Why are people nicer when you treat them like crap?

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It seems, in my experience, when someone treats me poorly or rudely, the harder I try to be cordial the worse it gets. The minute I freeze up on them and act like I can't even stand to look at them, they get nice. Are most people just screwed up? Why is being humble and nice so worthy of contempt?

treating people like crap is a boundary. people respect boundaries. you don't have to treat people like crap - just be assertive

So you were nicer when someone else was treating you like crap as well. Why was that?

Because they realize they screwed up or went too far. Ideally the solution is to tell the person before it gets to that point. Sometimes you have to be blunt.

not all. Just women. They seem to love it.

I don't think that's true. NT men and women alike will have more respect for someone when they stand up to them and treat them like crap. If you don't, then they will treat you like crap. It's just the way their minds work. They will give you as much crap as they can get away with until you tell them to stop. They take politeness and niceness as a sign of weakness and an opportunity to exploit someone. I don't think this is exclusively an NT trait though. ASers also tend to keep doing something, largely because we're unaware we're being annoying until we are told. We just seem to have a higher natural level of politeness, that is to say we try to be as nice as we are capable of being, which does sometimes actually work against us for making friends with others. I find it difficult to believe when someone is being as rude as I have seen some people be, that they are unaware of how badly they are behaving, so in that case, they're just concerned with finding how much they can get away with. Once you tell them off, they know where the line is, and stay exactly behind it.

I resent that statement, perhaps because I'm a woman.

Some women, just as some men, only understand negative "crap" behaviour. But it's best not to involve oneself in their lives. Most girls seem to want someone nice but assertive... that they can trust.

I don't recall this being the case a couple decades ago. I seem to notice it more and more, that when I'm nice I'm treated like crap and when I'm cruel I'm respected. I'll have people push me in public places and others side with the pusher when I complain, only to stop yelling at me and putting me down the moment I give them the bird or yell "idiot!" at them. If I don't do these 2 things, they'll continue lecturing and yelling at me and putting me down and criticizing me for long minutes, even though I was the one pushed, not the pusher! They however stop IMMEDIATELY once I denigrate them. Go figure... Since I'm always alone in public, I'm an easy target (petite, decent, middle-aged woman) and I've to fend for myself. I tried all kinds of ways for years, all of them kind and polite, but the only one that gets me respected and makes them stop AT ONCE is to humiliate them.

I believe the reason is that, in today's world, PR and diplomacy and self-marketing and public image have become such enormeous, out of all proportion assets to have, that when people see someone who doesn't care for their own public image (by yelling "idiot!" or giving the bird, as a woman), they automatically believe the person is insane and become afraid, and they respect you in order to not get in trouble. Because people nowadays only know how to deal with others who are as public-image dependent as themselves - they have no idea how to deal with someone who doesn't care losing their public image, like me.

Another reason is that people tend to behave more nicely the more they need the other. So the other tends to see someone behaving nice to them as someone who "needs" them, therefore they feel they can treat the person as they like.

Hi again. I probably should clarify what I meant. When I wrote this, I was thinking of certain situations, like when you notice somebody ignoring you and it only gets worse when you try to be nice and get them to open up to you. When you finally cop an attitude and start blowing them off like they're crap, they start being really friendly. I know it's weird, and it's probably not everyone's experience, but that's what I noticed.

Yip. I have an acquaintance who I would have liked as a friend seeing as I have only 3, so I treated her well, made her tea and muffins, shared books, drove her around and she kept being aloof and occasionally "fake-friendly" and over the top smiley. Not sincere. She would literally ignore my text messages and then contact me a week later and just pick up as if nothing happened. I had enough so I stopped being the nice person and ignored her text message, avoided her company. And 3 weeks later she asks me to please let her know when I'm in as she'd love to see me etc. Go figure. Am I usually too nice? Do people resent feeling "needed"? Do they prefer hard to get games? I prefer sincerity and I'm prepared to wait for those people displaying that quality to be my friends and if not I'm ok with having my own company.

I'm like you in this regard, but nowadays I know better than act this way, because I've learned that high availability/accesibility lowers your value in the eyes of people. This is the reason why in soap operas, which are long as opposed to movies, the main characters are shown so little. To keep the viewer's interest. Otherwise people would become bored with them and thus with the show too. It's not that you have to play hard-to-get, but you have to be careful not to be too available or people start taking you for granted and getting bored with you, and they feel they're doing YOU a favor by eating your muffins. I'm not like them in this regard, and this Psychology of theirs bothers me a lot, but I've learned that I've no choice but treat people the way they are rather than the way I am.

In general, in spite of pseudo-intellectual evolutionary theory being prevalent these days, I disagree with this. I don't believe most women are truly as masochistic as society wants to make them out to be.

I have noticed a pattern to the females who stay with abusive men. This is a crucially important factor that seems to always be overlooked: abusive relationships are almost never initially abusive. It usually happens months or even years into the relationship.

My hunch is that the woman typically sees it as a "negative phase" in the relationship, and the reason she lingers around the abusive man is that she hopes to return to the more benign/fun/safe times of the relationship. I don't believe most women linger because of the abuse.

First of all I believe both women and men can be abusive in relationships. It is a shame that this is not more talked about in our society. Abusive relationships also occurs with gay and lesbian couples, not just a straight couple.

Second: I do believe that some people are going into abusive relationship with at least their subconscious knowing what is happening. In my mind it's kinda the same as some 'cutting' or eating disorders... one doesn't necessarily want the outcome, but can't help do it anyway.

Just airing my thoughts

I have been assertive with friends before, and I lost them for it. When I was leaving school, my friend wanted me to stay on another year with her in the sixth form, but I said I already had arranged to go to college to do this programme which will help me build up some social skills. But my friend kept on and on at me to stay with her, but I said no. I didn't want to give in, (like I normally would). I tried to be assertive and stand up to myself. I was 17 years old then, and I knew I had to make up my own mind what I wanted to do with my life, and I wanted what's best for me. In the end, she fell out with me. She didn't want to keep in touch or anything - and I wanted to go to college and still be her friend.

Then I met some friends in college who seemed nice. They wanted me to meet up with them on Saturdays - which I was really excited about because that didn't normally happen to me. But after about a year, I got a boyfriend who I loved, and my friends wanted me to go out with this other boy who they knew. I said I didn't fancy him, and that I already had a man. (My boyfriend was a lot older than me, and this boy who they wanted me to go out with was my age). I kept saying, ''no thank you, I already have someone.'' But then I started getting bullied by them after that, and they wanted to get my boyfriend involved (who didn't know them), and it was awful. All because I stood up for myself and said ''no''. So people tell me to say no more to people, but then I loose friends for it.

You're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't when it comes to Aspies and friendships.

Yeah, I dont get this crap at all. I am a very nice person and always there for my friends, but they don't do the same to me. I wish I could treat them like they don't matter- the way they treat me sometimes- but I just can't I'm sure if I did they'd realize what jerks they were being.

human nature sucks big wind.