So the understanding I came to is that there’s this unspoken contract: I am who I am, you are who you are, and it’s my responsibility to decide if I like you or not and your responsibility to decided if you like me or not. Any attempt to bypass this construct by being nice, submissive, apologetic, moral or polite comes with this inherent suspicion, because you’re seen as hiding your true personality. And, more importantly, if you’re acting this consciously moral, you must be holding yourself to certain standards, which you’re likely to be holding me to as well. You see this play out in more overt situations where simply being a vegetarian/vegan will have meat-eaters out of the blue start to debate and criticise you. Moral behaviour makes people feel judged and insecure.
Meanwhile, the thing about shitty people is that they make you feel secure: there’s this unspoken agreement that I accept your faults and you accept mine. If you’re shitty, then I don’t feel judged by you, and can feel secure that I have free reign to be shitty myself. You see this play out in political views: the main ‘selling point’ of right-wingery is that people feel ‘welcome’. People are very protective of their ‘right’ to own their psyches and selfhoods, and perceive moral behaviour as an invasion of their right to individuality; people subconsciously would rather surround themselves with people who are so unabashedly themselves that it’s almost inspiring. These people will be such a mess and so clearly existing within their own minds that they’re rarely projecting any sort of morality/logic outwards onto you. And I’m return, you can feel free to be an unabashed person back, even if doing so means you end up hurt, being stolen from, or abandoned. At least you’re left with the psychological buffer that you were never ‘forced’ to do it and everybody involved acted according to their own free will. The self is very fragile and seems to need this kind of protection.
Edit: I also want to add that when people feel judged by you, they want to punish you, and they will get you by your weaknesses - if they see that you have a certain morality, they will hold you strongly to it and any hypocrisies they perceive you as having. To go back to the vegetarian/vegan example, meat-eaters will start saying things like ‘plants have feelings too’ as an argument against you - it’s not about holding to any sort of consistency, it’s all about re-establishing order and reassuring themselves that morality isn’t an obligation and that their selfhood is sacrosanct.
janainaart
theartofmadeline
baratheonpilled
ellievsbear
2087
