Do you think mean people are born, or that mean people are made?

Question

If mean people are made by their circumstances and aren't born that way, why do we always blame them for it instead of pitying them? Are humans naturally kind, or can you be born cruel down to the bone?

Answer 1

It highly depends. Some people have a natural tendency that involves meanness aspects. They are instinctively and naturally mean at the core.

Others are modeled and their true nature is distorted by circumstances, events, people, and the result is an implemented degree of meanness.

It's true that it seems a little unfair and even hypocritical to blame mean people that became mean as a consequence of certain circumstances instead of blaming the circumstances. But the truth is that in today's society people view individuals as they are presented. They view the present selves of the individuals, not their past selves. When they judge you, they only take into consideration your present self and they don't analyze the journey that the self had to explore till it reached the state of the present self. They look at you and see the present you. They don't search for you in your past because they automatically suppose that the features you have NOW are a sum of your overall persona.

They don't consider the circumstances or events that brought you to your current state and directly blame you because people consider that you had a choice. You had the choice to either allow those circumstances to affect you or not.

Answer 2

You have raised the eternal question about nature vs. nurture. It is the general consensus that nurture has the most to do with how a person turns out. But you have also implied a linguistic error in your dichotomy of "blame" vs. "pity". Do not mistake "blame" for "punishment" nor mistake "pity" for "acceptance". Rather, "blame" should be understood to be "holding responsible" which is a natural and necessary social response for correcting bad behavior. If by "pity" you mean "acceptance of bad behavior", you would be dignifying cruelty, and thus exacerbating it. Hope this helps. Have a nice day.

Answer 3

Interesting question. I feel like most people learn by their circumstances & experiences. Their parents or whoever raises them for the first 5 years is probably the most influential in forming their attitude, behavior & values. Many people are born into poverty & raised around gangs, crime,drugs,etc and still make it in this world by their courage & determination, so I don't think it should be used as an excuse for bad behavior necessarily. I don't think anyone is born evil, then again, it's one of those things we really don't know for sure.

Answer 4

anything can become an obsession.should not blame or pity,but get down to the bone,and ask,what has caused this.is this a product of what man has caused as a whole?look at how we live,and we keep doing the same things over and over,just different theories,which in turn cause different opinions and beliefs,in turn cause separatism,which obliviously is not the answer.
no one is born a cruel and destructive person,but it is the influences that cause such.
the root of such is fear,in it's many forms.

Answer 5

People are born with certain tendencies called traits. They may make you lean one way or another and have a certain disposition in life, but the beauty of being a human being is that people are rational and can think and they can make choices and it is the choices people make that determine their ultimate personality. You may have been born with tendencies toward depression, but you can choose whether to give in to those tendencies or choose to fight those tendencies and behave differently, and thus experience different consequences. We must try to create who we are, and not just accept how we feel or wallow in pity over what happens to us. Left to circumstances without any effort on our part, organisms tend toward destruction and chaos. Unless we put effort into it nothing constructive will develop. Its called the personality laws of thermodynamics. ;-)

Answer 6

In terms of philosophy, some might say that humans are born bad/evil and need to learn to be good, and others say the opposite. I think it's a bit of both. Someone can be mean-spirited naturally, and it's something you can see in them from the onset of childhood. Others learn this behavior based on their environment. It's that old question of nature vs. nurture.

Answer 7

No I believe that we create that persona for ourselves, and yes it is sad, but people do that by choice, usually for their own protection and self preservation as they feel that that's right for them at the time.

People as a general rule, are kind and giving individuals and usually pretty smart
I ask a question when I see that in our children
"What's the one thing that could be stopping you from being a nicer person"?
we talk
usually followed immediately if you want the feeling of success you have to serve many people and situations and you will not do that by being mean

Answer 8

the people that are mean have a reason to be mean, not just because they want to. obviously a baby doesnt grow up thinking "oh im gonna be cruel to everyone in my life".

i know some people that are like that because they dont want to get hurt, so they hurt others instead. they might have had bad experiences in life, and they probably got hurt by others for too long that instead of being nice, they turned mean so they wont be taken advantaged of. because being nice is a huge disadvantage because as human beings, we take advantage of the nice people.
i know because i tend to be nice, but people do take advantage and obviously that pisses me off.

or others just saw it as a normal thing, aka just like if a kid grew up with an abusive father that hit his children. that child is more likely to grow up being abusive himself because thats how he was treated.
maybe that is the consequence of a parent being so mean to the child, that they see it as a normal thing.

Answer 9

I think they're born..and through life experiences they can get worse.. And it takes a strong person to be a naturally nice person. ...My brother and sisters were all raised the same, none were segregated or favoured and yet my sister turned out to be the most evil person I know.

Answer 10

i heard that we were born to be rude,and mean human beings but we learn from others not to be mean...if you are surrounded by mean and rude people then you will start out to be mean...but on the other hand if someone was nice to you when you grow up then it all changes...but in my sociology class they said mean people were born..people around them change who they are...