I mean those people who you look at them and they have the body and responsibilities of a 43 year old but then you hear them talk about other people or other ethnicities or other situations that people are experiencing elsewhere and the person had might as well be a remorseless 3 year old that was raised wrongly… The thing that floors me is hen you meet a very old person, Im talking in their 60s or older, and they start spewing some of the most idiotic, narcisisstic garbage a person could ever talk of… ‘How have you spent all these years learning nothing?!’
Is it really THAT hard to break free of the chains of your terrible childhood and develop just a little empathy , understanding and humanity towards others? I DEFINITELY didnt have the best childhood seeing as how I was bullied and ostracized for decades , even by my parents lol, but I came to realize that ‘Hurt people will hurt people.’ so why am I going to go out of my way to be selfish and make more people who are hurt? But on the other hand I see , and Im sure most of you also have seen, that humans are not a very logicsl species sometimes. We have the potential to be more logical than Einstein but it doesnt always play out like that… We as a species do A LOOOT of things based on anti-logic, emotions, our pains, our traumas, or our cognitive distortions and this in turn sometimes creates more ‘hurt people’ …
Im not saying that humans have gotten worse over time cause anybody here can open up wikipedia and read about all the awful things we used to do to each other , if anything we have gotten better just a little bit. But why are there STILL in the year of 2026 people who choose to just not ‘grow up’ ?
TL;DR too many adults , and even seniors , Ive emcountered have illogical and sometimes psychopathic opinions . Why do so many people choose to not grow up and be more understanding?
What is your take on something like this?
I got into watching bodycam footage on YT recently and like half of these are 20 to 40 year olds crying for their mom, demanding the officers call their parents, etc. and unable to take responsibility for their actions, it’s absolutely wild how immature some people are.
I’ve noticed that there are two distinct mindsets in people who have been hurt in one way or another.
The first is “I had it bad, so I don’t want others to experience the same.”
The second is “I had it bad, so why would anyone else have it better?”
I think they genuinely feel cheated when someone else gets something they never got. And they take it out on the people who did get that thing instead of holding the people accountable who denied them that thing. Even if they didn’t deserve to get hurt, that is a shitty outlook to have on life and it’s not going to do anyone any good.
what do you get when you spend decades eroding a social system that prunes itself and replace it with a social structure that allows inclusive shameless adults that receive little to no punishment?
There are a lot of people in the world, somr will be like that. Besides we are not logical beings, sure logic has helped us a lot but there is no logical thing to do if you are not following or chasing something usually defined by emotions. A goal, a feeling, moral compasses and a lot of other stuff.
Also sometimes people don’t know they are even hurt or at least deny it which makes the healing process a lot harder if well, they don’t want to heal.
I believe everyone learns something, every piece of information you process and stuff you deduce in your enviroment, people telling you stuff. Some stuff will be useless long term of course, other will be easier to forget. And if you just spend your life changing pleasure or something, without exploring different perspectives aside from your own, staying in the same circle and using bad coping mechanisms I see it unlikely you will learn much, specially if the circle discourages this stuff and critical thinking and you just distract yourself through life.
If the people around you don’t grow and that’s all you know, and have a possitive perspective around those people it’s harder that you grow too.
Also those people are unlikely to be psycopaths. Psycopaths are usually calculative and would not let you know they don’t feel empathy. Of course some psycopaths can be good people even without feeling empathy, some could not be so smart and yea yea. Sociopaths are usually more impulsive too from my understanding. I doubt those people are any of those, probably just more like “those people are different” and that’s hoe they feel no empathy for them. When you see people as others, outsiders, enemies, different or maybe not even human it can be less likely for you to feel empathy for them.
or idk i don’t know how humans work.
One of the great struggles of humanity is ‘cognitive load.’ Thinking, even if you have a very efficient brain, takes effort, and more advanced thought requires more effort. In hierarchies, part of the power dynamic consists of the displacement of cognitive load. The higher powered individuals don’t think about what the lower powered individuals think, and, with enough power, not even the collective. The lower powered individuals, though, must consider the desires of those with higher power in order to make their way through the world. They have to expend effort, to carry the cognitive load.
Those adult children you are talking about are those who have not had to carry the load. People generally don’t expend effort they are not forced to, so why would they go to the effort of considering the effects of their actions on others when their life has taught them that’s the job of those lower than them? Or that they can do what they want without expending the effort and not only not be punished, but get ahead in life because their society runs on psychopathy?
I think it’s because they gravitate to jobs and social circles where everyone else behaves similarly and expresses similar views.
As you allude to in your first line, it’s a mostly invisible disability. It’s also one that is difficult to fix past a certain point, and that point of correction has been actively sabotaged for at least the past 23 years (in the USA).
I highly doubt you’re a paragon of empathy or understanding, and your post here is very clear evidence.
You want to dunk on them to boost your ego. You’re just like them, just younger and more arrogant and blind to your own prejudices, biases, and abuses of others.
well youre not wrong . I am DEFINITELY not a paragon of empathy . And yes I do have my biases, but almost all humans have some biases right?
But as for my ‘abuse of others’ ?.. Wot? I swear Id never. I never want to hurt innocent people and further ‘enshittify’ the world that is already shitty.
I must say that your post itself does not come across as particularly empathetic. Calling people “negative IQ narcissistic garbage” is rather harsh and dehumanizing way to describe them, even when their behaviour is genuinely harmful or immature.
People do not simply choose to become the way they are. If you had inherited their genetic predispositions, been raised by the same parents, and grown up in the same environment, you would very likely think and act much as they do. Treating individuals as the ultimate, free authors of their character and behaviour is an error in my view. This is not an excuse for harmful actions, but it does call for more compassion and a clearer recognition that most of what separates us from them is luck rather than personal moral achievement.
The fact that some of us managed to develop greater empathy or self-awareness is largely a matter of circumstance. It is not a virtue we can fully claim credit for, any more than others can be fully blamed for failing to escape the patterns they inherited.
I have never seen anyone use the term “IQ” in any fashion who wasn’t some incel tier troll. OP seems to fram thmselfe as not, and it may be just an innocent use, but it feels like a vague tell.
Also, in my experiencr, essentially anyome who would actually be “high IQ”, does not give a shit about some baseless number to represent intelligence, because they know what constitutes intelligence has like 100 different angles. Its easy to be “smart” on dozns of areas and completely dumbshit on dozens of others.
ya youre right I should probably remove that.
I only used negative IQ because I remember seeing it from a meme and it stuck with me cause it was kind of funny lol
I do think the number is almost meaningless cause it only measures your comprehension of what the IQ test asks of you and not your comprehension of more complex things like different human connections and different things the human body can do when it comes to things like dancing , or reaction time or calisthenics for examples.
This is a well-thought out, balanced, and nuanced take that I completely agree with. Although I admit, I do sometimes fall short of the ideal when faced with bigotry. It can be hard not to dehumanize those who would dehumanize you - but that creates an inescapable cycle.
Unless it was edited though, OP didn’t call people “negative IQ narcissistic garbage” but was referring to their words. I think it’s an important distinction - the words we choose to speak can be harmful, and it’s something we inflict on the world. Even if the way a person arrives at a hateful conclusion is defensible, it doesn’t make their views any less contemptible.
We’d probably both agree that “negative IQ” is ableist language, and using that kind of language as a pejorative is wrong. OP could do better next time, and after reading your exchange I think they probably will
I guess I can agree with you. My view from all the pain and Ive experienced from others’ mean acrions or words or their unusual ostracization of me was “They can be mean to me all they want. The world sucks enough already. Why would I want to make it suck even more?”. But maybe Im just speaking from my narrow perspective . All because I was able to turn around the hate I received around into a little bit of love and self-love maybe I was more priveleged than others to a point where I had the capability to turn my hate around because I receivced more guidance on how to do that from my therapist and teachers than others did.
Though I still have a hard time accepting that most fully grown adults who choose to do or spew hurtful things have NO agency in what they choose to do. Certainly there has to come an age where you just ‘wake up’ and realize that ‘Hurt people may hurt people …Therefore why the hell would I deliberately hurt more people?’. Right?
Well, rather than wondering about how they have lived this long and still haven’t learned, that can be flipped the other way around too: they’ve acted this way for 60 years already. The patterns of that behaviour are quite deeply engraved at that point and even more difficult to get rid of. Older people are called stubborn for a reason and there are sayings about that too such as “an old dog doesn’t learn new tricks.”
However, as I said, it’s not to excuse that behaviour but rather just approach it from a different angle. When a person behaves that way asserting blame as if they could have acted otherwise is unproductive. The focus should in my opinion be in understanding that this behaviour is usually a symptom of some deeper issues. These people are in pain whether they know it or not.
Makes me think of a certain person at work who was always in a bad mood and lashing out. The one time he then took it too far so I asked him to step aside but rather than telling them off I asked whether I had unknowingly done something to them and told how disrespected I felt by the way they behaved. Well, turns out it had nothing to do with me. They were embarrassed and apologized and ever since that they have acted super nice towards me. I wish this reflected on how I always handle conflicts, it doesn’t, but this time the more gentle approach completely de-escalated the situation. I can well imagine how that could’ve gone completely differently had I taken a different approach.
But again: stressed out, underslept, overworked and then tipped over by a minor inconvenience. The reasons behind this kind of behaviour are usually rather mundane.
Well, rather than wondering about how they have lived this long and still haven’t learned, that can be flipped the other way around too: they’ve acted this way for 60 years already. The patterns of that behaviour are quite deeply engraved at that point and even more difficult to get rid of. Older people are called stubborn for a reason and there are sayings about that too such as “an old dog doesn’t learn new tricks.” However, as I said, it’s not to excuse that behaviour but rather just approach it from a different angle. When a person behaves that way asserting blame as if they could have acted otherwise is unproductive. The focus should in my opinion be in understanding that this behaviour is usually a symptom of some deeper issues. These people are in pain whether they know it or not.
Ah yes! Good ooint. It could just be that theyre conditioned to act or react in those ways to certain , or sometimes even all, stressors in their life . Like their oast trauma has been so thorough and long that theyve become conditioned in this way usually through no fault of their own. I dont think we should excuse toxic behaviours though I was watching this one Dave’s Lemonade episode about a man who did something absoutely heinous but after hewas caught and convicted there was a ‘secondary trial’ for him that assessed whst in his life led to him becoming the type of man that he was…and…yup! His childhood and even his adulthood too surprisingly clearly explained how he became the way he became. Ill try to find thr video… Edit : Here it is: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Otz6Ydf9Avk
But again: stressed out, underslept, overworked and then tipped over by a minor inconvenience. The reasons behind this kind of behaviour are usually rather mundane
Good point. Well I guess I am speaking from a point of privelege here again cause usually when I feel this way I can take a moment , or even many moments, to just cool off , understand what is making me mad, understand ehat happened to me, and try to find ways to overcome it. Others may not have this luxury…
People are social creatures. They follow peer pressure. If you want to make the world better, one of the ways is to spend the effort to be better, to work on being kind with other people.
I had two different work friends, years ago. Both of them had low to mid grade homophobia. They’d say things. But after a couple years of me working on them, they stopped.
Was it worth it? Maybe. It was harder than just writing them off, but I like to think as a result of my spending the time with them, they hurt people less.
I remmember I used to have a racist coworker and I tried to be kind to him and help him understand that he cant keep saying and doing such things to his fellow coworkers cause they werent ‘White Enough©®™’ for his liking. …Was it worth it?..No…Cause he got worse… Somehow
I got fired anyways so I have no idea how he is nowadays. Maybe he’s turned around…hopefully…
Religions tend to reinforce being a child, Christianity at least. It makes people more malleable to the social engineering.
Ow the edge
Religious people act like they do because they believe an invisible sky person has some big cosmic plan, and they are helping to fulfill that plan by being the generally shitty way they do.
Calling that out for what it is is hardly being edgy.
Religious people act like they do because they believe an invisible sky person has some big cosmic plan, and they are helping to fulfill that plan by being the generally shitty way they do.
No biases , overgeneralistions or anything similar to that here. Nope, just straight “Facts don’t care about your feelingsTM”
People tend to keep their views and the world was a lot different when they were young. It’s hard for them to see that conditions have changed or that the victims of the change are not the issue because it worked fine for them in ideal conditions to start a family etc.
They’ve been programmed by American propaganda about rugged individualism to not seek help with internal strife and to be judgemental of those who lean on others, as well as a specifically targeted belief about therapy being unnecessary and wasted money through even most Hollywood depictions.
It’s not a dead end starting point for someone to change for the better, but it’s a big hill to get over for someone who accepts no advice, especially from those younger than them.
That all being said, my grandma is in her 80s and is far more progressive than almost every boomer I’ve ever met and even most gen x.
The people in power are strongly encouraging it, and propaganda works. So yeah, it’s pretty hard to fix people like this, or for them to fix themselves.
I will admit thst the lack of mental health care provided by those in power most places makes me start to understand why this is such a recurring phenomena in many places .
Though I live i canada which pretty much has free mental health care and ONCE AGAIN most of the people Ive talked to here have either ghosted me for no reason which theyve stated, ignored me , or said mean words or done mean actions to me. This is the same regardless of the age of the person Ive talked to . I would assume that a person who was 40+ would have wised up as to how this is not a way to behave to other people who you have been talking to fr the last couple of weeks , months …and yet…
Have you tried to actually access mental health care recently? My country theoretically has free healthcare, too, but it’s pretty hard to actually access it, especially when you’re suffering from mental health issues which make navigating the labyrinthine bureaucracy challenging. And that’s if you actually think that you need therapy, which usually isn’t true for the kinds of people you’re describing. In come the pied pipers telling them that all of their problems are due to brown people, gays etc.
Im not even joking I simply said to my doctor that Im feeling ‘self deletable’ and I was given an appointment with a osychologist within the same week. Completely free. I was shocked at the expediency. I still talk to that psychologist about once a few months, not because she has a full schedule but because Im busy doing things. I could make numerous appointments with her per a month, like once a week, I have just chosen not to.
Im speaking from a point of privelege once again cause ease of acfess to mental health care clearly isnt available for everyone.
But this was about 7 or so years ago so I dont think much has changed.
But you said that these people dont need mental health care and now Im curous as to why you think that? I was stuck ina cycle of thinking when I was at had my most ‘self-deleting’ desires but the words of my psychologist broke the cycle to make me think in different ways about my self-deleting thoughts . I realised that my self-deletiony was a strange defense mechanism I created for myself and I was just relying on it cyclically to accept that Ill never have to do anything and if Im ever asked to do something that I must? Ill just delete myself… (yes , it was a very strange defence mechanism . But it was what it was)
I feel that a lot of these people I speak of , older , biased to the point of self-destruction, selfish , and even generally sef-destructive, need that one or two intervention that breaks this cycle that theure stuck in. And in my opinion that people created this psychological cycle as a reaction to the cruel capitalistic world and people who have harmed them. basically I now see their cruelty was simply a DEFENSE MECHANISM they created as a reaction to the cruelty theyve experienced and now theyre stuck on this cycle of a defense mechanism cause they dont see any other method to use. I canexucse a younger person who thinks like this since most young people are impressionable and inexperienced. But for an older person? …No… You dont think the same of them?
I meant that they don’t think they need therapy, i.e. narcissists, psychopaths etc. generally don’t think that there’s anything wrong with them.
Ah I see. And sadly yes youre right. Its like the people who need it the most have a tendency to Dunning-Krueger themselves into believing they dont need it at all, while those who are more open to the idea and need it less so are the most likely to seek a psychologust to speak with.
Is it really THAT hard to break free of the chains of your terrible childhood
Yes, it’s hard and you should do some therapy about it, but we don’t live in a society that encourages this. I know how you feel but most people are not capable of doing that on their own.
Very old…
In their 60s
lol
isnt that when a person becomes a senior citizen?
To me 40 is old cause thats when your athleticism and your recovery time start to slow down.
Ha! How long are you planning to be old? That is insane. If you are old at 40 you could be old for over half your life!
I am near 60. I bike to work, work over 40 hours a week, do yoga 4 days a week, lift twice a week. Definitely slower, can’t run but not really old yet, as far as I can tell. I think very old is over 75 usually - that’s when people start to feel like they have lived long, and start really seeing people they know die of old age.
And if I am going to live to 90, as the statistics seem to think, I can’t really be OLD until I am like 80.
Please let me be there when you tell your mom and dad that very old is 60 years old, and that senior citizen is when you are 40
To me 40 is old cause thats when your athleticism …
No
