We’ve all witnessed it, or perhaps even felt it stirring within ourselves. That sharp-tongued colleague who eviscerates others for minor mistakes, only to dissolve into wounded indignation at the slightest hint of feedback. The online troll, spewing vitriol from the shadows, who immediately cries “bully!” when someone claps back. The family member who expertly pinpoint your every flaw, yet whose entire demeanor crumbles into a defensive fortress if you voice a single, gentle concern about their behavior.
It’s a peculiar, almost universal human contradiction: many of us are architects of verbal structures we ourselves could never live in. We dish out criticism, sarcasm, and outright abuse with a kind of assumed immunity, operating under the unspoken rule that the heat of our words is for others to endure, not for us to feel. But when the direction of the flame shifts, we are often stunned by its burn. Why is this?
The core of the issue lies in a profound disconnect between aggression and empathy. When we are in the mode of “dishing it out,” we are operating from a place of power, frustration, or wounded ego. Our words are extensions of our own inner state—our anger, our insecurity, our desire to dominate or deflect. In that moment, we are not thinking of the recipient as a feeling, complex human being with their own internal world. We are objectifying them, making them a canvas for our own emotional graffiti. The thought of their inner experience—the sting, the shame, the simmering resentment—simply doesn’t compute. Our empathy is switched off.
But when the roles are reversed, the entire psychological landscape changes. Suddenly, we are the canvas. The incoming words are not felt as mere words, but as a profound threat to our self-concept, our dignity, our social standing. Our empathy, now fiercely turned inward, magnifies the pain. The criticism feels personal, unfair, and deeply revealing. The armor we never considered needing for ourselves is found to be missing, and we feel exposed and fragile. The person who was a warrior with words minutes before becomes a raw nerve, utterly unprepared for the battle they themselves started.
This hypocrisy is also rooted in a skewed narrative of justification. In our own minds, our harsh words are always warranted. They are the “truth” others need to hear, a “joke” everyone should get, or a “reaction” someone else deserved. We construct a whole dossier of reasons why our verbal assault was legitimate. Yet, when we are on the receiving end, we instantly invalidate the other person’s justification. Their truth is “mean-spirited.” Their joke is “crossing a line.” Their reaction is “wildly disproportionate.” We judge others by the impact of their actions, while judging ourselves solely by our intentions.
This cycle creates a toxic ecosystem of communication, where everyone is simultaneously armed and vulnerable. It breaks down trust and ensures that no real conflict is ever resolved, because the moment one person feels the heat they lobbed at others, the conversation shifts from the issue at hand to a debate over victimhood and fairness.
Breaking this cycle requires a brutal and uncomfortable self-awareness. It asks us to perform a simple but difficult thought experiment: before speaking, imagine the precise words you are about to say being spoken to you, in the same tone, in front of the same audience. Feel that imaginary sting. If it gives you pause, then you have just touched the common humanity that your anger was obscuring. It is in that pause that we choose to build bridges with our words instead of fortresses. We might just find that the world becomes a less prickly place for everyone—ourselves most of all.
