I’ve come across these people in my life who are known to be toxic, yet they seem to always have a lot of friends surrounding them. I always wonder what’s the reason why these people who seem like manipulators have a lot of friends. What makes people drawn towards them? I’ve also noticed that they tend to have short-lasting friendships. When I talk to these people, I get a bad gut feeling in me. Sometimes they’re just outright toxic. What gives? Why do these toxic, mean people have so many friends? I’ve been described as kind and genuine and only have 2 friends which I’m very grateful for. But I’ve never really been surrounded by a group of friends. When I was it was the worst experience ever because they were so toxic.
24 comments
To make it simple. Its hard for humans to be ourselves, so we’re all attracted and amazed by people who are good at being themselves. Those people aren’t necessarily “mean and toxic”, they just dont care what people think. Thats what it takes to be happy though, a certain level of selfishness.
Because they’re not real friends. Toxic people don’t have real friends and people like that feed off of each others bs. That’s why there’s so many of them.
They view friends as disposable and collect as many as possible. If they lose a friend, they always have many others. I think they want to be in control of many people so as to manipulate them or send the narcissistic “flying monkeys” after someone who’s fallen out of favor.
Because the world is the opposite of what is ideal. These people treat others like collectables rather than human beings. As soon as anyone requires more than the bare minimum, they drop them and move on.
Meanwhile, people who really value friendship and loyalty unfortunately have to put up strict boundaries, or else they’re at severe risk of attracting and being hurt by toxic individuals. As a result, they have far fewer friends, sometimes none. I got hurt badly by someone close to me earlier this year, and now live in a different city from the few people I keep in touch with, so I’m unfortunately all too familiar with how this dichotomy works.
That being said, people change over time. Sometimes people get tired of the shallowness, put the effort into removing the toxicity, and start whittling down the entourage in a way that encourages deeper connections. And sometimes people who have been burned are able to heal enough and give others a chance again.
Some people grow up and stay close to their friends they made through childhood / school. They move to the same city or area after college and continue having that support network and that’s regardless if they are a shitty person. Said friends might just be used to it and ignore those bad traits.
Also those mean types with big social networks usually are persistent about getting their friends to do stuff with them. Usually being mean requires a certain level of assertion and directness which plays a hand in garnering friends
As a person with toxic traits I can say that the friends you see aren’t friends.
They are random people I don’t even know.
I have like 4 friends for real, the others are simply part of the group.
I could organize a rave party with that amount of ” friends”, but not a table games night.
And all I care about are table games, really. The majority of people I frequent don’t even know that I’m an asocial introvert in the bottom of my heart.
They only see an asshole who is able to get a big group of strangers in no time and makes the night more fun.
The reality is that when you are in a big group your personality kinda changes, for the worst.
Yes, I would say that you become the worse version of yourself. In a charming way. And I have little control about it.
They might be casual friends or acquaintances.
Cluster B personality disorders – especially narcissistic personalities.
A very good read.
Because when you’re “friends” with the bully, you cease being a target.
Its cos they play a character in order to get what they want at the time. For example: if you want social validation pretending to be kind/generous is one of the most effective way to get it. However if you actually are not a kind person at least half the time the character you are playing is not sustainable in the long term
Human beings can only form beliefs and opinions about themselves, never anyone else, otherwise they are jealous.
When human beings have strong beliefs and opinions about their own lives, they focus on love, because that is all anyone cares about.
When human beings focus on love, that is the strongest self opinion. The idea is outside of fear, conformity, and authoritarianism (all lying and cheating).
Anyone that is aristocratic in their views is afraid of telepathy.
In order to focus on telepathy, human beings MUST focus on love. Love is honesty and respect ONLY. Violent men always try to paint love as either gay, weak, or feminine in more mature, psychologically developed males. They are attempting to control ideas and beliefs (vibe) with lying and manipulation (anger).
In order to focus on love, human beings MUST be emotionally secure. Honesty and respect naturally create empathy, and empathy requires a secure mindset. Anyone that is bossy, forceful, and aggressive is NOT mentally secure. Force is mental instability. Aggressive minds are cruel, and they are afraid of perceptiveness in others, so they attack, judge, and provoke out of fear of being figured out.
To focus on love, which is honesty and respect ONLY, requires humility and vulnerability. Violent, aristocratic, aggressive human beings do not participate in authentic emotions. The personas they present socially are artificial, and anti-empathy beneath the surface. Aristocratic minds reside in shallow emotions ONLY, which are insulting and threatening. Emotions can only be based upon empathy or lying. Never both.
ALL violence and aristocratic ideas are against women socially. Machismo has nothing to do with Islam, communism, survival, self defense, or any other manufactured threat. Males want control over women in their own communities. Machismo is not protective. It is selfish manipulation towards women. A violent temperament and machismo are ALWAYS synonymous.
Religion is used to promote status and popularity in the selfish individual ONLY. Popularity is centered around social cruelty and depression, not humility and empathy. Religion is an authoritarian, aristocratic, image-conscious social clique centered around corny and wooden acting skills, not REAL beliefs in God or the hereafter.
Human beings only care that life after death is real. They could care less about religion at all. It’s time to get real, and leave lying (authority) behind. Human beings chose either to evolve (telepathy), or stay fearful and conformist (alpha / authoritarian).
Jealous (violent) human beings will always attack friendly (non-violent) human beings to build a social life. All religious human beings share this idea and MUST support it. If they do not support authority and conformity, they are not accepted by anyone that is religious.
There are no leaders, but only lowlifes pretending to be. Strong human beings are friendly, mature, wise, and on equal footing socially at all times. This prevents human violence in all ways, as well as manipulation of the truth.
Focus on meditation. Watch and listen to the mind within like a TV and a radio. Absolute mental silence for indefinite periods of time is never the point of meditation. Meditation is watching and listening, not emptiness or void.
Whatever is beyond the material 4 dimensions is pure consciousness. The other side (spirit world) is unconditional love and understanding, not demonic or evil. Hearing messages from Source is not schizophrenia. It is telepathy.
The ideas being shared by men are extremely cruel towards women socially, and this is exactly why religion still exists. Religion is for those shunning personality growth and character development.
Dogmatic images/beliefs, such as Christ consciousness, chakras, and Hindu symbols, are always surrounded by authoritarianism and machismo. Those are images of spirituality without substance.
Anything authentic and sincere regarding spirituality will center around simple ideas such as Source, attraction, non-violence, equal footing socially, and telepathy.
The ONLY way to focus on telepathy is to be non-violent completely, self loving (humble), anti-conformist, and anti-authoritarian.
Love is strong mentally. Fear is mentally weak. Love IS telepathy. Telepathy, love, and giving are synonymous.
Lying turns the human mind crazy. End mental illness (selfish thinking) for good. End religion.
https://youtu.be/hHcIOwgOHqk
People who manipulate others often create a group to have a source of meat. One manipulator openly admitted to me they were no better than cattle, bragging about her achievements.
Usually the goal is to live off of someone for free. It’s easier to do this when you have a source of people you can pull from. The more you look like you can be manipulated and can be taken advantage of the better you are treated. They hide harmful behaviors from these ones.
Meanwhile people who can not be manipulated might catch on to their game, so they need to be outed. This sometimes causes the manipulator to make up some story about this person to keep their group from socializing with them. Sometimes the story can be quite harmful. It’s easier to see this harmful behavior from the outside.
Something to keep in mind is not all groups of people are toxic or harmful. Not everyone is manipulative. This is a [hopefully] rare phenomenon.
It goes with the saying that birds of a feather flock together. These types of people want to have as many people around them as much as they can- and only those who are the same as them in terms of personality will gather together. Then there’s also the genuine nice ones who also fall into the trap thinking “wow this person has a lot of friends- maybe I should get to know them too?”
In summary, these people are mean and toxic because they get their confidence from having ‘friends’ who will agree with their every word. It’s very common.
Toxic people are often respected because charisma is viewed as strength and valued more than kindness.
Hmm, this seems like a correlation fallacy. At least a doesn’t always = b.
I think people have answered well, but as someone who has a lot of friends who isn’t a pos (I think :’)) — my trauma led me to wildly good connection and communication skills( as well as a self-sacrificing never-ending pool of empathy because I don’t want people to hurt), so that I would never feel alone again, lmao. It is slightly manipulative I guess.
This world is hard and dark, and people just want people they can trust. I made the mistake of being there for so many people, and making them “found family”, and it gets sort of exhausting because you cannot possibly be a good friend to everyone AND yourself.
But I think people, from the outside, think I am super lucky and popular
it’s the paradox of power. those that gains power in the first place due to their qualities lost those qualities when they get more powerful. I saw an old friend became like that
Congratulations, you just discovered narcissism. They aren’t mean to everyone, it’s just people who they think are beneath them. Usually they’re charming and funny in order to attract the right people around them, hence they have alot of friends.
The mask-off answer is that it’s because it can be fun. Being a dick without having to face consequences feels great and cements your position as the dominant one.
First off this is a pattern in your direct environment, it is not the rule but that aside someones value dictates how people are attracted to them and this can be quite surprising, it’s not impossible for a person to be addicted to toxicity itself, if you look at twitter for an example. I don’t know the person in question so I wouldn’t want to write them off as having just that one trait.
i have no idea. i assume they are just shallow friendships and party friends, not the kind to visit u when ur in a hospital.. but u never know.. dont overthink it, just live ur life
Because they’re fake
Misery loves company
There’s a lot of people that can be around a lot of people. They are good at finding people but not retaining them.