How Do You Act When You're Angry? (PART 1)
Does being an angry kid affect your relationships or politics later in life?
Table of Contents
If you met my friend Martha, you’d probably think she was a sweetheart. She holds the elevator for her insufferable neighbor, even when she’s running late. She tips generously, even when the service is worse than the food. She covers for her incompetent boss, even when he’s tripping balls in the middle of the day. But she doesn’t do these things out of the kindness of her heart. She does them because she knows better.
You see, Martha’s not “being nice”. She’s swallowing her anger:
1️⃣ “I hold the elevator for their entitled ass so they don’t bitch about it later.
2️⃣ That tip is my way of saying: ‘Fuck you and keep the change, your broke ass needs it more than I do.’
3️⃣ And the sooner I get off work, the sooner I can get home to my kids. Look, people be crazy, y’all. I’m just out here pickin’ my battles!”
Regardless of her motives, Martha’s suppressed rage keeps people happy—and the world going. But she’s not the only one. You’re probably brewing a cup of wrath at this very moment, trying to deal with something you’re not even conscious of. Family drama. Relationship issues. Politics. Corruption. Inequality. Discrimination. Who ate your sandwich at work…
There’s so much to be mad about yet you seem to keep it together. It’s behavior we collectively reward as a society: you’re so selfless, forgiving, patient—a saint! We even have little phrases to normalize the passivity. This too shall pass. Water under the bridge. Fuhgeddaboudit. Be the bigger person.
But admit it. Every once in a while, you think about punching someone in the face. I know I do. Think about it, I mean…
Just the other day, I was on the subway and this old Asian couple walks in, sits right next to me. They’re minding their own business when this inebriated dipshit shows up—out of nowhere—and starts hurling racial slurs right in their face. They didn’t engage, of course, but this fucking lunatic just kept going. You should have seen this guy, I mean he was one relentless son of a bitch. Just three more stops and I was out of there. But now I could hear his filth through the music blaring full blast on my earphones. I thought, fuck it, I should just beat this asshole to a pulp. Right here. In front of all these people. A good ol’-fashioned blackout—no, you know what? I should make him apologize. Make the fucker grovel. And everyone would fucking applaud. They’d fucking remember this moment.
👩🦰 Tell us, what was going through your head at the time?
🎙️ Gee, I dunno… I didn’t really think. I just knew I had to do something.
👩🦰 Well, you did indeed—you saved the day.
🎙️ I dunno, I just did the right thing. Can’t run away from something like that, ya know? Gotta act.
👩🦰 There you have it, folks, a reminder to all of us: actions speak louder than words. Back to you, Joe.
But that’s just some Taxi Driver shit…
We’re not supposed to fight fire with fire — we’re supposed to use words. Which would be fucking fantastic except no one says anything these days. We all just stood there. I just stood there. What kind of asshole just stands there and does nothing? So much for my self-serving fantasy. I watched as the couple abruptly got off the subway with the drunken fuck following them out.
I’d swallowed my anger. Just like Martha. And the worst part: I was angry at myself. Why the fuck didn’t I do something?
What is anger?
Clearly anger isn’t the root of the problem. It’s how we act upon it.
But understanding the big why behind humanity’s rage-fueled thoughts and behavior requires a little more curiosity and a little less moral condemnation. For Dr. Robert Sapolsky, neuroscientist, primatologist, and author of Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst, our actions are far too complex to be reduced to one thing:
“You are going to get nowhere if you decide ‘here is the part of the brain that caused this behavior’. We need to look at one second, seconds to minutes, hours to days, weeks to months, back to adolescence and childhood and fetal life, back to fertilized egg, and back millennia before that to understand why a person acted the way they did. […] We are nothing more or less than the biological and environmental luck, over which we had no control, that has brought us to any moment.”
If you’re a fickle fuck like me, you’re going to love that one when you’re being a dick and hate it when you’re being told off by one. It’s human nature. We want to believe we earned every bit of good fortune, but got struck by an ancestral curse when things didn’t work out the way we’d hoped. We need to believe we’re god’s gift to humanity — that we’re worth preserving.
So where does anger fit into all this and what does it do to our state of mind? I don’t even know what I’m really pissed about half the time I’m screaming at the news, so here’s clinical health psychologist Dr. Jade Wu’s take on it:
“[Anger] is a threat-activated neurophysiological arousal response, which means it’s created when a threat triggers the brain to send out a rallying cry to the body, putting the troops on high alert. The amygdala starts the call to battle. Then a cascade of brain and body events leads to adrenaline and cortisol pumping through the bloodstream, an increased heart rate, tensed muscles, heightened and narrowed attention, and a facial expression that flashes like a warning sign. Acting aggressively isn’t mentioned anywhere in the definition of anger. That’s because anger is not a behavior; it’s not the same as hostility, violence, or aggression. Those words describe what people do; anger describes how people feel.”
So, anger is an evolutionary stress response. Like many things in life, it’s not “good or bad” but thinking makes it so. This explains the power of resistance inherent in social change and political activism. It also explains the catharsis we experience through rage-fueled music or comedy as it releases a bottled-up emotion “from the shelf of anger that sits in every man’s chest.”
All that to say, you haven’t really lived until you’ve been angered. And that doesn’t happen when you’re old and wrinkly. It all starts when you don’t even have the language to explain it.
Anger in childhood
I have no idea what kind of childhood you had. But I’ll wager it wasn’t as hectic as it was for twelve-year-old Matilda (played superbly by then child-actor Natalie Portman) in Léon: The Professional. This 90’s gem follows the story of a little girl teaming up with a professional hitman to avenge the murder of her family.
But Léon (played by minimalist Jean Reno) isn’t just any hitman. He’s the best in the biz. As big boss Tony tells him: “You’re indestructible. Bullets slide off you, you play with ‘em!”
As for Matilda, her family’s been slaughtered by a deranged pill-popping psychopath who also happens to be a corrupt NYC cop (an unhinged Gary Oldman who listens to Beethoven on drugs). She’s no stranger to violence, growing up in an abusive household, but she’s traumatized by the massacre, particularly by the loss of her innocent little brother. Now she wants revenge, and as luck would have it, she lives next door to the only person who’s ever shown her any kindness: a reluctant friend who also happens to be an assassin.
If the premise sounds a bit jarring, that’s because it is, especially as you pick up on the suggestiveness of this problematic relationship. At the same time, the film is clearly meant to be shocking, provocative, over-the-top, offensive. It’s set in a cruel sadistic world where you don’t raise children to be law-abiding citizens. You raise them to hunt and survive. It’s no country for old men — and young women. As Edison Smith of VHS Revival writes:
“The story may pose uncomfortable questions, but these are deeply dysfunctional characters in uniquely desperate circumstances, and the film’s central relationship maintains an endearing sweetness that speaks more to paternal instincts. Then there’s Portman herself, a mindboggling talent who wowed a generation with an impossibly complex turn for someone so young. Reno’s character may adorn the marquee, but this is Portman’s movie. Fearlessness has rarely been so captivating.”
Damn right. I wish I was half as fearless when I was twelve. Or twenty. Thirty. Older. But I wasn’t. And I’m not. But it makes my experience of the film that much more gratifying. As I’m writing this, I’m having a little trouble recalling my earliest experience with visceral anger. I grew up around a lot of hot-headed adults, yet all I can remember is crying a lot. That’s not anger… is it?
I remember being scared. Fighting with my siblings. Throwing up in the backseat of my mom’s car, all over my lovely neighbor who decided to carpool with us that one afternoon — a well-preserved reel of memory from the original collection of My Childhood Nightmares™. I still recoil in agony when I think about that one today… but for the life of me, I can’t remember a moment that truly pissed me off as a kid. Like, y’know, a punch-a-hole-in-the-wall kind of moment.
And then it finally hit me. The first time I cussed.
Profanity
I wasn’t a particularly sharp third-grader. But for whatever reason, I remembered new words — the way they sounded, especially when they were emotionally charged. I’d picked this one up from my dad who said it every single time he was enraged, which was… often. This was the day I learned the word “bastard”.
‘Course, I had no idea what it meant. As far as I was concerned, you were a bastard if you were annoying. Or ugly. Or both. Later in life, I would learn bastards come in all shapes and sizes. Like my high school math teacher who straight up told me I was the worst student he’d ever had. If only he’d actually taught me instead of handin’ me a freakin’ packet, yo.
I must have been seven or eight when I first said it. I was playing with another kid who thought it’d be funny to push me against the wall. It wasn’t—not for me, anyway. But instead of crying like I usually did, I looked him dead in the eye and pulled the proverbial trigger.
Gasp. You can’t say that.
I did. BASTER.
It would be two more weeks before I’d learn there’s a “d” at the end of this smoking pistol. But I didn’t care. He knew better than to mess with me now. That baster.
I still have a “potty mouth” in case you haven’t noticed. And you know what, I’m fucking glad I do. In fact, I recently discovered that swearing can improve your pain tolerance. It activates a fight-or-flight response that helps nullify the link between the pain and your perception of it. Moreover, swearing intelligently has been linked to emotional regulation, creativity, authenticity, and social bonding. I don’t mean like that deranged lunatic spewing hate on the subway. More when it’s… ya know… benign.
All I’m trying to say is… when you’re angry and alone… don’t be afraid of the word muh’fu’a.
Internalizing
The point is, we tend to associate childhood anger with temper tantrums and harmless scuffles in the playground, but it can manifest in many ways—not all of them physical or even threatening to other people. In fact, this toddler reminds us that you can direct upsetting emotions toward yourself at a very young age. Here’s how his father describes his reaction with empathy and humor:
“All right, this is hands-down the most emotional baby I’ve seen in my life. His brother and sister just left for school and this is his honest reaction. He’s not just upset. He’s upset that he’s upset. So what does he do? He slaps himself in the face. This is an outward expression of what he’s feeling on the inside. People asked why I didn’t laugh. ‘Cause I was scared. This is none other than an evil villain’s origin story.”
According to the National Health Service, one of the most effective ways to deal with childhood anger is for parents to try and identify the source — just as the father does in that video — in order to help the child understand and navigate anger in a positive way.
At a certain point, it’s not enough to tell a kid what to do and what not to do. They need to understand the why in order to regulate their own emotions in a healthy way, and much of that depends on the emotional intelligence of the parent or caretaker.
This becomes even more important when kids start getting picked on for being “different” like the protagonist of Moonlight. That’s when it gets incredibly difficult to not respond with aggression or suppression, especially if the threat remains active for a long period of time.
Think of isolation. Public humiliation. Bullying. Low self-esteem. And how it all shapes your sense of identity and belonging in this world, both as a child and an adult.
Bullying at school
Clearly I remember
Pickin’ on the boy
Seemed a harmless little fuck
But we unleashed a lion
Gnashed his teeth on the recess lady’s breast
How can I forget
But he hit me with a surprise left
Jaw right open
Dropped wide open
Just like the day
Like the day I heard…
"Jeremy" by Pearl Jam
There’s no shortage of angry music from the ’90s.
But this song stands out for its allusions to two real-life school tragedies tied to bullying and mental health. One was a real-life school shooting by someone that frontman Eddie Vedder went to school with. The other, which the song is titled after, was a real-life incident in Richardson, Texas, where fifteen-year-old Jeremy Delle shot himself in front of a classroom. Vedder read about this in the local paper which then inspired him to write the chilling chorus: “Jeremy spoke in class today.”
Later in a radio interview, Vedder explained his reaction to the news — and how it became part of the band’s debut album:
“I thought of even calling up and finding out more. Like, I wonder why that happened. I wonder why he did it and it seemed like…Richardson sounded to me like a decent suburb…um, middle, if not upper, class. And the fact is, I didn’t want to…um…I thought that was intruding completely. I actually knew somebody in Junior High School in San Diego, California that did the same thing, just about. He didn’t take his life, but ended up shooting up an oceanography room. I remember being in the halls and hearing it. And I’d actually had altercations with this kid in the past. I was kind of a rebellious fifth-grader and I think we got into fights and stuff. So it’s, um, it’s a bit about this kid named Jeremy and it’s also a bit about a kid named Brian that I knew and I think it says a lot. I think it goes somewhere and a lot of people interpret it in different ways. It’s just been recently that I’ve been talking about the true meaning behind it.”
The song received four MTV awards in 1993, including “Video of the Year”. During his acceptance speech, Vedder remarked: “If it weren’t for music, I think I would have shot myself in front of the classroom. It really is what kept me alive. So…to the power of music.”
Obviously childhood isn’t the only time we’re made to feel like an outsider. Just think of a time someone pushed you around when you weren’t able to defend yourself. At home. At work. In public. In private. Online. Offline. If you have no one in your corner, you’re made to feel even smaller, more insignificant, like you don’t matter at all. It feels like the only way out is to somehow make the world stop. Except the world doesn’t stop for anyone.
Aggression isn’t just about getting into altercations. It’s about not being able to figure out your own emotions and being completely alone with this internal battle. This is why creative outlets like art, performance, sports, friendship, counseling, and mental health support are all such a critical part of “growing up” and making peace — both with your pain and who you are.
You can’t choose your family or where you’re born or your fucking school or your fucking town, but you can always find stories of people who’ve been where you are now — and that can absolutely change your life. Whatever you’re feeling is just a short chapter in a book that’s almost always full of surprises. At least that’s what I liked to believe as a child, even if it felt like a lie sometimes.
Bullying at work
Say you’re not a “conventionally angry person” despite all the shit you’ve been through. What’s keeping your anger from turning into rage? Is it meditation? Swimming? Is it being in nature? Hitting the gym? Playing sadistic games during VIP dinners?
One way to understand rage is to view it as “anger that arises when our boundaries are being transgressed.” And more often than not, there’s anger on both sides of this transgression.
In fact, research shows that bullies don’t attack who they consider to be “powerless” — they attack who they perceive to be a threat. Their brain is “so frantic, so threatened, it’s not registering others’ fear or suffering.” We see this kind of remorseless behavior play out brilliantly in HBO’s Succession, where the all-powerful media mogul Logan Roy terrorizes everyone around him, including his own family, in order to preserve his dominance rank, in spite of his poor health. His sociopathic behavior makes more sense when we learn about the trauma and possible abuse he endured as a child. In a blink-or-miss moment, we even catch him smile with pride when his eldest son Kendall finally reveals his own “killer instinct”. It’s a full-circle moment resulting from “a blood sacrifice”.
This is why Dr. Laura Crawshaw, psychotherapist and self-proclaimed “boss whisperer,” believes: “Behind every abrasive boss is a struggling, fearful, insecure person.” Her goal is to teach workplace bullies how to read people’s emotional and physical cues without constantly feeling threatened.
(Sheesh, someone send this lady to the oval office…)
We think high school’s over, but the truth is, workplace politics are full of dominance interactions and petty displays of authority that make Regina George look good. Think of a CEO reprimanding a senior leader in front of their whole team. Or a new boss picking on something totally insignificant. Or how about those abrupt demands that can totally wait till next week? Or the classic “bitch, please!” during a televised press conference…
All this performative aggression serves to materialize the insecure leader’s bloated public persona—and your response to it either cements or shatters it. And if you’re in a precarious political crisis like war… well… damned if you do, damned if you don’t.
Either way, our stress response is tied more to our personality than our pecking order—not much different from wild baboons.
According to Dr. Sapolsky, who studied primates for 25 years in Africa’s Serengeti Plain, there’s always a price to pay for being domineering and aggressive. Baboons spend three hours hunting for food, leaving just nine hours to establish their rank in the social hierarchy. “Physiologically, it’s very expensive to be a bastard all day long,” he explains.
Perhaps the same could be said of dominance hierarchies in human societies. Except, you know, some of us would clearly prefer to die on this hill like the bastards that we are. It gets even more fascinating when you consider this fact:
“Despite the picture of baboons as being highly aggressive, the vast majority of dominance interactions involve not overt aggression but only threats of aggression or, even more often, psychological intimidation.”
Hmmm. Remind you of an old boss… or perhaps a current leader?
Identifying these aggressive personality types at work and managing aggression, staged or otherwise, isn’t just important for the individual’s own health and survival—it’s also necessary for the entire culture and safety of the tribe, company or nation.
Otherwise, you’re just a few boar-on-the-floor nights away from becoming “The Cunt of Monte Cristo.”
👋 Hey, you hell-raisin’ Homosapien!
➡️ CHECK OUT PART 2 where I discuss anger in sports, music, horror, art, culture and society at large
🎬 Cool stuff referenced in this piece: Taxi Driver by Martin Scorsese, Kill Bill: Volume 2 by Quentin Tarantino, Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst by Robert Sapolsky, Léon: The Professional by Luc Besson, Moonlight by Barry Jenkins, Jeremy by Pearl Jam, Succession created by Jesse Armstrong. Enjoy!
💭 So whatcha think? How do you deal with anger? What films, music, books or word of advice helped you get through a heated moment? Let me know in the comments below!
💜 Thank you for supporting my content. If you like what your read, subscribe to my newsletter to get notified when my next post is live!
Excellent text
Hi Luiz, thanks so much for stopping by and leaving a comment! Glad you liked the piece!
I really appreciated this article! My favorite part is: ‘You can’t choose your family or where you’re born or your fucking school or your fucking town, but you can always find stories of people who’ve been where you are now — and that can absolutely change your life.’ I find this message incredibly powerful..
Hi Cristian, thanks for reading. Glad that line resonated with you—those stories definitely saved my life.