"Stop liking what I don't like!" - Why is this a thing?

[Pink Gregory]

Cue another thread of me being unable to comprehend or understand the essential nature of people and the internet.

But seriously? Why is it a thing? And I'm not talking about that meme image with the kid playing chess; if anything that's surprisingly accurate; rather, I'm talking about the phenomena it represents.

Thoughts?

 

[Darken12]

I blame moral and epistemological objectivism. The idea that there is only one objective truth, that certain things are always right and others are always wrong. I also blame the society-wide dismissal of emotions and the irrational need to support inherently subjective things on "facts" (I also blame societal gender constructs, because that attitude is pushed onto men from birth). Combine all this and you end up with people who like things not because those things make them happy or elicit positive emotions in them, but because they are objectively better (as proven by "facts") and liking them is Right and True. If you disagree, you are Wrong and your opinions are False.

I am a relativist and a subjectivist, so I'm not afraid of saying "I like this because it features X, and X makes me feel good" or repeating that all opinions are inherently subjective and therefore are all equally valid. Some people, though, just plain don't get it.

 

[piinyouri]

Cause people are people even over the internet?

Ok, I'll give a small theory I have on the matter.
This may have varying degrees of sanity and/hilarity as I do not profess to be a psychology major, nor an astro physicist.


The world we live in is very hard to define. In order for our brain to make sense of all the chaos and random information it needs anchors, things that we can look at and point and say "That is [name]". Basically the argument of "An apple isnt an apple, it's just a round some what spherical red thing." But even those breakdown with enough scrutiny really. ""Are they still apples if there is no one left to speak of them?" ect.

Anyway, I'm getting off track.
That basic idea, that your brain needs concrete things, or ideas to latch onto, to declare what the boundaries and definitions of your reality are, extends to entertainment media as well.

Now when you attack or challenge something like this, that is basically attacking a persons perceived reality.
And I've found over the years that it's playing with fire.
(Try telling a evangelical christian god doesn't exist, or a militant atheist that he does)

Take into account that media often times helps us develop, helps s grow is there for a lot of good times and a lot of bad, in some weird way becomes a part of you, whether superficial or otherwise, it's not surprising people tend to have the knee jerk reaction they do.

I'm not saying we should let our baser impulses rule us and not try to be nice with each other in regards to common likes and dislikes, I just think it's a bigger part of a humans psyche than most realize.




I have no idea if I communicated what I'd hoped to or if I sounded like a stark raving lunatic, but if so, I hope you at least got some food for thought out of it. ^^

 

[Queen Michael]

I guess if you think one creator of art is more talented than another then it annoys you that someone who deserves less credit is getting more of it.

 

[Christemo]

Human instict tells us that anything we don´t like is wrong and shouldn´t be accepted. In itself, that´s not so bad, but combined with Human stupidity, it can lead to things such as the "stop liking shit i don´t like" stigma.

 

[Bertylicious]

I blame moral and epistemological objectivism. The idea that there is only one objective truth, that certain things are always right and others are always wrong. I also blame the society-wide dismissal of emotions and the irrational need to support inherently subjective things on "facts" (I also blame societal gender constructs, because that attitude is pushed onto men from birth). Combine all this and you end up with people who like things not because those things make them happy or elicit positive emotions in them, but because they are objectively better (as proven by "facts") and liking them is Right and True. If you disagree, you are Wrong and your opinions are False.

I am a relativist and a subjectivist, so I'm not afraid of saying "I like this because it features X, and X makes me feel good" or repeating that all opinions are inherently subjective and therefore are all equally valid. Some people, though, just plain don't get it.

Ninja'd, though I kind of disagree with the conclusion.

See; it kind of represents a whole "everyone has won and all must have prizes" attitude, only applied to concepts and values which makes it even more sketchy. I'd assert that it is possible for one thing, concept or experience to be superior to another. For instance if we were sat in a cafe and I refused to stop playing Venom on my ghetto blaster, carried on my shoulder naturally, then the experience would be objectively terrible for all of us. If I didn't have the ghetto blaster, or even if I just played something less dire than Venom, then the experience would be irrefutably superior.

In addition there is also the problem of contradiction. If I state that human rights are inviolate and you state that a woman is property of her father till she is sold to another family and becomes property of a husband then our positions are anathema to one another. If you practice your position it undermines mine and vice versa. It is difficult to conceive of a compromise that can be reached between these two positions.

These are extreme examples, to be sure, but I'm just saying that sometimes there are situations where subjectivity doesn't cut it.

 

[Scarim Coral]

Pretty much you want everyone to be a sheep as in agreeing with you then to actually form an opinion on the subject matter, usually have a polar opinion to yours hence they like someone/ thing to which you hate/ dislike.

 

[Keoul]

Every human has come from unique circumstance and therefore have unique opinions on things.
Also humans in general hate to lose. Bring anonymity and the internet into the mix and you have to wonder how could this not have happened?

Without fear of prosecution they're all free to voice their opinions as aggressively as they'd please.

 

[Strazdas]

everyone (yes everyone, even you) think they are the only person who is right and everyone else is wrong. this is how human brain works. therefore if you do not like something and other person likes it, he is wrong and therefore he should stop doing that. you know, like the whole "omg trolls should die because they are different" movement here on escapist.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Well, depends. If they see something unworthy getting too much popularity and thus success, whilst "better" things get overlooked, I can sorta understand that.

If they see something which is morally wrong getting too big, you can have a reaction to that.

 

[King of Asgaard]

People don't like being wrong.
Them liking or not liking something is a choice made by them, so others not agreeing with that choice for whatever reason has unfavourable connotations for them.

 

[TheSlothOverlord]

The thing you described annoys me to no end. And since I'm a fan of classical music I see this sort of behaviour all the time.
It seems that on almost every video there are two kinds of comments: "Ohmigod I'm 16 and none of my friends listens to this, I'm like, so special" or "Justin Bieber sucks and anybody that listens to him is stupid". The fact that people flame someone just because he/she doesn't like the thing they like ties in with the common conception that liking something makes you immediately smarter and better than the "non-believers".
Since I'm not a psychologist I can't say anything for a fact, but my theory is that people do this because: a)they need to boost their self-esteem and/or b)they are insecure about their opinions.I honestly think that this is a really stupid thing to do. Thinking that somebody is inferior just because they like different things (by extension things that you might hate) is an incredibly narrow-minded approach IMO.
Mind you, I'm only talking about entertainment and tastes here. If someone is sexist/racist or otherwise is displaying a very hateful and hostile attitude I do think you have a reason not to respect that person.

 

[SonOfVoorhees]

I had this thing also. I love my horror and would import foreign movies from all over the world. An then that became a thing and before long The Ring, grudge, Versus etc started to be released in the UK. I guess thats just what comes with something being popular but id did annoy me for a while.

Same with books for people. You can love a book. But when it turns into a movie every one starts reading it. I guess its because something that made you different from others now becomes the norm. An it seems others are just jumping on the bandwagon instead of being a true fan from the start.

 

[lacktheknack]

I blame moral and epistemological objectivism. The idea that there is only one objective truth, that certain things are always right and others are always wrong. I also blame the society-wide dismissal of emotions and the irrational need to support inherently subjective things on "facts" (I also blame societal gender constructs, because that attitude is pushed onto men from birth). Combine all this and you end up with people who like things not because those things make them happy or elicit positive emotions in them, but because they are objectively better (as proven by "facts") and liking them is Right and True. If you disagree, you are Wrong and your opinions are False.

I am a relativist and a subjectivist, so I'm not afraid of saying "I like this because it features X, and X makes me feel good" or repeating that all opinions are inherently subjective and therefore are all equally valid. Some people, though, just plain don't get it.

The thing is, I consider myself an objectivist, and even I get the concept of "not all brains respond to stimuli the same way".

A more likely candidate, I think, is that people have difficulty with empathy, or "seeing through someone else's eyes". I've told people about my love for Myst, only for them to tell me how boring and non-actiony it sounds, missing the point of "playing to relax".

 

[Maximum Bert]

People experience things differently one mans meat is anothers poison as they say so everyone speaks from their point of view sometimes they make decisions on their own others times they are stupid and follow public opinion.

Both can be right to themselves especially when dealing with unquantifiable factors maybe they can even see the other persons point of view but they will never be able to comprehend it fully as they are different people. Good and Bad right and wrong these things change depending on your viewpoint many we agree on due to convenience, perception and influence but in theory at least it could be totally different.

Oh and this causes arguments because obviously people think they are right even though no such thing exists except within the parameters they have set for themselves.

Edit: Just randomly came across a quote from some guy I have never heard of that basically summarises what I was saying

?In reality, there are an infinite number of perspectives, but we act as if there were only one.? - Zen Master Dennis Genpo Merzel

No real need to post it except it felt like it fit.

 

[Navvan]

Well there are two types of people that statement covers. Those who base the statement in the topic on fundamentally subjective grounds, and those who base it on fundamentally objective grounds.

That is if their fundamental reason they don't want you liking it is because they don't like it (subjective)
They actually have a rational framework for why they don't want you to like it (objective)

For example a meth addict "likes" meth, but there are objective reasons why those who don't "like" meth don't want the drug user to "like" meth.

Direct answer: The first case by definition has no real rationality, but others in this thread have addressed why a person might be inclined to repress thing s they don't like. The second case seems to be legitimate in at least some cases, and the reasoning behind it will vary form case to case.

 

[Genocidicles]

If tons of people like something I dislike, then I'm worried more of that stuff will be made at the expense of stuff I like, or the stuff I like will be changed to appeal to the people who like the popular thing.

Now this doesn't apply to everything. For all the millions of screeching fangirls Justin Bieber has, good metal songs are still being made. For all the tripe like Twilight, good literature is still being written. In some cases though, one thing being popular can be detrimental to other things, Like Call of Duty. I dislike the games, but I wouldn't have a problem with them if they weren't so popular.

Their popularity means loads of other people are trying to copy it's success, with less than stellar results (Unless you think the multiplayer in Bioshock 2 was awesome or something). This sucks because if I wanted to play Call of Duty I'd go get the 'superior' experience and actually play Call of Duty instead of a game trying to rip it off.

I don't want to play Call of Duty, but because it's the big thing right now every other game is trying to be more and more like it.

So stop liking what I don't like because the success of the things you like is changing the things I like.

Of course this doesn't apply to having a go at people for liking things that aren't that popular.

 

[sextus the crazy]

Because people dislike dissenting opinions.

Sometimes bad things do affect the production of good stuff, but this isn't always the case.

 

[BeeGeenie]

It is human nature to identify oneself with a group; to divide the world into us/them. In the beginning it was our tribe vs. their tribe, then our city vs. their city, our country vs. their country, etc.

As the world becomes more interconnected, and we break down those barriers of race, religion, language; we naturally start looking for other sources of competition: Sports teams for the jocks, Console wars for the gamers, who is best pony, etc.

It is human nature that was bred into the species by millions of years of competition. It's not going anywhere any time soon. It is man's nature to dislike people who like things he doesn't like.

 

[bug_of_war]

People like to complain and get annoyed when someone doesn't agree. I generally live by the code of, "Nothing is inherently good or bad" but I still find myself pondering at times how people can like things that I see no redeeming qualities in. It's just what happens when one interjects emotion into something and we are quite the emotional species, and while we try to always think logical it is improbable to always be wary of what you say and it's validity.