Why You Need to Stop Being Nice

I find there are few things more loathsome than a Nice Person. I’m not talking about the friendly folk you see on the street and give a polite smile and a “how do you do” as you pass. I wouldn’t call that nice so much as good simple etiquette. Nice used to mean a good and agreeable sort of person who you could depend on to come through for you in a jam. Nice used to be a simple statement with which to express a modicum of pleasure in something. I would argue it means something entirely different in today’s world, the sort of something that would best be avoided.

Just think of the most well-known bad sort of nice, the perennially dreaded yet always lauded Nice Guy. He exists everywhere in our media, the sort of hands-in-pockets stooped-shouldered fellow who hovers in the back, never quite aggressive enough to say what he believes or thinks. He is indeed a good and agreeable fellow, but hardly the sort anyone should ever want to aspire to be. He is horribly mistreated, rejected at every turn by women, laughed at by his peers but never sees any reason to defend himself or take a stand for anything important. Ah, but it is not all bad for Nice Guy. After all, we see that if he hovers around a particular female he is attracted to for a long enough period of time that she will come to see that he is a good fellow who deserves her love and sex. What a happy ending for Nice Guy.

A crock of lies of course. These sorts of fairy tales where one just has to wait around for a happy ending are nothing more than feel-good nonsense peddled around by our modern bards. I think deep down we all know this from our own experiences but refuse to accept it because of the enticing fairy tale ending. Why bother doing anything hard or God forbid, a bit mean, when we can just wait around for our dream girl to get tired of the endless array of men that warm her at night?

But of course this nonsensical bad nice extends beyond the well-known Nice Guy archetype and can be seen everywhere one looks. This sort of nice that isn’t simply being an agreeable chap who gets along with others, but a harmful and self-denigrating type of nice, is all too common. This is the type of Nice Person that I find loathsome, as this Nice Person usually hates themselves and makes sure everyone else knows it, going back to that self-defeatism I talked about last week. Beyond that they are often perfectly willing to drag everyone else down to their level. This often isn’t even a conscious choice so much as them instinctively leveling the playing field in a twisted way of making their own lowly social status look all the more appealing.

Now I’m not going to spend all my time just whaling on these Nice People. But what I would like to do is point out how harmful being Nice is and how destructive the behavior is that stems from this Niceness. Think about the usual sort of nice, that agreeable and polite person that says hello. That sort of nice is twisted and taken to its furthest extreme to become Nice. When you become Nice you are no longer allowed to speak out against something you disagree with or don’t like. That wouldn’t be very nice after all. A Nice person can’t just help others; they must help others at their own cost, going out of their way to be helpful even it harms them.  A Nice Person is a groveling sort of fellow with a back bowed from carrying others’ burdens alongside their own. A Nice Person frequently ends up in a state of paralysis, unable to make the simplest of decisions for fear of offending someone somehow and being discovered as not being nice. Because everything must be sacrificed on their self-made altar of Niceness, especially their own well-being.

The worst part about being a Nice Person is that it destroys the part of your brain that would enable you to break free from your bonds and learn to just be a nice person. Because I’m going to take a safe bet that some of you might have read the above paragraph and saw absolutely nothing wrong with the person just described. “A heroic individual! Sacrifice is to be admired, not curbed!” Utterly rubbish I say. That’s hardly sacrifice for starters; sacrifice implies purpose or good coming out of a conscious choice of loss. This being Nice is nothing more than self-destructive behavior, for what good comes out of it? You get to be called nice. Fantastic. The Nice Person gets to watch as life passes them by as they remain frozen by indecision. They get to eternally wait for their dream lover to finally notice them begging at their feet or their boss to see how much hard work and overtime they put in for the company at the expense of their own family or heath. Is this noble? Is this what we are to aspire to live for each day? Sounds like misery to me, a misery that hardly seems worth it.

I’ll also make a special note here for Christians. Modern Christianity seems to preach nothing but a twisted Gospel of Nice, where Christ has become some sort of feelgood communist figurehead who just wanted everyone to get along. This sort of kindergarten Christianity is not only meaningless nonsense, it’s downright heretical. While Jesus did teach to be nice and “turn the other cheek”, he also publicly shamed the religious leaders of the day, frequently used violent imagery in his parables, told his disciples to sell their cloaks and go buy swords (Luke 22), not to mention that one time he very violently attacked everyone misusing the Temple as a marketplace with a homemade whip (John 2:15). Christians should have no more of this Gospel of Nice; Jesus was a man of balance who knew the time and place to be nice, knew when to take command and most importantly, knew when to take a stand.

To those who are not Christians, the above can still be helpful. Being nice is all well and good, something we should incorporate into our daily lives, but being Nice means we are throwing our lives out of balance. We are intentionally bringing harm and injury to ourselves solely for the sake of being seen as Nice. It is a useless thing to try to gain simply because nothing good can be gained from such destructive behavior. All of these Nice People need to realize that sometimes we simply can’t be nice and there’s nothing wrong with that. This article isn’t very nice for instance, but I’m hoping it can be helpful. Criticism isn’t always nice but it’s definitely helpful. Calling out someone’s bad behavior isn’t nice but it may help them. But most importantly, putting our own needs above other people’s needs isn’t always nice but it is something that must be done.

Again, people will likely balk at a statement that seems absurd. It is far from being absurd however; the fact that we must help ourselves before we can help others is basic common sense. How can we even think that we are in a position to help others if we ignore our own troubles? The Nice Person sees no issue with this. They may be financially or emotionally burdened but will go out of their way to take on the problems of others around them. Yet if they are unable to deal with their own problems, how can a Nice Person deal with other problems? They can’t of course. Such harmful behavior permanently swamps them, feeding their own fragility and leaving them unable to grow as a person. Yet we continue to promote such awful behavior! We continue to promote and accept that these harmful emotional and psychological behaviors are for the ever vague “greater good” and will ultimately be best for everyone involved.

Well I say it’s time to stop it all. There’s more to life than constantly seeking approval from others. There’s more things Nice People can do besides keep their faces to the dirt posturing about how wonderfully Nice they are. It’s time to stop intentionally lowering yourself on the social totem pole just to get noticed for being Nice. It’s time Nice People all just stop being Nice. Be selfish. Put yourself before others. This will feel wrong at first, foreign and strange, but double down on it. Learn to build yourselves up, not because you’re Nice, but because you’re You. You’re not just a trait or an emotion, you’re a person. Strive to be a balanced person, a person who’s more than just nice. Be cool, confident, calm, whatever. Hell, be angry if you want. Establish your boundaries. Establish yourself. You don’t need to be hateful and nasty, but also understand that you just will be sometimes. Learn to deal with and even harness such emotions. Balance humility and pride and you’ll find that you will go farther than you ever realized you could by just being Nice. So go on, go be a bit selfish. Be selfish in the sense that you’re going to start making decisions based on what’s best for you instead of what you think would be best for others.