What is the most belittling thing you have seen somebody do to someone ?
Posted by originalindividiual@reddit | AskUK | View on Reddit | 49 comments
Either in HighSchool or Work ? Do you still speak to any of the people involved ? If so how did it effect the person involved & has the person doing the belittling expressed regret over it ?
JurassicM4rc@reddit
I'm currently between jobs and visiting the jobcentre weekly. I could start a list of all the belittling things, but there isn't enough paper in the world to write them all down.
Difficult_Style207@reddit
But there is enough paper to print out the long form web addresses of every single job you look at and /or apply for, take to to the JC in a massive bag, and put it on their desk to read because your previous evidence of web links was found to be inadequate proof. (Source: me)
MuntyCatt@reddit
I remember years ago at the job centre, I got asked if I had a copy of my C.V. so she could show me how to fill it in 'properly'. She scowled at it for a minute or two and then handed it back to me saying that she thought I'd done quite well with it...
L-0-T-H-0-S@reddit
Back in school there was a kid, younger than the rest of us, physically - puberty didn't hit him til relatively late, so though little he had good skin and he could get away with been cheeky, a lot. Especially to female teachers. It became his thing.
One day in german class he said something to this one, particular teacher - I can't remember what it was specifically but it was clearly some sort of sexual innuendo supposed to make this teacher blush and there'd obviously been talk amongst the other teachers of him doing this and getting away with it, so this particular teacher was prepared.
Rather than having the desired effect she spent the rest of the following year doing to this kid exactly what he tried to do to her: if she got the slide projector out she'd single him out and very deliberately ask him if he'd "like to come up here turn her on" - that sort of thing. and sh'd make him do it as well, come all teh wqy to teh front of the class and switch on the projector.
It was pure Are You being Served level innuendo, nothing you wouldn't see in your homes every week on BBC1 many times ove, but It got to point he'd walk into class, head down, already blushing - she'd have an innuendo waiting for him on arrival every lesson.
Things came to a head one day, about 10 minutes before the end of the lesson. She gave this kid some money and told him to go to the Library to buy her a KitKat. Weird as it sounds, the Librarian was the staffs chocolate dealer - he made regular trips to wholesalers keeping the staff topped up with mars Bars and KitKats - so the library office was stacked with boxes of sweets, the Librarian literally had to turn sideways to squeeze himself in just to get to his desk. Best place in the entire school was the first floor library - books, confy seats and all the mars bars you could neck so long as you were in with teh librarians.
Anyway, when he came back, right in front of the entire class, she thanked him, looked him straight in the eye and proceeded to ask him if he'd like a finger....
That kid never said shit to a female teacher that wasn't yes miss or no miss from that point on.
ChelseaDagger16@reddit
I can believe there was a kid who made smutty comments to teachers, a librarian who sometimes gave out chocolate and a teacher who publicly cut him down with the KitKat line. I can’t see a teacher having an innuendo ready every lesson. It’s a crude comment multiple times a week in front of class, word would spread upwards realistically.
JeffBroccoli@reddit
Yeah, I agree. This story sounds like absolute bollocks
ChelseaDagger16@reddit
OP is likely repeating a school urban myth. The teacher, the student and the zinger were probably real, but the rest sounds embellished. It was likely an origin story about a hot teacher who didn’t take shit, passed down by an older sibling before OP joined the school
Even in the story; there’s a ton of fluff about why the KitKat was obtainable, who the librarian was and what the library was like (because OP experienced it first hand). But there’s nothing on what the offending remark was or much detail on the comments by the student and teacher (because OP obviously wasn’t there). I also find it hard to believe that someone who sexually harassed multiple women that “Would you like a finger?” was the most egregious check he’d received; so much so, he never made a comment again.
DefinitelyNotEmu@reddit
Upvote for Marathon reference
sock_cooker@reddit
That sounds really sex pesty tbh
Sorry_Information749@reddit
You couldnt a teacher just tell him to put a lid on the comments rather than this?
Sounds like the kind of thing that would easily get a teacher struck off now.
ChelseaDagger16@reddit
They’d be sacked in 1986 too
The teacher is making sexual comments in front of the whole class to the same student, multiple times a week. And this went on for months. Word would get around after a couple of weeks. In 2026, they’d be sacked. In 1986, they’d be told to stop by the Head. No headteacher is going to allow that in 1986.
FunkyYoghurt@reddit
If it makes you feel any better she'd be sacked in a 2026 school.
sock_cooker@reddit
I'd hope so, tbh. Although the whole story is a bit "chinny reckon" to me
FunkyYoghurt@reddit
OP calls Snickers Marathons so back in that era, a teacher like that wouldn't surprise me. Not excusing her at all, mind. But definitely in these times she'd lose her job and even the Union Rep (very powerful in education) would be sat face-palming in the meeting. Safeguarding is 100% Number 1 the most important thing working with children and being remotely sexual - even as a joke - with a child is a "Go home and never come back" and the Local Authority Safeguarding Team would have you on record forever. You'd never get a job working with children / vulnerable people ever again.
sock_cooker@reddit
That's true, likewise the Are You Being Served reference. Boggles my mind that anyone would make sexual references to a child
evenifihateit@reddit
You're not impressed with the teacher here, are you? Please don't tell me you are. Please.
Silent_Current7840@reddit
In primary school, a lad was a bit of an introvert…teacher used to call him up to the front of the class whenever there was a maths lesson to perform calculations related to the lesson on the board in front of the class. He struggled with maths I believe in general, but not majorly.
Obviously with the given situation he would struggle as the class would be mumbling and groaning and laughing etc. went on for most of the school year. It was clear he was being belittled by the teacher looking back, she never did this with any other students.
I assume this was the teachers way of confidence building but it had the opposite effect. Think later on he kept his head down in high school etc, as I ended up moving away from the area.
Eventually he would start getting them correct but was more as he would do the homework about 10 times the night before and read forward etc.
prussian_princess@reddit
That sounds like how my teachers taught in Lithuania. That leftover Soviet mentality of shaming you if you don't perform well.
Puzzledandhangry@reddit
That’s awful.
Petrosinella94@reddit
One of my ex-bosses once cornered me the corner of the office to yell at me for writing colloquially to a client - it was my first job post-uni and was a horrendous place to work (story for another day) but that is one of the events which stays with me. I know my written skills aren’t great but I never thought I would be yelled at for it. It has made me practice my writing skills which have improved but he could have brought it up better.
fourlegsfaster@reddit
I'm going to belittle you and say that the word you should have written is 'affect'. I hope that the effect will be that you use the correct word in future and despise my pedantry.
ALCATryan@reddit
…as in, what he’s written already? Miserable pedantry.
Extension_Ad4492@reddit
To be fair the original post included ‘effect’ as a verb.
glitterswirl@reddit
Nope. Affect is right. You want to know how something affects someone, or the effect something had on someone. At least get it right if you want to be a pedant, please.
tradegreek@reddit
My guy came with receipts
pickindim_kmet@reddit
Last week watched an awful human colleague at my partner's work refuse to use her name and call her by her role title. Completely dehumanising her.
Boring-Equivalent315@reddit
I once worked in a team where the mos junior member thought she should have been promoted into the role of a much more senior new colleague who joined. She refused to speak directly to the new person unless absolutely necessary, where she was incredibly sharp. She would ask each person in the team if they wanted coffee, except the new member, rolled her eyes when he spoke, muttered rude comments under her breath when he spoke. Basically refused to acknowledge him as a human for absolutely no reason.
We called her out on it numerous times but it made no difference. She was just a bully.
2014R1@reddit
Watched a guy spend 20 minutes explaining to his wife how a roundabout works. She’d been driving for 15 years. He didn’t have a licence
Boring-Equivalent315@reddit
I’m guessing this wasn’t in high school,so he did this in work in front of people? That’s hideous. What a god awful man.
Disastrous_Yak_1990@reddit
To be fair I’ve seen a lot of drivers who have probably been driving for 50 years who don’t know how they work.
davehemm@reddit
On a trip to company accountants last year my brother drove us both, first and very certainly last time that is happening, his total lack of awareness at a restricted view T-junction was breathtaking; almost had a car plow into me (passenger seat) as my brother barely slowed down at the junction before just going YOLO style.
catzrob89@reddit
For info - had you seen her drive a roundabout? A lot of people can't...
Manatsuu@reddit
20 mins? Were they just talking about how roundabouts work while eating out or something?
chrisxxviv@reddit
Naa just parked at the edge of the roadabout blocking the traffic.
LockedinYou@reddit
"I can drive, I just don't have a licence"
Necessary_Umpire_139@reddit
To be fair I can drive, I'm just not allowed due to medical.
LockedinYou@reddit
We can all collectively allow that
Necessary_Umpire_139@reddit
Eh?
Bigallround@reddit
This never fails to make me lose respect for someone.
Any_Preference_4147@reddit
I have ADHD so it takes me a while to grasp new things. My first job at 16, I was crap at the till and kept making a lot of mistakes. The manager printed out this chart and put it in the staff room and it said something like "days -my name- hasn't caused a refund" and for each day I didn't make a mistake I would get a star on the chart.
I was so young I didnt really grasp how much of a c*nt the manager was.
fotla@reddit
Things like this make me so mad when older employees bully younger ones. That would have been a clear cut case for workplace bullying and legal action, but kids don’t know this at the time. Boils my blood.
sock_cooker@reddit
When my mum died, my aunts basically overrode all the hymns I'd chosen for her funeral and the rest of the family all basically shunned me at the funeral (there was a mix of not approving of the care I tried to give her as she was living with dementia and my being gay).
Physical-Crow-2154@reddit
Sorry to hear this I can empathise with some of what you went through as it was the same for me.
FrostyImplement9565@reddit
One of my close friends is a golf tutor she’s extremely good. Always has men trying to teach her how to play. It’s very annoying. We were playing once and someone asked if I was teaching her, they were a bit shocked when I said it was the other way around
tiorzol@reddit
What's up with these bait questions where the op doesn't even put their own example in. Feels like fishing for a shitty BuzzFeed article.
originalindividiual@reddit (OP)
What a strange interpretation.
mackerel_slapper@reddit
Hotel manager took the piss out of a duty manager who stammered. Manager was a fat cunt, duty manager (whose wife was a chef) shortly after did a moonlit flit and left said manager up the creek. Awful man. This a long time ago. He is still alive, unfortunately, probably inflicting what passes for his personality on others. (Just Googled him, some Tripadvisor reviews on his hotel mention him being a miserable git).
AtmospherePrior752@reddit
My old supervisor, the owner of the company, used to call me “Barbie” because I had blonde hair and was young enough he didn’t bother to remember my name.
Kind of hard to earn respect of the staff as their personnel/HR rep…it sucked but idk if that’s considered belittling?
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