Loyalty and Lions
January 20th, 2008
today i’m choosing to blog about loyalty. i dont quite know what the point of this post will be or what i want to say, and i’ve still got a lot of conflicting ideas about the topic, but i believe my non-existent message will unravel itself as long as i continue typing.
i am aggressively loyal to the people i love and care most about, and this is a loyalty that transcends all logic and reason. my best friends could be the worst people on earth and i would still love them always. for instance, sieutheng can be very selfish sometimes but i dont care because she’s sieutheng and i love her. waimin tends to push us away when she’s in trouble, but i will still always be there for her because she is waimin. i’m very anti-fur, and even though tzeching is like ‘fuck all you fur activists la have you not felt how soft mink/fox/rabbit fur is!’ (quoted verbatim from her blog wtf!), i will still always love her because she is pang tze ching and we used to trade sweet valley books wtf.
sometimes i struggle with this kind of loyalty and i wonder if i’m making the right decisions. i dont know what exactly the struggle is but there just is a weird tension between my principles and my loyalty. like the fur thing for instance - i would immediately dislike any stranger who said anything remotely close to what tzeching said, but i would never harbour such thoughts against tze ching. when she says things like that, i just go haiyaaahhh why this tze ching so like that wan! and then i’ll continue chatting with her about our mutual love for grey’s anatomy and pretty handbags. and then there’s also the fact that i hate all my best friends’ evil ex-boyfriends simply because they broke my best friends’ hearts. that’s loyalty. but is it fair to these ex-boyfriends? granted they probably don’t really care, but it is an unfair judgment nevertheless because i don’t know their side of the story. but then again does such a judgment matter if it doesnt affect their lives in any way and is only brought up when a good ex-boyfriend-bashing sleepover session is in order? you see what i mean when i say there is a weird tension between my loyalty and what is right?
i guess what i’m trying to say is - i generally don’t like to judge people i’ve not encountered or who have never done anything wrong to me, BUT THEN this rule doesn’t apply anymore when it’s my best friends or family who have been wronged by other parties. and that even in situations where my friends and family are wrong and do things that are totally against my principles, i don’t fault or disrespect them. all that stuff just goes right over my head. it’s like a blind love thing.
some days i like this part of myself. some days i dont.
there is a second facet to this whole loyalty issue that i’d like to touch on. i have a story of me, my friend Aaron, a girl Belinda whom everyone hates, and a guy Chuck whom everyone hates. my friend Aaron hates Chuck, ok? and i really hate Belinda. conflict: my friend Aaron really likes Belinda for reasons unknown to the universe and all of its inhabitants and i swear this is not an exaggeration. a bit of background - Aaron has a lot of friends who are very loyal to him, and i am one of those friends. loyalty to Aaron is a default dislike / contempt / non-contact with Chuck; basically if you are friends with Chuck, you are not a friend of Aaron’s.
when i first met Aaron, i instantly took a liking to him. to me, he was one of those genuine guys whom i felt close to very quickly and could really click with. i’d met Chuck before and i didnt think much of him, but when Aaron told me all the stories there were to tell and i had digested all of them, my position on Chuck was now a total 100% dislike and i wouldn’t have touched him with a 6 foot pole. why? because i trust Aaron and i believe that everything he tells me is true. even though Chuck had never personally done anything wrong to me.
now we bring in Belinda, whom i absolutely loathe for many, many reasons. Aaron knows this, and he also knows that EVERYBODY (again, not an exaggeration) doesn’t like her and also hold the same contempt for her that i do. yet he dismisses all of our views, scolds some of us, and continues protecting Belinda and trying to placate her. he takes ’stuff’ from some of us to give to her, which makes us really angry and confused. at the same time he keeps announcing his complete neutrality in this Belinda vs The World issue, when it is very obvious to everybody that he is in fact biased in her favor. he cites that he does this because Belinda is loyal to him.
my question is, is it fair to dismiss everybody else’s loyalty for Belinda’s loyalty? the rest of us external observers know why she is ‘loyal’ and it is for completely materialistic and selfish reasons. Aaron of course refuses to see this. i cant speak for everyone else involved, but i know that my feelings have been extremely hurt. i showed him nothing but unwavering support in his crusade against Chuck, but when it comes to Belinda - my opinion doesnt matter, he doesn’t believe me, and he chooses her over me and the rest of us. it’s hurtful. it makes me wonder about loyalty. is there a loyalty that is more important than others? right now i fail to see what is so noble and great about this material-based loyalty that Belinda shows him, compared to the collective loyalty that the rest of us have given him.
the third facet of this loyalty issue - what happens when someone takes advantage of the loyalty his or her friends show? without going too much into detail because i am really just. so. tired, the story goes that there is this friend of ours whom we love very, very much. but lately he’s been taking advantage of his eternal get-out-of-jail-free card and taking certain liberties with us. we’ve told him that we don’t appreciate him using us like this, but it falls on deaf ears and he actually starts lying to us so that we don’t realize what he’s doing. and of course, we believe all his lies because he’s our friend.
some of us are extremely angry at him and want to cut him out of our circle. i’m a little bit angry too, but loyalty dictates that i stick to him no matter what, even though he has become this conniving little lying thing that i no longer recognize. i cant tell you what he does and what he lies about, and i understand that this lack of information is probably pretty crucial to any decision one would have to make.. but what would you do if you were me? he’s not changing his ways. so do i stay with him and give him space to be himself, at the risk of propagating his selfishness and ignorance… OR do i work with this boycott on him so that he eventually comes to his senses and learns that he cant get away with treating his friends like shit?
loyalty. such a multi-faceted thing. please do leave me any of your views and comments on this topic, i would very much appreciate it :)
EDIT: i’ve just heard that some silly person thinks she’s Belinda, and she went and lodged a little complaint to the person she thinks is Aaron. all i can say is, the world does not revolve around you, ok? you may for some obscure reason think that it does, but i can assure you that reality is far from your assumption. if you think you have lots of things in common with Belinda, then that is a very, very, very sad thing to realize about yourself, because Belinda is a horrible and rude person whom nobody likes.
do NOT try getting me in trouble with this person whom you think is Aaron. you are, as always, really pushing the limits of my patience. just try to be a nice person for once; it’s not very hard. as of now and in relation to the issues brought up in this post, my BEST FRIENDS are going through some problems, and i intend to be there to support them. clearly, you are not one of my best friends. so, do not hijack this and turn it into one of those chapters in the elaborate movie of your life. in a nutshell, please dont be so damn perasan.



55 Comments Add your own
1. tom | January 20th, 2008 at 4:10 am
wow.. a late entry in the middle of the night.. must be the YouthMalaysia holding you out the whole day huh? :P
anyways, it was so deep the drama here..
when come to situation like how you are facing..
I would space myself out from everyone when it comes to HIM.
I will stay neutral and when I do.. I mean it..
Friends are there and you can’t expect friends to be perfectionist. Neither are we right? The only thing to change him is to find out the root to all his selfishness and ignorance. People tend to behave strangely beyond normal because they “might” be in a situation where they want/have to behave like that..
I wouldn’t want to boycott him totally but on certain occasion.
Just to pull him apart a lil bit and let him think why people are boycotting him.
Just like, you can’t change a drug addict by telling them “Don’t take drugs” when you barely them. It takes a lot of LOVE and TRUST between two parties to have that word to take it’s effect.
2. DolphyN | January 20th, 2008 at 4:26 am
hmm….wat a coincidence….im going thru a similar situation now wif a fren of mine who is in our circle of frens….we’ve been in the middle of coursework season for the past few weeks and basically he’s just been taking advantage of everyone’s concern towards him….like getting notes from us, getting points for our research essays and stuff which we r supposed to do individually for fear of collusion or plagiarism and all that shit, crying and then we all feel sorry for him and end up helping him write his essay wtf…..(which my fren n i did til 4am for him cuz he couldnt finish his essays on the day of our submission…haih) and we even typed his essay out for him (!!)…but in the end wat we got in return was nth but him saying we only helped him a little bit and that he felt like everyone’s against him. he’s just super spoilt cuz he expects us all to help him like we alwiz do. point is, we still love him cuz he’s a real nice guy and all, but honestly, u cant just take advantage of ur frens like that cuz we were all super stressed and busy wif our essays as well but he was this crying, miserable, depressed mess and we couldnt bring ourselves to say no to him. he knew that and used our sayang for him blatantly, i mean, like, at least 6 of us were helping him wif his essays although we had our own to write and we were kinda depressed ourselves too cuz hey, everyone’s going thru the same thing anyway so wat made him so special? sigh. thats loyalty i suppose.
i guess in the end u just hv to know where to draw the line. there’s loyalty and there’s a limit. just go wif the flow lah.
PS i just realised i was rambling nonsensically. oh well. haha. take care su ann!!!
3. WP | January 20th, 2008 at 5:00 am
Well, it’s nice that you’re so loyal and have so many loyal friends. The number of friends I can consider really loyal can be counted on the fingers of one hand. And since I place high value on loyalty (and try my best to be loyal) that is pretty disappointing.
In Aaron’s case, I don’t think his liking Belinda shows any loyalty or lack of. For you, loyalty might be liking/disliking someone your friend likes/dislikes, but he might not see it that way. (as for me, I’d wait to know someone before deciding whether to like/dislike them, even if all my friends like/hate them) As long as he remains loyal to you, there shouldn’t be a problem. Of course, if he’s giving your stuff to her while knowing full well that you wouldn’t want him to, that would be completely disregarding your feelings and (I might be harsh) I’d say he’s not worth your loyalty.
In the third case, I’d say go yell at him and tell him to stop taking advantage of you. And if he doesn’t change, well, same thing, he’s not worth your loyalty.
lol I sound like such an un-loyal person now :P
4. aronil | January 20th, 2008 at 5:02 am
well you are up late.
quite hard to gauge, pink since this is after all your affair, and maybe not all the pieces of the story are put together? Like for me as an external reader, I can’t tell why do you loathe Belinda as much, or understand why you’re friend Aaron behaves as such.
What i will say though, is that if you really are his friend, tell him that you have an issue with his behaviour. If everyone has been silent about it, maybe you can confront him personally on the matter.
Further more as his friend, maybe i don’t know try to understand his situation. For all anyone knows, he really does care for Belinda it ways that are really tender and that is his business. Why shun him if he has strong liking towards a person you disagree with?
Then again, maybe he needs his space. I remember from somewhere that even as friends sometimes, we need to go our separate ways before the two can return as true friends again…. or something like that.
What I’m probably saying is boycotting him, may only push him further to the person you may not like, for when he has no one else to turn to because everyone else has boycotted him….. how then can you be friends with him again?
Just my two cents.
Take care and hopefully your situation will get resolved soon.
5. Michelle | January 20th, 2008 at 7:16 am
In my opinion, loyalty sounded a bit underrated here. I mean, to everything you do, there must be some line. If someone were to backstab about me, i’ll be careful about that. I’m quite wary and my loyalty towards that particular friend will falter.
Initially, before you introduced Aaron in this picture, i was thinking that we should accept people’s flaws because none of us are perfect. Like A always uses profanities and screams at your face or B always badmouth about people, yet we’re still friends with them. That, sounded really okay.
But Aaron constantly covering things up and verbally protecting Belinda? That part sounded really wrong somewhere. Loyalty doesn’t sound like the right noun (or is it an adjective) to use. Because if he is infatuated with her, loyalty is a totally different issue. When you really like a person, you’ll do anything to protect him or her. And if you really hate a person, we will complain every single mistake he or she did and laugh about it. And even the tiniest mistake like breaking your pencil into half is taken account to.
My take is: Favouritism overcomes the word loyalty
Oh well, this is just an opinion. If I’ve offenced, I apologize beforehand. =D
6. Gin | January 20th, 2008 at 10:04 am
aiyooo. the aaron thing nvm la. ppl fall for someone eidi wad to do. just let them fall and face the consequences la. haha.den u can go i told you so after that ;p
anyway loyalty isnt really that neccesary all the time especially when it comes to friend based situations =S shit happens.
7. wenqi | January 20th, 2008 at 12:51 pm
ehhh… are u still asleep??
ur not onlinee!!
come come.. come online wtf
i want to ask u something wtf
8. skyler | January 20th, 2008 at 1:03 pm
Haha wenqi’s comment is super funny.
I would go with the boycott.
9. Michael | January 20th, 2008 at 1:45 pm
humans~ *sneers*
opps. i’m one too.
i learnt this once in my university subject “Chinese philosophy and culture” (ok, completely not related to my major).
Chinese tends to forms circles among circles, like the most inner one, family, then close friends then etc etc. The circles dictates ur behaviour and attitutude towards them. (JUST AN EXAMPLE)
Eg: Ur brother raped a girl, u forgive him
Ur close friend raped a girl, u never see him again.
A stranger raped a girl, u condemn and spit at him.
Ok, if some bad guy sell drugs and kills ppl, but super good to his family, then consider not “too bad”. But, if some super nice guy treats his family like shit, then….do he still the “nice guy” in ur heart? This has a whole lot to do with our perception to these relationships…..(not chinese only)
Back to loyalty. Loyalty is clearly biased and human.
What can i say is. Try to be rational first, if can’t,
just let ur feelings decide it.
10. reallybites | January 20th, 2008 at 1:45 pm
ignorance is bliss uh la la
even if u boycott, will this fella eventually comes to his senses?
11. amy | January 20th, 2008 at 1:47 pm
hi, we met yesterday :)
anyway, back to your problem. i think u should let him know how everyone feels. i mean he prolly already knows u guys arent happy with what he’s doing, but until one of u actually talks to him about it, he may think that he hasnt reached the end of your patience yet and may continue to take advantage of your loyalty. err… get what i mean?
12. reallybites | January 20th, 2008 at 1:50 pm
btw what happened to the snail post har. why u never give me!
13. Grace | January 20th, 2008 at 3:01 pm
hrmm…i have a very dear friend who is loyal to her bf no matter watever he do and no matter what v say about her bf. she jz trust her. although she knows that it is wrong.
i think dt is loyal.
however to me i think loyalty is a must in every sorts of relationship, but there must be a limit.
there are good and bad friends around us, it is very bad to judge a person like this, but sometimes ppl tend to use your loyalty against you.
thats why everytime v must be loyal, kind but smart at the same time.
14. Kevin Chan | January 20th, 2008 at 4:16 pm
lets see… so now the issue is that you feel betrayed in a sense that aaron protects belinda (whom you so loathe) when in the past you have supported him in his crusade against chuck.
lets take a look at loyalty here. imo, loyalty does not necessarily mean being enemies with your friends enemies and friends with your friends friends, but rather just being there and sticking up for your friend, no matter what, purely based on your personal relationship with that person in question.
The world we live in is indeed a tangled web, and i have found it quite unreasonable to align ourselves with our friends every single time. doing so will only result in weird situations when you have friends who have varying opinions on a certain third party.
I try not to bother about the people my friends align myself with unless it becomes a problem that hurts our relationship. Thats a problem between you and your friend then, not with the people he befriends. If he really is a true friend, things will work out in the end.
15. Michael | January 20th, 2008 at 4:21 pm
btw, ur booth on youth 08′ is kinda “de-decorated”
although the contents is still as yummy as always~
16. k0k | January 20th, 2008 at 4:32 pm
Maybe my “no-liability” approach to friendship isn’t such a bad idea after all. I personally dislike any friend that talks shit about other people and try to turn everyone else against someone they loathe. We can’t choose our enemies, but dammit, we CAN choose our friends. And I won’t want to be associated with anyone that petty.
Loyalty is good. Blind loyalty, not so. Poor Chuck.
I don’t think I’ll write a lot here, seeing that so many people have already written essay length comments about it.
17. k0k | January 20th, 2008 at 4:39 pm
Anyhow, you chose to be blindly loyal to Aaron. You should respect (and understand too) his decision to be blindly loyal to Belinda. After all, you’re both alike that way.
18. Mr. I-now-have-lesser-reading-material-thanks-to-loyalty | January 20th, 2008 at 6:58 pm
I show loyalty by reading ur blog and not someone else’s because u said so.
19. kiasu andrew | January 20th, 2008 at 6:58 pm
biiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiimboooooooooooooooo
20. lishun | January 20th, 2008 at 8:08 pm
blind loyalty is bad.
at least have a proper reason besides “cuz i’m loyal to him/her” when asked why you stick by one person and not another.
21. pinkpau | January 20th, 2008 at 11:23 pm
tom : haha youth malaysia! were you there too? yknow, that’s some really good advice to just boycott him once in a while to force him to think about why we’re doing this. i never even thought about that; trust me to be so extreme and never consider a middle approach :) he actually means a lot to me and the rest of us but i think his view on friendship is just quite superficial at this point in time.. so he probably thinks we dont really mean what we’re saying when we tell him we’re angry or hurt.
dolphyn : i really like your story :) i think many of us have come across friends or teammates like the one you just described. true, there always has to be a limit. but what happens when that limit has been breached? did you guys ever tell off that friend of yours?
WP : a few really close and loyal friends that can be counted on one hand is not a bad thing :) you know what they say about quality over quantity! as for the aaron/belinda case, yes, he has been taking stuff from us to give to her. in reality, it’s not what it sounds like (i’m sure you’re imagining him taking things from our homes and giving them to her as gifts), but that’s about as much detail as i can give right now. the thing is, we actually dont like what he’s doing (this giving her things) and we tell him, but he still keeps doing it at our expense. so yes, i do think it’s a big disregard of my and our feelings. this girl has badmouthed and been rude to a lot of us, but he can still find it in himself to close one eye to these things. as for the third case, this guy has been yelled at.. but no change :P
aronil : yes a lot of pieces are missing. i have talked to aaron about this, and so have many of us but it is apparently quite ineffective. i guess he just likes to make his own decisions instead of letting many dissenting voices affect his opinion. but the thing is, are we not his friends? do our honest opinions not matter? his relationship with belinda isnt very difficult to understand because it’s not complex. he doesnt have feelings for her or anything, but he just wants to maintain some sort of neutrality. but because there are so many people who dont like her, it’s almost like he feels compelled to negate all this bad energy, so he goes over the top with the good energy. and that annoys us (and for some of us, hurts our feelings very badly) greatly because it’s done at our expense. the boycott thing is a separate case and for a different friend :) thank you linora for your wisdom :) it’s always so good to hear other people’s perspectives.
michelle : you have no idea how hard you just hit the nail on the head :)
gin : he doesnt like her romantically. yalar but thats the thing we dont want to see him ‘fall’. and the situation is such that if he ‘falls’, it affects a lot of people and not just him.
wenqi : ok im online already wtf
skyler : why are you not online!
michael : rationale.. something i need lots and lots of :) i’m way too emotional sometimes.
reallybites : i dont know! talking to him doesnt seem to work. so i suppose temporary isolation may shake him up a bit. he depends on us for certain things, so if we take the supply away maybe he will realize the gravity of the situation. hahaha i give you snail you dowan!
amy : hi amy :D it was good meeting you even though we didnt get to talk very much. we have talked to this friend of ours actually, scolded him even, but it didnt change anything. :\
grace : wise words :) i hope your friend’s boyfriend is good to her and deserving of her strong loyalty.
kevin : it’s actually more complicated than it sounds. if you must know, yes, his friendship with belinda hurts our relationship as well as his relationship with other people. we dont ask that he not befriend her, but we ask that he stop doing things for her at our expense. for all his talk about neutrality, that sure doesnt look very neutral to us. also, she’s implied that she thinks that he shouldnt be friends with us if he is friends with her.. you see what i mean when i say she’s toxic? yes i feel somewhat betrayed that he’s nice to her while fully knowing that she’s a real bitch to us and that she’s got material intentions on her mind 24/7, but i’m also angry that he scolds some of us when we try to tell him what she’s doing, and that he takes things from us to give to her, that he distances himself from us just to maintain this ‘neutrality’ thing. it hurts my feelings that he cant see who the better and more sincere friends are.
michael : hahahaha i didnt actually decorate my booth. i only came back to KL on the morning of the exhibition, so my friend Yat (who had the booth next to mine) helped me randomly stick some pink stickers here and there :P
k0k : actually, i’ve just found out that belinda is telling aaron not to be friends with all of us :) who’s the petty one in this situation? that’s why i dont like her. and dont say Poor Chuck.. he deserves it. loyalty is blind :) it’s the choosing who to be loyal to that isnt blind.
Mr. I-now-have-lesser-reading-material-thanks-to-loyalty: hahahahaha who are you! i never said that! haha aww dont cut down on your reading material.. let me forward you to some excellent blogs!
kiasu andrew : WHY DO YOU SAY THAT!! DID YOU READ MY ESSAY WTF!!!!!!!
li shun : of course we all have our reasons to be blindly loyal :) i think loyalty is blind. otherwise it wouldnt be called loyalty.
22. mIcheLLe | January 20th, 2008 at 11:35 pm
*ponders* it’s true that we are blindly loyal to people we care about no matter how much they suck sometimes. And the fact that they put themselves out blindly for other people we don’t like at all. That’s gotta hurt. *–*
That happened to me at uni. -_-
23. Rosa Close | January 20th, 2008 at 11:48 pm
THANK YOU!!
I am also so anti-fur that I now create anti-fur groups worldwide. Check the page “online groups” of my web http://www.antifursociety.org
Warm regards!
: -)
24. Michael | January 21st, 2008 at 12:09 am
well. i prefer no decoration at all lol.
those stickers kinda…erm…
u know la, less is more ma.
maybe no decoration = best “decoration”
lolololololol
25. KY | January 21st, 2008 at 12:17 am
Aiyoh your friendship loyalty thing is so confusing especially at 12am.. I think I should be re-reading this so that I can fall asleep better.
Screw counting sheep.
26. entwined | January 21st, 2008 at 12:46 am
i know what you mean about the constant tension between principles and loyalty. one eg that easily comes to mind is that i absolutely loathe people who cheat, but when it’s my girl friends who cheated (and regretted, of course), i’m more forgiving and not judgmental about their behaviour and accepting their excuse that they were lonely. :/ this always makes me feel like i’m a hypocrite for practicing such double standards.
as for A,B and C issue, if i know that A is a good guy, i might trust that he will have his personal reasons for sticking by B. however, if B is really evil and A just can’t/refuse to see it, then no matter how much you want him to see the truth, no one can force him unless he is willing to open his eyes. sometimes, you just have to let go and let others learn their mistakes, because no matter how much you sakit hati on their behalf, they can never fully appreciate it.
and for the friend who keeps abusing your loyalty, i would probably let the friendship die a slow death, seeing that he isn’t willing to change. i won’t go out of my way to ignore him, but i wouldn’t make the first move either. good friendships can be difficult to let go, especially when you think of the good old times everyone shared together. but sometimes it’s flogging a dead horse just to keep the friendship alive based on nostalgia.
27. tom | January 21st, 2008 at 2:06 am
Yes I was there and how could you not notice the tallest guy in that particular area..?? :P
but anyways..
Give a mild approach and see how things goes. I’ve friend who are so annoying that we abandon him for some time and when we started calling him out, he asked “why so long never go out ah?”. The truth is told in his face and we started seeing change. It works on different people.. maybe it would on HIM.
28. ponderer | January 21st, 2008 at 2:17 am
do not boycott him. you are loyal to him because you love him as a person and as a friend. now that kind of love is hard to come by these days when we live in a world where individuality is all that matters. don’t let that love inside you slip away. yes, he may have done this and that but how sure are you that by boycotting him, he will come to his senses? people don’t do what they believe in. they just do what’s most convenient and then they repent. by the way, none is perfect, so hate the sin and love the sinner. just don’t claim you are without none.
29. DolphyN | January 21st, 2008 at 3:04 am
haha…su ann….update : yes, we told him off after we submitted our courseworks….and he was in tears after our one hour lecture to him about his selfish, spoilt attitude…..BUT. he said he knew he was in the wrong and he promised us he wont do it again. :D
so now everyone’s happy again and coursework season is over and we r going to shop til we drop cuz its winter sales in UK. wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
happy ending after all! :)
i think things will alwiz work themselves out sumhow. hope they work out for u as well!!
30. sieutheng | January 21st, 2008 at 3:06 am
thank you for still loving me eventho i damn bitchy and selfish wtf. ok now no guys will want me cos u have publicly announced that i am selfish and i admitted it wtf.
but i still love u *insert big wet shining eyes emoticon*
31. alice | January 21st, 2008 at 4:43 am
so many sides to the story. i understand your questions. i ask them of myself a lot, but i’m not as loyal as you are. you have a lot of comments already, so i’ll try to be quick about it.
1) aaron - you should listen to your friends when they need an ear. but don’t let it sway your judgement. be open and let yourself make a judgement about chuck if the time ever comes. my friends and i do not dump each other simply because another doesn’t hate someone we hate. we respect each other’s right to choose a friend. it should not be anyone else’s call and quite unfair to believe “if you are a friend of ___, you are no friend of mine.” ultimatums never work the way we think they should. it develops even more conflict.
overall, your loyalty, even if slightly blind, is fine. it’s acceptable. not all your friends will have your values. it’s okay to love them even if some values go against yours.
2) Belinda - it may not be fair for him to put her above everyone else’s loyalty. if everyone were to leave him, her loyalty wouldn’t do him much good because if it’s true that she gives less than she takes, then she will disappear eventually, too - when he has nothing else to give. But if you want to keep aaron as a friend, you can only stand by and let him put you all aside, and see where it goes. just watch your stuff carefully. she’s victimizing him and he’s allowing her to. it doesn’t mean you should allow her to victimize you through him. watch your stuff. don’t let him take anymore. as a friend, you want to steer them in the right direction, but there’s not much you can do if they do not feel the need or want your help. you can only hope they realize the error of their ways and stand by their side until you can’t take it anymore.
3) the friend that takes advantage - you can also apply the same thing to this friend as to aaron. what i would do, though, is take a step back from the friendship. not cut them off completely, but lay off the friendship for a bit and cool it down. it might help you see things in a better perspective and spend a little less time with them. if you mattered to this person enough, they will notice the difference in your attitude towards them and maybe talk about it with you. if not, it’s also a good time to assess whether or not you need to be friends with someone who doesn’t notice you’re lack of presence in their life. as far as the boycott, it may or may not work. most likely the boycott may just make him hostile towards everyone else. there’s no sense in creating conflict. possibly the best thing is just to move on from friendships that hurt.
so much for making that short. either way, your friends are all grown up and you can’t parent each other. these people will grow their own way regardless. i wish you luck.
32. pinkpau | January 21st, 2008 at 7:05 am
michelle : yes i saw your post :( so angry :(
rosa close : that’s fantastic work you have there :) kudos!
michael : haha no lah i thought the stickers were damn funny. it’s so like a guy’s kinda decoration :P
ky : KY dont be mean! i didnt say your hit-and-run incident was boring!
entwined : the cheating thing!!! i so know what you mean. my girlfriends have done that too, and like you i always accept it and then start reassuring them. double standards indeed.. but that’s what friends are for :P yeah i agree with you about having to let A learn from his own mistake with B. sigh. okay now i just have to teach myself to be patient until that actually happens. about the friend-who-takes-advantage, the slow death thing sounds scary :( i cant give up this friend.. we are really really close.
tom : the tallest guy’s name is shaz and you are not shaz :P
ponderer : thank you :) you have reminded me of what is important.
dolphyn : i am happy that you had a happy ending :D your friend sounds very emo btw haha.
sieutheng : chung tau emoticon *EYES*!
alice : i love your comment - it was very eye-opening. the aaron belinda situation is slightly more complicated than it sounds; technically we cant watch our stuff and cannot do anything if aaron wants to take it from us to give to her. right now, she’s already victimizing us through him, and that’s what makes us all angry. i’m not even asking that he hate someone i hate (which i learnt is what she just told him to do, which annoys the hell out of me), but i just want him to stop feeding her greed and self-centeredness. what he does for her - instead of for us - isnt very fair despite his claims of neutrality. and it makes us feel so hurt and wretched when someone as terrible as her can take precedence in his life over us. le sigh. you’re right, not much can be done until he sees what he’s doing wrong. i just hope that time comes soon -__-
33. sheon | January 21st, 2008 at 8:37 am
loyalty to a close friend is a virtue…..but its a mutual thingy. when that friend starts lying and being deceitful, thats a monumental breach of trust now, isnt it? strike three…and he/she’s out! i do not welcome anyone i dont/cant trust inside my mind and heart.
maybe aaron has feelings for belinda……that explains a lot! :) a guy would do the stupidest and silliest things on earth…just to impress the girl that he likes……its one of the silly things guys do… i’d done silly things for girls…..BUT NEVER BREACHING OF TRUST!
ps: i hope the belinda is NOT belinda chee………coz belinda chee is sooo freaking hot!!!
34. tom | January 21st, 2008 at 11:33 am
no way.. !!
but well.. shaz bigger size than me.. i shall withdraw my claim hahaha -_-
35. Gin | January 21st, 2008 at 12:03 pm
some things are inavoidable. @_@ is that even a word @_@ inavoidable @_@ hm
36. sheon | January 21st, 2008 at 1:23 pm
GO WATCH “CLOVERFIELD” !!!! ITS FREAKING AWESOME!!!!!
37. pinkpau | January 21st, 2008 at 1:33 pm
sheon : never belinda chee!!! i think she’s awesome :) this friend’s lies are not damn big or earth-shaking, but still hurtful nevertheless. he’s very cute wan lah.. i dont think he realizes that his actions affect us as much as they do. as for aaron, he does not have feelings for belinda, and we know that for a fact :P i guess a big part of it is that he’s just trying to negate all the negative treatment she gets from people. so he goes a little bit over the top with the good treatment.
tom : hehehehe
gin : unavoidable, my dear :P haha no lah it’s not happening.
sheon : i know i know i know i want to watch it too!!!!!
38. alea | January 21st, 2008 at 2:25 pm
blergh. that’s what friends are for right? loyalty.. it’s a good thing but then you’ll get stabbed on the back or betrayed once you’ve been too good to them. now im only loyal to few people. your situation with the aaron belinda thing was abit like mine though, but mine is relationship wise. My then boyfriend whom is my ex now, fell for the person that i loathe the most which was his bestfriend. I accepted her and let him being friends with her since i wanna make him happy, but then he left my loyalty ass for that monster. I also dunno whether being loyal is a good thing at times, but oh well.
i guess next time just listen to our instincts when we doubt abt loyalty.
39. alea | January 21st, 2008 at 2:26 pm
btw, tze ching is like me lor. im not anti fur at all. If im wealthy, i wanna be like Liz Taylor with all the furs and diamonds. wtf jk please dont kill me ah su ann.
wtf am babbling.
40. Michelle | January 21st, 2008 at 2:42 pm
Did I?
ZOMG. ==
All of this must be hard for you. Even harder when someone begins to make assumptions. Well, we shouldn’t assume too much. Makes an ass out of you and me.
41. ben | January 21st, 2008 at 4:50 pm
“so, do not hijack this and turn it into one of those chapters in the elaborate movie of your life. in a nutshell, please dont be so damn perasan.”
hahahhahaha pinkpau i love you. please teach that annoying little whinger a lesson. for the good of all mankind.
42. k0k | January 21st, 2008 at 5:04 pm
actually, i’ve just found out that belinda is telling aaron not to be friends with all of us :) who’s the petty one in this situation?
Wait, that sounds really familiar!
Isn’t that’s what you guys did too? Asking Aaron not to be friends with her?
If she’s truly so vile, you should let Aaron find out for himself. Having all of you emptying rounds into her is just going to make Aaron feel more like she’s championing a poor, misunderstood damsel (and we all know how guys like feeling like a knight in shining WTF armour). And if he’s already smitten with her, it would HAVE to run its full course.
Anyhow, I apologize in case I am having any erroneous impressions here but it’s plenty hard to comment with the limited amount of info you give. At any rate, I AM truly neutral :)
43. k0k | January 21st, 2008 at 5:07 pm
wait, how come I feel like I’m trying to champion the poor, misunderstood Belinda too o.o?
44. Lalita | January 21st, 2008 at 10:40 pm
I think we all do the loyalty thing to some extent, no? Wrt to the people who are our friends, we dislike the same people etc. As for your edit, I am sitting here geleng-geleng my kepala. Somehow, some people will turn anything out there into “Me, me, me”. Aiyoh, pleaselah right!!!
45. doink | January 22nd, 2008 at 1:46 am
hello,
i came and saw. =)
to me, loyalty is non-existence if its one way. sometimes, you just have to accept the true colors of humanity and move on. you can’t dwell too much on insignificant individuals, if you do, it will just suck the life outha you !
btw, nice meeting you. ;)
46. pinkpau | January 22nd, 2008 at 2:50 am
alea : wow that best friend boyfriend thing really sucks. that is so blair-serena-nate! O_O poor you :( i’m sorry that had to happen.
michelle : haha that ass out of you and me thing cracks me up all the time!
ben : dowan lah ben. i’m so sick of all these petty little things.
k0k : you’ve misinterpreted the situation :) we never asked him not to be friends with her. anyway ya i think that knight in shining armour thing is what is at play, but you cant blame me for having no respect for that sort of machination. neutrality is something one should only employ after thinking long and hard about both sides of the story, instead of employing it because one is lazy or just afraid of responsibility.
lalita : yes! please lah right!! -_____-
doink : such wise words. i should so stop giving air time to insignificant people -___- sigh stress me out for nothing only.
47. Sparky | January 22nd, 2008 at 3:23 am
if you’re really loyal to your friends and love them that much, the love should also transcend to showing that they’re wrong. Do the boycott, but do let him know its a consequence of his action; then he might change for the better.
As for Aaron, leave him be. Sometimes pple need to discover things for themselves, esp if this girl is as horrid as you make her out to be. Common sense will prevail.
48. alice | January 22nd, 2008 at 6:55 am
i hope he does realize it, too. helplessness isn’t fun. i have a friend that’s similar in that way. different situations, but the overall idea is still the same - the friends are punished by their choices as a result. as for us, we are still waiting for her to come around. we haven’t abandoned her, but we aren’t holding our breath. our life goes on with or without her and when she comes around, she’s welcome - anytime.
love can be so silly sometimes.
49. keropok | January 22nd, 2008 at 11:33 am
i think u shouldnt boycott him. all u hav to do is wait, pray and hope ur best friend made a right choice, hope that he wouldnt be hurt by this vicious girl everyone hates.
this is what friends mean aint it. never ask for more, because he is still the same deep down when you guys are together.
50. pinkshirtz | January 22nd, 2008 at 5:22 pm
haha … i have a friend, whos girlfriend is quite a insect. Biting and gnawing away. But we still have to put up with her character … in fear of her boycotting our friend and … its tough when your friend likes a very unlikable girl. Sighz!
51. alea | January 22nd, 2008 at 5:58 pm
VERY blair-nate-serena situation. but thank god i wasn’t that close to her before or else it’ll break my heart to pieces even more. That’s why im always in Team Blair wtf
52. TheRealAnonymous | January 22nd, 2008 at 7:59 pm
WAHLAU… everyone got damn long replies yo! =p
I won’t say much… but I’ll comment on your last scenario…
You didn’t do anything wrong in believing him. He was wrong to lie. You didn’t do anything wrong to trust him. He was wrong to use it to his advantage.
On the other hand… if u are one of those who swore to be by their friends at times they need you most… do you not think that this is that time? Is this not the time where your friend is at most in need of being saved? It might not seem so now, but if you do manage to change him, one day he’ll look back into his past and be damn right grateful for wat you have did. =p To have still stood by him when everyone else thinks all hope is lost. =p
I’m not suggesting you carry on being taken advantage of lah… You might hold back a lil’, yes, but dun la sampai neglect all. I got a perfectly gooood example story exactly like this situation… will cerita to you when we go out lerz. =p
In the mean time… carefully consider your actions lar. I personally never neglect any of my friends… nobody wants to be lonely. =)
53. abby | January 22nd, 2008 at 10:52 pm
i love you.
:P
54. aud | January 23rd, 2008 at 12:17 pm
justice to the world yo wtf
55. jihan | January 24th, 2008 at 12:09 pm
i like ur blog.its nice n always have a beatiful picture. n i like ur style.u look relly nice and cute.n im sure u r a nice person though i dont know u.keep up the good works!
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