With friends like Kanye, you wouldn’t really need enemies. All the Kanye memes this week got me to thinking that many of us have folks like him on our friends list. For those of you not familiar with the term, frenemy, popularized by the episode of the same name in Season 3 of Sex and the City, is a term comprised of the words fri(end) and enemy, giving you a term that refers to someone who pretends to be a friend but actually is an enemy.
And thus, I bring you, five signs that your “friend” is actually more of a frenemey:
- They’ve replied to your squee about an achievement or a rare drop more than once with a reply that reminds you they’ve already been there and done that.
- They never seem to actually ever compliment you on anything you do, giving you a backhanded compliment at best. In fact, often rather than gratzing you personally for your achievements, they’ve given you an ungrats– congratulating your guild or your raid on your accomplishments, or worse yet, using that old uncompliment “I haven’t had a chance to congratulate you on…” which is still not a congratulations any way you shake it.
- They listened to you when you sighed about needing only a Malygos run for your Frozen Wastes title then made sure to set up a raid for the one day they knew you couldn’t make it.
- You are up for a guild promotion but they don’t say anything in your favor. No, wait they did say that for the amount of time you have available and have been playing you aren’t that bad at your class.
- They cry bitter tears in blog posts and tweets when a raid fails due to your not being able to be there yet on a day-to-day basis you are never sent a tell, or directly invited to come to heroics, or given any indication at all that you are an important person in their grand scheme of things.BONUS: They leave a horse head in your bed.
Once you’ve identified a frenemy, there are two options open to you: call them on it or cut them loose. If you think the frenemy’s irrational competitiveness and jealousy of you may be due to some sort of misunderstanding on their part, sitting them down for a chat can be a good tact to take. But often, it’s not something you can sort out. You’ll never be on the same page as some folks. And that’s when it’s important to give yourself permission to cut them loose. Turn that frenemy into a non-entity and save yourself some stress/lower your blood pressure!
For more true stories on frenemies and how to spot them, check out the most recent edition of the always compelling This American Life podcast.
Kanye meme graphic posted by cosmic_iris on Wow Ladies.
I really like this post. 🙂
I’ve met a few people like that in the real world. I know I’ve met at least on in WOW, Alliance side. One of the reasons I left the guild. He is the guild leader. Not things he did to me directly but observing how he treated others, well it was sad.
I bet if you posted an ‘EOE achievement run’ in the forums you would get a group. 😉 I know I would love to see EOE again. I remember we went in there a few days after it went live, and it was bugged. 🙁 Now that I think of it, I have had a few ‘bugged’ heroics/raids. Although to be fair, most of them happened soon after WOTLK was released.
The graphic…I cannot stop laughing. What a jackass.
Do we haz frenemies?
As Norm says, “We must always be friends.”
Hehe I borrowed some of these from recent LJ dramaz but it is true that I am in dire need of the evil Malygos, dead. I should try to set up a run in the next week or two.
I think that is my favorite of the Kanye meme graphics so far.
I wish everyone was a friend, but I think everyone has a frenemy or two somewhere. I am happy to say I’ve identified and ditched the few I’ve had IRL.
I’ve found a few of those sorts in various guilds, suttle ‘haters’ calling them on it just makes you the bad guy though. Because its “Just a game” and Y so serious? eh?
Interesting POV. I think in general if someone is being an ass, not calling them out on it gives them reinforcement that their behavior is OK. And frankly, who needs folks in their life or in their game who are bent on trying to keep you down? Not me.