Sunday, January 13, 2013

You just can't win with Drunk A$$holes

I'm 24, but still feel like i'm playing in the kids sandbox.

A common saying in rap culture is that haters gon' hate, and often I find meaning to these simple words of advice in my day-to-day life. I attempt to surround myself with people who are going to push me up and help me get to a higher ground. But sometimes those bullies just come out to play and they are not satisfied until hurting someone else to provide validation for their own worthless lives.

Now some of these bullies will grow up as they learn that there are other ways to enjoy life, and others will just keep leading a life of anger and pushing friends away. The latter is who I gripe about today. Here is my example of the constant double standard and utter irony I must deal with from a hater. 

If y'all have read my past posts, we have a house dog. It is owned by the hater, but not necessarily taken care of by its master. So myself and other roommates will pitch in refilling bowls of food/water, taking him out for walks, and the like. But when the dog ran out of food, I simply put the old bag by the front door as a symbol that the dog's owner should get him some food. Eventually another bag of food was purchased within days, but the old one was never thrown out. So this hater decides a week and a half later when the bag is still sitting there, that he will pick up the garbage and yell about how it is stupid that the bag was not thrown out. Granted he was drunk, so maybe he didn't understand that the one who gets the new bag of food should kindly throw out the old bag, keeping the system flowing and moving forward like a well oiled machine. But no, the hater has to make a big stink of something that was his own responsibility, attempting to put it on me that I was stupid and should have moved the bag sooner. (As I write this, the small replacement bag is almost empty, let's see what happens next)

This kind of attitude clashes very hard with my style of life, because I like to use the pay-it-forward method. But when I run into someone who does not give back to the greater good, than I end up getting the short end of the stick. Since my stick is getting very short and I have resorted to minor communication to minimize conflict with the aggressive roommate, I've started looking into other options of how to handle an adult bully. (25 is considered adulthood, right?)


Tactics of the adult bully
As this case illustrates, emotional bullying occurs when someone tries to gain control by making others feel angry or afraid. It is often characterized by yelling, and name-calling, sarcasm, mocking, putting down, belittling, embarrassing or intimidating.


Bullies often have personality disorder
Many bullies have a deep sense of insecurity about themselves, completely lacking empathy or the ability to perceive how they are negatively affecting others. They honestly don’t see themselves as the problem and are constantly dismay when others around them are devastated or offended by their behavior. This is known as “narcissistic” personality disorder, where one is only capable of interpreting events from their perspective. Pre-occupied with themselves, with little regard or understanding of the feelings of others.
Can bullies change?
While research shows that most bullies are unable to make deep changes to their personality, they are sometimes able to modify their behavior to the extent that they are more tolerable. Usually, the motivation to change is inspired by outside influences such as employers, spouses, or children. Other bullies decide to change at the threat of losing their job.
Four Ways To Cope written by Tony Fiore, Ph.D, a practicing psychologist and anger management trainer in Southern California these tips are used from www.angercoach.com

  • Focus on the positive attributes of the bully and try to ignore the negative parts. For instance, Bill had a very sweet and generous side to him when not being a bully— a side Ann could learn to focus on to survive the unpleasant times.
  • Be confident and look your bully in the eye. Speak in a calm and clear voice while asserting yourself by naming the behavior you don’t like and state what is expected instead.
  • Create a distraction or change the subject. Try using humor or a well-chosen word to disarm the bully.
  • Give the bully’s ego what it needs. For instance, Ann learned to praise Bill more and give him more credit and acknowledgment for things he did do well. While this tactic is a little manipulatory, it never- the- less worked well to decrease the number of times Bill bullied her. And it allowed Ann to survive a difficult situation.

In conclusion: I will use these methods to help cope with the bully, looking him in the eye, changing the subject and blatantly ignoring his attempts to aggravate me or get a rise out of my emotions. It would be hard to do #4 since there are very little opportunities to give credit, but who knows, maybe I will walk downstairs after this and see he has cleaned up for football Sunday.  My mother always tells me, everything happens for a reason and I guess there is some great purpose why I am put in this position to test my nerves. Maybe I just have to learn that not everone will be there with positive reinforcement and learning to deal with Drunk A$$holes will help me become a better, stronger man.


Haters gon' hate, but I got work to do!


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