A bully seeks to castrate you. But someone can hector you while still not being a bully--they can in essence be challenging you to step up to the plate (that is, in a real sense, attempting to empower you or to get you to empower yourself). I do not take well to castration and generally counter it head on – for example by not keeping silent when someone seeks to talk over me. But I cannot help loving those who challenge me to step up to the plate. Whenever I enter a new social situation- say, visit a new church– my antenna are aware of two basic approaches. The people are (1) seeking to intimidate me by implying that they are better than me or (2) they are loving, empowering, and seeking to encourage me. I sometimes get the impression when sitting at a dinner table that the person sitting across from me garnered all they are telling me about art, music, literature, social issues, and science not out of a love for it, but solely as a tool to intimidate and castrate others. Such people I consider intellectual bullies. I generally seek to avoid such people.
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