It seems odd to me that if people like something, many of them bash a person or product that is viewed as the “rival” of what they like. Here a couple of examples:
Apple/Mac fans are always bashing Windows
Letterman fans don’t like Leno at all
Fans of “cool” music bash Top 40 mainstream music
Not everyone does this, but it seems like it’s very,very common. It’s not enough to enjoy what you use/like, you have to run down the other stuff. Anyone know why?
I have no idea why this is - I don’t generally do it myself, although I have to admit that it would take a lot to get me to even consider buying a Mac simply because I find the whole “Macs are perfect, never have any problems, are totally immune to viruses, etc” mantra of Mac users annoying as hell.
Sports are very prone to this too. One of the shirts I see in the window of the UNC store is “I only cheer for two teams - UNC, and whoever is playing Duke”.
Heh. Yeah, the Yankees suck.
I think maybe it does follow from sports , and I expect it there. BTW, I live near Raleigh so I see those shirts too.
Familiarity breeds contempt. Hell, the Cubs and the White Sox aren’t in the same league and hardly ever play each other, and their respective fans despise the other team.
Q: What can a PC user do that a Mac user can’t?
A: Shut the fuck up about his computer.
Good joke I heard a few months ago: When you walk by the Apple store you can see the smugness billowing out the door.
Erm, because that’s how rivalries work. It wouldn’t do at all if say, USC and UCLA football fans were always praising the other team for what right good chaps they are. Can you imagine how lame of a rivalry that would be?
Testosterone poisoning.
Haaa!
As I said, I fully expect this for sports teams.
But are Letterman and Leno really rivals like teams? They do compete for fans/viewers but that’s about it. They can both do well. I find it interesting that Leno fans don’t seem to dislike Letterman nearly as much as the Letterman fans feel about Leno. Why are the feelings mostly 1 way?
I think it is part of human nature. People will mock/put down other people’s choices or circumstances, whether it be their computer, sports team, religion, race, country, political persuasion, etc. Many people desperately want to be on the right “side” and bashing the other side helps them feel like they are, especially if they have doubts about their side.
In addition to sports being the genesis of the trash-talking rivalry, I think it sort of follows like this: I like Letterman and don’t like Leno; you like Leno; therefore since I dislike Leno and I clearly have much better taste in these matters than you do, there must be something wrong with you; not the least of which is you have no taste, and as such, I’m entitled to ridicule you for your cluelessness in matters of late-night talk show humor, and by the way, you’re stupid and your mother dresses you funny. Wanna take this outside?
Substitute Microsoft/Apple, Dancing With The Stars/So You Think You Can Dance, toiletpaper coming off the top of the roll/behind the roll, etc.
I wish I understood the philosophy. Why do so many GM trucks have window clings of Calvin pissing on a Ford logo instead of some kind of “GM Rocks!” sticker? Why go on about how much iPods suck if you can just buy a Xune (or whatever) and not use an iPod? It shows up here with certain posters in political threads. They can’t just say “my political party is awesome.” They have to characterize the other major political party as being anything from evil to insane.
I much prefer to be known for what I love instead of what I hate.
A sidenote on Mac owners: I use Macs and Windows both on a daily basis. Personally, I prefer the Macs for most (not all) of what I do, but they’re really just tools. The smug Mac-users annoy most of the other Mac users just as much as they annoy the Windows users. The commercials make sense, though, because the best way to promote a product with small marketshare is to compare it to a product with huge marketshare, and focus the comparisons on the advantages. I don’t hold the commercials against Apple – and some of them are actually funny!
I remember when Mac users also bashed the hell out of Intel CPU chips. Then all of a sudden 1 day Intel chips were fine!! 
When you make a choice, you also mentally devalue the other options.
If you are asked to give several items a 1-10 rating, then told you may choose one item to keep, then asked to give the items a 1-10 ranking again, the items you didn’t select will generally have their ratings drop, even though the only thing that changed is you decided you liked another item best.
You don’t always devalue things you don’t choose. I bought an Accord but I think the Camry is really nice too. I don’t have anything bad to say about the Camry.
You have no ego invested in a Camry vs. Accord decision. There is no cool factor - “Yo Dude, check out my Camry - it can totally smoke your Accord!!!” is never going to emerge from your mouth…
Now - why there is ego invested in Letterman vs. Leno, say, is less clear. I will say this - there was a choice framed in our minds when Carson was to be succeeded. It was drawn out and there was an established narrative created by the media: if you like Leno you like this (no edge, genial good guy) vs. if you like Letterman, you like this (edgy, irascible, Carson’s protege). So the options were clarified…
Ah, but clearly you liked the Accord better, or you would have purchased the Camry. Just because you don’t bash it doesn’t mean you didn’t devalue it after you made the choice. (Unless the Camry was more expensive, in which case it’s not a good comparison, because the Camry wasn’t really a option. In which case, you could still potentially have the, “The Camry isn’t as good, because it costs way too much” attitude.)
The problem with the Camry was not the car itself but how they are sold. Toyota has a confusing system of options on their cars. With Honda you don’t get options you buy the EX , LX , etc. Once you pick the LX you essentially have nothing more to choose or worry about the cost. I don’t consider the way the cars are sold to be part of the car but I guess others might .
And in any event , I am not saying “The Camry is total crap” like I hear other people say about stuff.