McAlister posted:

I have a friend who doesn't understand why new hires are frightened of him. He just talks straight and tells it like it is ... as he has ways done. It's baffling to him that he can bring people to tears with a few remarks these days or that people actively seek to avoid his attention.

I keep trying to explain to him how relative power changes the way things are interpreted such that being one of four devs back in the startup days is completely loving different than being the highest ranked architect/mythical founder/BFF of the CEO 15 years later on a department of 49 devs.

When you can get someone fired and/or relegated to dead end poo poo work at will then being dismissively critical scares the pants off them. The problem isn't them, they are acting rationally. He needs to moderate his expression to his actual level of dissatisfaction rather than over-do it such that everything is either brilliant or blithering idiocy.

Esp in front of the CEO.

Relative power abso-fuckinglutely impacts the level of emotional response to a person's actions. When I have power over you I can hurt you so much more than a random person can.

To say that it doesn't matter who has a significant physical advantage over the other is like saying that what happened to him is just like him waking up in secure restraints such that she could do whatever she wanted and he would be physically unable to stop her. Helpless as his requests to be released are ignored.

That his loss of personal agency/damage from that would be exactly the same as from this.

Bullshit.

By that logic a beggar following you for three blocks pouring on the guilt till you give them money is the same as a mugger.