| There's a name for people like that: assholes. There's also a lot of insecurity going on there, but that's true of most people. The difference is in how we deal with it. Some people do so by trying to become kinder and more decent people, which has an amazing effect on your own level of social comfort. Others try to bring the people who threaten them down to their level (or beneath, if possible). Oddly enough, this strategy does not improve the underlying level of social ease. Quite the opposite. I mean, these are people (a) who act like assholes specifically to (b) lower those around them so they don't have to (c) do the hard work of making themselves better. It's a triple play of shitty behavior stemming from a toxic combination of fear and laziness on one hand, combined with sickening disregard for others. The result is clear. You don't introduce them to others. In other words, you specifically and deliberately limit their social horizons, having (correctly) judged them as unfit for decent company. This could be an addressable problem if the people in question had a baseline of personal integrity. But as you noted, they can also be willfully ignorant when convenient. Aside from being intellectually dishonest (which is maddening in its own right), it's also a major barrier to personal development. Self-reinforcing assholedom, essentially. So, uh, maybe you need other friends? |