Mean People Suck

I said a few days ago that I haven't felt like posting anything recently. But, some events over the past few days have really bothered me and so I was inspired to post something once again.

First, I want to preface that sometimes I say "you" in this post, but I don't really mean, you the reader. I think most of you are very nice people. Also, if I'm talking about you specifically you'll know, because I'll mention you by name (or the only way I know to identify you)

As most of you know, who read my blog regularly, I love basketball. This time of year A LOT of my time is spent watching basketball. Michael is the assistant coach of both the JV and Varsity basketballs teams at Holden's school. I am the stat keeper for both teams.

We played a team in our conference Friday night. We had played them once before this year and had won. It was an upset for them. They were supposed to kill us.

There is one boy on the Varsity team that is a really great player. J averages about 20-25 points a game. Sometimes when teens (and sadly, adults) are that good at something, they are cocky and usually not very nice to others on the court. J is not that way. He just loves basketball and goes out to play to the best of his ability.

When they announced the starting lineup for our team, the opposing team's crowd booed J. They didn't boo everyone, just him. First, that got to me. But, then it got worse.

They started the game, and every time J touched the basketball the crowd started to boo, loudly. Whenever he threw the ball to someone else the booing stopped. I was so mad I was about to cry.

What is wrong with people? He's just a high school kid. Why do you want to be mean to anyone, especially someone you don't even know?

My personal opinion is that most people are so self-absorbed that they don't really ever think about other people's feelings. They don't really care if it hurts anyone else as long as it makes them feel better.

And, that's another thing, why does it make you feel better? Do you really need to pick on a high school kid to make yourself feel good? If so, there is something really wrong with you.

Eventually, the crowd stopped booing. But, then our own parents started up. They were sitting right behind our player's bench. Most of the time that J touched the ball, one of them would start yelling at him to dish it off and stop trying to do everything himself.

First off, why in the world do you want to harass a player on your own team? Secondly, he's really about the only one on the team who can play decently.

If he was a ball hog I could see why they might do it. Not that it would make it OK, but I could better understand their motivation. But, he's not. He not only scored 26 of the 52 points scored by the team, he also had triple the amount of assists of anyone else on the team. That meant he dished the ball off plenty and others scored because of it. There was one game where he had over 20 points and he had 9 assists.

The only motivation I can think of is jealousy. They were jealous that their kid wasn't scoring most of the points. They need to stop comparing their kids to J. They need to focus on the good attributes that their kids have and quite comparing them to someone else.

What makes people act that way? When are people going to learn that it's not about them and their feelings all the time? If people would stop comparing themselves (or their kids) with others life would be much simpler. I just don't understand why you can't be yourself and let others be themselves. Even if you don't agree with the way other people live their lives, why do you feel the need to condemn them and belittle them? Why do you care? As long as society is not suffering because of the actions of these people, keep your mouth shut.

This brings me to the second part of my post. Like I said, the first incidence happened on Friday. I never really thought to post about it, because I didn't really think any of you would care.

But, I read this post today and my anger flared once again. Not because of the post itself, but because of a comment made to this post.

This is not the first comment this person has left, but it was kind of the straw that broke the camel's back for me.

First, let me address the anonymous issue. If you are so sure that Allison is such a horrible person then why are you so afraid to let anyone know who you are? If you're going to be mean to people, you should at least own your meanness.

Secondly, not to sound cliche, but if you don't have anything nice to say then....don't say anything at all. I don't expect you to like everyone, but if you don't, why can't you just keep it to yourself? Why must you try to hurt people's feelings? It's just mean.

Maybe you're saying I shouldn't get involved. It's really none of my business. But, that's another problem these days. Unless something directly effects them people just don't want to get involved. I know Allison doesn't need my help. I think she's done a fine job responding to Mr. or Mrs. Anon all by herself.

Anonymous, if you're reading this, back off. She's just trying to make her way through this world like everyone else. Try focusing on what you can do to make yourself a better person and quite critiquing everyone else.