To a certain extent, they've switched places. They've ended up less extreme as the opposite started out, but I'll admit new!Bob sounds like a Jerkass.
The owner of this account is temporarily unavailable. Please leave your number and call again later.I'd have to go with bob on this; though it might be socially expected, changing from weak and whiny to confident and funny is a major achievement.
Regarding Alice's situation; I think it's more intriguing than admirable. Short of surviving a near death experience you don't see many people pulling a 180 with regards to their personality/outlook on life.
Confidence and self-esteem does not equal asshole every time.
In my case, I'm not really the intimidation type, I have more of a reactive strength. I don't really mess with people(except my friends), but I'm nigh-impossible to mess with, and that's the important thing.
^
That is an interesting point, it's kind of like why the hulking huge dudes are the nicest folks in the world, while lots of smaller guys can be aggressive, the larger folks are so intimidating in stature that people don't pick fights with them, while the smaller folks have had to deal with being seen as a weak target, and have to put up a front.
I think that was part of my issue, when I was growing up I was a tiny kid with toothpick arms, I had to learn to put up a very aggressive verbal front to keep people back, and make friends with all those easy-going and friendly big folks.
It's like me and my partner at work, I'm a 5'7 scrawny white dude, he's a Samoan 6'3 ex-marine forward observer who is now also a cop. He's friendly, soft spoken, and very approachable. I frequently come off as being combative, tenacious, and perpetually pissed off. I think that's part of why we make a good team, but our childhood development probably had lots to do with why we're the way we are.
edited 16th Jan '11 11:31:46 AM by Barkey
They Fight Crime!! It had to be done
And I just don't like the fact that when people like me (who lets face it is not a hulking tower of muscle and buttkick) who are trying to increase their physical strength get disdaining looks from people who seem to have replaced their arms with hams. I mean, come on dude, surely you were having to work on your body type once, leave the new guy alone.
Explains why my grandfather was so nice to people (he was a boxer and police officer). Of course, how he was @ work could be different than how he was at home :p
You said Bob's example is what happened to you. Not "similar to" or "like" or whatnot. I assumed you mean verbatim due to a lack of clarification xD
So you exxagerated yourself.
WHASSUP....... ....with lolis!It's hard to explain really, ever since I started to make that change to my personality when I was young I started to look upon folks who let themselves be pushed around by others with disdain for letting it happen.
Now if you're being pushed around lots but you're making an effort to push back but it isn't enough, I have plenty of respect for them. Least they are trying, I just don't like people who are doormats. I guess it's a bit of admiration for the concept of pride and introspection, I feel people need to be proud of themselves, and put up a contemptuous resistance towards people who want to screw with them. I've got much more respect for someone fighting a losing battle than someone who just completely surrenders, metaphorically anyway.
Someone who mocks a person who is what they were is a hypocritical asshole.
It'd be admirable to maybe HELP the person grow up, but to mock them, for what you once were?
Its like people giving newbies in video games shit. They were newbies once too.
I cant stand those people.
edited 16th Jan '11 2:18:06 PM by Thorn14
It isn't so much hatred or mockery as a feeling of disdain from afar.
I don't mess with those people, and on occasion I'll defend them, but it's a little different to see adults who act this way because the odds of them changing their ways are much lower than changing as a child.
edited 16th Jan '11 2:19:42 PM by Barkey
It is definitely a line that gets danced.
Unfortunately I was a psych major, so I have my little complex pretty well analyzed.
I was picked on around the elementary school age for being small and meek, in Junior High I started learning that having a biting wit mixed with lots of aggressive profanity was a good defense mechanism. In High School I perfected this, and as such I didn't get messed with, to this day I have a defense mechanism, when I decide something or someone is hostile to me, I feel contempt and disdain for the hostile element and either attack it or disregard it as a pathetic non-issue that isn't worth my time.
This has it's share of personal problems, it leads to being very self-reliant and being hard-pressed to open up to others, and an extreme fear of appearing vulnerable.
All that because I learned that instead of telling the teacher someone was picking on me or politely asking someone to stop, I could give them the finger, say "Go fuck yourself, asshole." and appear ready for a physical confrontation.
edited 16th Jan '11 2:30:25 PM by Barkey
I understand you all too well. I simply went a different route.
Its not my personality to try to rise up aove people and prove myself above them, hell, I still have huge self image issue scars from those days. Instead I just chose to be nice to anyone and everyone around me, which I still do (I let the frustrations out onto the internet
) and it's done me well I think.
Sure, you get the occasional asshat from time to time, but its really heartwarming when the people you have been nice to, but dont really count as 'friends' stand up for you when being bullied.
In other words, I don't think meekness is always THAT bad of a trait.
^^
No, I just have an Associates Degree and a bit of university that I've been bleeding away at over time, I'm almost to my bachelors. I'm not licensed to be a psychiatrist or anything, but I do have a decent breadth of knowledge on the human mind I guess. (Business Management with an emphasis on workplace psych was my minor, basically the psychological ways that a manager can affect the morale and work-ethic of employees.)
Psych kind of sucks though, it's rather damaging to the people who learn it due to Interns Syndrome and similar effects, hence this discussion. Really helps for law enforcement work anyhow, which I also have an associates in due to my air force schooling counting as college credits toward the subject.
Buuuut to stay on-topic..
What Bob is going through is very debatable as to if it's a good thing or not, it'll probably lead to lots of insecurity in younger adulthood while he establishes more self-confidence than the knee-jerk front that he puts up to dissuade social predators.

I would probably see what their personalities are like aside from their stated parameters and then make a decision.
And both are worthy of admiration, work has been put forward to change oneself for the (potentially) better, so its all to the good. The only problem is how far the change actually goes. Bob could be drinking heavily on the side in order to make sure he doesn't appear "weak", Alice could be trying to be good and end up doing more damage to others. Its not enough data to go on (there is never enough of that
)
As a minor thing, but I dislike it when people on the internet say "I was weak and became strong", if only because of the implied rebuke that it delivers to everyone who doesn't consider themselves "strong". It's also because they often start from the assumption that anyone with personal issues can solve their problems in the exact same way that they did. And if that isn't a tad ridiculous I don't know what is.