Due to the recent emergence of the disgustingly trashy blog College ACB, I thought it would be an appropriate time to write a little about jealousy. Jealousy is the ugly, nagging creature that lives inside of us, makes us feel bad about ourselves, and manifests itself in destructive ways. Whether it’s treating yourself or someone else worse than they deserve, rarely does someone feel better about any acts that result from jealousy. Despite knowing that, the green monster manages to creep its way into our thoughts and behaviors multiple times a day.
College ACB is one of the greatest displays of jealousy manifesting itself in today’s society. The blog is flooded with frats trashing other frats, sororities trashing other sororities’ girls, guys asking for “hot freshman meat” and girls posting bad things about “sluts who cheated on their boyfriends”. If you’ve ever posted something, stop now and be honest with yourself about why you did it. If my Psychology minor has taught me anything, you’re probably feeling pretty pathetic right now, and deservedly so. You let the jealousy get to you so much that you lost all regard for how your simple post (which is probably a lie anyways) affected someone else.
Despite the fact we all know in the back of our minds most of the posts on College ACB are false, it still has an effect. Think about how much we read trashy magazines like US and People, which probably have just about the same percentage of accurate details. Although we know they are full of white lies, we casually associate the facts with the celebrity and consciously or not, it affects our perceptions of them.
Our society’s constant desire for scandals shows how jealous and insecure our society as a whole has become. The whole thing’s really just a vicious cycle. Because we are so critical in our society, we become insecure, we become jealous, and then we become critical of other people for unfair reasons. If you think of the last time you were unfairly mean or critical of someone, think about what they have that you don’t see in yourself. Sure, you may think they’re prettier, smarter, etc. but did it make you feel any better to make them feel bad about themselves?
I’d be the first one to admit that I act unfairly out of jealousy and insecurity on a daily basis, and I’m sure most of you would too. If we all know it really does more harm than good, then why do we do it?