Why Do People Hate Me?

 

Surely I'm not the only one who experiences this? You know somebody and they truly despise you. Maybe it's for a reason; you've done something bad to them and they can't forgive you. However, very often it's a baseless hatred with no motive at all; you've done them no harm at all, and you might not even know them very well. For me this used to happen all the time. Probably over half the people I interacted with responded in this way. In my case I know what the source of that ire was, I just didn't understand it. It very often arose after that "popping the question" moment, see: https://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.com/2022/10/popping-question-responses.html. Their face turns into a blank stare and they stop talking to me. Very often they leave the conversation and try to avoid me afterwards. Sometimes they don't actually "pop the question" to me directly, their behaviour changes when they hear about my answer through the grapevine. "Have you heard Ben is proud to be a hospital porter?"... "Oh my God, no! How could he!? He has no such right!" This loathing can reach truly obsessive levels. It happens especially online, but I don't know if that's because the trolls hate me more than other people or just because it's easier and safer to express feelings over cyberspace. For example, when I got discharged from the NHS, see: https://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.com/2025/01/thirteen-years-on.html, one of my trolls created a new social media account, seeing as I had blocked all his others and he knew I would block this one too, specially so he could gloat about it. He said: "I hear you've lost your job, Ben. I'd just like you to know that I'm currently having a champagne breakfast to celebrate." I always found this vitriol incomprehensible. If I am proud to be a HP what makes them the injured party in that situation? I've come across a YouTube channel that is fascinating. It is packed with information that I've never heard before; needless to say I've subscribed. It's based on the work of the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche and one of the videos is called Why People Hate You for No Reason- The Brutal Truth by Friedrich Nietzsche. It is the best attempt I've ever come across to answer this conundrum.
 
According to Nietzsche, the negativity is their problem. It's not about you; it's about their feelings towards themselves. You are simply the means by which they can see elements of themselves that they otherwise ignore and hide from. To be a proud and dignified HP has certain implications; it means that you feel positive about yourself and your occupation without peer approval or admiration from wider society. Many other people deep down would like to feel the same way about themselves, but they can't. They need external validation from their community and they understand what a precarious position that is. Yet they can't admit it because they lack introspective awareness; they are what are commonly known as "NPC's", see: https://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.com/2022/04/ben-emlyn-jones-on-msp-second-series.html (Programme 337). For this reason the only way they can deal with it is react with jealousy and hostility towards the proud and dignified HP for making them feel that way. Another problem is that most people are what Robert Anton Wilson called "neophobes", afraid of change, taking comfort and feeling secure in normality and stability. A proud and dignified HP inevitably rocks the boat. The sad thing is, all people who have advanced human beings as a species have had to endure the hardship of being resented for forcing their companions out of that comfort zone. Whether it was the caveman who found a new and better way of carving stone; or the inventor who thought alternating current would work better than direct current, see: https://hpanwo-tv.blogspot.com/2019/07/the-current-war-film-review.html. Just think what we could achieve if we valued mavericks instead of denouncing them! Also proud and dignified HP's are, virtually by definition, self-confident. Those who lack self-confidence may feel envy towards those who do because, deep down, they suffer from their fear. "They see the world through the lens of their own wounds", as Nietzsche said. Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VoqBUFJvGv0. This, of course, does not only apply to HP's; anybody can be in this position. I think my comment under the video says it all: "Well, that comprehensively solves one of the biggest mysteries of my life!" This revelation has actually been of some consolation to me. It's also reduced my own reciprocal feelings of anger towards the ODP's and others who gave me a hard time, especially "Jack Shaw", see: https://hpanwo-hpwa.blogspot.com/2023/05/i-lied-to-jack.html. I've also lost a lot of the arrogance this tension generated, arrogance I never knew I was expressing beforehand. I now feel more compassionate towards my aggravating acquaintances.