I feel like a lot of people don’t fully appreciate this point because they are well adjusted and hear no constantly.
You have to view these billionaires as toddlers. They never hear a simple “no”, and when they do they go apoplectic.
You have to view these billionaires as toddlers. They never hear a simple “no”, and when they do they go apoplectic.
I think it's a relatively universal human trait to resent dissent, these guys just have more resources to make their distate known.
Most people when they hear “no” feel a little upset and get over it.
When a narcissist hears “no” he suffers a narcissistic injury and seeks revenge.
When a narcissistic billionaire hears “no”… well, buckle up. 1/6 showed us how bad that can get.
Which is also the story of Twitter and Musk.
I think it didn't even scratch the surface of how bad it can get. But it was already plenty bad.
Just saying yes as a parent doesn’t help them learn to cope with it. Rather a close similarity to GP’s point!
A few times a day.
> I find it pretty common to get a visceral reaction when I disagree with people,
I only find this common with people who are very sensitive (not that there is anything at all wrong with that). An interesting corollary I've found as well: very sensitive people tend to think the rest of the normal world is equally as sensitive (something I've picked up from having a very sensitive partner for over 5 years now; a partner who has many very sensitive friends); they somehow seem to forget that countries like Germany have people that are super direct as the norm.
> I think it's a relatively universal human trait to resent dissent
I hear far "worse" from good friends on the spectrum or from Germany or Russia and it's rather easy to chalk it up to them just communicating in a different way.
None of this should ever apply to any even moderately-adjusted individual beyond childhood. Certainly not as an adult.
It doesn't have to be just billionaires, one of the startups I worked in had a leadership culture like this. I ended up leaving after the new person I was reporting to took this to an extreme.
One they are billionaires, hearing no is likely exceedingly rare, however to get to prestige, I'm certain they heard no many many times (or the equivalent, say "no way you can do that") so they're so used to people objecting and they succeed anyway - Tesla, SpaceX come to mind here - that no just makes them want to double down on what they're doing, combined with the fact that their inner circle at this point likely isn't saying no very often, if at all, directly to the person at hand, it makes them very resistant to real feedback