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Rejection Sensitivity

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Re: Rejection Sensitivity

#81

Post by plank_time »

shkkmo wrote: post #78
plank_time wrote: post #73

Maybe I’m more considerate than average to people I’ve known throughout my life, but being rejected is not normal for me. The frequency to which the author was rejected by people seems to indicate there’s a problem with him, not society. Of course it has happened, but we are talking about ex-girlfriends or people I’ve had legitimate fights with. But I still have friends from every stage of my life. I have a group of…

Social skills are not equally easy for everyone. > makes me think he’s simply not a good friend and deserves to be rejected. You sound like maybe a bit more rejection would have been good for your sense of empathy.

Empathy doesn’t mean saying “everything you do is okay.” Thats called enabling their behavior. It sometimes means having to say the honest, hard things in hopes that people will change their behavior for the better. It’s fairly obvious that the author has a hard time maintaining friendships. To blame that on society today and social media is wrong.

Re: Rejection Sensitivity

#82

Post by default_friend »

Author here!

I think what (maybe?) got lost in this blog post is that it's more about the unhealthy nature of lifestyles that encourage the constant churn of socialization than feeling rejected by someone unfollowing me on Twitter. For me, lots of people I know in person follow me on Twitter, it's a bit of a ding. I'm also a super high visibility person on social and elsewhere, which complicates things.

But lots of folks are in this boat -- people like me who are constantly meeting new people, folks who work in jobs that necessitate hundreds of applications, people on dating apps who go on hundreds of first dates. It's not so much that every individual rejection is a character indictment on anyone involved, it's more that the transient nature of socialization is stressful.

I hope my frame didn't suggest a shallow definition of friendship or one specifically anchored in social.

One last example that might be salient - The Bay Area is all about this kind of radical openness that isn't scalable or sustainable. Even if you have more real friends outside of that framework, being a human airport of connection kind of blows. Maybe a very specific scenario.

Re: Rejection Sensitivity

#83

Post by Ensorceled »

default_friend wrote: post #82

Author here! I think what (maybe?) got lost in this blog post is that it's more about the unhealthy nature of lifestyles that encourage the constant churn of socialization than feeling rejected by someone unfollowing me on Twitter. For me, lots of people I know in person follow me on Twitter, it's a bit of a ding. I'm also a super high visibility person on social and elsewhere, which complicates things. But lots of f…

> I hope my frame didn't suggest a shallow definition of friendship or one specifically anchored in social.

I certainly didn't take it that way, but I do believe the "lingering" nature of these new types of friendships has changed the nature of rejection; or forced things that didn't have a rejection component before to now have one.

And I agree with your point of we have a lot more connections now and, hence, a lot more "micro rejections".

As someone with actual rejection sensitivity (ADHD), I know exactly what you mean.

Re: Rejection Sensitivity

#84

Post by teachrdan »

jcims wrote: post #42
virgil_disgr4ce wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think that's why incels attract such hate. I'm pretty sure it's because they are largely unbe-LIEV-ably misogynistic and hateful towards women.

Their lived experience, whether perceived or by proxy, is that women hated them first. The 'incel culture' is really just the same echo chamber amplification that the Internet enables with any marginalized group. Some are going to get out and lead a normal life, some are going to lean into it and get more and more detached from reality.

> Their lived experience, whether perceived or by proxy, is that women hated them first.

How do we define "hate" here? There are incels who literally claim that they are entitled to sex with virginal women who are also extremely conventionally attractive. Does it rise to the level of hate when they are rejected by such women?

There have also been incels who have gone on killing sprees and murdered multiple women -- and those killers have then been celebrated by other incels.

It is a false equivalence to say, "They hated me, which made me hate them." I know of no cases where women have created a community where they encouraged each other to kill incels and then made heroes of them after the fact. This behavior is specific to incel culture.

Re: Rejection Sensitivity

#85

Post by eswat »

clipradiowallet wrote: post #68
jollybean wrote: post #24

'Ghosting' is one of the most petty things imaginable. Sorry to say I judge a person's character so much by this. It's understandable that someone may not want to break up with their partner, but simply not responding is still terrible behaviour. I'd rather be yelled at than ghosted, at least it's candour. Summon the courage and civility to find a few empathetic words and that's that. It's odd that we teach 'knowledg…

Ghosting is bad for other reasons also.. Imagine one of your parents "ghosted" you. Would you feel rejected? Or would you think something bad must have happened, and break down their door assuming they must be in duress and need assistance? That's an extreme example, but I was trying to point out that dropping off the face of the earth to avoid an uncomfortable interaction, and lead to a _much more_ uncomfortable and…

It would be especially bad if the person experienced ghosting-like behaviour when they were young, including from their parents.

All those little events build up and can make one insecure about their relationships if any hint of abandonement is in the air, let alone complete abandonement through ghosting.

Re: Rejection Sensitivity

#86

Post by dang »

dronesoul wrote: post #23
dronesoul wrote: post #16

"Incels, a subculture mostly composed of young men" yeah...that's certainly _a_ way to describe them. haha.

lol, downvoted. A sensitive incel I suppose? should've realized this is incel land. Using that power to silence other users here when they criticize incels seems like quite the abuse of that power. "Discussions in incel forums are often characterized by resentment and hatred, misogyny, misanthropy, self-pity and self-loathing, racism, a sense of entitlement to sex, and the endorsement of violence against sexually act…

Your comments have broken several of the site guidelines. Would you mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and sticking to the rules when posting here? We'd be grateful. Flamewar and fulmination are two things we're trying to avoid, and going on about downvotes is a third.

Your GP comment was flamebait and unsubstantive, so it's hardly surprising that it was downvoted.

Re: Rejection Sensitivity

#87

Post by jollybean »

clipradiowallet wrote: post #68
jollybean wrote: post #24

'Ghosting' is one of the most petty things imaginable. Sorry to say I judge a person's character so much by this. It's understandable that someone may not want to break up with their partner, but simply not responding is still terrible behaviour. I'd rather be yelled at than ghosted, at least it's candour. Summon the courage and civility to find a few empathetic words and that's that. It's odd that we teach 'knowledg…

Ghosting is bad for other reasons also.. Imagine one of your parents "ghosted" you. Would you feel rejected? Or would you think something bad must have happened, and break down their door assuming they must be in duress and need assistance? That's an extreme example, but I was trying to point out that dropping off the face of the earth to avoid an uncomfortable interaction, and lead to a _much more_ uncomfortable and…

If a very significant other ghosted you it would almost invariably be an emergency. That or an extremely problematic relationship. Parents don't 'ghost' children. I mean, unless there's something very, very wrong already like an abusive relationship etc. etc..

For 'recently dating couples' the issues is that the one couple doesn't want to own up to saying 'no' so they just duck and avoid.

Re: Rejection Sensitivity

#88

Post by watwut »

hirundo wrote: post #26

How much violence in society is a reaction to cumulative rejection? I'd guess a good deal if not most of it. Our ancient lobster-shared neural mechanisms take it deadly seriously whether we do consciously or not. From the long perspective of our selfish genes, rejection is a mortal threat. I appreciate the sympathetic treatment of incels in this article, which seems like an exception to the norm. I think most of us c…

> ow much violence in society is a reaction to cumulative rejection

Given how much violence happens in relationships or between people sho closely know each other, this is unlikely.

Even mass murderers and such dont really fit this stereotype. Not even Elliot Roger whose communication issues run super deep, but ultimately forcing girl to date him would not fix him. Elliot Roger was not actually rejected by a girl, not even once.

Re: Rejection Sensitivity

#89

Post by [deleted] »

leephillips wrote: post #72
dnautics wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My personal take is that the Incel phenomenon is not actually about the sexual dynamic, but that society builds a wrong narrative about what the modal heterosexual dynamic is; Incels attract hate because they are working to break the narrative and they have a massive and annoying sense of entitlement. It's not just that we can't help them. It's that we can't help them and there is a kernel of truth to what they are s…

The claims of incels resemble the complaints of businesses about the shortage of labor, when they are offering only minimum wage.

[deleted]

Re: Rejection Sensitivity

#90

Post by rriepe »

dnautics wrote: post #80
rriepe wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're just narcissists. Projection: I'm a virgin so I want virginal women. The other type of projection: I want nice girls so I should be a "nice guy." Impossibly high standards and sense of entitlement: The point is rejecting to get a sense of power or self. Complaining: They'll complain about outcomes but never offer solutions. The incel community is more about attacking untruths. It's like a negatively-defined i…

> I'm a virgin so I want virginal women. I have interacted with women that wanted virgin men (not to mention being surprised at the excitement of the woman who took my virginity, I am pretty sure in the end it was not a fantastic experience for her, though we're still friends). I was friend of a bride for a wedding where the man had never even kissed a woman before (the officiant embarassingly brought it up during th…

I'm a Christian so I know all about the "I'm a virgin and want a virgin" thing and couldn't approve more. Just... healthy expressions of it. The complete production people put on when a 25+ virgin is discovered is shameful, not for the virgin but for everyone acting it out. I hope I didn't imply I subscribe to any of that. But that being wrong is still an example of calling out an untruth. It isn't a truth unto itself.

> I could be convinced but I'm not sure. I think this is more of a PUA thing.

There will usually be something like a PUA nearby torturing or exploiting them with demands and expectations, yeah. Narcissists form vicious hierarchies. Incels are just the ones at the bottom. You have to subscribe to the gymbro's ideas/values before he can 'win points' torturing you about gains or whatever. They're both obsessed with looking in the mirror. One just likes what he sees so he ends up higher in the pyramid. They both project their own self-image (bad or good) onto the expectations of others.

Lots of people think of narcissism as an after-the-fact thing but it's not. It's a pattern that anyone can be in, ugly or beautiful, rich or poor. Incels are unsuccessful narcissists; PUAs are successful narcissists. You're right to see a pattern.

In simplest terms, narcissism is an addiction to deeming things not good enough. The three flavors of targets are family/friends/SOs (covert), things (megalomania) and groups of people (grandiose). Incels are basically grandiose narcissists that can't back it up with any form of societal success.

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