The Good, The Bad, and The Emo
Jerry Springer, Real World, Cops, the five o’clock news. What do all of these have in common? They prove to us that we are more interested in the negative than the positive. Whenever we can get our hands on a juicy piece of wrongdoing, we seize it and revel in the greatness our own righteousness beyond that of the wrongdoer.
Livejournal, Billboard Top 100, Freudianism, this. What do all of these have in common? They all prove to us that we feel a greater need to release (though communication) negative feelings toward a circumstance than positive.
Put them together and what do you get? One person thinking badly of Another person based on the word of a Third person. Third person feels no need to speak good of Another person, but only to congratulate that person on his or her well doing, if that. If One person does not have any information about Another person or as much as Third person, then One person will only know what Third person tells him/her. Since Third person likes to talk about the things Another person does wrong and One person takes interest in those bad things, One person is only left to see Another person in bad light.
Your child talks back to you: you chew him/her out.
Your child fails to talk back to you: nothing.
Your boyfriend cheats on you: you slash his tires.
Your boyfriend fails to cheat on you: nothing.
Your employee is late: you write him/her up.
Your employee is on time: nothing.
Do you remember those ten times when you were pissed off and that one person called and bothered you with a bunch of questions? Do you remember the tens of tens of times when you were pissed off and that one person did not call and bother you with a bunch of questions? I bet your answers are “Yes >:(” and “Well, now that you mention it…” respectively.
What is the person who hears you chew out your child, sees you slash the tires, finds the write up, or reads your blog about the annoying caller going to think? The same thing they think when you do nothing? I think not.
So, my advice to you is not to base your opinions of someone on the incomplete, inaccurate, one sided ramblings, rants, and complaints of one person.
In more applicable terms, if you think I am a jerk, you do not know the whole story.
Oh, and (on a similar note) stop telling your friends that they “don’t need him, anyway.” You don’t know what you’re talking about.
wow. good point.
did you fall off the face of the earth???
Haha. No. I’ve been at camp for the past six weeks minus weekends. This is my week off and I’ll be back there on the 10th for two more weeks.
I’m planning to do a lot of writing this week and maybe a new theme for this site, but that depends on how much time I spend sleeping.
But enough about me. Let’s talk about you. How have you been doing? How’s the youth group? Are you even still going?