@Kloi Part of the benefit you're seeing in A-B comparison of the two methods, is one rather directly challenges the ego of the other person, thus fosters (irrational) resistance. The Jerry Springer show helped usher in an era where confrontation and emotive grandstanding got encouraged for external (to the parties involved) entertainment and monetization value, thus modeling and normalizing it to the masses. Nowadays, with additional input from the likes of Fox News, it's as though much of society even realizes you CAN interact with others, using other methods that don't instantly invoke defense mechanisms, and count only zero-sum domination of one party as "winning" or "owning" the other party.

I think it was Dale Carnegie who said, "The best way to enter into the citadel of another's mind, is arm in arm with the owner."

A female friend of mine got negged in a beautifully unintentional way; let's call her Brienne.

There was this dude (Xander) that more or less frequented the same bars as we did, and the three of us had a LOT of common acquaintances. I did not know him personally nor did I talk with him, but at some point I found out that he had a big crush on Brienne, to which she had a strong reaction: some sort of mix of being pissed off and demoralized at the same time.

As this felt a bit too much despite this Xander dude did not having the best of reputations, I asked other friends of Brienne what the deal was with her reaction, to which some replied slyly: "it's known that Xander likes curvy girls". Hahaha, it seems that THIS got to her more, and poor Brienne wasn't even fat, quite the contrary.