The Art of Being Politely Disdainful

Pretending to like everyone is extremely stressful. Constantly putting on a facade of "like" can quickly start to tear a person apart. I know it all too well. Freshman year, I had a really terrible roommate situation, and instead of just making it work as a mutually respectful roommate environment, I made a conscious decision to force a friendship. But the thing is, it wasn't a friendship---it was a fake friendship. Perhaps I should clarify [girls are rather confusing creatures].

See, girls have a tendency to think that they have to be "friends" with everyone, and what this really means is they think they have to act as if they like everyone in order to be proper girls. So, girls build up pretend relationships with people. The relationships established are kind of, sort of, sick utilitarian friendships, where instead of extracting something from the other poor girl wrapped up in the fakeness, the girls extract something from the presentation of being totally amiable in society's eyes. For example, with my freshman year roommate situation, it meant that I got to maintain the image of an idyllic roommate relationship [even though we really didn't have a relationship that was beneficial in any way; in fact, it was quite dreadful]. I got to live in a fantasy world of perfection that was really a world of emotional turmoil.

Creating such fake worlds becomes dangerous for all parties involved, because everyone wrapped up in it runs the risk of getting seriously hurt AND because it's simply unhealthy to ignore one's actual feelings. I have come to the conclusion that it's really not worth anyone's time to pretend like they like someone when they really don't. It just becomes something else about which to worry and calculate. Every time you run into someone with whom you have established a pretend friendship, you have to think carefully about everything you say so as to not give way to your real feelings.

The thing is, though...people aren't stupid. They can tell when you don't like them. That's why I have come to embrace the Emily Gilmore lifestyle of polite disdain. When you don't like someone, simply be polite and not friendly. For example, if I were to encounter Betsy, a purely hypothetical girl who I really just don't like [because she is rude, obnoxious, outspoken, and a generally ugly person who is like a porcupine to my skin], our conversation may go like this:

[Walking across Healy Lawn]
Betsy: Hi, Katelyn! How are you doing?
Katelyn: I am doing very well. Thank you.

Yup. That's it. Nothing impolite happening there--completely acceptable. I avoid any potential effort on her part to create a friendship[or fake friendship, or frenemy relationship, or...you get the idea] by not asking her a question in turn. Both parties are protected from any potentially harmful relationship efforts, and we can carry on our days without feeling badly about being rude.

Creating clear boundaries yields happiness, because your expectations are determined and accepted. There is no fakeness, and this means that you are living and behaving truly with regards to your feelings and your deepest sense of self; and when you are true to yourself, you are happiest. When you waste your time on fake relationships, you lose opportunities to focus your energies on building genuinely good friendships that help you better define yourself and make you a better person, the kind of person you want to be. No one wants to be someone who constantly lies to both themselves and those around them for the sake of putting on a masquerade.

I think that the reason girls have a reputation for generally catty relationships is because they refuse to abandon the societal ideal that all girls should be BFFs. O, please. Everyone knows that we all can't be friends [especially girls, sometimes we are so super-duper emotional...that estrogen can easily become too much], but we can generally respect each other. In my opinion, the best way to respect those around you is to be honest with them, and it is simply easiest to be honest with others when you are honest with yourself. Relationships degenerate into "frenemy relations" when involved parties feel the need to maintain a facade of friendliness that covers up truly hateful and hurtful behaviors.

If girls didn't feel this intense desire to be friends with everyone, we would avoid the general bitchiness and cattiness that are stereotypical of their relationships. Girls just need to realize that their fake friendships are exactly that--FAKE. They must acknowledge that they don't come across as friendly--they just come across as sick and twisted. If girls ever want to be viewed as anything other than completely crazy by our male counterparts, I suggest we start by putting an end to our bizarrely torturous relationship mechanisms.

So, ladies, next time you encounter a person you really don't like, I beg of you to behave honestly [note: not rudely]. This way, there will be no hard feelings on either side and you won't build up any unhealthy, pent-up aggression that leads to frenemy relationships. Let's practice with another hypothetical example right now:

You run into Beatrice, your long-time frenemy who is constantly rude and ill-behaved:

Beatrice: Hi [insert your name here]! How are you doing?
You: Very well, Beatrice. Thank you.

And all the while, you can be emotionally honest and think to yourself, "Bitch, leave me alone." And you will express this somewhat rude sentiment in a polite manner that is both socially acceptable and honest. Beatrice will get the idea and know the boundaries of your relationship, and you will be able to avoid any long drawn-out conversation in which you would have several more [if you're like me, probably several hundred more] rude thoughts that make you feel like and become an ugly person.

See, polite disdain is just better for everyone. Remember, you just have to respectfully love everyone---not like them.