I’m a self-proclaimed misanthrope. I covet solitude for the most part and I can go weeks without really getting the urge to have one-on-one time with another human being. This is partly because I live with a person and I get enough time there, partly because as the years have gone past most of the things that I sought after in other human beings I mostly found in myself, and partly because I have been hurt so many times and so frequently by others that on a base level it’s generally not an enjoyable experience for me. This isn’t something that should engender pity in anyone – it’s just the way it is.
Yet over the years I have found people who’s company I genuinely enjoy. People that I consider friends. I don’t hate human beings as a whole. For one, I am one. And I know that I can have experiences that I find fun or meaningful. Yet chances are if I meet a random person on the street, there’s a 90% chance I won’t like you them.
So why is that? And keep in mind if you are doing any of these things, I’m not telling you to stop. It’s just personally what I don’t like having around me. And I wasn’t sure what to write today for my scheduled blog post, so here’s what you get.
So why do I probably not like you?
You don’t respect my choices. (Don’t have to respect the -thing-, just my ability to choose it)
You make disparaging comments about my appearance, behavior, or personality
You try to pressure me into doing things I don’t want to do
A majority of your personality is contingent on you wanting to impress other people
You make fun of me if I say anything you don’t understand
You have a hard time understanding that some people think differently than you do
You talk exclusively about yourself and don’t ask me any questions
You try to force intimacy and trust instead of letting it develop in me at my own pace
You’re overly negative or have a generally pessimistic attitude about life
You don’t take responsibility for anything
You tell me you like my writing, but then interrupt me constantly while I’m actually working
You tell me I’m weird or awkward to try to either put me down, test my limits, or feel better about your own behavior
If you’re a man, you neg me
If you’re a man, you treat me like less than a human being. Either by putting me down, or elevating me above humanity.
You tell me my problems don’t exist
You constantly treat me like I have to prove myself to you
You make assumptions about my behavior, and it generally has something to do with how I’m hurting you somehow
Okay, so now that I’ve got that out of the way, what do I like in other human beings?
You have genuine interest and passion in something
You’re generally positive, and don’t feel the need to hurt people to make yourself feel better
You’re an individual, unique. I’m interested in people that are unlike anyone I’ve met before.
You respect other people and their choices because you’re firm in your understanding of yourself
You have some amount of self-awareness
You’re interested in the world around you, and ask questions
You’re not perfect, but you recognize that
You have a certain something inside of you. A spark.
Your eyes aren’t dead
You display genuine intelligence and understanding
You’ve been hurt badly but you don’t use that as an excuse to hurt other people.
You see something beautiful in the world and existence
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Self portrait by me canon t51
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My Feral Dog // How Love Resides inside of Everything
The vast majority of humanity values themselves by their correlation to others; they value themselves based on social acceptance; of finding the perfect balance between their identity as individuals and their identity as part of a collective, a group. Consequently, their social capital becomes their primary heuristic for their value and obtaining it becomes a premier social drive.
Putting others down increases your social capital relative to your surroundings, that's why they do it. Making yourself seem something greater than you are is another one, that's why they enact the lies and self-aggrandizement.
Self-described misanthropes on the other hand, determine their value based on the things that they do, based on actions and their results; thus devaluing social capital and valuing genuine things. So when you take such an individual and place them into a crowd of other people who have only social capital, they devalue those around them as they have nothing worth having while the others devalue that individual because they simply cannot understand what it is like to not value social capital at all. It seems like a completely alien mind to them.
Our identities are determined by the things we enjoy and the things that we hate; all our actions consequently revolve around doing things that we like an avoiding that which we hate. So when we "misanthropes" enjoy something genuinely while devaluing social capital and consequently hating people who value social capital over everything (and thus, them appearing to be wasting their lives on it), we are ostracized simply because our identities differ far too greatly from others to be accepted within their spheres of acceptable identities.
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It's disturbing to me how much people are motivated by the construct of their ego and how they appear to others.
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For any functional civilization to exist, there must be some social structure. For it to thrive, there must be competition in that social structure. Humans are still biologically bound to the genetic constraints of their ancestors who founded civilization on the very basis of mutual cooperation whilst simultaneously jostling for social competition.
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'You see something beautiful in the world and existence'
You know how to put your pain into prose in a beautiful way. Thanks for sharing it with us.
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good god do i empathize with those first three paragraphs so much. i'm legitimately in that exact same place mentally. and then when you tie it up with the "You’ve been hurt badly but you don’t use that as an excuse to hurt other people" bit, that's just the bow on top. many of us have been hurt badly by others and still find a way to be decent to other people. the ones who can't are a complete mystery to me.
thanks for the post! :)
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Thank you @bucho!
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I can relate so easily to this post. I live with my best friend and four other people yet they rarely see me. Solitude is an essential and without it I would wither away. Most people aren't worth expelling my energy over, but when I do happen to find that soul with a fiery spark I want to get to know them and talk to them endlessly. I'm looking forward to more posts from you. :)
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