Misconstrued Identity

One thing which surprised me was realizing how the same person or entity could be perceived so differently. On one end a person could be considered a hero and looked upon as being a very kindred spirit full of love and empathy, while on the other end they may be considered the vilest human being, wicked and full of hatred.

How is it possible for a person to be perceived so differently? I am not talking about a person playing a different persona or doing a pretense game. I simply mean a person acting normally in every situation and yet being perceived differently by different sets of persons. You can witness this vividly with persons like celebrities and public figures, on one had you have their fans who love them and everything they do, never finding fault in any of their mistakes and will defend them no matter the atrocity, on the other end you have people who despise them and who have never liked them one bit, looking for fault in everything they do and praying for their downfall.

Why is it so? I don’t think the fans were exposed to different information than the haters, neither do I think there was a specific predisposition for some people to like them and for others to hate them. So if we consider that the information everybody receives about that person is the same then it means the variable most be in the fans and the haters.

First, let's talk marketing

There is a degree of marketing every person conducts (intentionally or not) which determines how they are perceived by others, when you are nice to people they will tend to perceive you favorably but when you are mean to people they will tend to perceive you negatively. Sometimes, like in the case of public figures, they have to carry out targeted marketing campaigns aimed at giving them a specific image. You can notice this when you feel like a celebrity is “hot” at the moment, those are just the results of a marketing campaign.

This is to say that marketing plays a vital role as to how we perceive others, even on the individual level we carry out “marketing campaigns”, you can imagine working hard to be appreciated by certain persons and also not caring what others think of you. That's how you carry out a marketing campaign at an individual level, and that's why the same person can be perceived very differently.

What makes you like or hate them?

You notice this disparity of appreciation very intensely with people like celebrities and political figures and this is only possible because of the variable which is found in the people perceiving that person, the variable is “relatability”. How much you are able to relate to a person is going to determine whether you like that person or hate them. I am not trying to establish any law here, relatability is just one factor, you still have a whole slew of emotions and even circumstantial events which will determine whether you’ll like a person or not.

To cut a long story short, your emotions, personality and state of mind at that given point in time determines what you think about another person, added to that you now have their actions and their overall demeanor.

You are a part of it

I say all this because the way you feel about a person is as much about you as it is about them and their actions. You choose to be offended by their actions, you choose to neglect all the good things they did, you choose to villify all their intentions and so you hate them. In the same way you can choose to ignore and justify their mistakes, you can relate to them and feed into that emotion and thus become of fan. Ultimately, it all depends on the context in which you are found. You have a part to play in whether you like somebody or you dislike them.

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