Spite, The Underestimated Human Behavior Destroying Everything
It matters more than ever.
You know the saying about cutting off your nose to spite your face?
Well, it happened.
In the 9th century, a group of Scottish nuns disfigured themselves to avoid being raped by Vikings. Some accounts indicate they cut off parts of their face, including their noses. Unfortunately, it didn’t do much good. If anything, the self-mutilation seems to have made the Vikings angry. They didn’t spare the nuns. They just set them on fire and watched them burn.
You can read about it here.
A thousand years later, we have small business owners like Austin Petersen who voted for Trump “to own the libs.” Now it’s blowing up right in their face. Recently, Petersen expressed dismay over Trump’s tariffs and trade war—now that it’s hurting him personally. As he posted on social media, “Well there went my shoe business. I don’t understand… why does government punish small businesses in this country knowing full well that Nike and all the big brands will be fine paying the taxes but Steffi and I get wiped out?”
Austin here still doesn’t grasp that Trump doesn’t care about him, and that he’s spent a lifetime stomping on small businesses for personal gain. Of course, he’s like so many other MAGA minions who voted less out of personal interest and more for the sake of doing harm to someone they don’t like. Now they’re watching their wives and girlfriends get dragged away by ICE agents. They’re watching a pointless trade war destroy their livelihoods. They’re suffering from preventable diseases and overdosing on vitamins. And yet, they’re still so wrapped up in their ideological narratives that they can’t find the basic self-awareness to express regret or remorse for what they’ve done… to themselves.
What’s really going on here?