Real-life implications of Foe Yay

So I recently added the following to the troper tales section:

• Either subverted or double-subverted with a girl this male troper knew in middle school. She would always insult me, spread rumours about me, say that I was talking to my imaginary friend whenever she caught me talking to myself, etc... but she was popularly rumoured by the school to have a crush on me. I never got to find out her reaction to the rumours, as I do not recall anyone mentioning them in front of her. The way I see it, though, even if she did have a crush on me, then whether she was expressing it or hiding it, she sure picked an awful way of going about it, and I probably would not want to go out with someone so obnoxious and rude anyway.

For what it's worth, this is far from the only trope about blurring the lines between hate and love, and tropes about romance in the context of antagonism are probably far outweighed by tropes about antagonism in the context of romance.

But still, the idea of Foe Yay seems to me to make more sense in the context of some Worthy Opponent variety of rivalry, especially if the circumstances leading to the rivalry are resolved, than the kind where whoever supposedly has a crush expresses nothing but contempt... in which case there is also something downright disingenuous about using said contempt to hide admiration...

I think your example has more to do with middle schoolers not knowing how to deal with their emotions properly than anything "deep".

I think it's more realistic in cases where the antagonism is not based on any personal reasons, but professional ones, such as two members of a rival corporation. In other words, the Romeo And Juliet archetype.

I am not sure what you are getting at, meloncollie. My point was that even if it really was Foe Yay I am not sure if I would want to go out with someone who would hide or express it in that way... if it had been something like contempt being expressed that way, or something like envy being hidden that way, it would not be considered an acceptable enough excuse for it, so I am not sure why exactly you brought up your point.

^^^ How often is this ever deep? Hell how often does it even show up outside of fanfiction?

It's just the old cliche about boys tugging on a girl's pigtails because he likes her aged up.

Bad choice of words on my part. You seemed to be looking for something meaningful in the OP, and I was trying to say that whatever it was you were looking for probably wasn't in your example. Drakyndra said what I meant to say. Typically in real life when someone treats their crush like dirt it's because they don't know how to deal with or express their feelings properly, nothing more. Of course it's disingenuous, they don't want you to know their real feelings so they overcompensate. Or they think it's cute to tease you in what they think is a Vitriolic Best Buds way, but doesn't come off that way to you.

Sure, maybe you can obsess over a rival to the point where you start admiring them, but I think that's much less common than what I described in the first paragraph.

... I see. Well in any case, even if they act that way because they are desperate to hide their feelings of love, it is hardly worth more pity than someone acting that way because they are desperate to hide envy, or whatever other motive you could name. And for what it is worth, I do not pity guys who would treat their female crush like dirt to hide their feelings either.