For me, it's not a deep need for revenge ("You want mean, I'll give you mean!") as it is this irrational conviction that the other party thinks I'm an idiot for even trying to talk to them. "Would you please just shut up?" some people seem to be saying with their eyes. "And just answer my simple question. Don't give me the novel when I want Cliff Notes."
When I get flustered, though, I immediate start babbling like a brook and things just get worse.
If anything, I don't find myself hating those who can be "mean" (maybe they're having a really bad day and that's just their reaction to stress) but being intrigued. What could be going on in their lives that makes seem act like a Dickens's character? Surely, deep down inside them someone nice is hiding.
There's a huge difference between grumpy meanness and something much darker and intentional. As Blanche Dubois says in A Streetcar Named Desire, "Deliberate cruelty is not forgivable. It is the one unforgivable thing in my opinion."
How To Be Nice To Mean People
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