I have a lot to say, but here’s the thing about Corinne on last night’s finale and reunion.

She explained it all herself. In so many words, she said that without the fact that she says offensive things that are hurtful to people, she’s “just another girl.” she said this is what’s “endearing” about her. She said in so many words that there’s nothing likable or interesting about her except that she hurts people: “When you take that away, I’m just another girl who doesn’t have much of a personality.” Much as I detest her, it was maybe one of the saddest things I’ve ever heard.

This is someone who has lived in this headspace for such a long time, where the only thing she’s developed any skills at is bonding with Person A because they’re both picking on Person B, that she really believes this is what real affection between two people is about. She really believes not only that this is legitimately endearing, but that it will make people understand that behavior better if she says, in effect, “This is all I have.” She doesn’t understand that to most people, that means you’re utterly incompetent at everything that matters.

I’ve seen people before who are like this — who believe that being jerks constitutes their “color,” or who believe that the only thing people value them for is the ability to be the most unfeeling person in the room, because it’s kind of entertaining. But I think Corinne was the most direct in saying (and this part was not acting; this is what she believes) that without negative attention, she’d get no attention at all, and that this is why she goes out of her way to be cruel. I think it was an accidental moment of complete transparency, where something she thought would strike people in one way struck them in another.

There’s a particular ethos involved in this “I have no filter, and it makes me great” argument. It requires you to believe that having a filter means you’re a phony — that you make decisions about what to say and what not to say only if you lack the courage to face the consequences of truth-telling. This is where “keeping it real” comes from. This is where “I’m not afraid to say what I think” comes from.

It requires you to believe that you live in a world where everyone thinks nothing but awful, angry thoughts, so that “no filter” means “horrible and offensive.” If I spoke with no filter, then yes, I would hurt people’s feelings more. But I would also spend more time bubbling over with excitement about how much I love them, admire them, respect them, and appreciate them. You just don’t say everything. You just hope you say enough.

And in fact, the reason people apply a filter about hurtful comments is generally not a fear of dealing with the consequences of the unfiltered truth, but a simple choice not to create those consequences. You always choose what to say and what not to say; either way, there’s a filter of sorts. You have a thought; you make a decision about what to say about it. There was certainly nothing “unfiltered” about Corinne’s comments about Sugar’s father — undoubtedly, without question, the most indefensibly inhumane thing I’ve ever seen anyone do on this show. Those comments were entirely rehearsed, calculated, and preplanned to inflict pain. Why is tailoring your remarks to inflict pain more false than tailoring your marks not to?

As awful as she is — and she’s one of the few people on this show I believe has grown to be such a toxic, fundamentally amoral person that she will always be a toxic and amoral person and stands zero chance of ever changing — she’s mostly pathetic. If you listen to her saying, “Without that, I’m just another girl,” and it doesn’t get you a little, you’re missing the sadness of it, I’d argue. She doesn’t value anything loving or kind in herself. She doesn’t believe anyone else values anything loving or kind in her, either. There’s only being cruel and mean, because that’s what she does that other people don’t do or won’t do to the degree that she does it. It’s like being proud that you’re the only person you know who swallows ground glass or steals things out of cars.

She believes “nice” isn’t a personality, because she believes it’s necessarily false. She never has kind thoughts about people, because she’s learned not to. She would never think about whether “generous” is a personality trait, or “compassionate,” or “loyal.” There’s being intentionally cruel, like she is, or there’s being artificially “nice,” like she thinks everyone else is. It’s impossible for her to face the fact that other people simply aren’t as angry and negative as she is — they’re not filtering the desire to throw someone’s dead father in her face; they simply don’t have that desire. Her personality has darkened to the point where it’s either being vicious or constantly fighting the urge to be vicious, which is what she figures everyone else is doing. The fact that she doesn’t fight it? It’s “endearing.”