Does anyone feel people are rude to them for no reason?

[informa]

My friend pointed out that for some reason people are ruder to me than they are to others. That is to say, I experience rudeness from members of staff or the public more than the average person.

We spend a lot of time together so she witnesses rude waitresses or arsey people on the train for example. It may be luck or it may be something else that gets their back up.

I’m unfailingly polite and kind. But I still get attitude from people for no reason.

Some people in the past have told me that I’m intimidating. I have no idea why, other than being well spoken.

I used to get this a lot. You're being TOO nice and polite OP and as such, have unwittingly become an easy target for others to vent their shitty mood on. I'm not suggesting you become rude or aggressive, but drop the overly nice/ meek behaviours and you will notice a change in how others treat you. It's utterly bizarre psychology but people seem to prefer and respect those who appear a little more feisty and pose the risk of biting back should they overstep their boundaries.

I've got a terrible resting, don't want to say bitch face. I just look disgusted, even when there are no particular thoughts going through my mind! I've also been told I look intimidating! Not much I can do about my face, so stopped caring too much over the years

I'm Audhd and part of my masking is to be ultra nice to people. They then take this as weakness and some people then start patronising me. I then force myself to remain nice whilst imagining punching their lights out 🙄

I recently had a frenemy who kept pushing the boundaries and getting ruder and ruder towards me, so I dumped her.
These things never happen with ND friends, so I think it's part of NT communication styles to try and impose their pecking order. No wonder so many people are absolutely horrible if this is how communication and interaction is organised. Definitely not my circus.

Same here . I think of people want to judge a book by its cover and not get to know me then it's their problem not mine . I do make a joke out of my resting bitch face and laugh it off . That's all I can do . I can't help what I look like .

Some people also take quietness for a weakness

I do think, not in a woo way, but in a real way that we each put out energy based on our personality and our experiences and that is the energy people respond to. Something about your energy is causing people to respond to you this way. If it were a once off I think it would be about them but since it is a rather unusual pattern it is about you.

Maybe if people think you're intimidating they are getting defensive. If they want to judge you without getting to know you then they are the problem not you . Don't take their rudeness though .

Interesting, I do hope my energy isn’t bad!

You say you are well spoken, are you also loud? I find when I am with a certain friend who has a very posh voice people sometimes stare or roll eyes - she's a lot of fun but laughs loudly and generally doesn't notice people being a bit WTF. I'm quiet in comparison but I know her vocal "poshness" can really wind people up.

I am pretty quiet and introverted and I do find that some people think that this entitles them to take the piss. They always look shocked when I bite back. I may be quiet,but only until you start upsetting me!

Nice is not meek.

People sometimes make that error with me.

Not as such but I have noticed that, in recent times people are just ruder. At work I get parents complaining about their kids teachers on things that are utterly inconsequential and really not worth a complaint/their effort. Think Johnny’s homework was late so teacher gave him an extension but he’s got football tonight so how is he supposed to do it now type thing.
I’ve wondered if, with more people working from home, they just don’t get that social interaction to bounce things off other people before opening their gobs so by the time they get to the school/restaurant/train station staff get both barrels of rudeness cos they’ve used hardly any social skills that day.

You're right, nice is not meek. However, people often interpret it as such and treat others poorly based on what they believe, confident in the ir assumption that they won't ' bite back'.

@NotAgain1963

Same here

I like to be cheerful, upbeat and kind and some people mistake that for weakness. If they're rude or unkind to me, they don't mistake me for weak anymore.

I have this a lot and my friends have also spotted it - it’s particularly when I need help with something ie the ticket machine at the station or help carrying the pram up the stairs.

i am not at all meek or mild or quiet, but im equally not rude or loud. Im just normal. I think it’s more noticeable when I need help because of shadenfraude. I will never forget when I had my 5mo baby (he was enormous as born big) in a sling at a Christmas market, I was actually pregnant again at the time and didn’t know it yet. I went to sit down as I just felt so tired and hot and someone raced me to the seat and laughed at me as they sat down.

people like catching you in a weak moment or bringing someone else ‘down a peg’. Do you dress well or are you pretty OP?

I tend to assume gobby. rude and loud people are by default rather stupid and weak and are making so much noise to try and hide their ignorance and deep-seated insecurity, so it cuts both ways.

Maybe your too nice? people see it so when stressed take it out you as they dont think you will say any thing, If someone rude to me they will know about it, I aint taking shit off anyone if they dont like me I really dont give an flying fuck. Dont be an people pleaser and get walked all over by an bunch of idiots.

I get this too OP, and am Audhd, mid 40s, have always found it confusing. It's like people want to take me down a peg. I think the bit above about NT people wanting to impose a pecking order is something to do with it. I'm dealing with someone at work right now who goes out of his way to try to make you 'feel bad', and like he's there to make the tiles rules (he isn't), and that elevates himself while pushing others down. It's constant and I find it really wearing. I get the same as you in public. But, I may also have a victim, hangdog vibe, not sure I carry myself very well. Maybe it's partly me.

I get this too, OP!

On a train, I sat in what was an unreserved seat for part of my journey which then became reserved further up the line IYSWIM. The people arrived whose seat it was (a mother and late teenage daughter), the mother said ‘that’s our seat’ so I gathered my stuff to move, and as I did so, the daughter glared at me and said ‘you’re not getting it’ 😵‍💫 I was picking my things up at the time so clearly not planning to fight them for it! 🤷🏻‍♀️

Also had a weird encounter with a man from the council delivering our new recycling boxes a few weeks ago. He dropped off two identical sets, so I said we’d only need one, as we don’t have storage space or generate enough recycling. He asked which set I’d like to keep, so I said (completely genuinely), ‘well, they’re both the same, aren’t they?’ To which he replied ‘well that’s put me in my place!’ 😮 I was shocked that he’d inferred I was being rude to him or putting him in his place, when I was genuinely looking at these identical recycling boxes.

I’m also a young-ish woman, early 30s, quite quiet which could be construed as meek, always (try to be!) unfailingly polite. So maybe it is that that rubs people up the wrong way, or makes them think they can take their stresses out on you, like PPs have said.

I’ve also been out walking my dog on the way to the vet, and she stopped to do her business, I had bag in hand at the ready (luminous green, so not exactly hard to see), and a passer-by said ‘there’s countryside up there, you know’, admonishing me for letting my dog do her business on the way to the vet 🤷🏻‍♀️ it’s not as though you can ask them to hold it!

Sorry you get this too, OP, it really baffles me.

I agree with the person that says people communicate different energy. I know someone who is extremely well mannered in obvious ways but within 2 minutes of seeing me is always verbally rude, though I don’t think she means to be. She phrases things in such a way as to make me feel judged. I’ve tried ignoring her, trying to find out what she really means, laughing it off but she just carries on and it’s making me dislike her. I get on with most people and have loads of friends so what is her problem? It really irritates me, but I need to be like some PPs and just not care.

Some people don’t realise they’re being rude, and get outraged when someone responds to them in a hostile manner.

My SIL is generally well-meaning, but is very bad at reading the room, as in she doesn’t understand when her monologues are boring someone, and she can be terribly tactless. We were out for a family meal last week with my parents when she and my brother were visiting and she called a waitress to ask for butter, and because it was noisy and she has a strong regional accent from a different part of the country, the waitress didn’t understand her and asked her to repeat herself, perfectly politely, twice. SIL went huffy and started spelling out ‘B.U.T.T.E.R’ insultingly slowly, as if to a small child, and didn’t appear to connect this with the fact that the waitress stopped smiling and went off to get it without a word, which she thought was ‘very rude’. (She also didn’t grasp that the waitress, who wasn’t white in a country where non-white people are a very tiny minority, also thought she was being racist.)

I’m not suggesting you’re anything like this, OP, only making the point that some people who are perfectly intelligent about other stuff (as SIL is), have absolutely no idea they are regularly rude.

Mild autism / adhd. Some people sort of blank me. I have ADHD and was always 'friendly' and 'kind' but in fact I was masking the 'correct' behaviour and I think many people clock this and are then less friendly.

Some of us def put out a certain vibe.

I never got rudeness but I was always ignored. It has become a running joke between my best friend and me....I'll ask for something in a shop or work related and either get ignored or told 'its out of stock'....
I then have to send best friend in to pick up whatever it is that has magically become available or just to get attention.

Happens less often now Im in my 50s and give zero shits what people think of me! I think I kinda take up more space nowadays.😄

Interesting. I've found that if I take the attitude of strolling around as if I've got all the time in the world and am happy to stop and chat, then people are much nicer towards me! It's when I'm in a rush doing errands that people seem to take offence (and I don't push past them or anything like that, I'm just trying to get from A to B!). It's really odd and I don't understand why this keeps happening.