Quote from John Freeman on January 10, 2021, 7:46 am

Hello  guys,

I'm now being in the situation where I decided that I don't want to keep A. around. Yesterday, I invited my friends at a board game and he's constantly smart-alecing, putting himself in the judge role and social scalping.

• Smart-alecing: always want to show he knows best and is smarter. He did saw some things in the rules of the games we played, but it's the attitude. It's not a collaborative one but a one-upping one.
• Judge role: Remember how he was saying it's John's pussy to say that I'm lucky, now he started to say: now it's JB's pussy
• Social scalping: once more he proposed to help me do the dishes, I said no thanks but he was not going anyway.

He made fun of my dating life indirectly and with disempowering frame.

The problem is that I was not wanting to start a conflict with him as we're playing. I was tired, drunk and I did not put up my boundaries and I don't want to start to show him like he is. But I'm finding he's really diminishing my status among the group. He's constantly bashing everyone. So it's difficult to speak up in these moments as these are moments of fun. Some of us are teasing one another in respect and with fun. But not him. I think he really thinks he's superior to us.

I've been nice with him so far but now I don't want to defend against someone in my free time. At work, it's ok. But in my private life I want to be around people who are not making fun in a value-taking way of others all the time. So, he got his ticket out of my life yesterday evening.

I will not see him 1-on-1 anymore and I'll fade him away from my life slowly. The only reason I would keep him around and this is the reason I'm coming here is to train power dynamics. However, this is a sad realization. But this is what happens to value-taking individuals, they get ostracized. I'm not going to change him and I'm not going to fight him all the time. I have better things to do in my life.

He used his "you're a genius" joke, but he used it at the beginning in a value-upping, but still judge role and later on as a value-taking. I'm not going to maneuver anymore. I'm just not going to invite him as often, then less and less.

I was mentally prepared to fight, but as we had a laugh together at the beginning and since I do like him I dropped my guard and did not want to put it up again. So I did not fight. I was tired and drunk and he took advantage of it. As I said in another thread, I do not want to take over anymore, I want to have fun and share. I'll leave power dynamics at work and find higher-quality individuals for my private life. At least my social circle.

In the evening, I did my best to bond with him and acknowledge him, but with these kind of individuals it plays against me. As they're not interested in collaboration so I'm only giving fuel to harm me. Through him, I learned how humor can be used to harm people and it's shit behavior.

I also noticed that the 2 friends he introduced me to, he does not see them 1-on-1, only in groups. So I think they might feel about him as I do.

Being dominant is good. Being intellectually dominant is good. But being intellectually dominant to make other people look bad is not good.

Also an interesting sign: when we were playing I was going to propose him a win-win move. He was not interested.

Having power-hungry insecure friends who always want to show how bad you are and how good they are is no fun :(