It means I think everyone else is an asshole.
I might be too, but I don't think I am.
this post was submitted on 01 May 2026
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Yeah, ive always taken it to mean "we could live in a better world but the likes of Donald Trump exist".
We ALL get to be the asshole at one time or another, which you've glossed over.
I didnt gloss over anything. Its just a matter of how you interpret what ive said.
You've argued that assholes are individuals, instead of all of us.
Don't be disingenuous.
Of course we can all be arseholes at some point. I think youre just getting hung up on the fact that i chose someone rich/famous as an example.
It's kind of funny that because most of us are nice, no one just beat the shit out of trump or worse. Assholes are kind of like parasites taking advantage of kindness.
In Intro to Political Science, I read King of the Mountain.
In it, the author explores the behavior of primates when they take over social groups. They secure access to food, mates, and social prestige. This happens in gorillas, chimpanzees, and in human beings, too. In humans, it tends to take the form of powerful leaders securing themselves wealth through corruption, having mistresses, and forming cults of personality, and that all of these behaviors are more pronounced under more authoritarian governments than under functional democracies.
I don't think that humans are inherently bad, in fact I think that we achieved our level of success on the planet through our communal and altruistic tendencies. But I also think that there are human traits that we still have in common with our ape cousins, and that we've got to keep a close eye on them and think about what we can do to account for them and prevent them from overriding our healthier and more beneficial impulses.
ashole
I mean... Humans ARE assholes. Some are cute beyond imagination, while some are just... horrible.
It's okay to say, "I wish the best for my friends and family over the entirety of humanity". It's the winning strategy of game theory plain and simple, isn't?
"Start by being nice and cooperative. If faced by defection from the other side, do not cooperate until the other side cooperates again".
The simplest example would be sharing a house as housemates. Some humans are assholes who you'd never want to share space with. Some, you'd desperately want as housemates.
Damien Walter comes across as a bit of an arsehole, to be fair.
Sometimes human nature tries to trip us up but we can be consciously aware of these things and actively work to train yourself to avoid them. Studies show that people trust others more the more similar they look and a reverse correlation between looking different and distrusting people is also true. Letting that run wild leads to things like racism. Being cognizant of it allows you to avoid the trap. That's just one example.
Or a skeptic.
Okay but... doesn't that still kinda support their point?