What's the most hateful thing anyone has ever said to you?

[Viridiana]

Geez! I almost decided not to post after reading that last one (post 60), but I guess killing the thread won’t solve anything. I’m really sorry to hear that story, calm kiwi (and all the other posts, really. Most sound very painful).

1. I don’t remember exactly, but along the lines of, I’m judgmental and reject everyone for the tiniest little thing, and that it was hoped that eventually that would find me alone and friendless and miserable forever.

2. Well, no. I certainly make judgments, as any sane, aware person who wants to survive does, but not unfaltering edicts based on perceived superiority, as I think she meant. To the contrary, I like to operate on hope whenever I can. But, I’d decided to drop this person as a friend (for a good few reasons) and did it by cutting off communication, so I can understand the response. I feel bad about it, but I feel it was the right thing to do.

3. I don’t like to swear at people, even in jest, but once, someone close to me did something really terrible, and I lost it and called him every name in the book; all swear words, monster, evil. Though things were reconciled later, I still feel bad about it - I don’t ever like saying things that aren’t true. I hate lies. I hope it never happens again.

[Arglefraster]

@Sleeps_With_Butterflies

Of course the answer to him should have been “Well, that’s good. At least one of us had some fun out of it.”

Hee! I wish I’d thought of that at the time.

@Arglefraster

3. There was a boy in high school who claimed to be a neo-nazi (I think he was just trying to shock people). I was about as radically liberal as you can get (I’m still somewhat liberal, just not as extreme anymore). He loved to bait me into arguments, and I’d fall for it every time. During one of our screaming matches, I said "You know what? I think you’re the only person I’ve ever met that I can honestly, thruthfully say that I hate. I hate you Billy.

I just had an epiphany about this! I’ve always known that he saw our arguments as a “game”. He thought it was fun to needle me into screaming political debates. But you know what? I think he thought it was fun for me too. Like it was a game or mental exercise or whatever for both of us. When I said that I hated him, he realized that I was genuinely getting upset during each and every argument. This realization, coupled with the fact that someone he thought of as, probably not a friend, but at least a respected opponent, hated him, is what upset him so badly. Huh.

[Reply]

@Arglefraster

I just had an epiphany about this! I’ve always known that he saw our arguments as a “game”. He thought it was fun to needle me into screaming political debates. But you know what? I think he thought it was fun for me too. Like it was a game or mental exercise or whatever for both of us. When I said that I hated him, he realized that I was genuinely getting upset during each and every argument. This realization, coupled with the fact that someone he thought of as, probably not a friend, but at least a respected opponent, hated him, is what upset him so badly. Huh.

I was gonna say similar… at first glance it almost sounded like one of those situations where he was secretly crushing on you and making fun of you because he liked you. But isn’t high school a bit late for games like that?

Anyway. Were you that difficult to read…? Did you never try to tell him previously, in less dramatic terms, that you were actually upset? I’m not doubting your story; it’s just funny that people can be so clueless even in high school. Boys will be boys

[Hi_Neighbor]

@calm_kiwi

The most hateful thing said to me was my husband’s suicide “letter”, it said “hope you are happy now”.

I wasn’t.

The most hateful thing I ever said was to him.

I had gone to my parents house, he rang every 15 mins at the very least. Just before midnight my mum declared that enough was enough.

He rang and said “I have 20 mins left to live”. I said “Stop acting like a bloody child, go to bed and I will talk to you tomorrow”

Well talking to him the next day never happened. So many years later I HATE the fact that that was his final human contact…“Stop acting like a bloody child”

Oh my gosh

[salinqmind]

All this is so sad! Glad I’m not alone in it, though. Hateful things said to me? Too many to count, mostly from my mother, a cold, two-faced, bitter, emotional basketcase. I’ll leave her comments out of this. (I would like to say that now, now that she’s old and feeble and needs my help with things sometimes, we are getting along better these last few years than ever before. Like becoming friends with an old enemy. Very strange.)

How about a completely out of left field comment by a complete stranger? Years ago a local disco sponsored a Pajama Party, everyone invited to attend wearing pajamas, nightgowns, baby dolls, etc. My friend and I put on layers of pantyhose, camisoles, bras, topped with our most fetching nighties and high heels. We picked our way across the parking lot and a bunch of louts driving by yelled out the window, “you’re ugly and look like idiots”. I was so hurt by that. We looked adorable. It had taken some courage to dress up and attend the PP. I felt miserable and uncomfortable and called someone to come pick me up after about an hour.

Sorry for not quite following the format. Those are two examples of hate that have reverberated throughout the years.

I can also relate to the poster whose father drove 12 hours to help out the sibling. My father did the exact same thing when my brother’s car broke down out of state, he jumped in the car and drove all night to rescue Li’l Brudder. As for me, I never had a conversation with the man. He simply had nothing to say to a daughter. On one of the two times in 20 years he ever came over to my house after I was married, all he did was criticize the way we wallpapered and fixed the place up. Oh, and shortly after I was married, I called my parents on a Sunday and asked if they wanted to come over for a BBQ. My mother relayed the invite to my father, and I heard him loud and clear in the background: “Why?”

Why, indeed? Never made that mistake again.

[Arglefraster]

@Reply

I was gonna say similar… at first glance it almost sounded like one of those situations where he was secretly crushing on you and making fun of you because he liked you. But isn’t high school a bit late for games like that?

Anyway. Were you that difficult to read…? Did you never try to tell him previously, in less dramatic terms, that you were actually upset? I’m not doubting your story; it’s just funny that people can be so clueless even in high school. Boys will be boys

Well, our “debates” always devolved into a lot of insults and name calling. Even though I kind of knew that he was picking fights on purpose, I always assumed he despised me as much as I despised him, and was picking the fights with the intent of trying to humiliate me. I don’t think I ever specifically told him how much it pissed me off. I assumed the screaming insults would have clued him in, but that may have been all part of the “game” from his point of view. I mostly tried to avoid him, so my only interactions with him was when he ambushed me in the halls with comments about the evil Jews, or animal rights or soemthing. So I think it was a combination of him being clueless, and me not being direct about how much it bothered me.

[Jragon]

1. This one is really, really hard to convey to anyone who isn’t me. I’m going with “hurtful” because it conveys the EFFECT rather than the intent. In fact I’d be surprised if anyone can see what I’m getting at.

I don’t remember the exact conversation but I made some offhand remark that must have been about women or dating or something and my friend casually replied (again ballpark estimation) “I don’t know, you’re the one with all the chicks.”

2. Now let me forward with this:
   It wasn’t intended to be malicious in any way, in fact he was partly joking most likely, but it screwed with me in a weird “cascade” effect.

At first I didn’t think much of it, but a couple seconds later I got to “processing” the comment. I have a lot of female friends and I’m generally more open and animated around them. But what hit me is he wasn’t just implying I had a lot of female friends, but by the way he said it and the context he was implying a lot of them had liked me at some point. I thought back and, sure enough, several of the ones I liked at the time were doing things that could only be described as flirting or similar, and while I may be hindsight misinterpreting some of it, there was definitely some that was “you’d have to be a moron to miss that.”

It was at that point I looked over the rest of my life and truly realized for the first time how little self esteem I actually had. I had a lot of friends who genuinely liked me and girls who I liked that I probably could’ve had go out with me in a heartbeat, but I was so utterly convinced I was worthless I never noticed and had, for the longest time, relegated myself to being almost a total loner outside of school (and mostly in school) for about 5 years at that point. That realization that I had something that great I was ignoring for that many years, and by proxy the fact that I probably hurt a lot of people by not going to parties I was invited to and such (“oh they’re just being nice” I’d tell myself) crushed me, especially since this revelation had the courtesy to escape me until the tail end of my senior year.

I don’t think he has any idea how much that one comment hurt me, but I’m not about to bring it up since it obviously wasn’t meant to offend me, but man that one left a mark.

3. “Hmmm…”

3, now with added context!
I think point 1 and 2 established the fact I’ve been utterly clueless and self-esteemless for a while, right?

Well, I was at a church camp in 10th grade (Most people at my church had an unspoken tolerance agreement with me, we didn’t like nor hate each other, we just tolerated… also I’ve never been Christian save a brief 2 month period in 5th grade. Despite that I used it as an excuse for forced social interaction). One girl I’d never seen before went with our group. We flew up and once we got up there we both looked about equally miserable, I don’t remember who talked to who first but we really hit it off. We had really similar interests, and similar beliefs and were generally inseparable when we had a choice (i.e. not in forced groups). We even sat together in the god-awful concert and made snide comment while sitting in a side section away from everyone else. Near the end of the 1 or 2 week camp (it all blends together) her family comes to visit, I see her with some guy, reasonably good looking the right age. I must have shown some sort of visible disappointment because in the middle of our typical upbeat conversation the next night (next time we got to talk) she said “Oh by the way, that guy was my cousin, I don’t have a boyfriend.”

Me: completely clueless and with issues that convinced me that this beautiful awesome girl could not possibly like me in anything more than a “just friends” fashion I replied to that statement with the following: “Hmm…” (or “Hrmph” that kind of dismissive “good to know” sound). I thought it was just “trivia” or something.

She was visibly hurt by that, she tried to hide it, but she looked sad for the last few days of camp, after that nothing was really the same. We still were inseparable, but I felt this weird tension that I never pieced together why until on the plane ride home. I really wanted to switch seats with the person ticketed next to her on the plane but I couldn’t work up the nerve to. I never saw her again after that camp, every once in a while I wish I’d just bump into her so I could apologize, I don’t even care if she had a boyfriend or wouldn’t still be interested (I would say I’d take her up on it now), or hell, doesn’t even remember that incident or me I still feel bad for making her go through half a week of noticeable depression.

I’m nowhere near conceited enough to think I completely wrecked her. I mean I’m sure I’ve offended people before, made them royally fume even! But I’ve never managed to actually visibly depress someone for days on end with an offhand remark before or since then, hell I’ve barely been able to piss someone off for more than half a day in the intervening years (I’m apparently one of those people you can’t stay mad at or something. I got into a fight with my friend who does not forgive easily and we made up on the same 15 minute bus ride).

Yeah, mine are really, really stupid.