> actually hate me and talk shit about me whenever I'm not around.
This happens virtually everywhere. It is extremely rampant. I have yet to find a place where there are humans and it does not happen, excl. friend circles.
Yeh, I know. It's a kinda sad fact about humans. You can handle it a few ways. The most tempting and easiest is to compete on the same level, sniping at other people. More difficult but similar is to take it a step further and be the biggest guy at the pub, deal some drugs, fuck more girls, act like a friend and then talk shit. Every bar has one... it's just a method. They learned it from the internet, or possibly from being abused as a child. My method in all cases, everywhere, is to be extremely honest and see what comes out of people. What I find respectable is someone who tells you honestly what they think, even if they're not your friend. The people who tell you the unfiltered truth as they see it. Those are the good humans. Making other people reveal themselves, so you know what you're dealing with. That's actually understanding the world.
I am mostly just a listener, and at times a mediator. It worked well for me in cases where I was liked by most. Sadly it does not work well even when it comes to family, they talk shit about me behind my back to people and so forth.
> What I find respectable is someone who tells you honestly what they think
I think. Hear me out. To be a good mediator is also to be brutally honest with everyone. And your takeaway isn't them liking you. If either side liked you, you'd be a shit mediator. lol
The good news is they'll respect you for something they can't get anywhere else.
Had a long-time friend group explode last year over this. Years of behind-their-backs shit-stirring lies by a couple members of the group finally got figured out and called out, publicly, which lit the fuse. Exact same behavior that was called out was immediately employed to try to spin that and get these people's "enemies" pushed out of the group, which was the bomb going off. About half the group survived with some scarring, the rest just shattered.
Toxic people gonna toxic.
> There’s always going to be a shot caller or instigator behind it and everyone else who is weak willed will get on board with it.
Yeah, a major factor was lots of people putting up with some real bullshit for years to try to keep the peace. That, and the ones who did try to do something about it approached the problem-people one-on-one, which just led to them being lied to ("oh no, there's no problem between us") and then smeared even harder to others, and marginalized, having no idea why any of it was happening.
I've gotten in the habit of straight out calling out these people, including throwing them out of my house when they start down this road.
They tend to have some form of serious mental illness and/or a major substance problem they're not interested in addressing, which leads to emotional dysregulation. So not exactly great people to have around anyway.
Have I lost friends over it? Yes. But that's fine, having no friends is better than having fake friends who undermine you.
I would not punish them for having a mental illness, I am understanding of it as I have, too, but it is completely fine if you, yourself, do not want to handle or deal with it.
I tend to call people out, too. I keep the ones that take it gracefully.
Yeah, I try to give people some grace but if their behavior is repeatedly disruptive over a period of months to years, eventually something has to give. Everyone needs to have some boundaries.
It’s not necessarily punishment, e.g. leaving an abusive partner is in most cases about self-preservation, and if intended as a punishment, very ineffective at that. That said, I think a lot of people who end up at the receiving end of it do tend to try to spin it as a punishment due to self-centered thinking and in order to frame themselves as the victim.