People are divided on whether you should get revenge on someone that did you wrong or just let it go. Some will say that your enemy must suffer the way you did, while others will suggest that the best revenge is having a better life than the person who was previously ruining it.
A woman shared a story of petty revenge by actually being nice to her high school bully who was her server and didn’t recognize her at first. She left a generous tip, showing she had money and referring to a moment in both of their pasts. To make sure the bully knew who she was serving, the woman left a note and remained until the former bully read it, getting a satisfying reaction.
More info: Reddit
Woman met her ex-friend-turned-bully and decided to kill her with kindness, taking her petty revenge
Image credits: Fill1970 (not the actual image)
At the beginning of high school, the Original Poster (OP) was friends with a girl who became depressed and suicidal because of online bullying. The friend shared her thoughts with the OP, which made her very concerned. Wanting to help, she told the school counselors and the friend’s parents about the situation.
While the OP was only looking out for her friend, the girl felt betrayed and became a bully herself. Not only that, but she became friends with her own bullies, although she didn’t realize it at first as the other girls made a fake Facebook profile to harass her.
When Bored Panda got in touch with the Redditor, she told us that she can’t go into the specifics of how her own bullying showed itself as “Most of this is too identifiable for her.”
The woman was friends with a girl in high school who had suicidal thoughts, so not wanting to lose a friend, she reported her
Image credits: u/FlashyCow1
So we will stick to the story of the bullying moment which led to the petty revenge. The OP was working as a server for her first job and the friend knew that. The bully came to the restaurant when she knew the OP was working and showed a bad attitude from the start.
The friend told the OP that "Service industry workers are servants who don't need to be paid" which hurt the Redditor so much that she remembered it for years. Thankfully, she never had to serve the former friend, as the restaurant manager was understanding enough when she explained the reason.
But she still couldn’t completely avoid her former friend: “She tried to bully me for 2 years after the servant comment, but I completely ignored her. She never tried to apologize or reconcile.”
But the friend took it as a betrayal and became a bully herself, despite her depression being caused by having been bullied
Image credits: u/FlashyCow1
However, the OP got her triumphant moment when she came back to her hometown and went to a local restaurant where she saw her bully working as a server. The Redditor told us that she was surprised to see the ex-friend as her waitress but at the same time, they lived in a small town so it wasn’t that out of the ordinary.
The woman realized that her ex-friend didn’t recognize her as the server kept asking if they knew each other. In an edit, the woman explained that since they’ve seen each other, 15 years have passed by and the Redditor changed her name after getting married, started wearing glasses and shaved her long hair. But to get her revenge, the woman didn’t reveal their relationship and kept being very polite and nice.
The moment that really stuck with the woman was when her friend told her she didn't deserve to get paid when she worked as a server
Image credits: u/FlashyCow1
When it was time to pay the bill, the OP gave her server a 100 percent tip and left a message on the receipt asking if people working in the hospitality industry are still servants who don’t deserve to be paid.
She made sure to see the reaction when the former friend read the note and the server’s face was red. In the comments, the OP explained that this meant the woman was angry and not embarrassed as she would go pale from embarrassment.
She could have told the ex-friend the same thing when she was already successful in life and this time she was being served
Image credits: Chris Bloom (not the actual image)
Image credits: u/FlashyCow1
You may think that a better act of revenge would be to give your bully a taste of their own medicine, as the definition of revenge is “the action of hurting or harming someone in return for an injury or wrong suffered at their hands.” But in the comments, the woman explained that her former friend was already having a miserable life and also, she didn’t want to drop to the same level as the bully was back then.
However, it is clear that the OP felt rewarded for her actions and this is the same feeling people who have more malice in their revenge also experience. Science Of People brings up an experiment conducted by Swiss researchers who allowed the participants to punish another person who had done them wrong and scanned their brain.
That scan showed “a rush of neural activity in the caudate nucleus. This is the part of the brain known to process rewards.”
But the woman didn't want to go as low as her former friend then was and actually left a 100 percent tip with a note on the receipt
Image credits: u/FlashyCow1
It is probably better that the OP chose this route of revenge because as Science Of People explains further, “Even though the first few moments feel rewarding in the brain, psychological scientists have found that instead of quenching hostility, revenge prolongs the unpleasantness of the original offense.”
Additionally, if your fantasies of taking revenge on someone turn into actions, there is a bigger chance that you might be narcissistic. Joseph Burgo, the author of The Narcissist You Know, identifies Vindictive Narcissist as a type and Ryan P. Brown concluded that “Both the narcissist’s inflated social confidence and the narcissist’s sense of entitlement could produce a desire to retaliate against wrong-doers and could reduce constraints on acting on this desire.”
Researchers also believe that people with high neuroticism are more likely to seek revenge because “their vengefulness is a product of their inability to manage negative emotions, particularly anger.”
The note asked the server if she still thought that servers are servants who don't need to be paid, which clearly rung a bell to the ex-friend
Image credits: Global Panorama (not the actual image)
Image credits: u/FlashyCow1
Revenge is truly sweet if you have the time, energy and courage to execute it, but it won’t necessarily last and won’t make you forget the reason why you were so hurt that you wanted to hurt another. However, do you still think it’s worth it? Do you think the woman should have left that note but without a tip? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.
People in the comments thought the woman was too kind but admired that she kept her composure
