You Might Be a Hater
Or
(A Path to Happiness)
Life Philosophy #2: Hating is bad for the soul
In 1993, Jeff Foxworthy released You Might Be a Redneck If…, a comedy album which among other stand-up routines, includes some of the famous one-liners about “rednecks.” Like all stereotypes, the truth in the jokes is what made them funny. This truth and humor helped Foxworthy sell three million copies of that album. It also opened eyes to the (slightly exaggerated) lives of “rednecks”.
Hopefully you’ll allow me to shine a similar light on the life of the hater. Sadly, there is no room for humor in said life—well, unless it comes at the expense of others. As the impeccable* source Urban Dictionary explains, the hater is someone “that simply cannot be happy for another person's success. So rather than be happy they make a point of exposing a flaw in that person.”
(Point 'em out Jeff)
What is the goal? If it is happiness, then hating is just dumb. Theory and practical application show that positive reactions to the successes of others leads to happier, healthy lives. The converse in this zero-sum game, is negativity. So, if you are not happy, then well, you might be a hater.
Were the hater just jealous, it would be easier. We could fix that. At least understand it. But as our reliable* dictionary further explains, “hating, the result of being a hater, is not exactly jealousy. The hater doesn’t really want to be the person he or she hates, rather the hater wants to knock [someone else] down a notch.”
This talk and my theory on haters is based in academia (or at least supported by it). Allow me to direct you to a 2004 Shelly Gable study. Here, she and others found that “relationships in which one’s partner typically responds to capitalization attempts enthusiastically were associated with higher relationship well-being.” Basically, “Don’t hate, congratulate”.
Not “hatin’ but appreciatin’” is not new though. In 1990, an experiment was set up by John Gottman on the campus of the University of Washington. It studied couples and their interactions over the course of a weekend and followed up with them six years later. The study found that the couples that were still together had shown interest in their partner’s attempts at connections (observations, etc) 87% of the time. The couples now divorced had responded only 33% of the time during that fateful weekend.
Though the study and experiment involve couples, I do not think that it is much of a stretch to apply its’ findings to platonic friendships, or even interactions with strangers. See, my thinking is that, at the core of the study and the experiment above is the importance of reactions. My take away was that any interaction between people is an opportunity to be a hater or a “congratulator”. This means that every interaction has the potential for a happy outcome or unhappy outcome.
The “hater or congratulator” dichotomy has more formal terminology courtesy of Amie M. Gordon and her Psychology Today blog. She explains there the ideas behind constructiveness and destructiveness and the active and passive version of each. In my words: let’s say you decide to be positive, the difference between active and passive boils down to enthusiasm; more enthusiastic versus more understated. Now let’s say you decide to throw shade or be negative. You can do it subtly, just kind of ignoring or diverting attention away (passive). Or you can also do the equivalent of the “shade rain dance” and straight up belittle what was said (very much active).
Let us go through an example of each using the scenario that a friend just got back from a date that went well.
An active-constructive response: "Nice! I knew you would find someone you would connect with!”
A passive-constructive response: “I’m happy for you.”
An active-destructive response: “Oh yeah? I wonder how long this will last. You know your taste in [insert sex] is suspect.”
A passive-destructive: “That reminds me. Guess who hit me up today?”
Take note of the reactions (see if you can spot who the haters are) and bear with me as I guess the outcome of the interactions. I think the first reaction allows the friend to continue to feel the buzz of the great date with your support as an addition. The conversation probably continues and both you and the friend would probably be in good moods, albeit for different reasons. The second reaction is tricky. I would actually argue that the passive-constructive response sounds more like humoring than anything else. Generally I would feel it is inappropriate for those people in your life that you really care about. It is however, an easy, non-hating response to an acquaintance or a stranger. The last two though?
The third response legit took the hopes of the “friend” and [insert violent imagery]. Tell me, where can that interaction possibly go? The “friend” will either be discouraged or defensive while you would have created bad feelings in someone you “supposedly” care about. The last example is more a low-key hating move. The moment was not about you but you had to take the shine. The friend may or may not notice the subtle shade, but you both definitely missed an opportunity to connect over their good news. In fact, important to note is that both of these type of hating responses miss the chance to create the joy that comes from connection and support.
Haters. Can’t live with them, can’t live without them. Don’t quote me on that, I am sure that it already exits. You could probably find its origin alongside the million “Haters Gonna Hate” memes. We’ve accepted as fact that with success comes haters. But do you have to be one of them? Happy people exist too. Where? They are the ones not feeling some type of way when good things happen to people. They are the ones that root for their friends and thus share in the joy of success.
The answer to the question of who we are lies in our actions. And if we turn in, accept bids for connections or volunteer our time or positive energy in the service of others, there is proof that we will be happier people. There is another outcome though, one that comes if we poo-poo the achievements of those in our lives (however fleeting their stay). Now it may be that you suffer from a “negative dispositional attitude”…or, you know…you might just be a hater.
-Eberechi
Thanks to: Business Insider, Urban Dictionary, Shelly Gable et all, John Gottman, Google Images