I believe people have to be nice to one another but I have spent entirely too much time humoring, placating or otherwise trying to please some miserable human beings who I can safely call certifiable creeps, including: A misogynist client who told one of my employees that she has “a nice chest,” a good friend’s haughty husband who asked me to compromise my business integrity, and an employee who shamelessly cheated on his expense account but was protected by my boss because he was “such a great salesman.”
I was nice to these assorted folks because I felt I’d lose something if I wasn’t. I’d lose a friend or a client or incur the wrath of my boss. As it turned out, it didn’t really help to treat these “people” as well as I did. The salesman’s business tanked, the client took his account away and the friend turned out to lack as much integrity as her pompous husband.
While there’s nothing to be gained by being nasty to unsavory or unpleasant types, I finally know that it’s a waste of time and energy to kill them with kindness.
0 Responses to “You don’t need to be kind to creeps”
Ursula says:
I think you are naive. When the initial glow of love wears thin what keeps a marriage going is friendship, respect, children and things you have in common. A successful marriage is HARD WORK. But that is for us regular folk. The rich and famous live by different rules. They are so busy keeping careers afloat they don’t have the time or patience to put in all that effort. Divorce is painful. You lose your spouse, his family, and some of your friends…they do take sides after all. And if you have children sometimes you lose them too. Most people would rather live with compromise than forfeit all that. But famous people don’t even lose their fans. By tomorrow we’ll all be looking at who Jennifer Lopez will be seeing next. Does true love exist? Don’t be foolish…divorce statistics tell the real story.