Why do we hurt people we love?

Affable

This fascinates me. Do we only respect the bastards in this world?
When we see someone's warmth, their beauty, their kindness, sometimes, I can't fathom why, but it's just '**** it, what use is that, why respect it, I'm going to hurt it, tear it down, see how it feels'

Can't really gain insights into why, maybe testing how much it means to you, or maybe flirting with how ruthless you can be, to toughen yourself up.
Maybe borne out of conditioned self-disgust for humanity as a weakness, so punish someone else who has it. You don't punish those who are ***** to you, but you do to those who want to help you.

not like it's a recurring theme in my life, just an abstraction, of behaviours I've had on rare occasions, experimental you could say.

Euro_Kraut

Its is only those that we love that are around us. Therefore it is only them we can hurt.

RealEstateKing

(1) Cause we can:

It is far easier to hurt somebody if you know them very well.

Saying "Fcuk off ya cnut" to a stranger, isnt gonna hurt half as much as saying "I think you've wasted your life, everything you've ever tried has been a failure." to your husband.

(2) When we are depressed, some part of us is refusing to see the good in life , the world or human relationships - when people show us at a time like that, how much they love us, how infinitely capable of caring about us they are, it annoys us, cause it reminds us how much beauty there is in the world that we cant feel.

(3) We dont have to be polite to those we love: In some cases, we know we can get away with being an asshole, an they will still love us. So we do so. We know that if we behaved that way with strangers they'd be out the door in a second.

nyarlothothep

It sometimes appears to have something to do with perpetuating the cycle of hate and cruelty, when you're a part of it, you'll have resentment which you dish out to the next person, under the guise of toughening up and ruthlessness, true weakness is giving into impulses like these.

miec

Maybe borne out of conditioned self-disgust for humanity as a weakness,

I often wonder is a self disgust within, not so much at others, but that one despises themselves and takes it out on others. I also believe a lot of scapegoating goes on between loved ones (whether friends, family or other half). For instance being told you are too depressed by someone who denies that they are themselves depressed or being blamed for something that the person did but they put it on you. Basically humans don't like admitting to their own faults so they'll try and dump on their nearest and dearest and if they have any sense they will challenge that and often a row ensues and bitchy things get said. We don't project our **** on strangers as much because we don't know them.

Also

(2) When we are depressed, some part of us is refusing to see the good in life , the world or human relationships - when people show us at a time like that, how much they love us, how infinitely capable of caring about us they are, it annoys us, cause it reminds us how much beauty there is in the world that we cant feel.

(3) We dont have to be polite to those we love: In some cases, we know we can get away with being an asshole, an they will still love us. So we do so. We know that if we behaved that way with strangers they'd be out the door in a second.

this is a very good point

OneArt

Same reason I kick puppies.

It's fun.

fintonie

if your hurting them you dont love them so the question is not valid.

Novella

The people we love are generally also the people who love us. It is almost impossible to hurt someone who doesn't give a sh!t about you because seriously, why would they care if you said something mean to/about them or whatever?!
We hurt the one's we love because we can't really hurt anyone else.

Affable

Affable wrote: »

This fascinates me. Do we only respect the bastards in this world?
When we see someone's warmth, their beauty, their kindness, sometimes, I can't fathom why, but it's just '**** it, what use is that, why respect it, I'm going to hurt it, tear it down, see how it feels'

Can't really gain insights into why, maybe testing how much it means to you, or maybe flirting with how ruthless you can be, to toughen yourself up.
Maybe borne out of conditioned self-disgust for humanity as a weakness, so punish someone else who has it. You don't punish those who are ***** to you, but you do to those who want to help you.

not like it's a recurring theme in my life, just an abstraction, of behaviours I've had on rare occasions, experimental you could say.

Seriously, people think too much. Everyone seeks to understand everything and that interferes with our natural ability to get along with other people. There's also a huge influence in our current society to conform to the idea that everyone is "nice", and we should be "nice" back. I've been told that the most successful & longest lasting relationships are those that shout at each other, letting out their frustrations, forgiving each other and moving on with things? Go against everything I was raised to believe. Better to hold it in and not say how their actions hurt me. Gosh, thats worked so well over the last few years... Well, no, it actually hasn't.

I've been going to counselling sessions for the past few weeks. Pretty good since he guided me towards realisations about past experiences, and the guilt I placed on myself and others. he explained very well that our society favors people to feel guilt, but provides no mechanism for us to relieve ourselves of it. So we go around tensed up even without knowing it. Holding & bottling up our emotions until we explode in one direction or another. For me, I cut people off, and removed myself rather than having to feel guilt for saying no to someone (regardless of what they asked). For others, they might explode in violent behavior, or say nasty things.

The point is that we're expected by society to behave in certain ways, and even before we go to our first school as kids we're being trained a certain way. Unfortunately for us, we're not trained to release the stress in any efficient way. Which is why there are so many "bastards" & "victims" out there.

I was told to stop thinking so much, and to just say "fck it".. I got the second part, but I'm having trouble not thinking too much about how to stop thinking too much, and that in itself generates a certain amount of stress. :rolleyes: