# On being a jerk **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [June 8, 2014, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-being-a-jerk/690337 "2014-06-08T16:05:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![aldiboronti](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@aldiboronti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aldiboronti)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-being-a-jerk/690337/1 "2014-06-08T16:05:49Z")
Please move if the forum is considered inappropriate but as one of the chief rules here deals with being a jerk and we’ve often talked about what exactly jerkitude entails I thought this might be of interest. It’s a piece called [A Theory of Jerks](http://aeon.co/magazine/being-human/if-youre-surrounded-by-idiots-guess-whos-the-jerk/) by Eric Schwitzgebel, Professor of Philosophy at the University of California, Riverside. The whole article is interesting but the paragraph below sums up perfectly the essence of being a jerk and describes to a T some of the examples of the breed that we’ve all encountered on the board in the past. > [@](#): > > I submit that the unifying core, the essence of jerkitude in the moral sense, is this: the jerk culpably fails to appreciate the perspectives of others around him, treating them as tools to be manipulated or idiots to be dealt with rather than as moral and epistemic peers. This failure has both an intellectual dimension and an emotional dimension, and it has these two dimensions on both sides of the relationship. The jerk himself is both intellectually and emotionally defective, and what he defectively fails to appreciate is both the intellectual and emotional perspectives of the people around him. He can’t appreciate how he might be wrong and others right about some matter of fact; and what other people want or value doesn’t register as of interest to him, except derivatively upon his own interests. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-being-a-jerk/690337/2 "2014-06-08T16:07:34Z")
Soo… 98% of Internet commenters? ---
**Author:** ![aldiboronti](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@aldiboronti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aldiboronti)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-being-a-jerk/690337/3 "2014-06-08T19:59:11Z")
Gresham’s Law revised, bad comments drive out good. ---
**Author:** ![Bozuit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/edb3f5/32.png) [@Bozuit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bozuit)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-being-a-jerk/690337/4 "2014-06-08T20:54:49Z")
> [@Jonathan\_Chance](#): > > Soo… > > 98% of Internet commenters? You have a remarkable amount of faith in the Internet. ---
**Author:** ![donkeyoatey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e47c2d/32.png) [@donkeyoatey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/donkeyoatey)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-being-a-jerk/690337/5 "2014-06-08T21:26:43Z")
> [@Jonathan\_Chance](#): > > Soo… > > 98% of Internet commenters? I resemble that remark, sir ! ---
**Author:** ![Kenm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bc79bd/32.png) [@Kenm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kenm)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2014, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-being-a-jerk/690337/6 "2014-06-10T02:15:39Z")
The OP’s quote could be a description of a psychopath. I suspect that one employer I had is a psychopath. There is no doubt among anyone who knew him that he’s a jerk. ---
**Author:** ![Morgenstern](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Morgenstern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgenstern)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2014, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-being-a-jerk/690337/7 "2014-06-10T04:26:29Z")
Fortunately, the mods are blessed with a Mantle of Perception that allows them to ferret out and smite with great vengeance the jerks among us. That’s good enough for me. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2014, 7:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-being-a-jerk/690337/8 "2014-06-10T07:56:29Z")
I blame [God](http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_M_voZidIPUU/TUvJTbjrYQI/AAAAAAAAArw/oKYXL3zXLEI/s1600/JERKS.jpg). ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2014, 10:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-being-a-jerk/690337/9 "2014-06-10T10:34:07Z")
> [@Kenm](#): > > The OP’s quote could be a description of a psychopath. > > I suspect that one employer I had is a psychopath. There is no doubt among anyone who knew him that he’s a jerk. I suspect jerkitude & psychopathy are different severities of largely the same constellation of defects. ---
**Author:** ![lieu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c2a13f/32.png) [@lieu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lieu)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2014, 11:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-being-a-jerk/690337/10 "2014-06-10T11:38:21Z")
> [@Kenm](#): > > The OP’s quote could be a description of a psychopath. SDMB: Don’t be a psychopath. Works for me. ---
**Author:** ![epbrown01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7ba0ec/32.png) [@epbrown01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/epbrown01)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2014, 11:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-being-a-jerk/690337/11 "2014-06-10T11:39:01Z")
> [@Jonathan\_Chance](#): > > Soo… > > 98% of Internet commenters? Internet commenters are people (we don’t _know_ if some are dogs, by their own admission). What the quote above says as far as defining a jerk seems to define most of humanity when dealing with pretty much anyone they don’t know personally - they don’t care what others think or how they feel. What the internet does is expand our exposure to people with no real connection to us, so we encounter it more than we do in the physical world, where 98% of the time we’re moving within our own circles. ---
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2014, 11:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-being-a-jerk/690337/12 "2014-06-10T11:49:41Z")
> [@aldiboronti](#): > > It’s a piece called [A Theory of Jerks](http://aeon.co/magazine/being-human/if-youre-surrounded-by-idiots-guess-whos-the-jerk/) by Eric Schwitzgebel, Professor of Philosophy at the University of California, Riverside. lol that dude sounds butthurt hahaha ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2014, 9:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-being-a-jerk/690337/13 "2014-06-11T09:55:05Z")
The best book I’ve seen on the subject says we’re all jerks at times, but that there are different levels. Most people are first degree jerks. They don’t want to be jerks, but occasionally do something that is inconsiderate due to anger or frustration or whatever. It’s spur of the moment and uncalculated, and there is always remorse for the actions, if not the sentiment. Then there are second degree jerks who are selfish and don’t consider others at all. A first degree jerk may occasionally lapse into this mode if they start calculating their actions, but a true second degree jerk just never thinks about it. They still have no specific desire to harm people, they just think they are “getting people back” or whatever. Finally, there are Nth degree jerks, which are pretty much psychopaths. The example in the book was about a girl whose parents started raping her at age 5 and broke her hand to keep to punish her so she couldn’t be a gymnast–the one thing she did that was out of their control. Part of the girl’s healing process was realizing that she didn’t actually have to forgive what her parents did to her, while at the same time letting go of the anger. I’m nowhere near doing it justice, but it’s been a long time since I read it. But I found the book by googling “nth degree jerks,” and it’s called _Don’t Let Jerks Get the Best of You: Advice for Dealing with Difficult People_ by Paul D. Meier, M.D.