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Comment by anotherthrow | Hacker News Reader

The sentiment of the article is great, but a lot of it just doesn't quite ring true.

When the auther starts going on about other people being losers, and him being a winner, because they do things he doesn't personally value, you start to wonder if he is really free from defining himself in contrast to the guys who excluded him years ago. Life isn't a competition like that.

There's a classic transformation you see a lot of high-functioning geeks go through when they leave school, and start earning more money, living more cosmopolitan lifestyles and meeting more interesting people than those they left behind - they flip around and start juding their ex-classmates negatively in just the way their classmates judged them. You see it a lot on places like reddit, and I think it comes through a little in this article.

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This is basically what I wanted to point out. And please understand I intend this to build up the community, not to tear down the author of the post.

"It's not me that's weird, it's them" is the wrong path to self-esteem. Really, it's a form of retaliation, and it's dangerous. If you categorize people who aren't like you as "weird" and write them off, then you are acting the same as those who are bullying you. The solution to bullying cannot be bullying the bullies.

I understand that when the author says, "There's nothing wrong with you. There's something wrong with them," his emphasis is on the first part. But the second part isn't necessary at all. And in fact, it's a dangerous attitude to have.

"Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that." - Martin Luther King, Jr.

It might come through a little, but there's a difference between comparing yourself perpetually to the people who used to torture you, and feeling sympathetic to a 14-year-old kid who's being tortured now because you remember what it was like to be his age. It's not too bad to remember that things used to suck, and that they're better now. Plus, I don't know a thing about this guy, but he sounds like like a cool dude from this blog post.

I know, but on a (probably unfairly) uncharitable reading his advice is 'don't worry, that girl who didn't want to kiss you is a loser, and so are the people who don't want to hang out with you'. It might be comforting, but I don't think it's healthy or true attitude to take.

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