Today, I suffered through Ricky Gervais as a guest DJ on the David Bowie dedicated radio station on Sirius XM. As he spoke, I realized that he reminded me of a coworker, who was a bit of an asshole — and that made sense because Ricky Gervais is a terrific mean person. In fact, I’d argue that he’s downright cruel. But before I ever knew that about him, I instantly disliked him. And the only reason I could give is “there’s just something about him.”
Psychologist Paul Ekman has done a lifetime of research in recognizing and reading microexpressions and how they can be, quite honestly, super false based on many known and unknown underlying biases. Malcolm Gladwell famously wrote an entire giant book about the “thin-slicing” or “thinking without thinking” we do instantly, that then inspired its own critical response book by Michael LeGault that urged people to not give in to “magical thinking” and abandon critical reasoning skills.
I’m a big fan of critical reasoning and attacking problems logically. And yet, every asshole I’ve ever met has rubbed me the wrong way from the first glance. Somehow at a very visceral level, I’ve known that they were not good people. And that instant read? It honestly has not been wrong yet.
Here’s the thing — my brain gets in the way so often. I want to believe in the genuine good hearts of people. So I talk myself out of my instant immediate dislike — maybe a good friend whose judgment I trust has known them forever. Maybe they are insanely good at something they do and I love whatever it is they do, so I let my love of their work override my internal barometer. Maybe there’s just not a good reason to dislike them — they’ve never done anything mean to me, for instance, or anyone I knew. Or they have done the opposite — been extremely kind and thoughtful and generous to me, which causes me to seriously doubt my instant read. Basically, these people have their own instincts of self-preservation and adopt based on my own reinforcement or lack thereof and then it’s just a bake off to find out who is better at faking the other one out.
And this is not to say that I’m not friends with assholes — some of my favorite people in this world are actually terrific stinky assholes! There’s a difference, though, between the asshole who is open about their gaping anus qualities, and the asshole who wants a kiss on the lips except really it’s a rim job.
Esteban is always telling me that I am too harsh on people, which is really funny to me because if anything, I feel like I’m an overeager puppy when I meet someone I like. And when I like someone? They are under my umbrella of protection — I will stick up for them probably far more than I reasonably should.
I think back to at least five of the last major assholes I’ve met — people who have raised my blood pressure with how terrible they were. These are people I talked myself out of my usual reticence. People who actually made me feel guilty about being so stand-offish and then I actually leaned in to be extra generous, open and supportive to them. Each one of them ended up revealing themselves to be a massive viper and each showed their colors the moment that they weren’t getting what they wanted or needed out of me anymore.
The asshole modus operandi seems to be this inclusive act — “Oh, I’m only like this with OTHER people, never with you, you’re in on the joke, aren’t we wicked” kind of schtick. I fall for it every time — even though I know better. I KNOW better! I’ve heard some of these people say truly terrible awful things in my confidence and when I call them on it, they always say the same thing “Oh, it’s just a joke! I’m only kidding.” But they aren’t kidding. They are never kidding. And by the time I hear this most obvious tell, I’ve usually already ignored about 800 other signs to GTFO.
And I shouldn’t be surprised that I’ve picked up this telepathy skill. Throughout my entire life I’ve been bullied and targeted and the victim of supreme righteous assholes. I’ve learned to detect them, my soul acting as a dowsing rod for cruelty. It knows. It always knows.
And Ricky Gervais? Definitely not a good person. I don’t care how much he gives to charity or how he cares for his aging pets or any number of kind things he has done for orphans or refugees or old women who needed to be helped across the street. And if you like him? Cool. I’m glad he has some fans. I don’t wish him ill, really — there’s just, as they say, something about him.
