Why do people hate whistleblowers?

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A question that perplexed me for some time, but since I entered my 40s and became more cynical (as if I weren't enough already!) then it all made sense. Not that I agree with it.

You hear about it all the time in the news, about how somebody blew the whistle on questionable business practices or what have you, and then said person is ostracized or persecuted. Then they set up these "whistleblower protection lines" which I find questionable...but anyway. From an ASD/HFA perspective, since I did post in this group after all, I think that we may have greater propensity to become whistleblowers as compared to the general population, because we are already stigmatized and feel that we have less to lose, as long as the entity we're lodging the complaint with doesn't know us (and therefore wouldn't have any preconceived bias against a "mentally ill" person like us not being credible or "valuable" enough to care about). For example, back in school we were unlikely to get results blowing the whistle on a bullying problem to the principal because we were held in low esteem already, not worth protecting or caring about, they covertly wished we'd just leave their "normal" school no doubt.

I suspect that society reviles whistleblowers simply because they are seen as sniveling or weak, they won't fit in or use their own mettle to deal with it. Whatever. Even if the whistleblowing is in the best interests of many people concerned (especially consumers of goods and services), the whistleblower can still take sh*t from some affected parties. For us with ASD/HFA, we tend to be more idealistic and utilitarian rather than deferring to narcissists / ASPD types at the top of the pyramid, which can get us into trouble; looking at the principle over the people as it were. But again, the propensity to do this comes down to the "nothing to lose" mentality, and this is all the more so if we're using it as a pre-emptive strike in case we're the ones who get thrown under the bus by the real wrongdoers, as we're the "different" ones so ergo the ones less likely to be believed or are considered dispensable

People hate whistleblowers because alot of people like to do things that are bad and get away with it. Whistleblowers where I come from are called snitches.

Usually they get ostracized or persecuted because the person that's doing the wrong deed knows they are and didn't want to get caught.

I will say though, there are some whistleblowers that get too stuck on the rules that they start to tell people about every little thing that goes wrong. These guys are annoying and probably started people hating whistleblowers.

I hate whistle-blowers, and I am not one myself. In fact I do dishonest things at work (not anything illegal or offensive) and I wouldn't want people telling on me, and if I see someone else doing something they shouldn't, I don't tell (unless it was something drastic like setting the building on fire or something, but I'm talking about little things like sneaking out for a cigarette or something). I know that people would get pissed off with me if I went around grassing on everything people did, and I can understand that.

Grassers, or whistle-blowers, can also be known as busy bodies, and I hate busy bodies. I've known nosy neighbours to report people for something like littering, and don't get me wrong, I hate littering, but to report someone of doing it just makes you an annoying, nosy jerk.

So yep, whistle-blowers piss me off.

These attitudes are born in the nursery. Children are physically powerless against adults, who make what seem like capricious demands upon them. Most children will disobey various edicts if they think they can get away with it, and suppression of witnesses is often required. This is accomplished through intimidation, with threats of retaliation when there are no other witnesses, but more often there is a mutual agreement to lie for each other.
These attitudes remain, even when as adults we can see the reasons for regulations, and how they are actually good for us. Most people have several secrets to maintain, from trivial things like their true opinion of someone's haircut to who is actually who's father. They fear a breakdown in their ability to conceal minor things more than they resent much larger thefts.
In any society, there are established norms for honesty. Most NT's in the US will pad an expense account by 15%, an amount that is fairly easy to hide, and not dangerous to confess to with friends. They will privately warn others who are taking 30%, hoping to avoid a general audit, while those who are honest feel like they are cheating themselves. A few of those may expose "normal" cheating as revenge for other irritations, valid or not.
The persecution of newsworthy whistleblowers is a battle between the very rare people of conscience and the gangs of psychopaths who indulge in things like war crimes and multi-million dollar fraud.

I think whistleblowing in the context of a corrupt organisation or government is a good thing. Authority is something that always needs questioned and challenged, not just accepted at face value. Whistleblowers are hated by society because governments aren't fond of people who challenge them - then again of course, it's a tough one, if you think of a situation where a whistleblower exposes something sensitive that may be of use to or cause a larger problem than the one they're trying to expose, that then is a little bit more shaky in my opinion. But what needs to be duly noted and attested to is the fact that authority isn't always correct. The increasingly collectivist and hivemind like mentality of our current society is a problematic thing, and anybody who goes against that or questions that is labelled deviant or dangerous.

One thing that they never teach you in grad school is how to deal with an employer who totally goes against all laws relating to proper storage, handling and disposal of laboratory grade chemicals. Large universities just assume that everyone gets inspected on a regular basis and all of the laws get followed. Unfortunately, I had the displeasure of working at a place that did none of that. The administration put everyone's lives at risk and they could have cared less. They thought that they could do anything that they liked as it was a "Good Ole Boy" system at play. If anything would have went bad, I would have been blamed, not the ones that had created the issues. Because of my professional ethics, I was required to become a chemical whistle-blower at the local, state and federal levels due to this place. You may judge me as you please on here, but I sleep better at night when I realize that my actions kept over one metric ton of high hazardous (ie. extremely toxic, explosive, radioactive, etc.) materials out of a local landfill.

I know that many people hate the EPA, but there are reasons why they exist like they do. This is but one of them.

Whistle blowing is also very important in schools or care professions, where young or vulnerable people may be being abused. If I had ever seen something that convinced me that harm was being done to a child, you bet I would be a whistle blower and report it! I read all those kinds of policies quite carefully when I start a new job.

I guess if you work for a company and you report something which means the company closes down and everyone loses their job then yes, they would probably be upset about that.

I assume by whistle blowers you mean tattling?

That annoys lot of people because it's usually just to get the person into trouble, not to make the environment safer for everyone or because that person is putting themselves in danger or others. Like if someone is breaking a rule and it's not harmful to anyone, it's considered tattling and even authority figures don't want to deal with someone breaking a harmless rule. I get annoyed when my son tattles on his sister so I tell him to quit tattling on her. Yes I admit it is laziness because us authority figures are too lazy to discipline so we don't want to deal with every little thing because then that means more work for us so if we don't know about it, less work there is. We would rather deal with major things like if someone doesn't show up for work or if my daughter wandered outside or she got into knives let's say.

If you mean by telling on someone because they were bullying you or someone else, etc. people just want to get away with stuff they do and they get mad at you for getting them into trouble because they were caught thanks to you.

Did you folks know in america its illegal to record or release evidence of how animals are treated on farms there?

People in power hate whistleblowers because lying is the best way to get away with evil.

The media run by the powerful people turns the masses against whistleblowers by creating lies about them and making them seem like the bad people, instead of the abusers being exposed.

A rough measure of human preference for group loyalty over obedience to rules can be found in the corruption of Police, who often become a law unto themselves. In terms of crime, they can become the biggest Gang around, or a partner in one. No one is in a better position to expose them than their fellow Police, but it almost never happens.