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Question: Friend One-Up As Wingman, how to handle it?

#1 · October 9, 2022, 5:56 pm

Quote from melontonin on October 9, 2022, 5:56 pm
Hi everyone, I hope you're all doing good.
Apologies if the formatting on this isn't the best, my MacBook's broke so I'm writing this on my phone.
I can't tell whether I'm being overly sensitive about this or whether I was justified. I was out last night with my friend and we were talking to a couple of girls. As a way of messing around, we were pretending we didn't know each other and then my friend says:
"Yeah I only came over to him because I felt sorry for him."
The way I interpreted and felt that was that he was ONE-UPPING me to make himself look better in front of these two girls - as though we were competitors rather than trying to help each other out as wingmen. It might've been alright if they'd have thought we knew each other but It's especially the fact that from their perspective we'd only met that night.
That was the most distinct ONE-UP but there were others as well like I was asking one of them what it was like to be her and he starts going "oh wow that's so sexy E."
Looking at it from the perspective of antifragility, it was beneficial because it showed me how my self-defence isn't strong enough yet. I was completely caught off guard by it and just laughed but didn't say anything (clear ONE-DOWN). But at the same time from my perspective he shouldn't have been doing that in the first place.
I did a ONE-UP back a bit later but I don't think it was on the same level. He was telling a boring story and I said "wow that story went absolutely nowhere."
He messaged me today saying how he was sorry he chased the girls away with his boring story and I used it as an opportunity to say about him ONE-UPPING. I said "
"Also I forgot to say last night but if we're gonna try pull together don't try and take the piss out of me to make yourself look better in front of girls, it's a rat move."
In hindsight I was maybe overly aggressive cos I felt disempowered and hadn't said anything the night before. I can see that was a failure on my part and I was bitter about it.
But overall how do you think I should've played it? A difficulty I've faced a lot so far is that when it comes out of nowhere I struggle to think of a good ONE-UP on the spot. At the very least, I feel like I should've not laughed but what else? Just waited for an opportunity to do it back?
Edit:
title changed and swapped "case study" with "question".
It's not a case study, it's a question.
And using the format "case study" is a form of social scalping, trying to frame a question (a request for value), into a give.

Hi everyone, I hope you're all doing good.

Apologies if the formatting on this isn't the best, my MacBook's broke so I'm writing this on my phone.

I can't tell whether I'm being overly sensitive about this or whether I was justified. I was out last night with my friend and we were talking to a couple of girls. As a way of messing around, we were pretending we didn't know each other and then my friend says:

"Yeah I only came over to him because I felt sorry for him."

The way I interpreted and felt that was that he was ONE-UPPING me to make himself look better in front of these two girls - as though we were competitors rather than trying to help each other out as wingmen. It might've been alright if they'd have thought we knew each other but It's especially the fact that from their perspective we'd only met that night.

That was the most distinct ONE-UP but there were others as well like I was asking one of them what it was like to be her and he starts going "oh wow that's so sexy E."

Looking at it from the perspective of antifragility, it was beneficial because it showed me how my self-defence isn't strong enough yet. I was completely caught off guard by it and just laughed but didn't say anything (clear ONE-DOWN). But at the same time from my perspective he shouldn't have been doing that in the first place.

I did a ONE-UP back a bit later but I don't think it was on the same level. He was telling a boring story and I said "wow that story went absolutely nowhere."

He messaged me today saying how he was sorry he chased the girls away with his boring story and I used it as an opportunity to say about him ONE-UPPING. I said "

"Also I forgot to say last night but if we're gonna try pull together don't try and take the piss out of me to make yourself look better in front of girls, it's a rat move."

In hindsight I was maybe overly aggressive cos I felt disempowered and hadn't said anything the night before. I can see that was a failure on my part and I was bitter about it.

But overall how do you think I should've played it? A difficulty I've faced a lot so far is that when it comes out of nowhere I struggle to think of a good ONE-UP on the spot. At the very least, I feel like I should've not laughed but what else? Just waited for an opportunity to do it back?

Edit:
title changed and swapped "case study" with "question".
It's not a case study, it's a question.
And using the format "case study" is a form of social scalping, trying to frame a question (a request for value), into a give.