Have you ever been mocked by someone else?
Do you remember what you thought and felt during that experience?
Do you still have lasting scars from what you experienced? And did you ever tease others in turn?
Sadly this kind of behavior is very common in certain types of people. People who usually have at least one of these psychological issues.
1. Insecurity (they put others down to make themselves look better).
A person who constantly makes fun of others is often incredibly insecure about their status in the social group.
As a result, they try to climb the social ladder by drawing attention to others’ shortcomings.
They tease and mock those around them in an attempt to establish or maintain a position at the top, or at least close to it.
Or they might be quite low in terms of social hierarchy and take opportunities to torment other people to get into their peers’ good graces.
2. They’re uncomfortable with those who are different.
Some people make fun of anyone who’s different from them.
This might involve mocking those who have different fashion or entertainment preferences, but it can also center on differences in ethnicity or appearance.
Xenophobia is a fear of strangers, but it can also refer to a fear of anything foreign or unfamiliar.
Xenophobia is why some people get angry if others speak in a language they don’t understand when they’re in their presence.
Mockery and belittlement can also be used to reinforce a person’s stance that their choices and preferences are correct and that anything different is somehow weird or “wrong.”
A person’s clothing, mannerisms, gender identity, speech, and so on—whatever is different becomes grounds for disdain and ridicule.
3. Learned behaviors from others.
People often mimic the behavior they’ve been exposed to, especially when it comes to family and close social dynamics.
As a result, if someone has grown up in an environment where mocking others was normal and commonplace, they’ll be likely to do the same.
Sadly, some parents use mockery and negative reinforcement to try to encourage their children to do various things.
Guess what those kids are going to do to others (including their own children) as they get older?
4. Projection about their own perceived flaws or shortcomings.
When someone dislikes something about themselves, they might make fun of those who also have those traits, but to a greater degree than they do.
One classic example of this would be a person who’s overweight but mocks those who have larger bodies. They may even tease those who are trying to get fit.
Basically, whatever they hate about themselves, they’ll ridicule in others. It’s self-loathing by proxy.
5. The need to be the center of attention.
Some folks get an endorphin rush from the attention that comes from people laughing at their jokes, and they strive to get more of it by any means possible.
As such, if someone got an intense reaction after roasting someone else, they might try to recreate the experience.
Deep down, they don’t have anything against their victim. It’s very much a situation of: “It’s nothing personal—I just need to burn you because what I say makes others laugh, and that’s great for my ego.”
6. “Better than average effect” (BTAE).
This is a psychological effect in which people show how superior they are to others based on their personal behaviors.
Then they put down those who either don’t behave the same way or whose efforts pale in comparison to their own.
This is especially common in those whose self-esteem is inextricably entwined with certain life choices.
When and if others don’t behave as they do, they feel threatened in their position of perceived superiority and seek to put others down by any means possible.
In essence, it’s a type of “holier-than-thou-ism” that manifests as shaming and mockery.
7. Ethical erosion.
Ethical erosion is a behavior that’s often demonstrated by people who are in positions of power or authority, such as healthcare providers and law enforcement officers.
When and if they come across others they perceive as being morally inferior or stupid, those people become targets for mockery and contempt.
A perfect example of this would be a doctor who makes fun of an obese patient for developing diabetes. They shame the patient by telling them that it would have been prevented if they had made “smarter” life choices.
This isn’t limited to healthcare workers, of course. Difficult, stressful times often show us the worst sides of people, causing them to abandon reason, logic, and basic human decency in an attempt to make themselves feel safe and protected.
8. Contempt toward perceived weakness.
Have you ever noticed that many of the people who seem the most frail and vulnerable are on the receiving end of mockery and contempt?
This is very much a herd mentality situation, in which those who are considered weak will be rejected by the strong.
Athletes might make fun of those who are small or unfit. Popular people laugh and tease those whom they consider “weird” or unattractive.
The privileged try to maintain their position in the social hierarchy by any means necessary, often by ridiculing others who have less than or are less than in their eyes.
9. Fear.
Some people develop a dark sense of humor and use mockery as a coping mechanism when it comes to things that they’re afraid of.
If a person is experiencing a difficult situation or is struggling with a health concern, they may find themselves as the butt of jokes by others.
One example I can think of is a girl who was going through chemotherapy treatment for leukemia when we were in our teens. She lost about 30lbs as well as all her hair, and she was constantly being made fun of by our peers.
Later on, I overheard some students in the restroom discussing how fearful they were of getting cancer themselves.
They didn’t have the healthy coping mechanisms needed to work through the difficult emotions they were feeling, so they lashed out instead.
10. They feel powerless, so they try to take power from others.
One of the main reasons why people make fun of others is because they feel small.
Someone else—possibly an abusive parent or older sibling—has put them in a position where they feel powerless, and they don’t have a healthy means of dealing with it.
All the difficult emotions they experience because of someone else’s cruelty must go somewhere.
While some people turn everything inward and repress their hurts and frustrations, others lash out at those around them in a process psychologists call displacement.
In particular, they’ll choose to unleash their hurt on those who are least likely to fight back in order to feel empowered again.
11. Low emotional intelligence.
Some people simply think that anything different from what they like is inferior or dumb and choose to mock it accordingly.
They don’t even consider how their behavior affects others, because why would they? They have little to no emotional intelligence.
Everything they say is hilarious to them, and if you try to argue a differing opinion, well you’re just wrong.
If you call them out on their behavior, they’ll laugh even harder and tell you to relax because it’s “just a joke.”
12. Control.
Mockery is often a technique that abusers use to control or change others around them.
It’s frequently used by narcissists to adjust their partners or children into versions that they would prefer, and they can be unrelenting in their abuse until the one they’re making fun of makes the changes demanded of them.
The abuser will either fixate on things they want their victim to change or on aspects the victim likes in order to degrade them.
This behavior isn’t limited to narcissists either.
Some parents will make fun of their offspring to try to shift them into becoming what they perceive as “better” (e.g., more preferable) versions of themselves.
Even worse, their abusive behavior is justified by them as “just trying to help,” when in fact it’s a means of coercion and control.
