Let’s talk more about brand loyalty. I don’t have any because I’m more utilitarian than anything. In yesterday’s post, I talked about why I don’t have brand loyalty, and I want to expand on why I don’t. I’m pretty sure it has somtehing to do with my neurodivergence, but I can’t say with 100% certainty.
Here’s the thing. I do not feel any loyalty towards things, be they brands, teams (yes, they are made up of people, but not people I know. Plus, I’m talking specifically about “the team”), or individual products. I can be inttensely loyal toward individual people, but even that has it’s limits.
I don’t believe in unconditional love; I just don’t. Why? Because to me, that’s how you abuse happens and is enabled. I know you can set limits and boundaries with someone you love, but there’s so much pressure to love someone no matter what. So many people believe that love means allowing the other person to walk all over you. I don’t agree with t hat, and I want no part of that. In addition, Toxic love is not unconditional love, but so many people believe the former is the latter.
An even more toxic version is, “You do everything for me, but I’ll do nothing for you (except maybe hurt you).” I see that a lot, and it’s disturbing to me. Brand loyalty is similar to me because the expectation to be loyal to a brand is pushed by people who aren’t affiliated with any given product.
I know there is something different with my brain because I just don’t undrestand the ride-or-die way people get with things/products/groupsl/teams they like. I can appreciate really liking something, but if that something no longer brings me satisfaction, then it’s time to go. I have heard so many people say about teams that if you bail when things get bad, then you’re not a true fan. What’s more, you don’t deserve to celebrate when they win. Also, that it’s more meaningful if you go through all the pain with the team as they are losing.
I want to make it clear that I actually agree with the basis for this. Knowing the hard times does make the good times better. Where I disagree is with the gatekeeping. I don’t see how it takes away from a longtime fan’s enjoyment if someone who’s only followed the team for a year is elated when their team wins.
This is me for everything, though. Someone else’s enjoyment of something has no affect on my own. Just like if someone wants to play a From game “wrong”, it has no affect on how I play the games. Or if someone liked Liz Phair’s album that was deliberately made to be more commercial/mainstream/palatable, that doesn’t take away from her more experimental works. In fact, if people get hooked on the former, that may open them up to listening to the latter.
Hm. Ian and I had a discussion about what I am. I said I was a libertarian with a lowercase L, and he said I was an anarchist. After thinking about it, I realized he was right. Not so much that I’m all, “Smash the patriarchy!” (though I am like that), but that I don’t recognize hierarchies.
I simply don’t care about things like that. I recognize that many people do, but I do not. I take great glee in flummoxing people by agreeing with them when they say I have bad taste in _____ (music, movies, TV shows, games). I don’t care! I like what I like, and nah nah nah to the haters. It amuses me greatly, plus, I can see why people would not like what I like.
I tihnk that’s the thing I don’t get. Even if you like something with all your heart, how can you not realize that there is going to be a portion of people who don’t? Just because people are different and don’t like the same things. Even the most popular groups, movies, TV shows, etc, have their dissenters. How is this hard to grasp?
As for me, I have a coldness in my core, I guess. If I’m no longer getting something out of a product, group, game, etc., then why should I not just walk away? It’s a little tricker when there are people involved, but even then, there is a point when I’m just done.
I don’t see it as virtuous to stick to something/someone no matter what. As I said, that way lies abuse and toxicity. Not to mention resentment and PTSD when you get to the extremes. I can see how it goes hand-in-hand with the mentality of giving 110% (which, I may remind you, is impossible).
This is one reason I realized that marriage was not for me, by the way. I could not see me forsaken all others for the rest of my life. Nor, to be frank, did I see myself capable of staying with only one person forever and ever. I’m very devoted, yes, but then, suddenly, I’m done.
Ideally, I would like to have two or there fuck buddies that I see once or twice a week for sex and laughs. I don’t want romantic relationships because quite frankly, I’m bad at them. I’m much better at sex than I am at love. At least I was. No idea how I’m at either one these days.
My point is that my viewpoint isn’t just slightly different than the norm–it’s completely opposite. I’m not one or two deviations from the norm–I am not even on the same graph. It’s taken me decades to be comfortable in my own skin, and i would say it’s still a daily struggle.
Or rather, it’s not that I have an issue with myself, but that I’m too painfujlly aware how different I am from other people. I have to hide my true self more often than not, and it’s lonely having to do so.
It’s not that I want to hide who I am, but I feel I have to do it. Given the political climate, there are several aspects of myself that are best left unsaid. Beyond that, though, it’s just that I don’t fit in polite society. If I were to be me even halfway unvarnished, I would be too much. I know this. It’s been tthat way my entire life, and yet, I chafe. I hate that this is how it has to be, but I don’t feel safe being the real me outside of very specific circumstances. None of these happen on the daily, though, which means I have to mask more often than not.
More tomorrow.