There are three levels of how people deal with “there’s a thing I don’t like which pretty much everybody else likes” syndrome:

1) “I guess it’s just not my thing.” This is fine.

2) “I don’t like it, and I honestly can’t understand why anyone would.” This can be dangerous, but it’s okay if you’ve made a serious attempt to figure out the appeal and genuinely can’t understand it.

3) “I don’t like it, and nobody else REALLY likes it. They only think/claim they do because [rationalizations]….”. Don’t do this. Don’t be this guy.

The above is taken from a recent Facebook post from my friend at Grading Fight Scenes. And he pretty much said verbatim the thoughts I’ve been having lately.

I have been noticing lately how vocal people are when they don’t like something. When they have something on their mind, they just jump right out and say it. They are much more outspoken than I am. If I don’t like something, I have the type of personality where I worry that I am offending someone so I usually tend to keep it on the inside.

But as I’m reading more social media, whether it’s on Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, etc. I’m seeing more and more of people who just say how much they hate something and don’t care at all what other people think.

For example this past week, the Oscars were happening. And I was very excited about them and I live tweeted through them. It was a lot of fun interacting with other people across the world and also because I was watching it alone, it just was nice to know that somewhere someone was able to share my thoughts. I did warn my readers in advance that I was doing this because I didn’t want to bug them. I also did the same thing during the Olympics. Things I get very excited about I like sharing with other people. Not because my thoughts are SUPER IMPORTANT but because I know that I can reach out and be social with them.

I don’t expect other people to share in my excitement because not everyone likes the same things as I do and nor do I anyone else’s. But when I see people posting comments, tweets, blog posts, or even say in person how much they hate these things and how they can’t stand when “such and such event happens” because it ruins everything for them, it makes me feel like I’m doing something horribly wrong for liking what I do. And then they proceed to go on about why they hate such things and why anyone who likes them are bad people. I’m like….what have I done to make you hate me so much???

But like I said that’s my personality. Even if I truly hate how you’re behaving, if you’re disgusting me and offending me horribly, unless you’re doing it in my face in person, I just usually let it go. I can always choose to not look at Twitter or Facebook. I can unfollow or block you. I don’t have to let your personal likes, enthusiasm, or mood get in the way of what I want to do. I make the choice to let it go versus just sit there and complain and insult others for what they want to do.  I don’t want you to know that I can’t handle it because your response would probably be the same as mine, just deal with it. However, I’m never going to tell you this to your face, nor am I going to spew this out anytime I see this on social media. Because I know it will offend folks and/or be taken the wrong way.

So I’ll be honest. When it comes to saying what you don’t like, I think it’s all in HOW you say it. According to the list, I’m a total number 1 person. I will let you know that I don’t like something so that you are aware. I won’t ever try to make you feel bad about why you like something nor will I claim that you don’t really like something and are faking it. But that’s just me.

Feel free to greatly dislike something. It’s your right. I just wish sometimes other people would just realize that everyone has different tastes and it’s ok that we all don’t like the same thing. Don’t get so worked up when unprovoked about it and try to immediately defend why you don’t like something or shoot down everyone else that does. Just…..let it go. It’s going to be ok.