Is it Human Nature?

I googled "kiss up, kick down" out of curiosity but all the references were to Bolton as though he were some unique example. I have experienced it at every level I have ever been in - from school to work (both white and blue collar) to most social interaction. At school, children suck up to the popular ones - the cheerleaders and the sports stars and bully the misfit. At work, people bitch about conditions but when the boss comes around, no one says a thing, but instead hang on his (usually) every word. I noticed early on that the person with the lowest wage gets the most duties. I think that is why a rich and/or famous person and a poor person can never get a fair trial. It is why the deaths of tens of thousands of poor people do not interest us. It is why at meetings people never hear what people socially below them say.

My sister and I used to laugh at how my aunt's voice would change when she talked to someone she thought was more prestigious, but if you watch humans, you seldom see a person who treats everyone equally. We are no different than hyenas in a pack. For an interesting view on stress related to social standing, read Massimo Pigliucci's Essay that says The best single predictor of heart problems is indeed stress, but of an entirely different and still widely ignored type: the stress that comes not from doing too much or being under self-imposed pressure, but from being ordered around with little or no control over your destiny.