Yeah, I don't do this at all, and I don't like being friends with those that do
It's very common for people to engage in the bullying, thinking that they are just ribbing; perhaps, never having experienced the safety that is required for ribbing.
This doesn’t mean that there aren’t funny people, or safe drivers, or great programmers. It also doesn’t mean that it’s impossible to KNOW you are funny, safe, or great at something.
It is a bit of a paradox, though, that right and wrong people can be equally certain.
If you ship code that blows up in production, you failed at programming. It doesn't necessarily make you a bad programmer in and of itself - everybody makes mistakes - but if you also refuse to acknowledge and own your error then that certainly suggests a lack of competence.
If you tell a joke that lands disastrously, you failed at comedy. It doesn't necessarily make you a bad comedian in and of itself - everybody makes mistakes - but if you also refuse to acknowledge and own your error then that certainly suggests a lack of competence.
I still don't understand why, for many people, that last point is so much harder to understand than the first two.
Then it is frequently just a public bullying of a victim. Bullying can be really fun and bonding activity for bullies. That is why many of them do it.
For example, if you make a public post on social media, your actual audience is effectively the whole world. If you wanted a smaller audience, you should not have chosen a public post on social media as your venue.
Would you mind being friends with someone like me? Or do you feel like engaging in that behavior at all, even if not directed at you, is enough to make you not want to be friends with them?