LAST EDITED ON 11-29-08 AT 01:09 PM (EST)I guess my problem is I know enough bullies and abusers who always manage to find something about a person to be the reason they were provoked into saying or doing whatever it is they do to their victims.
I agree that people should take responsibility for how they are being and that if one consistently gets the same negative feedback or label from others over and over they might want to take a look at why the generate that response over and over.
It just sounds like you say those that say critical things are not responsible at all for their world view or their actions. They can't help it. If only everyone around them would just behave the way they decide other people should behave every second of every day they would never say or do anything critical ever again.
There is responsibility on both sides, I can't just blame the one most likely to be labeled as the victim for what happened to them.
Like I said, one does have some responsibility for how one presents oneself to the world. However, everyone that responds to someone is also equally responsible for their interpretation of the events and how they express (or if they express) their disagreement with what is going on. That critics/bullies/abusers can't help themselves is something I can't agree with, and it seems that is what you are arguing. That most if not all the responsibility for the "bad words" is the person that those words are used on.
ETA: I quickly picked up on the fact that once I was targeted by the bullies in my school nothing I could change would take me off the list. I mean after all it is my fault one of the syllables in my name rhymes with ho and mo, I should have been smart enough to pick different parents, or something. I learned early on some people apparently need to belittle others for their own self worth. I really figured out pretty young that being who I was happy being regardless of what labels people put on me was better than trying to change myself into someone I was not just so the people that can't survive the day without picking on someone would find another victim and leave me alone.