What does familiarity breeds contempt

For the vast majority of people, though, liking for their dates decreased substantially after they had met them. The fact that we do is probably a result of an unrealistic level of optimism about how much we will expect to like others. And occasionally we do actually meet people who turn out to be similar to us, who end up as our close friends or even partners.

As this study shows, on the vast majority of occasions the less we know about someone the more we are inclined to like them because familiarity breeds contempt. Jean-Paul Sartre was right, on average: other people really are hell. That is, most other people are hell. There are, of course, a few people we each hold dear, people who do not begin to smell after three days; but these people are the glorious exceptions, so hold on to them tight.

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Likewise, while familiarity with a job or hobby could cause one to dislike it, or at least at times feel bored with it, it could actually sometimes make a person love it more. Familiarity breeds contempt is an old adage that means the better you know someone or something, the more likely you are to find fault with that person or thing and feel hostility or hatred towards them or it, or to begin devaluing them or it.

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You can find me on LinkedIn , or access my online portfolio here! Maggie Cramer August 30, Common Phrases Are you, ahem, familiar with the expression familiarity breeds contempt?

Your writing, at its best Compose bold, clear, mistake-free, writing with Grammarly's AI-powered writing assistant. Start writing with Grammarly. To understand this expression, all you need to do is look to the words it contains. Familiarity: a state of close relationship; being in close acquaintance with someone or something Contempt: the act of despising; having a lack of respect for someone or something, or to look down on them or it with aversion to even better understand the word, consult a thesaurus for synonyms for contempt Taken altogether then, you can see that this proverbial saying means that the closer one gets to a person or thing, the more they despise them or it.

Here are some example sentences using the expression familiarity breeds contempt : When I first started my job with the magazine, I loved it, and I got along great with my boss.

It was like a dream come true. At first, I adored everything about my husband, even the way he chews and his snores, and we had a wonderful life. My girlfriend and I had just started living together when the pandemic hit.

Definition: The longer one knows someone, the more likely that he or she will discover negative things about the other person. This can also apply to things. If a person does something for a long time, he or she might grow to dislike or hate it. The idea behind this expression has been around for thousands of years.

In ancient Rome, the writer Publilius used the expression. The English writer Geoffrey Chaucer was the first to use this expression.