometimes it is also good to tell a person not just "you don't have to stop being an asshat but you can't asshat here" but "stop that. we all hate it"
talked to a young gal who had had a young guy (both early 20s?) super-awkwardly expressing his attraction towards with her incessantly at a party she kept trying to be polite, but like... buddy needs a "look, imma be relatively nice about this, but [forcefully] your behavior might get you beaten up elsewhere" not to say she was obligated to confront him in this way (fwiw, kid was naive tiny timid nerd, basically zero risk of him being violent in this scene) but I wanted her to notice that NOT confronting him is NOT a favor to him. the next person he creeps on might not be so understanding! (nevermind that also actually being like "fuck off" as opposed to "thank you, you can go away now" might actually have gotten her more of the peace she was looking for)
being mean to someone for merely liking a sport/anime you don't is just cruelty. nothing noble there—live & let live. but being mean to someone because they won't shut up about that sport/anime despite nobody else around them being interested IS part of how they get the message!
in general, you don't need to be any meaner than you need to be in order to get your message across though and learning how much that is is a whole calibration process