Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Why I Hate Being Called Buddy

I have several pet peeves, the one that occurs the most frequently being the use of the word buddy as a form of direct address, as in the following examples:

How’re we doin’, buddy?
Nice job, buddy.
Watch it, buddy!

though I take no offense to its use in reference to an absent individual, as in this example:
My buddy over in Halifax can unpeel a clementine in one piece.

There is something about being called buddy specifically that irks me in ways that being called man, dude, brother, son, or even the occasional guy or chief do not. (These last two are so astoundingly rare that hearing them is for me anachronistic, so that I would be more likely to comment on the curiosity of these words than on any specific feelings arising from their use.) People often say that if I don’t like being called buddy, then why am I okay with other terms of endearment that are also (arguably) meant to embody close relationships?

The best illustration is an example from writer/director Savage Steve Holland’s* offbeat 1985 comedy Better Off Dead. The moment occurs after the scene where Lane Meyer (John Cusack), starting his shitty new job at the Pig Burger fast food restaurant, has just created a dancing claymation cheeseburger that sings Van Halen’s “Everybody Wants Some.” The cigar-smoking owner, catching Lane burning his meat, becomes enraged and hurls a hapless Lane into the restaurant where he lands at the feet of the film’s jockish villain, Roy Stalin.**

A little background: Lane Meyer is a high school senior whose decidedly bizarre world is filled with desserts that crawl off his plate and Japanese drag racers who speak like Howard Cosell. Lane is ill-adept at building things, is comically-far behind the rest of his geometry class, and drives a shitty station wagon. Just about the only things he has going for him are his skiing ability and his girlfriend Beth—both of which are taken from him by the confident, charismatic (“Who wants to hold my clipboard?”) Roy Stalin, who is far more popular than Lane and attracts the admiration of everyone for his own superior prowess on the ski slopes.

As Lane lies pathetically on the floor of Pig Burger still wearing an embarrassing chef’s hat with a pig snout attached, Roy Stalin sits above him with one arm around Lane’s former girlfriend. The camera looks up at Stalin from below so that he appears to tower over Lane as he taunts him:
STALIN: Buenos dias! (He makes obnoxious pig snorting noises.) Lookin’ real good, buddy. Lookin’ real good.

Here we have a moment where a clearly stronger character is making fun of a weaker character while also addressing him using the word buddy, a careful choice of words by screenwriter Holland. Whereas the use of Lane’s name would imply a more equal relationship with Stalin, buddy here accentuates Lane’s inferiority. It is not a direct insult, but Holland inserts it to highlight Stalin’s superior, bullying attitude and mockery of Lane’s embarrassing situation just as he also used the lower camera angle. The word buddy here only goes one way: Lane cannot call Stalin buddy because Stalin is a stronger character than Lane is. Holland wants us to hate Stalin and empathize with Lane, and his careful choice of words makes that even easier.

I’ve heard buddy used in this context many times before, from experienced athletes addressing their unconfident teammates to the derisive way that adults speak to small children. Again, in both instances, there is an imbalance in the relationship: the less-experienced teammate has no business calling his superior buddy any more than a child would call a teacher buddy. When the word is spoken to me by my peers, even in the most casual or innocuous of situations, I too feel inferior, as if the other person is also deriding me on the floor of my humiliating fast-food job.

I know that not everyone who uses the word buddy uses it with these intentions. I have been told that many times by many people. But the image is one I cannot shake any more than the lover who feels an excited burst of energy at hearing his partner’s name, or the woman who feels a disgusted chill at hearing the word cunt shouted aloud.

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* I re-watched Better Off Dead recently and was struck by the daring nickname and double-crediting of Savage Steve Holland as writer/director of his first movie. Who was Savage Steve Holland, and what other quirky, creative gems had he produced to equal the masterpiece that is Better Off Dead? I jumped on the internet and, finding his filmography disappointingly short, sought out his second film, One Crazy Summer, again starring John Cusack alongside a St. Elmo’s Fire-era Demi Moore. I dismissed (or skimmed over) the film’s poor reviews and watched it one evening after work only to be utterly disgusted by one of the most insulting movie experiences of my entire life. This movie is so bad that it deserves a proper blog entry explaining how bad it is, and not just a footnote within a marginally-related entry. It’s not even worth watching to see for yourself how bad it is, nor is it worth watching with friends to make fun of a la She’s the Man with Amanda Bynes. The film is made worse by my confusion and disgust at how Holland went from portraying twistedly funny distortions of reality in Better Off Dead to churning out cheap jokes and sight gags slapped on to a clichéd teen movie plot barely a year later. The story is one you’ve seen a million times before: a guy has to win the girl and save a town from destruction by corporate greed, blah blah blah. But while ‘80s movies like UHF or The Goonies have similar plots, they at least have redeeming jokes and characters to support them, whereas One Crazy Summer has none. The animated scenes are uninspired, the theme of a character wanting to find love never resonates with anything, actor Curtis Armstrong (the “Sometimes you just have to say ‘What the fuck’” guy from Risky Business) is frustratingly underused, and one of the other sidekick characters is so annoying that I found myself constantly withholding the urge to punch him in the face. My suspicion is that this movie came out so abominably because Holland, newly-initiated into the world of Hollywood, forgot the natural creativity that allowed him to produce his first film and instead wrote and directed the movie he felt audiences wanted to see, because that’s what everyone else was making, and that’s how grown-up writer/directors made movies, right? (Think of it as an ‘80s Barton Fink.) Writers who lack confidence in their creative abilities (myself included, though moreso when I was younger) will often fall back on clichés and conventions to progress a story, fill out a scene, or even shape an entire work. Imagine an endless string of these conventions pieced together into a movie, and that’s One Crazy Summer.


** My attempt to locate this scene on YouTube only resulted in a video of the original “Everybody Wants Some” scene dubbed over with Creed’s “Take Me Higher,” which I will not be reposting here for obvious reasons.

15 comments:

Danicus said...

I think it has a lot to do with connotation, as well. I have a couple of friends where thats how i greet them on the phone, and I dont mean anything derisive about it at all.
"Hey, man."
"Hey, buddy. What's up?"

It's also how I end phone conversations with my brother, most times.
"all right, I gotta get to class."
"cool. talk to you soon. Love ya, buddy."

Mike said...

If only there were a word that made me so mad, maybe then I'd understand...

Anonymous said...

I understand what you are saying for sure. I wasn't sure why it got on my nerves so bad but that makes alot of sense. It also bothers me because I am a girl! I feel like buddy is referring to males so when guys call me buddy, it makes me mad. What would be an equivalent of buddy to guys that would make guys feel girlie. I would like to try that out on some of my guy friends and see how it makes them feel. And I do call young male boys my little buddies so I can see the inferior thing...and I don't mind that I am the guys' friend but I definitely don't want to be one of the guys...and that's what buddy means to me.

Anonymous said...

Yes, I work with a man about 13 years older than me who addresses me as "buddy" at times. I believe it is inappropriate, and I do feel that in the workplace it is a superior/inferior connotation. I do not like this at all, but I endure it knowing that I am really not the one with the problem. Some people just love to feel important, and they degrade others to place themselves on a pedestal that will someday be knocked out from under them.

Anonymous said...

I also hate being called buddy. Glad to see my understandably irrational irritation effects other people.

Anonymous said...

I hate it too. I work with a guy that says it all the time and it drives me nuts! I'm not the only person he says it to so I don't think he means it in a degrading or insulting way but I don't like it. Glad I'm not alone.

Anonymous said...

I totally loved this article. Spot on. I hated the word since ever and this article clarified and shed light on why i dislike the word.

Anonymous said...

I've heard "buddy" and "dude" and it's mainly due to their own insecurities. One guy recently found out that I make more money than he does and now it's "buddy" rather than my name. Another time when I was promoted to lead a team, one of the guys stopped calling me by my name and started calling me "dude". I mentioned that he probably should be more professional in how he addresses me on a regular basis (every so often, who cares). He seemed more put off than "shocked" that I would call him out on it. :)

Anonymous said...

I have a British friend and she calls me 'buddy'–and I really don't like it. So I ended up here trying to see if others hate being called buddy too–and yep! We all don't like it. I hate being called buddy because it sounds impersonal and insincere. Anybody, anywhere is 'buddy'. There is something condescending to it: I've noticed it is often used by supervisors in service occupations like fast food jobs, gas station attendants, clerks: "hey buddy can to clean up that mess? Thanks!" or "good job on that buddy, now I need you to..." It's demeaning. It's also generic: addressing someone by their first name acknowledges their individuality whereas calling someone buddy is totally impersonal, like they're just another 'dude', 'man', etc.

::::P said...

wow i have found someone who feels the same way, I come from Northern Ireland and guys here usually call me "bud"/Buddy lad dude or mate all of these drive me mad i would rather have someone ask my name

Anonymous said...

If someone does not know my name then it's not a problem. But, if the person knows my name it is insulting.
I usually inform the person that "Buddy is an Elf". Unfortunately the Bozo does not "get it".

Anonymous said...

Yes i dont like being called buddy or pal. I think it's a bit condescending. I dont like when girls call me buddy.
Especially girls if they call me buddy. Am I 10? I'm 25. Just say Hi. Not hey Buddy. What if I called you pal? Imagine if i called people pal, imagine if i called girls pal or buddy. That's fricking weird. Chill.

Thee Indy said...

I don't note the things people say to defend their use of the term "buddy". I use their behavior towards me and their behavior towards others to determine the context of their usage of the word, and pretty much always without fail, I have come to the conclusion that it is used in a diminutive fashion. When speaking of those who seem to call everyone buddy, I've noticed that those people often have an attitude like everyone is just a side character in their life. This is their story and they are the main character in their minds, so addressing everyone as "buddy" is a way of establishing in their minds that these are all just characters occupying their space. There's definitely something territorial and passive-aggressive about it, and even if the person seems like a sweetheart, I often feel like if they hadn't already established some sort of social status to where they can feel like everyone else is a slightly lesser character than them, they would not be calling people around them buddy. It's simple enough to see when anyone of higher authority comes around.

They wouldn't call their boss buddy. They wouldn't call their father buddy. So why can they be a smarmy little fuck towards me? That shows me their inner thought process, their inner intent. It makes no difference if they go around cooing and petting people and taking their granny's grannies to their dialysis appointments. There's something maddeningly insincere and subtly yet deeply sinister about people such as that.

Unfortunately, these folks are our leaders and our rulers and our celebrities and our doctors and our lawyers and our academics and our teachers and our judges and our priests. They are psychopaths at heart, but they are crippled by a fear of being found out. Which makes them a particularly pathetic yet socially stifling form of psychopath... because all of their evil is couched behind a seemingly good nature.

I mean, similarly, science is just being informative and truthful when it incessantly calls humans animals. Surely it's all just in good faith and not an evil plot to diminish man below the level of even the lowest creature on earth, below even the maggot on cow dung. I doubt maggots will be charged a carbon tax or corralled into "smart cities" like cattle. I doubt maggots will be forced to wear muzzles or be quarantined for two years straight so their society falls apart and millions of maggots die of preventable illnesses because doctors made up a new disease to scare everyone into submission about.

Indeed, the fly larvae are afforded more dignity than us by our modern "humanistic" society. Perhaps that's why we feel just in making others feel similarly. Let's stop being wimps, though. If you really want to make someone feel lesser than yourself, just haul off and call them a fucking retard. Hey, fucking retard! How are ya? Probably pretty shitty since you're a fucking retard! Okay then, go enjoy your pathetic excuse for a non-life, you fucking retard! Wait... you're still here, fucking retard? I would've thought you'd take the hint and go kill yourself, you fucking retard!

But of course... that's not your intent. You swear. God's honest and all.

Puhleeeze! Stop lying.... to others, but most importantly to yourself. Examine yourself, as to whether your intentions are true. I'll bet you'll find that they're not... and I would bet all my life savings on that... which is about 100 dollars, thanks to smarmy fucks like you who think everything's just an entertaining game and people you view as inferior are just fun little toy people you can play with while keeping them at arm's length (because shit would get too real for you if you actually fucking knew anyone you were dealing with like that).

Don't call people buddy. You are ruining their life. Yes, you are. Yes, you have. Yes, it's your fault. May God have mercy on your eternal soul.

Chris Haugen said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

The video with Claymation hamburger & Van Halen song - https://youtu.be/0-HhEwoHSig?si=Yt5QE1cVyunFSHhs