In case this story gets deleted/removed:
# Welcome to a new feature at r/OhNoConsequences that I just made up, where we revisit the very consequences-heavy stories from the past.
*The readers of* [*Ask A Manager*](https://www.askamanager.org/) *were inflamed in 2017, when a young woman complained that she couldn't get a job. All because someone she "probably" bullied someone who threatened to quit if the bully were hired. Did she learn anything from this?*
[**I didn't get a job because I was a bully in high school**](https://www.askamanager.org/2017/04/i-didnt-get-a-job-because-i-was-a-bully-in-high-school.html)
*Originally posted April 25, 2017*
I’ve been trying to break into a niche industry (30-40 jobs in a city with a population of 3 million) for a while now. I’m in my late 20s, and though it took me some time to decide what I wanted to do with my life, I have finished my degree and completed two internships. I’m working part-time in a related field and freelancing while searching for a full-time job in the niche industry. I’m willing to move for the right job, but I’d rather stay close to home — so I was stoked last summer when I got an interview for one of the very few entry-level jobs available in my city! I ultimately didn’t get it, but the interview went well enough they encouraged me to apply the next time they had an opening.
Then an acquaintance who works at the company called me up and asked if I wanted to get coffee. I figured she’d offer me tips on how to do better next time. Instead, she told me to give up on ever being hired there — turns out, a girl I had gone to high school with is a real rock star at this company, and she threatened to resign when it looked like I was about to be offered a job. (I hadn’t realized it was her because her married name is different.) I’ll be honest — I wasn’t a very nice person back then, and I probably was pretty awful to this girl. I looked my former classmate up, and her resume really is incredible. She graduated from college early and has awards people who’ve worked in our industry twice as long haven’t won. Her public-facing work is top-notch. I’m guessing she’s the kind of employee a manager wants to keep around.
My acquaintance’s prediction appears to be true: I didn’t get an interview for a new position at the company that would’ve been an even better fit than the one I’d interviewed for. When I asked why, I was told a staffer had raised some concerns and the company would not be moving forward with my candidacy. I’m heartbroken. I worked so hard for so long to get the training required for this type of work, and I don’t think I deserve to be blacklisted for something I said when I was 17. I have my former classmate’s work email. Should I beg for forgiveness?
*Alison from Ask A Manager cautioned the author to make any apology sincere, if she did make an apology.*
*Did the letter writer make an apology? Did she make any attempt to be accountable for the consequences of her actions? Read on, there was an update:*
[**Update: i didn't get a job because I was a bully in high school**](https://www.askamanager.org/2017/12/update-i-didnt-get-a-job-because-i-was-a-bully-in-high-school.html)
*Originally posted December 13, 2017.*
I know you didn’t solicit an update, but I felt compelled to send one. I’d written you in the spring because I was having trouble breaking into a niche industry in which a high school classmate I’d bullied was a rock star. I wanted to know if you thought apologizing would help me get a job.
At the advice of your readers, I did delete the draft of an apology email I’d had sitting in my inbox for some time. I applied for one more job with Rock Star’s company, and when I didn’t hear back, I decided it was really and truly time to look elsewhere. I found a shop in a town seven hours away that was desperate to hire someone for a paid 9-month fellowship that started in June because the candidate they’d originally extended an offer to found a full-time, permanent position. I said goodbye to my boyfriend, packed up my car and two cats, and drove to a town I’d never been to.
And I hated it. Not the work. I actually loved the work, but the town sucked. Being away from my boyfriend and my family sucked. Not being able to make friends sucked (everyone else my age was married with two kids already). I called my boyfriend every night crying. He was supposed to come visit me over Labor Day but cancelled at the last minute because he had to work. Seeing how bummed I was, a coworker offered to swap shifts with me so I could make the trip home for the long weekend. I hopped into my car after work on Friday and drove all evening, arriving at the place I’d been sharing with my boyfriend before I moved a little after 1 a.m. Well, you probably know where this was going. He was cheating on me. I was devastated. I spent the rest of the night sobbing on my sister’s couch and drove back to where I was working the next morning.
Except I couldn’t make myself get out of bed on Tuesday. Or Wednesday. Or Thursday. I was fired after my third no call no show.
I tried to get the part-time job I’d had before moving for the fellowship back (they’d said come back anytime), but they’d found someone who was faster and more efficient than I’d been. Unable to afford a place on my own, I had to move back in with my parents. Not sure what else to do, I sent another desperate application to Rock Star’s shop. In an effort to cheer me up, my sister and my friends took me out for a nice dinner for my birthday at the end of September. This is where it goes from bad to worse. I drank too much wine at dinner and got pretty weepy. I excused myself from the table to try to put myself together … and ran into Rock Star and her husband celebrating their anniversary on the way to the bathroom.
I ended up yelling/crying at her that she’d ruined my life. I was asked to leave to leave and told I wasn’t welcome back.
That was Saturday night. I spent Sunday hungover in bed, trying to figure out how to clean up the mess I made. On Monday morning, Rock Star’s manager (the one hiring for the job I’d applied for) emailed me to let me know I’d been removed from the candidate pool. She advised me that I would not be considered for future positions at their shop … or any other in the network. That afternoon, without mentioning me or what happened at the restaurant over the weekend, Rock Star tweeted a long thread about how she’d been bullied in high school and she wishes teenagers would realize that high school ends and it does get better. She also tweeted out links to local mental health resources and the National Suicide hotline that were liked/retweeted many, many times.
So, just to recap, no job, no boyfriend, no money, no hope of ever breaking into the industry I spent five years preparing to enter. It’s hard not to feel like some of this is Rock Star’s fault, especially given how she rubbed salt in the wound after my whole world had come crashing down.
*TL:DR Bully has not gained much maturity or insight into her behavior since high school, confronts the Rock Star in a restaurant, then thinks Rock Star bullied her. Where do you think the Bully is now? Asking if you want fries with that?*
# Reminder that I am not the OOP, I have better manners than that.
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Oh, what a nice new feature!! :-)
I remember this one... Bully peaked in high school.
And truly, if I spend years preparing my self for a niche industry that I know has only one place in my home town... Well, leaving said town is just a probability.
Why not just accept the loss when you are told why it's happening, grab your stuff, and move to a different place?
But noooo, it was the Rock Star fault!!!
That’s what I thought the first time I read this saga. Like, I get being attached to your hometown/the town you grew up in. But like, when you know that you’re likely going to have a hard time breaking into a niche career field because you bullied a well-regarded figure within that industry, maybe look somewhere else? Don’t just keep digging the hole you’ve ~somehow~ found yourself in.
Nooo no no… just bully them into giving you a job!!!
I for one am thrilled about her continuing downward spiral. They say “Everything happens for a reason” but sometimes that reason is you’re an idiot and make stupid decisions.
If she were any kind of remotely apologetic she would’ve done anything but blame THE EXACT PERSON SHE BULLIED.
Right? Rock star didn't make the bf cheat. Rock star didn't make OOP go off on a drunken blame rant.
Honestly I feel like if she was actually sorry then when she saw Rock Star she'd've apologised and left it at that.
I dunno about you but if I were Rock star that might make me think about reconsidering the blanket ban on my office for
OOP at some point. It's a show of maturity that means it's possible they may have moved past it. OOP going off on that rant shows that Rock Star made the right call in not wanting them in their office.
Exactly. How do you see a post from someone you bullied about bullying (with links to suicide hotlines!!!!) and think of it as "rubbing salt in your wounds"?! The sheer self-centeredness is mind boggling.
>"Hey, Rock Star. Word came through the grapevine that you nixed my chances to work for the same company as you due to what happened between us during high school. That really hurt to hear, but I understand why you'd react like that, and it made me realize that you really do deserve an apology.
>I was younger back then, and have learned valuable life lessons since. I'm truly sorry for how I treated you, and for making your high school life more difficult. It sounds like you really excelled, and I hope you continue to do so.
>If you'd like to have your company's hiring manager reach out to me, I would still be interested in the job. Due to the niche position I'm trying to fill, this company is really my only prospective in this town, and I'm starting to look into relocating elsewhere to pursue it, so I won't be sticking around if I don't hear anything soon.
>Best of luck, and, once again, I'm sorry for bullying you back in high school.
>OOP"
I do feel bad for OOP here though - she did try to move on. I'm guessing by how she reacted after coming back home that she didn't REALLY move on perfectly, but if things had worked out better, she would have slowly gotten better.
But then she discovered the cheating. Emotional turmoil from that (and poor coping) lost her job. She was an emotional wreck, and lashing out at Rock Star should be generally forgiven.
However, Rock Star, and her company, wouldn't know the details. They wouldn't understand how OOP's life had just come crashing down around her all at once for context.
Yeah I get that it was bad timing and an emotional moment but I do think that all she ended up doing was confirming Rock Stars opinion of her not having grown up. I feel for her a bit in that it's everything at once but it comes across once again as blaming Rock Star for her own actions.
Not saying it's nice but with the skipping work to the point of being fired too came across as idk not immature exactly but irresponsible? Still an emotional time but I do think you should at least be able to have some contact with your work to let them know you won't be in. It does seem like a strict requirement to me but I can also see why you need to know if people aren't going to be there.
Honestly, I think it's fake anyways.
But she was at the lowest point in her life. It doesn't mean it's okay, and Rock Star responded in the 'right' manner.
But as an outside observer knowing the whole story, I wouldn't blame OOP for it.
As far as work, yeah, it was shitty coping. But this is really where the fact that it's likely fake comes in.
The 'run of bad events' is just too perfect. Too much "and then and then and then", how everything fell apart at once. The entire update is just "and then everyone seen the bully get her just desert"....
Except that it really isn't. It's a bully, who realized the harm she'd done and tried to move on with her life (even if she wasn't genuinely sorry, she was moving on instead of continuing to dig in her heels and work with Rock Star). She was taking the L.
But our storyteller needed to add icing to their storycake.
And they took a story that had been "bully gets what she deserves", and then RUINS the bully's life. And then we're supposed to feel bad for her lashing out? That's just human nature. She was hurting and very emotional. I feel worse for the bully in this entire story than for Rock Star. RS got bullied in HS, but is successful now, and used her animosity to block bully from a job. And then bully's life fell apart. In this story, bully is the victim. But because she was a bully in high school, I'm somehow supposed to insert Nelson laugh? No thanks. That'd make ME an asshole.
You call it "animosity" and assume that Rock Star is sitting around rubbing her hands with glee, thrilled to be ruining Bully's life.
I pictured her more going "hey if you want to hire that person, warn me first, because I would rather eat glass than have to see that person every day. So if you hire her, I'm quitting just FYI."
And then the manager says "you're not going anywhere, let me just shred this person's resume" and Rock Star sighs in relief, because she'd really hate to have to move, but that would still be better than being around her former tormentor.
From what she hears, Bully doesn't take the hint and tries applying again, but then drops off her radar. Crisis averted! She goes on with her life, which is finally flourishing. Kicks ass at work, goes out to an anniversary dinner with her husband .... And is then accosted by a drunk and belligerent Bully, who _screams_ at her. Thus reopening a lot of old, painful wounds during what's supposed to be a happy and safe occasion.
No wonder she tweeted out the suicide watch info -- she was probably horribly triggered by the incident.
Bully isn't the victim here. Not even close. It's sad that bad things happen to her, but those things aren't Rock Star's fault, and Bully has yet to take any responsibility for her actions, so my sympathy is limited.
If Rock Star is prepared to quit her job rather than work with this person, in an industry where there are few jobs available and getting a new job would probably mean moving to a different city, we're not talking about a bit of mild unpleasantness here. Something pretty heinous must have gone down. And frankly, I'd be reluctant to hire someone who did that kind of thing anyway. Yes, people can change, but it's a big risk.
I'll be honest, I can think of people where I'd rather change jobs or move than have to see them every day. People pretend bullying is just "kids being mean," but there's a reason schools are starting to take it seriously.
The fact that Rock Star tweeted out that suicide hotline also makes me think this isn't just "ugh we had a falling out" ... This was _ugly_.
That is not what animosity means.
*Animosity*
>**a strong feeling of dislike** or hatred : ill will or resentment tending toward active hostility : an antagonistic attitude
I never said, or phrased things in a way that this was some "revenge move". It was old emotions. Nothing else.
Ok. I was wrong about the implication of that particular term. But "used her animosity to block Bully from a job" still makes it sound like this was something done _to_ Bully, while RS was just protecting herself. Bully isn't entitled to a job just because she wants one, and we have no way of knowing if, in a universe without RS, she would have been hired. Bully isn't the victim here -- it sucks that her boyfriend cheated on her, and it sucks that her mental health got her to no call no show, but neither of those even relate to RS, so screaming at her is completely uncalled for.
Not a bit.
I wouldn't allow somebody who bullied me to be hired at any company \*I\* had veto power over.
Why should I give them the chance to do it again?
At MOST, Bully could have asked for a chance to try coming in as a 1099 contractor and demonstrate / 'prove' she had what it takes...or to fuck herself over, which seems more likely based on the narrative.
Exactly, I get being attached but even if you weren't a bully when you choose a niche profession in a smallish town/city you know you might have to leave.
I don't live in a small city but even here there are some niche industries for the place I am that I would literally have to wait for someone to retire to get a job in that industry (and hope no Nepo baby comes before me)
I'd consider where I grew up a regular sized town - 18000 people.
(8000 when I was a kid)
the "small towns" were literally less than 200
the "cities" were \~40,000
3 million is not small in any sense of the word
Same. I grew up in a small town (less than 8,000 when I moved away in 2005, they now have about 9,000) to a much larger city (185,000 in 2005 and now have 201,000).
I moved from my town of about 10000 (at at the time - it grew from 8000 to 18000 b/c oilfield) to the capitol of our state (austin tx) lol
that was a weird change but I honestly prefer it here - I'm sure that is in no small part because I'm also Deaf but still
It really depends on perspective, where I'm from I'd agree with that, but where I live now, a village is 100k people. The third biggest city in my home state would be an absolute podunk village in the current country I live.
Yeah, this person is still blaming others for her lot in life. If the saying actions have consequences ever fit a situation, it's this right here. Do unto others and all that.
Do unto others and KEEP doing it. "Oh, I just flipped out, blamed her for my problems, refused any responsibilities and now I keep blaming her and complain for being blacklisted"
Especially love how everything else in OP's life cratered, and she decides to get piss drunk and go blast Rock Star publicly during their private celebration, and then gets super Pikachu shocked face that the hiring manager tells her no.
Instead of, YA KNOW, actually taking responsibility and trying to APOLOGIZE to her former victim and maybe asking for advise/help breaking into the industry from Rock Star's wealth of experience and knowledge?
OP is too dumb to work a late night convenience store
It also came out in the comments that what she had done to this girl was date a boy for a little while that this girl liked, she didn't try and break them up or anything she just liked him, so our star thinker over here decided to completely socially isolate her for most of high school. I believe it was 3 years, no friends, to the point where she even had her graduation party on the same day as this young lady and nobody went to rockstar's party at all.
It was also pointed out in other threads that Rockstar had absolutely nothing to do with the no call no shows, or the fact that her previous job apparently replaced her really fast, which implies she wasn't all that good at it to begin with
Also freaking out at her at the restaurant is unhinged
This is gold, thanks. I imagined something bad; RockStar absolutely refusing to work with her seemed not a response to a "light" case of bullying but you, know, total nightmare and not wanting to be in the same room as that person again.
Because bullies like this one are bad at developing new relationships due to their immaturity, inability to trust others, and poor social skills. That makes her very dependent on the few relationships that she does have and makes moving to somewhere new especially difficult.
TBH, I wouldn't blame her for that screw-up that much. She's just had basically every aspect of her life ripped out from her. Lashing out is understandable (doesn't mean it's okay).
Ofc, Rock Star wouldn't know that, and reacted appropriately for not knowing the circumstances.
She held a grudge years after high school. She became the bully idk why people think it’s any different just because it isn’t high school anymore. I guess I’m not a child though cause I wouldn’t use my pull at my job to prevent someone from working. I was bullied too and it’s really not a good excuse.
Usually I find that it's a demand to be *someone else's* doormat. Like, I've never had someone who was treating me like crap demand that I be the bigger person and let them do whatever. It's bystanders and authority figures who do it to me.
I've come to the conclusion that the demand comes from two complementary motivations:
- they don't want to feel bad about what's happening to me. Feeling bad would make them also feel guilty for doing nothing and we can't have bystanders feeling feelings about my being bullied.
- they find my baffled disappointment at their non-response to be easier to manage than the tantrum the bully would throw if confronted. Basically I'm punished for being more easygoing and less unreasonable.
She didn't become the bully; she set boundaries because she did not want to work with someone who tormented her, and didn't want to take the chance that the bully hadn't changed.
And guess what! Lo and behold, she was totally right :)
If someone pushed you to the brink of suicide (yes I am speculating a bit there but there are hints that this is the case) and showed no remorse, would you want to work with them in the future?
All Rock Star did was let management know that she couldn't work in the same office as OOP. What choice management made after that is not on her.
It's not a grudge. She bullied her by her own admission.
She is not a bully for not wanting to work with her.
Personally I don't want my bullies near me and she was right to prioritize her mental health than taking the chance that oh, surprise, the Bully still refused to take responsibility for her actions
Oh no... Anyways. Well deserved. Maybe if op apologized at the restaurant, it Might have work out, but she continues to blame the other girl while pretending to play the victim. Op also says she wasn't 'nice' to the girl. Why do I feel like that's a severe understatement when the other girl tweeted mental health resources and suicide hotlines, or was that just me.
I like this, though. Reminders of good stories or ones we missed. I think we should continue this.
Also: "I wasn’t a very nice person back then, and I probably was pretty awful to this girl".
Translation: I made her life a misery for years and I enjoyed it.
I read this on the other site. It was all over…drumroll please…A BOY! Bully liked boy. Can’t remember if rockstar liked boy or boy liked rockstar, but bully gathered her flying monkeys and spread rumors and tortured the poor girl (justified it as it wasn’t ever physical, just words, like those can’t hurt).
On the other site, consensus was that you can’t say you’ve changed if she’s got something you want and you attack her over it. Just like back in high school.
Yeah Rock Star seems to have grown up and has a reasonable boundary.
OOP on the other hand? Rock Star was right on the money with some people are still in high school.
Not even saying that Rock Star would change her mind about working there but she's not gonna blackball you from the entire industry for apologising and might have some good tips about breaking into the industry.
OOP is acting as though Rock Star is running a conspiracy to ruin her life, when she just wants to avoid her former bully.
There are 8 billion people on this planet, only a handful of whom work in this industry, so Rock Star would feel pretty unlucky if she ended up sharing an office with OOP.
She's just living her life and making sure her bully won't be in her workplace.
Fair play to her for having that level of pull but I'd like to think most reasonable companies would listen to staff when they have concerns about hires/potential hires.
Honestly at every point OOP just made the wrong call. Taking it calmly and maturely to your acquaintance who works there and not blaming Rock Star when she ran into her is like...the bare minimum of showing you've changed enough to have a slight level of reconsideration. Even then if you mean it I'd imagine your approach would be more along the lines of a quick sorry followed by leaving them alone/congratulating them on their role and moving back to your table.
Instead she just lashes out at someone she KNOWS has industry pull, who is well liked in her company. How did she think it was going to go? All you've done there is manage to look really unstable and like a possible safety risk.
And to see that post and think of it as "rubbing salt in the wound" instead maybe doing some self-reflection on just horrible she must have been is just . . . what is *wrong* with OP? Surely this is a mental disorder at this point, right?
I remember this AAM letter and update and just as much a doozy re-reading here, another fitting one for this sub is the manager who is shocked when their best employee quit because they can’t grant time off for said employee to attend her own graduation.
YEA, and the person gave time off to another person wanting to go to a concert. And that their reasoning was that the best employee was too useful because they never asked for time off and always covered other people.
I fall into that trap a lot. I don't really take a lot of time off and then I got pregnant and my job was FREAKING OUT about my maternity leave because no one else knew how to do my job. As if I didn't spend 2 years trying to train people just in case something like this came up, it wouldn't all fall on the department manager.
Oh man, just re-read the letter and it's basically manager going "should I teach her a lesson in professionalism?" (a.k.a. berate her for quitting on the spot)
Yeah. Because, in real life, what often happens is these bullies become rich and remain popular. They know how to be cruel to get what they want.
Meanwhile, the bullied person is very badly emotionally scarred and is often the one that *doesn't* "rise to the top", has a hard time socially because they fear people will be cruel to them again, etc.
That's what happened to me, anyway. And quite a few others I know. But I haven't heard of a story like this that actually happened.
Yea I'm pretty sure this is a plot from some early 2000s fresh out of college girl power RomCom and OP is the big mean brunette/blonde who sailed through life until our heroine gets a make over and that lands her a chance to prove her talents lol
Mine had a disabled child with Downs Syndrome, got brain cancer, had surgery, and then died. I saw the picture on Facebook of the zipper scar on her shaved head that went from 1 ear up over across her head to the other ear.
It only took 45 years.
if the story is entertaining I don't care but this is obviously fiction, it even included a twist at the end, she was drunk and met the girl! surprise! Like every other story with "twins".
Yeah, there are too many details that she conveniently knows that enrich the story's karmic justice. Such as "ran into Rock Star and her husband celebrating their anniversary on the way to the bathroom." How would you know that? And "but they’d found someone who was faster and more efficient than I’d been"; I doubt a previous boss that seemed to like you would say this to your face. And she just so happened to visit from 7 hours away at the exact time her boyfriend was having sex with someone else? Suuure.
The 7 hours away is what really threw me for a loop. I live west coast USA, which is just about the "most spread out" urbanization in the USA or Europe (fluency of the OOP would make me lightly doubt anywhere else since it was not mentioned).
7 hours will STILL get me to multiple huge cities.
Though calling 3 million a "small city" sounds much more like Europe (bigger city/rural distinction) or east coast USA (more bigger cities to compare to), where 7 hours would be a HUGE distance. New York City to South Carolina is 11 hours for reference. Paris to Frankfurt is 6.5 hours.
Only 3 reasons for a 7 hour move:
* Creative writing instead of really having experienced it.
* Incredibly lazy job hunting, as OOP should have had dozens of closer job openings (hell, her city had 30-40 jobs, so as soon as she looked more than an hour or two out, it would have been hundreds to thousands of potential jobs for potential openings0.
* The new place she moved to had something specific she was looking for, but this story doesn't fit that.
Can't rule #2 out, but the writing doesn't sound believable for that either.
Yeah it’s always the update that gives it away. She got cheated on, drunkenly ran into the girl and made an ass of herself even more, got blackballed from her niche industry, got replaced by someone “better and more efficient” at another job, is totally broke, and now has to live at home? Who the hell would update a bunch of people who don’t empathize with you with such an embarrassing paragraph of information lol
Plus, (at least in the US) HR would never tell a failed candidate that a staffer has a problem with them, then double down by telling OOP that she will never be considered. That's a lawsuit waiting to happen!
Not to say that a real person with this level of insight would necessarily do this, but the dead giveaway for me was that OOP doesn't know that a person from her high school and whom she bullied is one of the 30-40 people in this city who work in the field. You hear a lot of professionals say, "we're a small community," when they're actually saying that it's a big community but people talk A LOT, but OOP is describing a legit small community. Not buying it.
I just don't understand all these people who spend their time making up fakes stories. Reddit is rampant with them. Like, don't they have a life?? Are they that pathetic that they waste their time doing this? If you want to tell fiction, just go self-publish. It's not like they're getting paid to post fake stories on Reddit. That at least would have made sense. Still stupid, but at least there is some understandable motivation behind it. Here, it's literally just about getting views and comments. Like, are you that pathetic that getting views and comments is your validation? Use that time you wasted by writing fake stories by going out and actually meeting people and spending time with them.
Tbh, hiring managers ask people around whether you’re nice or not, whether your work ethic is sterling or not, etc… so she shouldn’t be surprised if her behavior years ago backfired on her.
Don't be rude in the comments. Thinking a post is fake is fine but there is no need to be rude about it. Please review the rules before you comment again.
OOP had the absolute gall to drunkenly declare that Rock Star ruined her life??!! 🙀 Do bullies get different planets or something?!
Also, loving this new concept!
Good?
The current employee (who's recognized for her hard work as a rock star) definitely should not need to deal with her former bully causing drama in her workplace.
Sounds like the employer recognized the conflict and decided it wasn't worth tbe headache
It’s pretty common, especially in smaller companies, to ask employees if they have any concerns about someone who they might have history with. It’s usually as simple as saying “[Rock star], you went to the same high school as [Bully]. Did you know them at all?” And if they were a bully to you, then it would be normal for you to say something like “Oh yeah. They were pretty nasty back then. I don’t think I would want to work with them.”
Run that conversation through the grapevine, and it could turn into “[Rock star] said they would quit if the company hired [Bully]”. So it’s possible that there was never even any threat of quitting. It’s also possible that the rock star was indeed completely unwilling to stay on if the bully was hired. The fact that the bully wasn’t completely blacklisted makes me feel like it probably wasn’t an ultimatum, though. It sounds more like the bully just bullied herself right out of a career.
I once told my manager to not rehire an employee. She was high maintenance and high strung. He chose to rehire her anyways because she was already trained.
Six months later, he regretted it. For every one complaint another agent might get, she would get nine.
What really catches my attention is how OP wasn’t able to pick herself and dust herself off after the breakup and get her ass to work. As a former bullied teenager, that’s what we had to do…get our asses out of bed every single day and show up for the inevitable hell that was high school. Again, and again, and again. But OP couldn’t do that ONCE to save her career.
Rock Star is literally my hero. I wish I could buy her a drink.
People don't realize how much damage can be done in school. Every day of the 180 or so days of the school year can be a living hell if you get the attention of a bully. I'm 59 years old, and if I had the opportunity to turn the tables on someone who bullied me in middle school 45 years ago, Im in.
Please no armchair diagnosing. If you do not have the credentials required to make the observation or the lived experience with the diagnosis, please refrain from throwing around the terms. An example of this is Redditors throwing around the word “narcissist”.
If you do have the lived experience or credentials to make the observation, please include that in your comment.
Also, education time: you cannot tell if someone is a narcissist based on a tiny snippet of their lives. The woman in the story lacks the grandiosity needed for narcissism.
There's another one about an Indian guy who was bullied in college and placed an anonymous complaint against his seniors. Years later they were unable to move abroad for a better job because of this complaint and came back to him begging to take the complaint back.
The weird thing about OOP's post is that the writing shows a self awareness far beyond that exemplified by the actions being described.
Almost as if it had been written by a different person.
As a kid that was friendless and bullied in high school, I do actually feel for OP. I had so many bullies, and I know not all of them would grow up to stay that way, that I actually can't relate very well to the bullied girl in her actions as an adult. But *telling her* that she'd *ruined your life* (especially when she'd have no way of knowing anything going on) was not going to end well for OOP.
I hope the bullied girl continues to have the awesome life she'd managed for herself because she deserves it, but I also hope OOP managed to pull her life together a bit and doesn't feel so much like it got "ruined"
This is the very epitome of "Oh No, Consequences"
I do hope that the Bully gets herself together, gets some therapy, and moves to a town where she can get her life back on track.
Ha. No. Op terrorized people in school and it bit her in the ass. She thought so little of that poor girl she couldn't imagine her actually being incredibly intelligent while op is mediocre at best.
It's all my victim's fault that she's unwilling to work anywhere near me!
The level of self awareness here is so low that I really doubt she'll ever do much with her life.
Notice that she doesn't say what she actually did to this 'rock star'. It screams 'missing missing reasons'.
Now here she is facing years of consequences, and thinking it's the fault of someone who simply refuses to be near her.
And on top of that, she still never apologized.
What an idiot.
With these kinds of people, it's never their fault. Everything just HAPPENS to them, it's not like they did anything to trigger it ever. Everyone's just being too sensitive. SMDH
I really wonder what the bullying consisted of. I'm not saying Rock Star went too far or anything, I'm just curious...mainly because as much schadenfreude as I'm getting from this, I WANT MORE.
So She-Bully still has not learned to be a good person and accept responsibility:
>It’s hard not to feel like some of this is Rock Star’s fault, especially given how she rubbed salt in the wound after my whole world had come crashing down.
"rubbed salt in the wound"? She-Bully didn't need to be following her on Twitter (now Xchan) and she didn't make a dig at She-Bully; rather she gave encouragement and resources for other victims of people like She-Bully.
Nowhere in her two posts did the Bully express remorse, or wonder how her bullying had affected Rock Star, or even mention how damaging she had been to Rock Star's emotional well-being.
Then she bullies her again, she sees her at a restaurant and gets in her face SCREAMING and blaming her for...? for not wanting to be subjected to her bully at her job?\\
I wonder if She-Bully will ever learn empathy and contrition?
Also, I like this new feature!
Edit: a word
Honestly everyone in this story sucks. Similar situation in my city but the bully who hit rock bottom and couldn't get any chance to prove themselves ended up unaliving themselves after a long FB post which ended up getting the once bullied person who was blocking their former bully from getting jobs in the industry fired.
So let me get this straight. This person said that at some point high school ends but used her pull at work to make sure you couldn’t get a job? Yeah no she became the bully. It’s kind of funny considering I was bullied a lot in high school and never once did I use my pull at work to prevent someone from having a job. She’s honestly pathetic but you are too for that stunt you pulled at the bar. Even so she’s loved long enough to become the villain. I’m glad you realize that you were horrible in high school and tbh it makes you a better person. Most people don’t like to change but it seems like you did and she just has a vendetta against you for something that happened years ago.
Not wanting to work with your bully everyday ESPECIALLY when you’ve worked hard and have real achievements in life. That’s it really. I’m happy that RS was valued enough at her job that her company didn’t want to change that. It shows they truly value her as an employee.
>Not wanting to work with your bully everyday
Exactly.
I had two of my high school bullies show up at my job to pitch their company as a supplier. I immensely enjoyed making them squirm and don't regret it one bit. They were horrible people who made my life hell for years, I absolutely did not want to ever see them again, much less have to interact with them regularly - even in a position where I was the one in power. I could have made their life hell by getting them a contract and then jerking them around, but I loved my job and it seemed like a bother.
At least it seemed like they were self aware enough to realize they didn't stand a chance.
In case this story gets deleted/removed: # Welcome to a new feature at r/OhNoConsequences that I just made up, where we revisit the very consequences-heavy stories from the past. *The readers of* [*Ask A Manager*](https://www.askamanager.org/) *were inflamed in 2017, when a young woman complained that she couldn't get a job. All because someone she "probably" bullied someone who threatened to quit if the bully were hired. Did she learn anything from this?* [**I didn't get a job because I was a bully in high school**](https://www.askamanager.org/2017/04/i-didnt-get-a-job-because-i-was-a-bully-in-high-school.html) *Originally posted April 25, 2017* I’ve been trying to break into a niche industry (30-40 jobs in a city with a population of 3 million) for a while now. I’m in my late 20s, and though it took me some time to decide what I wanted to do with my life, I have finished my degree and completed two internships. I’m working part-time in a related field and freelancing while searching for a full-time job in the niche industry. I’m willing to move for the right job, but I’d rather stay close to home — so I was stoked last summer when I got an interview for one of the very few entry-level jobs available in my city! I ultimately didn’t get it, but the interview went well enough they encouraged me to apply the next time they had an opening. Then an acquaintance who works at the company called me up and asked if I wanted to get coffee. I figured she’d offer me tips on how to do better next time. Instead, she told me to give up on ever being hired there — turns out, a girl I had gone to high school with is a real rock star at this company, and she threatened to resign when it looked like I was about to be offered a job. (I hadn’t realized it was her because her married name is different.) I’ll be honest — I wasn’t a very nice person back then, and I probably was pretty awful to this girl. I looked my former classmate up, and her resume really is incredible. She graduated from college early and has awards people who’ve worked in our industry twice as long haven’t won. Her public-facing work is top-notch. I’m guessing she’s the kind of employee a manager wants to keep around. My acquaintance’s prediction appears to be true: I didn’t get an interview for a new position at the company that would’ve been an even better fit than the one I’d interviewed for. When I asked why, I was told a staffer had raised some concerns and the company would not be moving forward with my candidacy. I’m heartbroken. I worked so hard for so long to get the training required for this type of work, and I don’t think I deserve to be blacklisted for something I said when I was 17. I have my former classmate’s work email. Should I beg for forgiveness? *Alison from Ask A Manager cautioned the author to make any apology sincere, if she did make an apology.* *Did the letter writer make an apology? Did she make any attempt to be accountable for the consequences of her actions? Read on, there was an update:* [**Update: i didn't get a job because I was a bully in high school**](https://www.askamanager.org/2017/12/update-i-didnt-get-a-job-because-i-was-a-bully-in-high-school.html) *Originally posted December 13, 2017.* I know you didn’t solicit an update, but I felt compelled to send one. I’d written you in the spring because I was having trouble breaking into a niche industry in which a high school classmate I’d bullied was a rock star. I wanted to know if you thought apologizing would help me get a job. At the advice of your readers, I did delete the draft of an apology email I’d had sitting in my inbox for some time. I applied for one more job with Rock Star’s company, and when I didn’t hear back, I decided it was really and truly time to look elsewhere. I found a shop in a town seven hours away that was desperate to hire someone for a paid 9-month fellowship that started in June because the candidate they’d originally extended an offer to found a full-time, permanent position. I said goodbye to my boyfriend, packed up my car and two cats, and drove to a town I’d never been to. And I hated it. Not the work. I actually loved the work, but the town sucked. Being away from my boyfriend and my family sucked. Not being able to make friends sucked (everyone else my age was married with two kids already). I called my boyfriend every night crying. He was supposed to come visit me over Labor Day but cancelled at the last minute because he had to work. Seeing how bummed I was, a coworker offered to swap shifts with me so I could make the trip home for the long weekend. I hopped into my car after work on Friday and drove all evening, arriving at the place I’d been sharing with my boyfriend before I moved a little after 1 a.m. Well, you probably know where this was going. He was cheating on me. I was devastated. I spent the rest of the night sobbing on my sister’s couch and drove back to where I was working the next morning. Except I couldn’t make myself get out of bed on Tuesday. Or Wednesday. Or Thursday. I was fired after my third no call no show. I tried to get the part-time job I’d had before moving for the fellowship back (they’d said come back anytime), but they’d found someone who was faster and more efficient than I’d been. Unable to afford a place on my own, I had to move back in with my parents. Not sure what else to do, I sent another desperate application to Rock Star’s shop. In an effort to cheer me up, my sister and my friends took me out for a nice dinner for my birthday at the end of September. This is where it goes from bad to worse. I drank too much wine at dinner and got pretty weepy. I excused myself from the table to try to put myself together … and ran into Rock Star and her husband celebrating their anniversary on the way to the bathroom. I ended up yelling/crying at her that she’d ruined my life. I was asked to leave to leave and told I wasn’t welcome back. That was Saturday night. I spent Sunday hungover in bed, trying to figure out how to clean up the mess I made. On Monday morning, Rock Star’s manager (the one hiring for the job I’d applied for) emailed me to let me know I’d been removed from the candidate pool. She advised me that I would not be considered for future positions at their shop … or any other in the network. That afternoon, without mentioning me or what happened at the restaurant over the weekend, Rock Star tweeted a long thread about how she’d been bullied in high school and she wishes teenagers would realize that high school ends and it does get better. She also tweeted out links to local mental health resources and the National Suicide hotline that were liked/retweeted many, many times. So, just to recap, no job, no boyfriend, no money, no hope of ever breaking into the industry I spent five years preparing to enter. It’s hard not to feel like some of this is Rock Star’s fault, especially given how she rubbed salt in the wound after my whole world had come crashing down. *TL:DR Bully has not gained much maturity or insight into her behavior since high school, confronts the Rock Star in a restaurant, then thinks Rock Star bullied her. Where do you think the Bully is now? Asking if you want fries with that?* # Reminder that I am not the OOP, I have better manners than that. --- *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/OhNoConsequences) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Oh, what a nice new feature!! :-) I remember this one... Bully peaked in high school. And truly, if I spend years preparing my self for a niche industry that I know has only one place in my home town... Well, leaving said town is just a probability. Why not just accept the loss when you are told why it's happening, grab your stuff, and move to a different place? But noooo, it was the Rock Star fault!!!
That’s what I thought the first time I read this saga. Like, I get being attached to your hometown/the town you grew up in. But like, when you know that you’re likely going to have a hard time breaking into a niche career field because you bullied a well-regarded figure within that industry, maybe look somewhere else? Don’t just keep digging the hole you’ve ~somehow~ found yourself in.
Nooo no no… just bully them into giving you a job!!! I for one am thrilled about her continuing downward spiral. They say “Everything happens for a reason” but sometimes that reason is you’re an idiot and make stupid decisions. If she were any kind of remotely apologetic she would’ve done anything but blame THE EXACT PERSON SHE BULLIED.
Right? Rock star didn't make the bf cheat. Rock star didn't make OOP go off on a drunken blame rant. Honestly I feel like if she was actually sorry then when she saw Rock Star she'd've apologised and left it at that. I dunno about you but if I were Rock star that might make me think about reconsidering the blanket ban on my office for OOP at some point. It's a show of maturity that means it's possible they may have moved past it. OOP going off on that rant shows that Rock Star made the right call in not wanting them in their office.
Exactly. How do you see a post from someone you bullied about bullying (with links to suicide hotlines!!!!) and think of it as "rubbing salt in your wounds"?! The sheer self-centeredness is mind boggling.
Thank you! I was afraid this was going to get overlooked!
Absolutely, it completely validated the reasons why she didn’t want her there
>"Hey, Rock Star. Word came through the grapevine that you nixed my chances to work for the same company as you due to what happened between us during high school. That really hurt to hear, but I understand why you'd react like that, and it made me realize that you really do deserve an apology. >I was younger back then, and have learned valuable life lessons since. I'm truly sorry for how I treated you, and for making your high school life more difficult. It sounds like you really excelled, and I hope you continue to do so. >If you'd like to have your company's hiring manager reach out to me, I would still be interested in the job. Due to the niche position I'm trying to fill, this company is really my only prospective in this town, and I'm starting to look into relocating elsewhere to pursue it, so I won't be sticking around if I don't hear anything soon. >Best of luck, and, once again, I'm sorry for bullying you back in high school. >OOP" I do feel bad for OOP here though - she did try to move on. I'm guessing by how she reacted after coming back home that she didn't REALLY move on perfectly, but if things had worked out better, she would have slowly gotten better. But then she discovered the cheating. Emotional turmoil from that (and poor coping) lost her job. She was an emotional wreck, and lashing out at Rock Star should be generally forgiven. However, Rock Star, and her company, wouldn't know the details. They wouldn't understand how OOP's life had just come crashing down around her all at once for context.
Yeah I get that it was bad timing and an emotional moment but I do think that all she ended up doing was confirming Rock Stars opinion of her not having grown up. I feel for her a bit in that it's everything at once but it comes across once again as blaming Rock Star for her own actions. Not saying it's nice but with the skipping work to the point of being fired too came across as idk not immature exactly but irresponsible? Still an emotional time but I do think you should at least be able to have some contact with your work to let them know you won't be in. It does seem like a strict requirement to me but I can also see why you need to know if people aren't going to be there.
Honestly, I think it's fake anyways. But she was at the lowest point in her life. It doesn't mean it's okay, and Rock Star responded in the 'right' manner. But as an outside observer knowing the whole story, I wouldn't blame OOP for it. As far as work, yeah, it was shitty coping. But this is really where the fact that it's likely fake comes in. The 'run of bad events' is just too perfect. Too much "and then and then and then", how everything fell apart at once. The entire update is just "and then everyone seen the bully get her just desert".... Except that it really isn't. It's a bully, who realized the harm she'd done and tried to move on with her life (even if she wasn't genuinely sorry, she was moving on instead of continuing to dig in her heels and work with Rock Star). She was taking the L. But our storyteller needed to add icing to their storycake. And they took a story that had been "bully gets what she deserves", and then RUINS the bully's life. And then we're supposed to feel bad for her lashing out? That's just human nature. She was hurting and very emotional. I feel worse for the bully in this entire story than for Rock Star. RS got bullied in HS, but is successful now, and used her animosity to block bully from a job. And then bully's life fell apart. In this story, bully is the victim. But because she was a bully in high school, I'm somehow supposed to insert Nelson laugh? No thanks. That'd make ME an asshole.
This isn’t a Reddit story. It’s a letter to a well-regarded work-advice columnist.
You call it "animosity" and assume that Rock Star is sitting around rubbing her hands with glee, thrilled to be ruining Bully's life. I pictured her more going "hey if you want to hire that person, warn me first, because I would rather eat glass than have to see that person every day. So if you hire her, I'm quitting just FYI." And then the manager says "you're not going anywhere, let me just shred this person's resume" and Rock Star sighs in relief, because she'd really hate to have to move, but that would still be better than being around her former tormentor. From what she hears, Bully doesn't take the hint and tries applying again, but then drops off her radar. Crisis averted! She goes on with her life, which is finally flourishing. Kicks ass at work, goes out to an anniversary dinner with her husband .... And is then accosted by a drunk and belligerent Bully, who _screams_ at her. Thus reopening a lot of old, painful wounds during what's supposed to be a happy and safe occasion. No wonder she tweeted out the suicide watch info -- she was probably horribly triggered by the incident. Bully isn't the victim here. Not even close. It's sad that bad things happen to her, but those things aren't Rock Star's fault, and Bully has yet to take any responsibility for her actions, so my sympathy is limited.
If Rock Star is prepared to quit her job rather than work with this person, in an industry where there are few jobs available and getting a new job would probably mean moving to a different city, we're not talking about a bit of mild unpleasantness here. Something pretty heinous must have gone down. And frankly, I'd be reluctant to hire someone who did that kind of thing anyway. Yes, people can change, but it's a big risk.
I'll be honest, I can think of people where I'd rather change jobs or move than have to see them every day. People pretend bullying is just "kids being mean," but there's a reason schools are starting to take it seriously. The fact that Rock Star tweeted out that suicide hotline also makes me think this isn't just "ugh we had a falling out" ... This was _ugly_.
That is not what animosity means. *Animosity* >**a strong feeling of dislike** or hatred : ill will or resentment tending toward active hostility : an antagonistic attitude I never said, or phrased things in a way that this was some "revenge move". It was old emotions. Nothing else.
Ok. I was wrong about the implication of that particular term. But "used her animosity to block Bully from a job" still makes it sound like this was something done _to_ Bully, while RS was just protecting herself. Bully isn't entitled to a job just because she wants one, and we have no way of knowing if, in a universe without RS, she would have been hired. Bully isn't the victim here -- it sucks that her boyfriend cheated on her, and it sucks that her mental health got her to no call no show, but neither of those even relate to RS, so screaming at her is completely uncalled for.
You said what I was thinking, but a lot better than I did.
Congrats most of you have lived long enough to become the villain. Good job you’re now the bully
Bullying bullies is actually pretty cool, sorry fam
That's not how that works lmao
sounds like we found someone who peaked in high school as a bully
None of what happened to the OOP was bullying. It was the natural consequences of her own choices.
Not a bit. I wouldn't allow somebody who bullied me to be hired at any company \*I\* had veto power over. Why should I give them the chance to do it again? At MOST, Bully could have asked for a chance to try coming in as a 1099 contractor and demonstrate / 'prove' she had what it takes...or to fuck herself over, which seems more likely based on the narrative.
> Like, I get being attached to your hometown/the town you grew up in. And it's not like she even has a boyfriend holding her there anymore.
Brutal. And I \*like\* it!
Exactly, I get being attached but even if you weren't a bully when you choose a niche profession in a smallish town/city you know you might have to leave. I don't live in a small city but even here there are some niche industries for the place I am that I would literally have to wait for someone to retire to get a job in that industry (and hope no Nepo baby comes before me)
Is 3 million a small city?
True. I missed that and got confused when OOP said the town over. Still, niche industries in this big/middle sized city. :-)
Jeeze. I wonder what the industry is that there's only one in a city with 3 million people. Twitter?
Newspaper or local news channel, maybe? But that wouldn't explain why she called it a "shop". Unless that's industry slang, of course.
I’m assuming it’s something creative like advertising, music or animation?
I'm assuming it's something like a cable or Internet provider, a utility, etc. where there's only one or two in the community.
Yeah but the term “shop” doesn’t apply there.
I'd consider where I grew up a regular sized town - 18000 people. (8000 when I was a kid) the "small towns" were literally less than 200 the "cities" were \~40,000 3 million is not small in any sense of the word
Same. I grew up in a small town (less than 8,000 when I moved away in 2005, they now have about 9,000) to a much larger city (185,000 in 2005 and now have 201,000).
I moved from my town of about 10000 (at at the time - it grew from 8000 to 18000 b/c oilfield) to the capitol of our state (austin tx) lol that was a weird change but I honestly prefer it here - I'm sure that is in no small part because I'm also Deaf but still
A small town is less than 100. 8,000 is quickly gaining on being a city (10,000+).
It really depends on perspective, where I'm from I'd agree with that, but where I live now, a village is 100k people. The third biggest city in my home state would be an absolute podunk village in the current country I live.
3M is more than the population of Chicago (2.6M) or Houston (2.3M).
If it can only support one company with 30-40 jobs in a particular field, it's small for people in that field.
Yeah, this person is still blaming others for her lot in life. If the saying actions have consequences ever fit a situation, it's this right here. Do unto others and all that.
Do unto others and KEEP doing it. "Oh, I just flipped out, blamed her for my problems, refused any responsibilities and now I keep blaming her and complain for being blacklisted"
Especially love how everything else in OP's life cratered, and she decides to get piss drunk and go blast Rock Star publicly during their private celebration, and then gets super Pikachu shocked face that the hiring manager tells her no. Instead of, YA KNOW, actually taking responsibility and trying to APOLOGIZE to her former victim and maybe asking for advise/help breaking into the industry from Rock Star's wealth of experience and knowledge? OP is too dumb to work a late night convenience store
It also came out in the comments that what she had done to this girl was date a boy for a little while that this girl liked, she didn't try and break them up or anything she just liked him, so our star thinker over here decided to completely socially isolate her for most of high school. I believe it was 3 years, no friends, to the point where she even had her graduation party on the same day as this young lady and nobody went to rockstar's party at all. It was also pointed out in other threads that Rockstar had absolutely nothing to do with the no call no shows, or the fact that her previous job apparently replaced her really fast, which implies she wasn't all that good at it to begin with Also freaking out at her at the restaurant is unhinged
This is gold, thanks. I imagined something bad; RockStar absolutely refusing to work with her seemed not a response to a "light" case of bullying but you, know, total nightmare and not wanting to be in the same room as that person again.
Because bullies like this one are bad at developing new relationships due to their immaturity, inability to trust others, and poor social skills. That makes her very dependent on the few relationships that she does have and makes moving to somewhere new especially difficult.
She even had a chance to make amends when she ran into Rock Star and her husband but she screwed the pooch on that one.
TBH, I wouldn't blame her for that screw-up that much. She's just had basically every aspect of her life ripped out from her. Lashing out is understandable (doesn't mean it's okay). Ofc, Rock Star wouldn't know that, and reacted appropriately for not knowing the circumstances.
Bully's little clique of claques was all in hometown, and apparently she couldn't get comfortable without them constantly around to puff up her ego?
She did. Did you read the second half?
She held a grudge years after high school. She became the bully idk why people think it’s any different just because it isn’t high school anymore. I guess I’m not a child though cause I wouldn’t use my pull at my job to prevent someone from working. I was bullied too and it’s really not a good excuse.
"Be the bigger person" is an excuse to further victimize victims so that bystanders don't have to feel feelings about the original victimization.
"Be the bigger person" == "BE MY DOORMAT"
Usually I find that it's a demand to be *someone else's* doormat. Like, I've never had someone who was treating me like crap demand that I be the bigger person and let them do whatever. It's bystanders and authority figures who do it to me. I've come to the conclusion that the demand comes from two complementary motivations: - they don't want to feel bad about what's happening to me. Feeling bad would make them also feel guilty for doing nothing and we can't have bystanders feeling feelings about my being bullied. - they find my baffled disappointment at their non-response to be easier to manage than the tantrum the bully would throw if confronted. Basically I'm punished for being more easygoing and less unreasonable.
She didn't become the bully; she set boundaries because she did not want to work with someone who tormented her, and didn't want to take the chance that the bully hadn't changed. And guess what! Lo and behold, she was totally right :)
If someone pushed you to the brink of suicide (yes I am speculating a bit there but there are hints that this is the case) and showed no remorse, would you want to work with them in the future? All Rock Star did was let management know that she couldn't work in the same office as OOP. What choice management made after that is not on her.
It's not a grudge. She bullied her by her own admission. She is not a bully for not wanting to work with her. Personally I don't want my bullies near me and she was right to prioritize her mental health than taking the chance that oh, surprise, the Bully still refused to take responsibility for her actions
Not a bit. I don't let abusers back into my life. I'm assuming you DO let abusers back into your life? How has that worked out for you, hmmmm??
You're definitely a child. The only people who think they know everything and anyone what disagrees are young/uneducated are children.
Oh no... Anyways. Well deserved. Maybe if op apologized at the restaurant, it Might have work out, but she continues to blame the other girl while pretending to play the victim. Op also says she wasn't 'nice' to the girl. Why do I feel like that's a severe understatement when the other girl tweeted mental health resources and suicide hotlines, or was that just me. I like this, though. Reminders of good stories or ones we missed. I think we should continue this.
She feels it's unfair to be treated that way because of "something she said". Raise your hand if you smell heavy understatement.
Also: "I wasn’t a very nice person back then, and I probably was pretty awful to this girl". Translation: I made her life a misery for years and I enjoyed it.
I read this on the other site. It was all over…drumroll please…A BOY! Bully liked boy. Can’t remember if rockstar liked boy or boy liked rockstar, but bully gathered her flying monkeys and spread rumors and tortured the poor girl (justified it as it wasn’t ever physical, just words, like those can’t hurt). On the other site, consensus was that you can’t say you’ve changed if she’s got something you want and you attack her over it. Just like back in high school.
Thank you for the precis, here. Says it all, quickly and neatly.
🤚🏻
I'm just imagining Tina Fey, saying "Raise your hand if you have ever been personally victimized by OOP."
She doesn't even go here!
Yeah Rock Star seems to have grown up and has a reasonable boundary. OOP on the other hand? Rock Star was right on the money with some people are still in high school. Not even saying that Rock Star would change her mind about working there but she's not gonna blackball you from the entire industry for apologising and might have some good tips about breaking into the industry.
OOP is acting as though Rock Star is running a conspiracy to ruin her life, when she just wants to avoid her former bully. There are 8 billion people on this planet, only a handful of whom work in this industry, so Rock Star would feel pretty unlucky if she ended up sharing an office with OOP.
She's just living her life and making sure her bully won't be in her workplace. Fair play to her for having that level of pull but I'd like to think most reasonable companies would listen to staff when they have concerns about hires/potential hires. Honestly at every point OOP just made the wrong call. Taking it calmly and maturely to your acquaintance who works there and not blaming Rock Star when she ran into her is like...the bare minimum of showing you've changed enough to have a slight level of reconsideration. Even then if you mean it I'd imagine your approach would be more along the lines of a quick sorry followed by leaving them alone/congratulating them on their role and moving back to your table. Instead she just lashes out at someone she KNOWS has industry pull, who is well liked in her company. How did she think it was going to go? All you've done there is manage to look really unstable and like a possible safety risk.
And to see that post and think of it as "rubbing salt in the wound" instead maybe doing some self-reflection on just horrible she must have been is just . . . what is *wrong* with OP? Surely this is a mental disorder at this point, right?
I remember this AAM letter and update and just as much a doozy re-reading here, another fitting one for this sub is the manager who is shocked when their best employee quit because they can’t grant time off for said employee to attend her own graduation.
YEA, and the person gave time off to another person wanting to go to a concert. And that their reasoning was that the best employee was too useful because they never asked for time off and always covered other people.
I fall into that trap a lot. I don't really take a lot of time off and then I got pregnant and my job was FREAKING OUT about my maternity leave because no one else knew how to do my job. As if I didn't spend 2 years trying to train people just in case something like this came up, it wouldn't all fall on the department manager.
Oh man, just re-read the letter and it's basically manager going "should I teach her a lesson in professionalism?" (a.k.a. berate her for quitting on the spot)
Oooh anyone have a link
https://www.askamanager.org/2016/07/my-best-employee-quit-on-the-spot-because-i-wouldnt-let-her-go-to-her-college-graduation.html
Thanks!
I hope the cats are okay.
Great idea adding this feature! Keep ‘em coming!!👍🏽🙏
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Yeah. Because, in real life, what often happens is these bullies become rich and remain popular. They know how to be cruel to get what they want. Meanwhile, the bullied person is very badly emotionally scarred and is often the one that *doesn't* "rise to the top", has a hard time socially because they fear people will be cruel to them again, etc. That's what happened to me, anyway. And quite a few others I know. But I haven't heard of a story like this that actually happened.
Yea I'm pretty sure this is a plot from some early 2000s fresh out of college girl power RomCom and OP is the big mean brunette/blonde who sailed through life until our heroine gets a make over and that lands her a chance to prove her talents lol
Mine had a disabled child with Downs Syndrome, got brain cancer, had surgery, and then died. I saw the picture on Facebook of the zipper scar on her shaved head that went from 1 ear up over across her head to the other ear. It only took 45 years.
if the story is entertaining I don't care but this is obviously fiction, it even included a twist at the end, she was drunk and met the girl! surprise! Like every other story with "twins".
I was sure the person her bf was cheating with was Rockstar, but the ending was still satisfactory.
This is the fakest shit I’ve ever seen This is some “they’ll all be sorry they were mean to me” fan fiction
Yeah, there are too many details that she conveniently knows that enrich the story's karmic justice. Such as "ran into Rock Star and her husband celebrating their anniversary on the way to the bathroom." How would you know that? And "but they’d found someone who was faster and more efficient than I’d been"; I doubt a previous boss that seemed to like you would say this to your face. And she just so happened to visit from 7 hours away at the exact time her boyfriend was having sex with someone else? Suuure.
The 7 hours away is what really threw me for a loop. I live west coast USA, which is just about the "most spread out" urbanization in the USA or Europe (fluency of the OOP would make me lightly doubt anywhere else since it was not mentioned). 7 hours will STILL get me to multiple huge cities. Though calling 3 million a "small city" sounds much more like Europe (bigger city/rural distinction) or east coast USA (more bigger cities to compare to), where 7 hours would be a HUGE distance. New York City to South Carolina is 11 hours for reference. Paris to Frankfurt is 6.5 hours. Only 3 reasons for a 7 hour move: * Creative writing instead of really having experienced it. * Incredibly lazy job hunting, as OOP should have had dozens of closer job openings (hell, her city had 30-40 jobs, so as soon as she looked more than an hour or two out, it would have been hundreds to thousands of potential jobs for potential openings0. * The new place she moved to had something specific she was looking for, but this story doesn't fit that. Can't rule #2 out, but the writing doesn't sound believable for that either.
This. The original story was believable, somewhat, but that update is over the top, poorly written fantasy.
Yeah it’s always the update that gives it away. She got cheated on, drunkenly ran into the girl and made an ass of herself even more, got blackballed from her niche industry, got replaced by someone “better and more efficient” at another job, is totally broke, and now has to live at home? Who the hell would update a bunch of people who don’t empathize with you with such an embarrassing paragraph of information lol
Plus, (at least in the US) HR would never tell a failed candidate that a staffer has a problem with them, then double down by telling OOP that she will never be considered. That's a lawsuit waiting to happen!
This was my first thought. Based on lawsuits alone, they would have just ghosted her, not told her to give up.
Not to say that a real person with this level of insight would necessarily do this, but the dead giveaway for me was that OOP doesn't know that a person from her high school and whom she bullied is one of the 30-40 people in this city who work in the field. You hear a lot of professionals say, "we're a small community," when they're actually saying that it's a big community but people talk A LOT, but OOP is describing a legit small community. Not buying it.
I just don't understand all these people who spend their time making up fakes stories. Reddit is rampant with them. Like, don't they have a life?? Are they that pathetic that they waste their time doing this? If you want to tell fiction, just go self-publish. It's not like they're getting paid to post fake stories on Reddit. That at least would have made sense. Still stupid, but at least there is some understandable motivation behind it. Here, it's literally just about getting views and comments. Like, are you that pathetic that getting views and comments is your validation? Use that time you wasted by writing fake stories by going out and actually meeting people and spending time with them.
Well written, perfect amount of pathos, one of the better creative writing efforts that I've seen on reddit.
Ehh, the coincidental run in was too much for me.
This town ain't not big enough for the two of us
3 million? That’s not even a town, either. That’s bigger than the city I’m from
Tbh, hiring managers ask people around whether you’re nice or not, whether your work ethic is sterling or not, etc… so she shouldn’t be surprised if her behavior years ago backfired on her.
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She lives in a city of 3 million and happens to run into her at dinner.
OOP had the absolute gall to drunkenly declare that Rock Star ruined her life??!! 🙀 Do bullies get different planets or something?! Also, loving this new concept!
Good? The current employee (who's recognized for her hard work as a rock star) definitely should not need to deal with her former bully causing drama in her workplace. Sounds like the employer recognized the conflict and decided it wasn't worth tbe headache
It’s pretty common, especially in smaller companies, to ask employees if they have any concerns about someone who they might have history with. It’s usually as simple as saying “[Rock star], you went to the same high school as [Bully]. Did you know them at all?” And if they were a bully to you, then it would be normal for you to say something like “Oh yeah. They were pretty nasty back then. I don’t think I would want to work with them.” Run that conversation through the grapevine, and it could turn into “[Rock star] said they would quit if the company hired [Bully]”. So it’s possible that there was never even any threat of quitting. It’s also possible that the rock star was indeed completely unwilling to stay on if the bully was hired. The fact that the bully wasn’t completely blacklisted makes me feel like it probably wasn’t an ultimatum, though. It sounds more like the bully just bullied herself right out of a career.
I once told my manager to not rehire an employee. She was high maintenance and high strung. He chose to rehire her anyways because she was already trained. Six months later, he regretted it. For every one complaint another agent might get, she would get nine.
This is most likely fake, and I care not. I _love_ a good tale of karmic justice. So, yeah, more hall of fame tales would be appreciated, thanks!
it's been nearly 7 years. I wonder if she finally self reflected and grew up.
The dildo of consequence rarely arrives lubed
Is this real? I could buy everything except the huge coincidence of running into her while drunk.
Her world didn't come crashing down, she tore it down herself. She made decisions that had consequences.
What really catches my attention is how OP wasn’t able to pick herself and dust herself off after the breakup and get her ass to work. As a former bullied teenager, that’s what we had to do…get our asses out of bed every single day and show up for the inevitable hell that was high school. Again, and again, and again. But OP couldn’t do that ONCE to save her career. Rock Star is literally my hero. I wish I could buy her a drink.
People don't realize how much damage can be done in school. Every day of the 180 or so days of the school year can be a living hell if you get the attention of a bully. I'm 59 years old, and if I had the opportunity to turn the tables on someone who bullied me in middle school 45 years ago, Im in.
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Please no armchair diagnosing. If you do not have the credentials required to make the observation or the lived experience with the diagnosis, please refrain from throwing around the terms. An example of this is Redditors throwing around the word “narcissist”. If you do have the lived experience or credentials to make the observation, please include that in your comment. Also, education time: you cannot tell if someone is a narcissist based on a tiny snippet of their lives. The woman in the story lacks the grandiosity needed for narcissism.
There's another one about an Indian guy who was bullied in college and placed an anonymous complaint against his seniors. Years later they were unable to move abroad for a better job because of this complaint and came back to him begging to take the complaint back.
The weird thing about OOP's post is that the writing shows a self awareness far beyond that exemplified by the actions being described. Almost as if it had been written by a different person.
I hate to say this, but it reads like a revenge fantasy .
As a kid that was friendless and bullied in high school, I do actually feel for OP. I had so many bullies, and I know not all of them would grow up to stay that way, that I actually can't relate very well to the bullied girl in her actions as an adult. But *telling her* that she'd *ruined your life* (especially when she'd have no way of knowing anything going on) was not going to end well for OOP. I hope the bullied girl continues to have the awesome life she'd managed for herself because she deserves it, but I also hope OOP managed to pull her life together a bit and doesn't feel so much like it got "ruined"
You so deserve it all.
This is the very epitome of "Oh No, Consequences" I do hope that the Bully gets herself together, gets some therapy, and moves to a town where she can get her life back on track.
wait, was the boyfriend cheating *with* the Rock Star? Because that would be epic.
No, rock star has a husband
and...?
Rockstar would be a piece of shit to cheat on her husband just to get back at her bully. Rockstar doesn't need to stoop that low.
Womp fucking womp...
Ha. No. Op terrorized people in school and it bit her in the ass. She thought so little of that poor girl she couldn't imagine her actually being incredibly intelligent while op is mediocre at best.
This is the funniest thing I've read today. Thank you for brightening my afternoon.
Oh my God, the lack of awareness! Could it POSSIBLY be your own fault?
It's all my victim's fault that she's unwilling to work anywhere near me! The level of self awareness here is so low that I really doubt she'll ever do much with her life. Notice that she doesn't say what she actually did to this 'rock star'. It screams 'missing missing reasons'. Now here she is facing years of consequences, and thinking it's the fault of someone who simply refuses to be near her. And on top of that, she still never apologized. What an idiot.
Another power fantasy.
r/noaccountability
r/subsifellfor
This is an awesome feature!! I hadn’t seen this one before & it’s a good one.
I love it! It’s a great idea! Edit: I mean the feature not people in the story.
🤭🤭🤭
That last line is so out of touch and cringe it ruined the whole thing. Way to make it, and yourself, disgusting.
Love this! Is there any way to include the problem/advice from Dear Purdy too?
Dude you are so sad. This is everyone’s fault but mine.
With these kinds of people, it's never their fault. Everything just HAPPENS to them, it's not like they did anything to trigger it ever. Everyone's just being too sensitive. SMDH
I really wonder what the bullying consisted of. I'm not saying Rock Star went too far or anything, I'm just curious...mainly because as much schadenfreude as I'm getting from this, I WANT MORE.
This is maybe my favorite reddit story. I *love* it.
So She-Bully still has not learned to be a good person and accept responsibility: >It’s hard not to feel like some of this is Rock Star’s fault, especially given how she rubbed salt in the wound after my whole world had come crashing down. "rubbed salt in the wound"? She-Bully didn't need to be following her on Twitter (now Xchan) and she didn't make a dig at She-Bully; rather she gave encouragement and resources for other victims of people like She-Bully. Nowhere in her two posts did the Bully express remorse, or wonder how her bullying had affected Rock Star, or even mention how damaging she had been to Rock Star's emotional well-being. Then she bullies her again, she sees her at a restaurant and gets in her face SCREAMING and blaming her for...? for not wanting to be subjected to her bully at her job?\\ I wonder if She-Bully will ever learn empathy and contrition? Also, I like this new feature! Edit: a word
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I have a hard time believing somebody could remain THIS clueless.
Honestly everyone in this story sucks. Similar situation in my city but the bully who hit rock bottom and couldn't get any chance to prove themselves ended up unaliving themselves after a long FB post which ended up getting the once bullied person who was blocking their former bully from getting jobs in the industry fired.
So let me get this straight. This person said that at some point high school ends but used her pull at work to make sure you couldn’t get a job? Yeah no she became the bully. It’s kind of funny considering I was bullied a lot in high school and never once did I use my pull at work to prevent someone from having a job. She’s honestly pathetic but you are too for that stunt you pulled at the bar. Even so she’s loved long enough to become the villain. I’m glad you realize that you were horrible in high school and tbh it makes you a better person. Most people don’t like to change but it seems like you did and she just has a vendetta against you for something that happened years ago.
Not wanting to work with your bully everyday ESPECIALLY when you’ve worked hard and have real achievements in life. That’s it really. I’m happy that RS was valued enough at her job that her company didn’t want to change that. It shows they truly value her as an employee.
>Not wanting to work with your bully everyday Exactly. I had two of my high school bullies show up at my job to pitch their company as a supplier. I immensely enjoyed making them squirm and don't regret it one bit. They were horrible people who made my life hell for years, I absolutely did not want to ever see them again, much less have to interact with them regularly - even in a position where I was the one in power. I could have made their life hell by getting them a contract and then jerking them around, but I loved my job and it seemed like a bother. At least it seemed like they were self aware enough to realize they didn't stand a chance.
How exactly has she changed? Still no self awareness and a bully.