I am totally trying to help the guy. I am willing to make myself look mean to give him a better chance to slow himself *before* he gets too annoying.
Here, he’s a stranger to us and he comes in bragging essentially that he’s better than our friend Tom or that we should cut Tom off and be exclusive with him. That’s just a bad tactic. Charles Barkley can be brash. Willie Saylor can be brash. Kevin Hart maybe can be brash. But a total stranger with no reservoir of good will and no particular entertaining charisma should tread slowly. Traditional human relations 101.
I’ve tried to help guys before, when I saw they were about to get themselves banned. I see this as a similar effort.
It’s probably not worth it. I tell my kids to not give advice to most people, because they’ll often actually take the advice and improve themselves, but instead of thanking you, they’ll hate you. And so you’ve created a new enemy and improved him at the same time.
But I sometimes do it anyhow because I’m older now, and I don’t care, and I want to try to help people.