My daughter is in middle school. The breeding ground for haters and bullies, so it is a conversation we are constantly having in our home.

Thinking back on my middle (then junior) high school days, at the same school, and my experience as an adult, I just told her:

You’re nobody without haters.

Haters are gonna hate. Bullies are going to bully. But really, I think they are just fans and secret admirers, but their egos won’t let them say so.

Think of it this way: You must be doing something right if you are ruffling feathers.

So embrace your bullies and haters.

Over the few weeks there are several Legal Marketing Association-related conferences, in addition to the local chapter and City Group events:

Ready. Set. Let the #LMAMKT AND #LMACME trolls go!!

Oh, the attacks on the speakers. What we do. What we say.

The attacks on the content. The profession.

It won’t stop all day. And then they’ll get mad when no one engages with them.

I don’t know about you, but when I really don’t like someone or something, I just ignore it. It’s called apathy. I just don’t care.

So, just for today and tomorrow, I will remind all of you to ignore the haters and bullies. As a story teller, I have my own reasoning (ask me about it tomorrow) as to why our haters HATE legal marketers so much.

Me? I’ll just look at them like the short, fat kid I went to junior high school with back in the late ’70s. He grew up to become a corporate lawyer. A lawyer at one of the firms I worked at, in fact. And a bully in the office.

When word got out that we grew up together, I would get visitors to my office to try and figure him out. Why was he such an asshole?

I would just pulled out my junior high school yearbook that I began to keep in the office, point to his picture and explained: “He was the short, fat kid that everyone made teased and made fun of and he is now exacting his revenge on the world.”

Understanding that one guy helped me to understand all the other haters and bullies in the world (and help my daughter to have empathy for others who are not in the cool clique, and to embrace her inner quirks).

Everything I have read about bullies is that the behavior has to do with their lack of self-esteem and self-worth. Their lack of power in one area, and trying to exert control in another.

When they attack and degrade, they are trying to make you feel less then so that they can feel better about themselves. They then surround themselves with their “fan club” who are also fearful, but feel protected by being “friends” with the bully.

The bullies will moan and groan and say that this is a crock of shit, but we all know the truth. And so do they.

So while I have my haters, who try to bully me, I prefer to think of them as (creepy) fans and secret admirers instead.

Why else would they, who have nothing but disdain and contempt for what I do and what I write, keep reading it, commenting on it, and sharing it with others?