Why are people who weren't nice, suddenly greet you as if you're best friends?

[Anonymous]

I can only think of a couple people that weren't nice in HS. There was a guy who had a habit of making bad jokes about disabled people or those surviving from cancer, was the class clown and thought it was funny, even when others weren't laughing. He was an arrogant, rotten person.

I was at a restaurant with a couple friends recently and suddenly the jerk comes up and says ''Hi all, nice to see you my friends, what's new? My male friend interrupted him and replied ''I don't remember being friends with you. You were a total jerk in HS''.

He then got offended and said ''What, still butthurt. I was joking. I thought we were friends''. Have this ever happened to you before? Someone that wasn't nice or even a bully, suddenly greets you as if you were best friends, as if nothing ever happened? Why do they do that?

[ProbablyClueless]

Well... because that was then, this is now... people, situations, thoughts, feelings, circumstances that were once a certain way, might change and no longer be the way they once were.

Sometimes people like that mature and grow in the time since they were mean. Life change things. People you once thought were total assholes and bullies will mellow out. Sometimes you're the one who changes and you realize that the person you once thought was as a jerk was actually trying to help and just went about it poorly.

You have to remember that he has his whole side to that situation, just like you do. He might act like nothing happened, because from his perspective, maybe nothing did happen. There's nothing wrong with letting go of hostilities after a while.

I once had a "friend" in high school who the same kind of guy as the one you're talking about; he had absolutely no perception of boundaries or limits, or why what he was doing stopped being a joke. He was the kind of person whose idea of "humor" was just being abusive. His "practical jokes" VERY OFTEN boiled down to the intense psychological torture people do to punish traitors and stuff. Like, if you were in a relationship with someone, and they started doing the shit he did, people would try to get you into therapy and as far away from him as possible.

In any case, I got in touch with him like a decade after high school, and somehow the subject of the stuff he used to do came up. He told me flat out that he categorically will never apologize for how he treated people, and in fact, he STILL DOES THAT KIND OF THING TODAY because he finds it funny.

I would have forgiven him right then and there if he said "hey man, I was young, I didn't realize the impact I was having. I'm sorry my behavior affected you the way it did." But that's just not what he chose to do.

The reason I told you all that was just to say that sometimes people change and evolve, other times they stay the same, but a big part of your own person growth is to be able to understand that other people are on that same journey as well.

[Asker]

yeah that jerk I'm referring to, still found it funny till this day and still sees nothing wrong. He hasn't changed one bit, nothing at all.

[ProbablyClueless]

Some people are just perpetual butt munches lol

[MissTrix]

Yes like so often! Constantly insulted and teased about being lesbian! Next time they see me like Hiii! We are friends and your so nice to be with.

Always rubs me the wrong want and I avoid them.

You insulted me and your being nice your crazy remembering me as nice. Just took it and ignored you.

[Asker]

Then they acted like the poor, offended party when you call them out on their BS. They just want to pretend like nothing ever happened, to treat whatever happened at school as a normal stage, to treat them as if they were your funny friends at school, lol.

[MissTrix]

Lol right they act like victims if you call Thier BS. Omg I'm sorry I offended you by being honest about your! Bad behavior!
Which you should not be doing.