It’s quite formal and ritualised in a language whose premier cultural exporter has been quite outwardly egalitarian since at least WWII. It’s just old fashione

It’s quite formal and ritualised in a language whose premier cultural exporter has been quite outwardly egalitarian since at least WWII. It’s just old fashioned. If you’re on this forum you’ve read enough English you’re unlikely to mess up but How are you? Great thanks. You? Fine, fine. It’s scripted insofar as no one cares how the other person actually is and answering I anything other than a positive fashion would be a faux pas but everything after “How are you?” is fluid. You can also go even less formal, e.g. “How’s it going?”