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Why do people care about insults?

^I wonder if it is a useful method to prevent physical conflict- maybe a way to release aggression on another without really risking anything.

That said, insult-laden conversation usually precedes physical violence so who knows.
 
^ A lot of people use it simply to instigate people. Looking for trouble.

And then there are those who will try to deescalate the fight because they're all talk.

That would be two of the extremes I think. There's obviously reasons between the two, like simply being angry then projecting.
 
Because left unanswered, you suffer downward pressure on your position in the dominance hierachy.
 
Whoever is getting insulted doesn't fall off some hierarchy if they leave it unanswered, if anything they gain "dominance" by remaining unaffected.

And if one does fights back, it shouldn't be an insult in reply but a comment on the insulter, shining a light on his weak ego.
 
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^Then it's just like comparing egos which is sort of egotistical... :|

There is nothing weak about being insulted and answering back if needed. Nothing wrong with defending your own self imo but I generally think fighting back against an insult is more effort than it's worth.

We evolved in a social environment where the opinions of others could mean the difference between life and death, our brains just cannot see that the stakes are generally not that high these days.
 
Defending yourself is all fine and good but the comment is more a reflection of the one insulting than the one being insulted, so like you said, not really worth the effort.
 
Whoever is getting insulted doesn't fall off some hierarchy if they leave it unanswered, if anything they gain "dominance" by remaining unaffected.

And if one does fights back, it shouldn't be an insult in reply but a comment on the insulter, shining a light on his weak ego.
A comment shining light on a weak ego is an insult.
Unanswered is not enough. The dismissal must adequately convey contempt either directly or perfectly poised indifference, or you look like a bitch.
Its pathetic I know. Buts thats peolple.
Consider for instance how everyone in the meeting laughs at the bosses jokes no matter how lame.
 
A comment shining light on a weak ego is an insult.

I guess for the most part that's true, unless you do it in a very diplomatic way.

The dismissal must adequately convey ... perfectly poised indifference, or you look like a bitch.

Right.

Consider for instance how everyone in the meeting laughs at the bosses jokes no matter how lame.

I understand the purpose, but don't fully grasp situations like this. I may deem those who didn't laugh to be level headed and serious about their work, whereas those who laughed may be more fickle.

Not all social situations necessarily require a response. Sometimes things just reach a dead-end and further acknowledging them is counter productive and inefficient, or redundant. Or in the case of insults, wasted effort to reverse something that never really had a drastic effect in the first place, aside from revealing the psyche of the one who insulted us. Sure, you may look like a bitch in the eyes of some if you just "take it", but getting defensive or coming back with an insult of your own could be seen in the same way. It's all dependent on the two people and their body language etc.
 
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A humorously barbed insult delivered seriously to a deserving target can deescalate a situation marvelously.

That said I have been punched in the mouth several times attempting to pull this off, it's a bit hit or miss tbh
 
I guess for the most part that's true, unless you do it in a very diplomatic way.



Right.



I understand the purpose, but don't fully grasp situations like this. I may deem those who didn't laugh to be level headed and serious about their work, whereas those who laughed may be more fickle.

Not all social situations necessarily require a response. Sometimes things just reach a dead-end and further acknowledging them is counter productive and inefficient, or redundant. Or in the case of insults, wasted effort to reverse something that never really had a drastic effect in the first place, aside from revealing the psyche of the one who insulted us. Sure, you may look like a bitch in the eyes of some if you just "take it", but getting defensive or coming back with an insult of your own could be seen in the same way. It's all dependent on the two people and their body language etc.
Its weird, the laughing at the bosses jokes thing, but people do it. Ive caught myself doing it and like wtf.

And yes I agree these things are situational and can be handled in various ways depending on your authenticity and or social skill. Its a sad reality I believe though, that always taking the high ground doesn't always pay the dividends that it should.
 
A humorously barbed insult delivered seriously to a deserving target can deescalate a situation marvelously.

That said I have been punched in the mouth several times attempting to pull this off, it's a bit hit or miss tbh
Ahh, so your that guy. Good on ya cheeky prick hehe.
 
Ok but truly what does heroin help them find?

Nothing, that is the beauty of that drug.
Nobody can smoke N,N-DMT or MDPV daily for example but with heroin & other potent goodies along that line they remove everything & you can sit there for 8 hours watching a shopping channel and be happy.

It is hard to put into words but the first time I did it I felt as if I had found the key to life in some way.
"If God made anything better he kept it for himself" William S Burroughs
 
You're right to point out the hypocrisy. I think it's a combination of two things. First, society uses shame to try to keep people in line with what the general social mores are. It works because people tend to fear what they do not understand. For drug use, propaganda has been circulated ever since drugs first became illegal to try to demonize them and also their users. Think Reefer Madness, where people were told that marijuana users become out of control rapists and murderers. A lot of people believed that so it's not hard to see why people looked down on drug users. They knew nothing about marijuana, except the lies they were told, which were specifically designed to produce fear. Although things have improved a lot (especially for marijuana), these ideas born from a lack of understanding are still affecting people today. For suicide, it makes even more sense, because suicide is terrifying for people who love those who do it. Someone who is not suicidal cannot understand why someone would do that to the people they love (that is their perception anyway), so there is a lot of fear involved. It's the kind of fear that causes people to forget their nice ideals about how one should act. It's easy to tell your child who is being bullied at school to not listen to the bullies. It's not so easy to have compassion for someone who has caused you or someone you care about a lot of pain, be it through drug addiction, suicide, or anything else.

I think another aspect that is a factor for some is the same schoolyard mentality that causes bullying as children. People aren't satisfied with their own selves/lives, and a quick and easy way to feel better is to compare yourself favorably to some other person or group of people. So I think some people that treat drug users like scum are using it to make themselves feel better about their own life... ie, "yeah, but at least I'm not a fucking druggie".

This 100%
 
Another thing that is very real is that when someone insults you or tries to spread a bad rep about your personality, it can affect your reputation. If you live in a small enough community or you have a public life, those lies can inflict real harm on your life. One of the colleagues I went to school with, she told a trans person that she couldn't treat "her" because she didn't have enough expertise. The trans person doxxed her. Found out her address, her online info, her website, her blog, all of it... and started a massive spam campaign to defame her as a transphobic doctor. The doctor actually did the right thing by not going ahead with treatment she wasn't qualified to do so, but it's not like the general public knows that when they read libel about someone. Now she is known as the transphobic doctor, when she isn't at all.

So yeah, if someone insults you to your face, they may be trying to shame you into changing who you are, to correct your behaviour, or to try and control you in some way. If the insult becomes communal, then it can affect your reputation and your livelihood. I've seen it happen so many times. Now that social media is everywhere, privacy culture is different. People have no qualms about outing you over the pettiest garbage, if it serves their interests. They act entitled to destroy you and if they're mentally unwell enough, they do try to do so over the smallest slight.
 
Yeah that's very true, especially when you're a public figure. There are magazines basically dedicated to trying to shame celebrities. It's really weird and disturbing.

humility, deprivation, confidence, shame, ego, emotional stability, state of mind, whether we're having a good day or bad day, how jaded we are, how open to others we are, how stressed out we are; these are things that are considered when we interact with other people whether or not we are going to succumb to a negative interaction or a positive one. having thick skin or not is one too. this is in addition to our mammal like behavior with the rest of our species.

there is also an energy that we all share (that is not generally accepted by all as being evident) and when we interact with other people a type of transference happens. a give and take. it can go all good/bad in one direction or another, it can be bad both ways or good both ways or it can be neutral with very lil of anything being passed between two or more people.

other than that it is a means of controlling people. how we control others with it depends on our intentions, who we are and the desired outcome. someone makes us happy when they give you a compliment or share their affection with you. they make you feel bad when they decide to control you for the wrong reasons or are not being mindful of other people. society creates this machination and does not take responsibility for it thereby upsetting the balance of the power dynamic that sustains itself and we get situations where people easily succumb to apathy, affluence and focus too much on the self.

idk, i haven't done enough drugs today maybe.

You're absolutely right about this. We interact energetically with each other (and animals too, especially other mammals) in some way beyond speech. Have you ever had someone come into a room and you feel their anger, or sadness, or joy? You can tell when someone is looking intently at you too. It's a sense we don't really acknowledge or talk about, but it's physical slightly and mostly just a knowledge. I will never forget this, I had a friend in college who was schizophrenic, he was intense as fuck and would do stuff like dressing like a cop and writing down license plate numbers of people he knew and stuff. It was so intense to be around him, you could feel his paranoia and wildness. One time me and some friends were in a dorm room, and the door was open. We heard the door to the hallway open, no sight on who is way, and immediately all of us felt that it was him and said that to each other, and then he walked in.

But yeah you can understand how people are feeling with that sense, and you can also definitely use it to affect them negative or positively, because it affects your own emotions to feel it from others too.
 
We are animals. After all, we are a tribal, group-orientated hierarchical species of relatively hairless monkeys. I think we just like to think of ourselves as not having social interactions that are based on our DNA as a species, as it were. (Tbc, I'm aware that heredity isn't an interspecies thing, but we have a lot of genes that are similar or the same as other primates.)

Hierarchical dynamics play a big role in shame because those on top are freer from it and those on the bottom are sorted into different bins of "why this is your fault". Our concepts of shame might have changed, but the reason (survival of the species) is the why of its evolution.

But yeah, it's weird.

And yeah, words can definitely hurt.
Because left unanswered, you suffer downward pressure on your position in the dominance hierachy.
I think these responses sum it up pretty well, but to elaborate a little...

We are social creatures, and generally insults are an act of aggression. I think even if someone doesn't want to engage or respond, there is a basal part in everyone that recognizes the threat and responds accordingly. In social settings, there is also a fear of appearing weak, so even if you aren't threatened by the person or the insult, you are still "threatened" by the group. Appearing weak or unable to defend yourself will cost you social status, whether people acknowledge it or not. And even if you don't appear weak, you don't really appear strong either.

I think a lot of this happens on a more subconscious or barely conscious level, but it seems like an observable phenomenon. The way people are generally more sensitive to these types of things in groups seems to demonstrate this point, as the more people there are the more social status there is to lose. Being insulted in front of 2-3 people who you are well established with probably won't matter too much, but being insulted in front on a stage in front of the world will probably sting for quite some time. Although, the victory of defending yourself in front of the will be astronomical compared to 2-3 close friends. Jordan Peterson, love or hate him, is a perfect example of someone whose fame is largely from doing exactly that. Among people that you are well established with, it might even cost you some for "lowering yourself to their level".

As much as I'd like to pretend that it doesn't matter what others think, I know that it generally does. People can use lies, and sometimes even the truth, and spread rumors about you to destroy your reputation. The MeToo movement has good examples of both, people whose lives were changed both justly and unjustly. Once the accusation has reached a certain level of public momentum, it doesn't really matter if there is any validity to it, you must respond or allow your silence to serve as your response.
 
Because insults hurt our feelings, and deep down, we all just want to be loved and accepted for who we are.
 
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