Sunday, July 28, 2013

On Shyness

Hello, audience. Based on my blog stats, you actually exist, which is gratifying. I assume you do, anyway. That, or things are randomly linking to my page, and people search things that I posted pictures of.

But I thought I'd take a few minutes tonight to explain to the internet at large why I HATE HATE HATE shy people.

Do you know why it is?

Because they're so full of crap.

We've all met the people who are just quiet. They don't talk a whole lot, and they're cool being on their own, and they don't need you to tell them it's okay. That's being called self-contained. When people say they're shy, you should automatically read that as "I'm an attention whore with a propensity to martyring myself." Because we've also all met those people. I've met several.

Let me take a moment here, my dear, faithful, presumably interested audience, to explain something: I am loud. I am opinionated. I am comparatively oblivious, and I don't cater to anyone in conversation (excepting age, because some things can't be said around the over-thirty-five/under-seventeen crowds). Get over it, sweetheart.

Someone posted this thing on Facebook that said something akin to, "I'm the friend who always gets cut off mid-story, and walks behind everyone else, and invites people to hang out so that I'm not excluded, and I will always be that friend, because wah wah wah." Or something like that. And being the diplomatic angel I always am, I commented.

I have been Bitched Out on more than one occasion (at least twice by the same person, who was the kind of "shy" I'm talking about here) for being a verbal bulldozer, being rude, interrupting, being pushy, loud, etc. And you know what? I am those things most of the time. But you know what else? Most of the people who actually enjoy talking to me (like my friends and close family members) can deal with that. They talk over me, and I talk over them, and it's not because either of us thinks we're more important than the other. We're just talking. We're comfortably sharing ideas and stories in a free manner.

This isn't frickin' LD Debate here, guys. I don't make an opening statement, followed by your opening statement, nd then my rebuttal, and your rebuttal, and my follow up, and your response, and then our closing thoughts. Conversation is a free flow thing. If you can't handle that, maybe you should only talk to people via text, because instant messaging, email, and texting all take place line by line where no one steps over the other.

Come to think of it, most of the whiny "shy" people do spend all their time online...

Anyway, the thought I had originally started with is this: People who claim to be shy are usually just looking for someone to validate them. And there are two things I have no respect for, and when people exhibit them on a regular basis, I stop talking to them so that no one gets throttled.
1) Stupidity. This is the cardinal sin in the Book of Rachel.
2) Excessive insecurity.

Let me clarify here. Everyone is insecure about things. No one is totally confident, totally happy, or totally together. We all have duckies that are getting away from us. But most of us have the decency not to cram it down everyone's throat.

In my experience, people who are "shy" are looking for excuses to martyr themselves so that other people feel sorry for them or pay excessive attention to them. So that when you don't make way on a red carpet covered on rose petals for their every little thought, you're a dick for not letting them speak.

Because I have news, babydoll, no one can tell you that you don't matter. No one can make you feel insignificant or unimportant.  No one can make you shut up when you want to talk. No one can make your opinions less important.

UNLESS

you lie down in front of their feet and explain softly that you're a worthless doormat, and  if they would be so gracious as to make you matter...you'd bitch them out for being so thoughtless and selfish as to think that their opinions matter. How dare other people be aware of their own worth when you need yours given to you by external forces?!

When you need validated and told you're a beautifuw snowfwake and we all appweciate evewything about you, it's your own weakness.

There you go, friends and neighbors. I think "shy people" are weaklings, and full of their own selfishness and arrogance on top of it. You don't get to condemn me or anyone else for asserting ourselves just because you need permission to say anything unless it;s to complain about your lot for being the self-proclaimed victim.

Shut your whore mouth, you freaking shy people. Get over yourselves.

2 comments:

  1. I'm gonna go ahead and put a comment here cause I disagree (gasp! I'm shocked, this never happens between us!). While I agree that bitching you out over facebook (or in person) for being your loud and interrupting self is pretty pathetic, that's not something shy people do. My dad falls under the self-contained as you put it or introverted as i would. He enjoys solitary activities and in fact needs them to recharge. However, he is also horribly shy. As a child he wouldn't raise his hand because he didn't want the attention, he didn't like the spotlight. He knew things and didn't want people looking at him so he didn't share. I don't think my Dad is whiny nor weak but he is quite shy. He doesn't like talking to people he hasn't met before; it's uncomfortable for him.

    I felt I had to comment cause it seems you're equating shyness to being insecure only. I am pretty shy myself and often force myself to talk to people and it's Very difficult. It usually takes a few minutes of working up the courage to talk to someone new unless I'm feeling incredibly spontaneous. I've worked on my shyness and as such can overcome it. To me, shyness is fear of talking to new people, and it's a form of bravery that allows you to overcome that.

    Yes, some people who are shy feel victimized and bitch about stuff when it's pointless and stupid. Course, if you take out "who are shy" you're just aptly describing humanity.

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    Replies
    1. No, I'm talking about a specific kind of people. Not all shy people are like this. That would be why I made a point of saying that very thing soon after I started, and proceeded to use "shy" in quotes. As I said, I wasn't talking about people who are simply self-contained. There is a huge difference. I'm talking about the people WHO DEFINE THEMSELVES as shy frequently and verbally, which makes them the victim of every interaction. Which they then proceed to tell everyone, "poor me, people never listen to me because they have things to say too."

      There's no reason to violently avoid attention or interaction unless one isn't comfortable with, or sure of, the response. I am incredibly introverted, but that doesn't stop me being loud, talking to people, or caring about how they respond to me. I think caring about how you are perceived by anyone outside of yourself comes down to insecurity/fear, which I would consider weakness nine times out of ten.

      I often talk about humanity in general. In this post, as you may have noticed from the carefully chosen title, I was talking about shy people in specific, which is a smaller sampling of humanity.

      And it isn't about feeling victimized. They victimize themselves.

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