Why Do You Visit People You Can’t Stand?
Sunday, October 28, 2007Posted in: It's just because she thinks you're a tw*t dearie, The Romance Blogosphere Aint It Grand?
I’ve always wondered about folks who get fixated on people they supposedly don’t like.
Why would you constantly visit the blog of somebody who A, you don’t like, and B, who equally thinks that you’re the biggest fucktard ever?
Why?
Throughout this whole blogging lark, I’ve made it a rule to never visit the blogs of people who I think need to be put out of my misery. How is it that not everybody feels the same way? Is that not just common sense?
I don’t really get it. What happened to the good old days of obsessing over something or someone for a day or two, then moving on? This is Romanceland for Oprah’s sake. This is how it’s always worked before.
I assume that because I find it difficult enough to post daily, and keep an eye out for interesting tidbits on the blogs that I do like, never mind reading the blogs of people I loathe, that everybody else is the same?
Well, apparently I’m wrong. Some people literally have nothing better to do with their lives than to obsess over people who think they are a little bit loco. AKA, a crumb short of a full loaf.
How do I know this? Because some of these people love spending hours on my blog. And I mean, hours. I find it quite sad, yet at the same time, highly entertaining.
Does that make me a mean girl? *g*
Rosie
October 28
2:40 pm
Seems a bit on the dim side doesn’t it? What’s the point and like you said who’s got the freakin’ time?
Kat O+
October 28
3:04 pm
If I wanted to know what that person was saying about me, I’d probably lurk. Then again, I’m on parental leave, so I have all day to hang around. (Also, I use feeds–easier that way.)
Or if I discover a new blog that looks promising, I spend a bit of time reading through the archives. Or sometimes I leave my desk in the midst of browsing and don’t return until hours later.
Sarah McCarty
October 28
3:51 pm
Could I guess morbid curiosity? Maybe a need for drama? I have met a few people who seriously believe that the people they dislike a) share the dislike b) everything the person does is some sort of coded attack. c) they need to spend a lot of time running around the internet looking for bits of “code” on which to build their “case”. Kind of a pointless expenditure of time IMO, but it seems to make them happy and on the whole it’s a relatively harmless way to feed a need.
Angela James
October 28
4:21 pm
I unsubbed (on my blog feeds) this week from the blog of someone I once thought was interesting and entertaining but who’s become bitter. Like you, Karen, I don’t have time for the blogs that I’m not enjoying!
I think that people sometimes keep reading because they’re waiting to see if the person they dislike or whatever will say something about them. And because they know other people read the blog and they don’t like to be out of the loop. Or…something.
avidbookreader
October 28
5:52 pm
I remember someone wrote something cutting about me on a blog once, it was linked to me so I took a look. I was stung but then I thought to myself: these people are strangers to me, they don’t know me from adam, and I move on, to never visit again. I don’t understand why people obsess over blogs that they hate, either. My perception of such people are that they are jealous and want to make everybody else’s life difficult, they want to be the center of attention. It’s so elementary school to me.
Keishon
Rocio R
October 28
6:03 pm
Maybe under all that hate there is a fascination !!You would be surprise at the amount of people that get mad at how easily others excell on things mighty hard for them to achieve!
Ann Bruce
October 28
7:31 pm
Ever heard of Evercrack? Well, this is blogcrack.
Karen Scott
October 28
8:24 pm
Now I wanna know who the person who’s bitter and twisted Angie, lol
Karen Scott
October 28
8:26 pm
Hey Ro, how are you doing? Long time no IM!
shiloh walker
October 28
8:31 pm
ummmm…. no life?
Honestly, I have no idea. People who bother me that much, I just tend to ignore if at all possible. So letting their blog eat up of hours of my day just isn’t going to happen.
Wendy
October 28
9:44 pm
I agree with the Sarah – some people just feel the need to create unnecessary drama. Personally I think it’s because they aren’t getting laid – but what do I know?
Kayleigh Jamison
October 29
2:38 am
I take the same apparently novel approach. If I don’t like someone or what they say, I don’t read their blog. It’s really that simple. If someone is prone to say things that piss me off, I don’t read it.
Imagine that.
Teddy Pig
October 29
4:27 am
Hey, hold on! Bitter and twisted are my signature words.
I excel at those things. I do try and say something nice every once and a while though. I promise.
Nora Roberts
October 29
10:50 am
Some people must be the hero of their own novel–in their mind they are the center, and all that is right and just. They must stomp out their enemies, discredit, destroy, dispatch.
Can’t do all that unless you’re watching the enemy’s every move.
Donna
October 29
1:07 pm
“They must stomp out their enemies, discredit, destroy, dispatch. Can’t do all that unless you’re watching the enemy’s every move.”
Wow Nora, talk about bitter and twisted… I love it!
Does that go along with “legend in there own mind”?
Angela James
October 29
2:16 pm
Hey, hold on! Bitter and twisted are my signature words.
I excel at those things. I do try and say something nice every once and a while though. I promise.
You did have a very funny lolcat picture on your blog the other day that I shared around. I laughed 🙂
sybil
October 29
3:48 pm
Hell I can’t remember to check the blogs I like muchless the people who waste oxygen.
Dude does that put me in the running for bitter? Cuz really I would much rather sign up for twisted I am too lazy to be bitter.
I have to say though I have yet to be able to resist the lure of the link back. And yeah… I think that secret was already out.
Karen Scott
October 29
9:45 pm
Maybe a need for drama?
Well Sarah, I’m a big old drama queen, but I do think there’s a difference between being a drama queen, and just being scarily obsessive to the point of madness.
I remember someone wrote something cutting about me on a blog once, it was linked to me so I took a look.
The links are usually there to draw attention to the blog, which is why sometimes it is best not to bother responding, unless the person is way too stupid to stop for their own good.
Some people must be the hero of their own novel–in their mind they are the center, and all that is right and just. They must stomp out their enemies, discredit, destroy, dispatch.
But they only seem to ever make themselves seem more foolish than people thought they were previously. Well, I say foolish, more like deeply unhinged.
Lynne Simpson
October 30
1:47 am
There’s a cure for obsessively reading blogs that add nothing to your life: being way too busy with stuff that, uhh, actually matters. I used to read vain, bitter, cliquish, sycophantic, or otherwise idiotic blogs every day, but I’ve been so busy this year that I can’t do it anymore.
I still read blogs, but I’m down to about a dozen that I really, really like.
Anonymous
October 30
3:10 am
You know, I think the big thing you’re overlooking is that the web offers obsessed folks way more ease in accessing that with which they obsess.
In the past, things went by the wayside because the blow ups, the back biting, the gossip, was done on the phone, maybe in letters, perhaps even face to face. But in the end, there was very little hard, solid reminders of what happened and folks moved on.
Blogs, however, are semi-permanent. So what pissed one off the first time they read it continues to piss them off each time they stop back to see what new comments have been made. And they don’t really have to fash themselves trying to delve up the item of offense. All they have to do is type in a web addy and voila, there it is again in living color, so to speak.
The internet, for all its plusses, does come with a few drawbacks, as you yourself have addressed a time or two, i.e. anonymous posters and borderline psychotic behavior.
Shirley
Angela
October 30
3:56 am
I don’t understand it either. If I don’t like someone, I ignore them. They no longer exist in my world.
heather (errantdreams)
November 2
2:13 pm
If someone bugs me, I move on and enjoy my life. But I’m eternally amazed by the number of people who get fixated on people they loathe, and thus make themselves all the more miserable.