"L'Enfer, wrote Sartre, c'est les autres." (Hell is other people) Sometimes, I am inclined to agree with him, and those who would say they have never agreed with him have never been on a committee. Everyone at some point has had difficulties with others. Whether it's the idiots who ride public transportation, the staff council meeting that just goes on forever, or my students who expect to get something for nothing, no one is immune to others. My personal ranting aside, unless one is a hermit in the woods (and so often I find myself thinking what kindred spirits Thoreau and myself are) we all have to deal with people (including Thoreau, who wasn't so much of a hermit anyway).
The interesting thing about people is that they apart from us. I do not think we would have the consciousness we do today if we did not have some "other" who is so different from ourselves. Someone who challenges our opinions and grates against us (for things so small as the way they chew their food) surely must be "other," alien to ourselves. If they were like us, we reason, they wouldn't be so damn annoying.
The false dichotomy of Us and Them exists even on the level of the personal Us and the everyone else Them. So often when we don't like someone we fail to realise how much of what we hate in others is what we hate about ourselves. We exist, however, partly because others do, and precisely because they are so alien. Others people's actions create part of our perception, even influence the way we perceive things, and our perceptions are all we have to say "I am here."
"Our quarrel with the world is an echo of the endless quarrel proceeding within us." -Eric Hoffer
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