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> Where people consider talking to someone a chore. This bit in particular really hit me. I've noticed a rising trend around the Internet (or maybe I was just

> Where people consider talking to someone a chore. This bit in particular really hit me. I've noticed a rising trend around the Internet (or maybe I was just blind to it before), mostly on Reddit, of people who really do seem to consider any sort of real-life social interaction a chore and an attack. I forget the exact context, I think the conversation that stood out to me was about someone in a gas station or something, trying to make friendly conversation with another shopper next to them, along the lines of "oh that's a cool hat". And the consensus of the thread was "yeah that's awful, why would you do that, why are you subjecting them to the labor of talking to you" or such. Guys... we're humans. It isn't a crime to make small talk. It's not a chore to open your mouth. Most of us consider (or used to consider; and I'm not even old) that enjoyable. What happened?

deleted 5y ago
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MeinBlutIstBlau 5y ago
I think it's because reddits user base has significantly decreased in age. I have been using it since late 2012, which even then I felt like a late adopter. The content on Reddit back then was like a more ”normie" version of HN and slashdot. It had good articles consistently with maybe 1 or 2 default meme subreddits. Then Reddit started cutting down content it didn't like and now it's just a leftwing cesspool of antisocial, antiwork rhetoric. It's not even worth posting or commenting because if your comment veers slightly off course, instant downvotes. Not to mention the monetizing of posts with stickers. It's just turned into out of touch people who glorify mental illness imo.
- GingerMidas 5y ago
  Have you considered the target age hasn't changed, but you're just a decade older now?
  - throwawaygh 5y ago
    Kids these days are such radicals ;-)
  - MeinBlutIstBlau 5y ago
    Yes and no. Reddit is nothing what it once was. I do wholly recognize that reddit has typically had a younger audience. But it was not as "we need a socialist revolution, hyper-progressive moderatism, 1 letter top comment"-y as it used to be. On a post about a guy who ran a company and sued himself, I couldn't find the TL;DR until like 15 comments in. All the preceding comments were like "genius!" or "It's perfectly legal so he's smart!" It feels like Reddit is actively hostile toward actual contributors. They just want eyeballs and clicks. They could care less about the rest. It's just as bad as facebook nowadays.
    - throwaway2037 5y ago
      Real Question / Zero Trolling: What forums do you like these days? I have been reading HN for a few years now. I am still consistently impressed once a day by comments I read here. The community works pretty hard to self-correct. An imperfect social science, but they try. (<hat tip> @dang)
renewiltord 5y ago
Internet people are usually a lot angrier than real world people. Hard to explain but they always seem a bundle of neuroticism and mental pathologies. HN is no exception. I find that when I participate I also start mimicking this behavior and insulation is required. Fortunately, nothing happened to small talk. I’m a talkative fellow and people still react cheerfully and converse with me. One can only suppose that everyone who hates this went online.
- rootusrootus 5y ago
  > Internet people are usually a lot angrier than real world people. Out of 100 people who read a comment, 99 of them move on even if they found it provocative. So the 1 that bothered to reply is the angriest of the bunch. Yeah, I realize that I post too much on HN, but I don't feel that angry. More like a know-it-all motormouth who types fast enough to pollute a pretty big swath of the 'net in a short time. But I do think that the effort to participate online filters for motivated people, and frequently that's going to be some form of anger. "Wait a second, be right there, someone on the Internet is WRONG!" (paraphrased from an ancient comic)
- nebula8804 5y ago
  I am concerned that long term commenting has negatively shifted my real life behavior towards being slightly more aggressive. Given enough time it feels like a behavioral shift can happen to people who are online way too much.
munchbunny 5y ago
I think it's an over-correction around the introversion/extroversion divide. It's true that sometimes I just don't want to be bothered while I'm running errands, but I wouldn't consider someone making small talk, cracking a joke in the elevator, etc. to be some sort of social transgression. As an introvert, chatting or small talk isn't really a chore, and I waste enough of my own time on my own time, so what's a few words with a stranger? That said, it should be considered perfectly acceptable to signal that you don't want to stay engaged in a conversation if it's someone trying to explain their theory on building a perpetual motion machine. That actually happened. I did not want to stay in that conversation. But even extroverts don't like dealing with crazy. It only becomes a chore when the talking itself is the work, such as dealing with Comcast charging you for a modem you totally did return, or dealing with the hospital when they incorrectly billed your health insurance and now they're trying to make you pay for the difference.
- Swizec 5y ago
  > it should be considered perfectly acceptable to signal that you don't want to stay engaged in a conversation I learned the perfect trick as a small time person of interest at tech conferences. You say “Okay thanks” and walk away. At conferences you can even go one better and say “I’m gonna go talk to that other group” and walk away. Signal intent, leave. Works like a charm.
- tremon 5y ago
  cracking a joke in the elevator I disagree with this. What people consider funny varies a lot from person to person, and a stranger trying to joke with me comes across as rude. A friendly nod, saying hello, that's fine. Approaching me and immediately assuming that we have enough in common to enjoy the same humor? Sorry, but that's creepy.
  - spidersouris 5y ago
    Except if the joke is straight up offensive or aims at mocking or stereotyping a certain type of people (whether you're part of this group or not), I fail to see how it can feel "creepy." Even doing a bad pun or joke related to the context has nothing creepy in it. At worst, it's cringey.
micromacrofoot 5y ago
>I forget the exact context, I think the conversation that stood out to me was about someone in a gas station or something, trying to make friendly conversation with another shopper next to them, along the lines of "oh that's a cool hat". And the consensus of the thread was "yeah that's awful, why would you do that, why are you subjecting them to the labor of talking to you" or such. This is kind of an American way of thinking. Small talk with strangers is weird in many places. If you're a woman spurning it can get ugly fast (you are not obligated to a reply from a stranger). It's not at all unusual for a woman to ignore small talk from a male stranger and instantly be met with vitriol. I've been in situations where an ignored comment like "smile honey" is instantly met with "bitch". If this is the cost of small talk, it isn't worth it. There's also the newfound respect for mental health, some people are extremely anxious or agoraphobic, and attempting small talk with strangers in places where people are required to be (grocery, fuel, etc) seems unnecessary. Is complementing someone's hat really worth the potential anxiety? not remotely. If you're lonely and want to meet people, don't try to do it via small talk with strangers. Join a club, take a class, volunteer. Go to places where interaction is expected, do not foist it upon strangers just trying to go about their daily lives. If you must small talk, please do not take it personally if someone ignores you.
- sobani 5y ago
  > Is complementing someone's hat really worth the potential anxiety? I still remember the compliments one of my jackets got me 1, 4 and 6 years ago. That probably helped making it my favorite jacket, especially since those are the only non-family compliments I got in the past 10 years. When you like something about someone, please make their year and compliment them on it.
- gameman144 5y ago
  I hear this all the time I'm these discussions, but I call bunk. Sure, small talk is filler content, but you're not going to jump straight into the more meaningful conversations with people you don't yet know. The filler small talk content isn't the substance, it's the launching point for those more substantive conversations. For instance, maybe you got the hat at a concert in Wichita, and this person at the gas station grew up in Wichita. Maybe they spent their career designing hats. Maybe their deceased kid used to love hats and seeing it reminded them of their kid. You don't know what the "actually interesting" topics available are until you actually spend ten seconds talking to someone. As with almost anything, people are free to ignore you or reject social conventions, that's totally their right. But it's also totally fine to try to start a conversation with someone. You're right that some people, for one reason another, might not want to carry a conversation. In those cases, they can simply not carry the conversation. One of the joys of being human, though, is commiserating with fellow humans. If the location isn't one where conversation is strictly verboten (e.g. movie theaters, gym machines, library study rooms), I see no reason why people shouldn't (respectfully) see if the other is up for a conversation.
rhino369 5y ago
Reddit has a culture that normalizes the symptoms of social anxiety. They call it introversion, but the way its described is 100% social anxiety. I am sympathetic, I have it too. Hell, ever male in my dad's family line seems to have it. But its a problem that needs to be treated and not a character trait that needs to be respected. The WORST thing you can do for social anxiety (or any anxiety) is to avoid trigger it. You'll become a depressed shut in.
- dbtc 5y ago
  I think /r/jung does a better job with this.
- GDC7 5y ago
  > The WORST thing you can do for social anxiety (or any anxiety) is to avoid trigger it No point triggering for the sake of it. You need to bring the socially anxious person in a very easy enviornment. A scenario in which they can easily "win" the social setting. Like a pre-season friendly game against a minor league team. You put 30 runs on them, and of course you'll start the season full of swagger. It's called the "winner effect" Social anxiety is essentially triggered by not being in control of social outcomes. Repeated winning outcomes do lower the need to be in control and thus should reduce anxiety
  - Domenic_S 5y ago
    > No point triggering for the sake of it. Actually there is, if it's contextualized correctly. It's called Exposure Therapy [0] and it's scientifically proven to help phobias/anxiety/fears. Avoiding the anxiety-provoking situations makes things worse. [0] https://www.apa.org/ptsd-guideline/patients-and-families/exposure-therapy https://www.apa.org/ptsd-guideline/patients-and-families/exp...
    - GDC7 5y ago
      I don't think people would ever become accustomed to being losers. It might work for fear of flying or heights But being in a social setting and trying to penetrate into the "in crowd" and being rejected would only make things worse. You need a controlled environment to exogenously make the socially anxious person "in" so that they then have enough momentum and confidence to go out in the real world and go through an X amount of rejections on their way to thier first real win. If they lose confidence before achieving a real win because the X amount of rejections is too high , then you gotta go back to the controlled environment. It's basically like baseball with Major and Minor leagues. Minor league aces are way more confident than sluggish Major league players.
irrational 5y ago
> Most of us consider (or used to consider; and I'm not even old) that enjoyable. Eh, I’m 50 years old and don’t really use social media (certainly not Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, twitter, etc.). I don’t even really text other people. But, I don’t agree with your sentiment. I’ve never understood people who want to have small talk with strangers. It is the opposite of enjoyable.
- cpach 5y ago
  To each their own. To me it can definitely be enjoyable. Yes, I’m an extrovert (most of the time).
- II2II 5y ago
  Heck, I'm not even a fan of small talk. It's not as though I have an aversion to talking. Discussing things of mutual interest is fine. Listening to people who have interesting stories, or even need to get something off their chest, is fine. But small talk has always struck me as the means by which people fill silence. You don't really learn anything about each other.
  - mmcdermott 5y ago
    Small talk can certainly be a vacuous attempt to fill the silence. It also seems to act as a social lubricant, moving with easy questions and accelerating into something more meaningful.
- ipdashc 5y ago
  That is completely fair. And I agree it doesn't have to be enjoyable, nor do we all have to specifically seek it out, or even engage in it when offered. But to call it "labor" or "a chore" or (I've even seen this once) an "attack" just seems... excessive, and indicative of an unhealthy mindset.
- honkdaddy 5y ago
  Someone complimented my hat in the subway today. I mentioned I got it back in Toronto, and we chatted about how disappointed we are in the Leafs. What is so unenjoyable about that? How can one spend 50 years on this earth and find human conversation, something we literally evolved to do, so uninviting? I just don't understand.
halfmatthalfcat 5y ago
I grew up in Midwest USA and lived for an extended period of time in NYC. "Small talk" is almost non-existent in NYC where it is very normal to stop on the street in the Midwest and converse with complete strangers. Just an anecdote for thought.
- nobody9999 5y ago
  >I grew up in Midwest USA and lived for an extended period of time in NYC. "Small talk" is almost non-existent in NYC where it is very normal to stop on the street in the Midwest and converse with complete strangers. I grew up in NYC and have lived in a variety of places around the US. To a certain extent, your observation about NYC is valid. But only to a point. In NYC, if you're walking down the (very crowded) streets or on the subway, since there's so little personal space, it's considered rude to just stop and start talking to someone. That said, if there's a reason to interact, most NYers are polite, pleasant, kind and helpful. What's more, if you're in a situation that calls for it, you can have wonderful conversations with New Yorkers. I do it all the time. I just try not to invade the limited personal space of other people. It's not that "small talk" doesn't exist in NYC, it's just that where and when such conversations happen differs from other places. I've lived a a bunch of different places around the US, and there are significant differences as to the etiquette surrounding interactions with strangers. It is a bit of culture shock though. I went to college in the midwest (Cleveland) and for the first month or so was quite taken aback by all the strangers who'd say hello as I walked by. I got used to it after a while. I think it's more about introverts vs. extroverts. As an extrovert, I'll pretty much talk to anyone, anytime. In fact, I pretty much never shut up. OTOH, a goodly number of those who spend a lot of time online are introverted or just misanthropic. As such, if you ask a lot of folks who are online, you're more likely to get responses like "Why would you want to talk to someone else?" because the folks who actually like interacting with other humans in person are doing that instead. That's more anecdotal experience and reasoning to consider. Edit: As tomjen3 pointed out[0], it's not just introverts and misanthropes who are uncomfortable talking to people IRL. Folks with social anxiety disorder and other issues are also in the mix too. Thanks for bringing that up, tomjen3! [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29151887 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29151887
jdavis703 5y ago
Think of it like this. I enjoy community clean up days. But if I had to do it every week it’d feel like a chore. Communicating is the same. It’s fun in small doses. But then by the time the evening or weekend rolls around the last thing I want is to talk with more people. Which is sad, because I’d really like to have a non-work, real-world social network. For sure talking in real life is not an attack (exempting folks with mental disabilities). But it’s something to think about. Especially as remote work makes our work relationships even more superficial.
adventured 5y ago
> Guys... we're humans. It isn't a crime to make small talk. It's not a chore to open your mouth. That's not uncommon in many parts of Europe, Germany for example. People in Germany are commonly rude (compared to American standards) in response to attempts at small talk (by strangers). Some cultures plainly frown upon small talk with strangers and in those cultures people find it uncomfortable at best.
- raxxorrax 5y ago
  That is a complete wrong stereotype in my opinion. While there are such people, there are as many that talk your ear off if you don't stop them. Perhaps I belong to the former group and perceive it this way, but it certainly isn't seen as rude or anything.
GDC7 5y ago
> Guys... we're humans. It isn't a crime to make small talk. It's not a chore to open your mouth. Most of us consider (or used to consider; and I'm not even old) that enjoyable. What happened? We are humans, but we are also ambitious. Most people have, in their mind, a clear idea of the profile and type of person they want to be having a conversation with. Inevitably the person making the small talk is never that type and profile of person. So there is the double whammy of the disappointment with one's social status and a feeling of missing out on something else (or in this case someone else) which kicks in . And with all this psychological shit going on in the mind of the person on the receiving end of the small talk....no wonder that a conversation doesn't organically ensue.
- ketzo 5y ago
  And, to wrap around to the original topic, I think social media can really enforce a particular vision of what that ideal conversational partner “”should”” be like, making the disappointment stronger.
  - GDC7 5y ago
    Oh for sure, but social media doesn't enforce anything, it just shows rare shit that has always been there. Point is it was hidden or not as visible. It's a very rare thing for Victoria Secret's models to be the ones start making small talk, and yet Brad Pitt or Leonardo di Caprio are on the receiving end of that. That would happen regardless of social media, but somehow a paparazzi or a photographer is there to immortalize the moment and then the content gets on the platform which again makes money showing very rare shit to the public. The combination of rare shit being thrown in the public's face and the unprecedented amount of free time that the public has on their hands to absorb the aforementioned rare shit causes unhappiness with the not so rare shit happening during the mundane daily life of the populace, like Joe Average complimenting your hat at the gas station.
    - throwaway2037 5y ago
      Wow, this is such an eye opening post. Thank you. You specifically point out "rareness". I never considered how much of a draw is rareness to human beings. I admit that rareness is like catnip for my discovery-addicted science mind. ("How is that possible? What are the chances? etc.") On YouTube, there is a whole category of silly (but fun) videos that are nothing more than incredibly rare events (some funny, some scary) being caught on film. Example: Freak waves A more thoughtful version of this would be a "supercut" which was quite popular about 10 years ago. Someone with a LOT of free time would find a particular actor/actress or view or pose in 25 to 100 different films, then curate a very short, but impressive video. Wider: Many of the posts you have made here today are very thoughtful. Keep up the good work! :)
bally0241 5y ago
We all became Finnish?
tomjen3 5y ago
It is perhaps not a chore to you, but if you have social anxiety it can be a big deal. Social Anxiety isn't the same as being an introvert. For an introvert it can still be a great experience, it is just that it drains him of energy.
- ipdashc 5y ago
  My whole issue, however, is the glorification of social anxiety and the conflation of social anxiety with introversion - exactly as you said yourself, they are not the same thing. An introvert would probably avoid small talk and would quickly tire of it, yes. I'm definitely not the biggest chatterbox myself. But to see the simplest form of small talk as a "chore" or "labor" - like it's some kind of hostile attack - feels far more like social anxiety than introversion. And social anxiety is not a good thing. We shouldn't be glorifying it. It leads to unhappiness, and life problems, and is considered to fall under the umbrella of mental health for a good reason. As this thread implies, it's mostly social media, particularly the Reddit crowd, that is hell-bent on glorifying harmful social anxiety and making it out to be just as benevolent as simple introversion.
Teknoman117 5y ago
I love talking to strangers. I am just exceedingly anxious about initiating conversation. I’m always worried they’ll take offense or something (‘why is this fat dude talking to me’ kind of stuff)... Someone asks me something at a bar? I’m a total chatterbox, but I can’t recall a time where I ever started the conversation. The problem is, people don’t usually start conversations with me. I’m 6’4, huge, and a dude. I’ve non-ironically thought about getting a shirt made saying "ask me anything" and wearing it in a public setting. One of the most fun things I can recall doing in recent memory was going on a pub crawl in Japan in spring 2019 (feels like a lifetime ago). I was vacationing alone after a business trip, and I just decided to sign up for a foreigner-aimed outing. An "all pretenses dropped, you’re coming here to meet and chat with other people" kind of trip. I had an absolute blast. The mix of people was like 60% foreigners and 40% locals. Didn’t really meet anyone I continued further communication with after the event, but it’s a fond memory. Didn’t manage to work up the courage to do a US based one when I got home, and the pandemic started 8 months later. It really boils down to in my mind, where do I meet people around my age? All my current friends are people I knew in college and we all do a nearly-every-night discord meetup where we talk about life and play games. It certainly doesn’t provide the same happy brain chemicals that doing literally the same thing but in person did when we were all in college, buts it’s kept me sane for the last 5 years. College was such a different social experience. I wasn’t top of my class grades wise, but I always got top marks in computer science and computer engineering courses. I also had a healthy amount of personal projects on the side. I ended up with this reputation on campus for being able to help with any of the computing classes, and I was always a firm believer in ‘master through teaching". I considered helping other people as part of my own learning process. For anyone who seriously wanted help, you could always reach out to me. I even gave supplemental talks for particularly rough classes during our ACM weekly "coffee and code" meetings. Needless to say, this made me fairly popular on campus. I knew a lot of people and counted many of them as friends. The group was fairly diverse, both ethnically/culturally and by gender. We ate dinner together, met up and played games, built things, etc. it was a fantastic time of life. But there was one underlying thread - I had never actually initiated a random conversation. Every person I count as a friend today had either looked over my shoulder and was curious about what I was working on, was someone who asked for help in a class, was introduced by a mutual friend, etc. That period ended 5 and a half years ago when I graduated and started working for a tech company you’ve definitely heard of. Things have been rough since then. I moved to SoCal because of the office I was working in. Only two of the people I knew from college went to SoCal, some moved out of state, the others moved to the Bay Area. I’m about to lose the people in SoCal, as they’re moving out of state to further their careers elsewhere. Now I'm weighing whether or not I should quit a job I actually like in exchange for moving closer to the people I know and a job that's an unknown.
hackernews777 5y ago
It is a chore to open your mouth. A person shouldn't be subject to being prepared to engage in a 100 different conversations for the crime of walking outside their house. It also doesn't help that the vast majority of interactions are negative (pan handling, cat calling, sales pitches, political affiliations, religious evangelism, scams, asking for favors / free stuff, bullying, snooping, etc.)
- kodah 5y ago
  Doesn't this track with human existence? Most of my inbox is spam, even if I fight to control it. That doesn't mean I turn my email off or never use it. All of the activities you noted suck, but there's a lot more humans looking for something other than that. I ride my bike around town a lot and end up meeting a lot of strange people because of that. Some people think it's weird and obviously straight up other me if I say, "hi" -- but who would I be if I didn't? When I lived in San Diego a good number of these interactions ended up in me being able to get someone homeless water (fun fact, not all homeless people look what one might think is homeless.) One time, I ran across a guy who was clearly struggling with a very messy divorce and struggling to get back on his feet. I sat down and just listened for the better part of an hour. I shared my own story of struggle and loss, and at the end he seemed like a large weight had been lifted from his shoulders. Sometimes, all people need is a bit of connection to get through life. Someone to acknowledge their existence in a world that otherwise doesn't care about them or their story. I'm by no means a priest or hippie, just an average dude who rides a bike and likes to say, "hi".
  - hackernews777 5y ago
    No it doesn't track with human existence. In the past such things lead to wars and large schisms in societies, it is completely abnormal for the vast majority of anything to be negative and the prevailing wisdom be just grin and bear it. The USA was founded on the idea of negative rights and an opt in culture, instead today we increasingly see a shift to people demanding positive rights and putting the burden on the individual to opt out. In the future I could totally see a market to have a robot buddy follow you around and have responses ready for all the things people want to pester you with.
mippenhappen 5y ago
>Where people consider talking to someone a chore. It is definitely chore to me. I'm however not claiming to be normal. I'm a hardcore misanthropist and overall pessimist. I have never in my 32 years of life enjoyed talking to people, and I have never been active on social media either (other than posting an extremely rare comment like this).
raxxorrax 5y ago
Not a fan of small talk, especially while working (I differentiate conversation and small talk). But some people really go to extremes. Perhaps social media is the cause here because people are finally so afraid of each other that having to answer something feels like a terrorist attack. I do prefer the polite gesture of small talk to not saying anything in some cases and can understand that people generally think so as well. And in some instances you really meet a new friend. Unlikely in business environments and yes there are some people that do too much small talk. But that isn't really an imposition.

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MeinBlutIstBlau 5y ago

I think it's because reddits user base has significantly decreased in age. I have been using it since late 2012, which even then I felt like a late adopter. The content on Reddit back then was like a more ”normie" version of HN and slashdot. It had good articles consistently with maybe 1 or 2 default meme subreddits. Then Reddit started cutting down content it didn't like and now it's just a leftwing cesspool of antisocial, antiwork rhetoric. It's not even worth posting or commenting because if your comment veers slightly off course, instant downvotes. Not to mention the monetizing of posts with stickers. It's just turned into out of touch people who glorify mental illness imo.

GingerMidas 5y ago
Have you considered the target age hasn't changed, but you're just a decade older now?
- throwawaygh 5y ago
  Kids these days are such radicals ;-)
- MeinBlutIstBlau 5y ago
  Yes and no. Reddit is nothing what it once was. I do wholly recognize that reddit has typically had a younger audience. But it was not as "we need a socialist revolution, hyper-progressive moderatism, 1 letter top comment"-y as it used to be. On a post about a guy who ran a company and sued himself, I couldn't find the TL;DR until like 15 comments in. All the preceding comments were like "genius!" or "It's perfectly legal so he's smart!" It feels like Reddit is actively hostile toward actual contributors. They just want eyeballs and clicks. They could care less about the rest. It's just as bad as facebook nowadays.
  - throwaway2037 5y ago
    Real Question / Zero Trolling: What forums do you like these days? I have been reading HN for a few years now. I am still consistently impressed once a day by comments I read here. The community works pretty hard to self-correct. An imperfect social science, but they try. (<hat tip> @dang)

renewiltord 5y ago

Internet people are usually a lot angrier than real world people. Hard to explain but they always seem a bundle of neuroticism and mental pathologies. HN is no exception. I find that when I participate I also start mimicking this behavior and insulation is required. Fortunately, nothing happened to small talk. I’m a talkative fellow and people still react cheerfully and converse with me. One can only suppose that everyone who hates this went online.

rootusrootus 5y ago
> Internet people are usually a lot angrier than real world people. Out of 100 people who read a comment, 99 of them move on even if they found it provocative. So the 1 that bothered to reply is the angriest of the bunch. Yeah, I realize that I post too much on HN, but I don't feel that angry. More like a know-it-all motormouth who types fast enough to pollute a pretty big swath of the 'net in a short time. But I do think that the effort to participate online filters for motivated people, and frequently that's going to be some form of anger. "Wait a second, be right there, someone on the Internet is WRONG!" (paraphrased from an ancient comic)
nebula8804 5y ago
I am concerned that long term commenting has negatively shifted my real life behavior towards being slightly more aggressive. Given enough time it feels like a behavioral shift can happen to people who are online way too much.

munchbunny 5y ago

I think it's an over-correction around the introversion/extroversion divide. It's true that sometimes I just don't want to be bothered while I'm running errands, but I wouldn't consider someone making small talk, cracking a joke in the elevator, etc. to be some sort of social transgression. As an introvert, chatting or small talk isn't really a chore, and I waste enough of my own time on my own time, so what's a few words with a stranger? That said, it should be considered perfectly acceptable to signal that you don't want to stay engaged in a conversation if it's someone trying to explain their theory on building a perpetual motion machine. That actually happened. I did not want to stay in that conversation. But even extroverts don't like dealing with crazy. It only becomes a chore when the talking itself is the work, such as dealing with Comcast charging you for a modem you totally did return, or dealing with the hospital when they incorrectly billed your health insurance and now they're trying to make you pay for the difference.

Swizec 5y ago
> it should be considered perfectly acceptable to signal that you don't want to stay engaged in a conversation I learned the perfect trick as a small time person of interest at tech conferences. You say “Okay thanks” and walk away. At conferences you can even go one better and say “I’m gonna go talk to that other group” and walk away. Signal intent, leave. Works like a charm.
tremon 5y ago
cracking a joke in the elevator I disagree with this. What people consider funny varies a lot from person to person, and a stranger trying to joke with me comes across as rude. A friendly nod, saying hello, that's fine. Approaching me and immediately assuming that we have enough in common to enjoy the same humor? Sorry, but that's creepy.
- spidersouris 5y ago
  Except if the joke is straight up offensive or aims at mocking or stereotyping a certain type of people (whether you're part of this group or not), I fail to see how it can feel "creepy." Even doing a bad pun or joke related to the context has nothing creepy in it. At worst, it's cringey.

micromacrofoot 5y ago

>I forget the exact context, I think the conversation that stood out to me was about someone in a gas station or something, trying to make friendly conversation with another shopper next to them, along the lines of "oh that's a cool hat". And the consensus of the thread was "yeah that's awful, why would you do that, why are you subjecting them to the labor of talking to you" or such. This is kind of an American way of thinking. Small talk with strangers is weird in many places. If you're a woman spurning it can get ugly fast (you are not obligated to a reply from a stranger). It's not at all unusual for a woman to ignore small talk from a male stranger and instantly be met with vitriol. I've been in situations where an ignored comment like "smile honey" is instantly met with "bitch". If this is the cost of small talk, it isn't worth it. There's also the newfound respect for mental health, some people are extremely anxious or agoraphobic, and attempting small talk with strangers in places where people are required to be (grocery, fuel, etc) seems unnecessary. Is complementing someone's hat really worth the potential anxiety? not remotely. If you're lonely and want to meet people, don't try to do it via small talk with strangers. Join a club, take a class, volunteer. Go to places where interaction is expected, do not foist it upon strangers just trying to go about their daily lives. If you must small talk, please do not take it personally if someone ignores you.

sobani 5y ago
> Is complementing someone's hat really worth the potential anxiety? I still remember the compliments one of my jackets got me 1, 4 and 6 years ago. That probably helped making it my favorite jacket, especially since those are the only non-family compliments I got in the past 10 years. When you like something about someone, please make their year and compliment them on it.
gameman144 5y ago
I hear this all the time I'm these discussions, but I call bunk. Sure, small talk is filler content, but you're not going to jump straight into the more meaningful conversations with people you don't yet know. The filler small talk content isn't the substance, it's the launching point for those more substantive conversations. For instance, maybe you got the hat at a concert in Wichita, and this person at the gas station grew up in Wichita. Maybe they spent their career designing hats. Maybe their deceased kid used to love hats and seeing it reminded them of their kid. You don't know what the "actually interesting" topics available are until you actually spend ten seconds talking to someone. As with almost anything, people are free to ignore you or reject social conventions, that's totally their right. But it's also totally fine to try to start a conversation with someone. You're right that some people, for one reason another, might not want to carry a conversation. In those cases, they can simply not carry the conversation. One of the joys of being human, though, is commiserating with fellow humans. If the location isn't one where conversation is strictly verboten (e.g. movie theaters, gym machines, library study rooms), I see no reason why people shouldn't (respectfully) see if the other is up for a conversation.

rhino369 5y ago

Reddit has a culture that normalizes the symptoms of social anxiety. They call it introversion, but the way its described is 100% social anxiety. I am sympathetic, I have it too. Hell, ever male in my dad's family line seems to have it. But its a problem that needs to be treated and not a character trait that needs to be respected. The WORST thing you can do for social anxiety (or any anxiety) is to avoid trigger it. You'll become a depressed shut in.

dbtc 5y ago
I think /r/jung does a better job with this.
GDC7 5y ago
> The WORST thing you can do for social anxiety (or any anxiety) is to avoid trigger it No point triggering for the sake of it. You need to bring the socially anxious person in a very easy enviornment. A scenario in which they can easily "win" the social setting. Like a pre-season friendly game against a minor league team. You put 30 runs on them, and of course you'll start the season full of swagger. It's called the "winner effect" Social anxiety is essentially triggered by not being in control of social outcomes. Repeated winning outcomes do lower the need to be in control and thus should reduce anxiety
- Domenic_S 5y ago
  > No point triggering for the sake of it. Actually there is, if it's contextualized correctly. It's called Exposure Therapy [0] and it's scientifically proven to help phobias/anxiety/fears. Avoiding the anxiety-provoking situations makes things worse. [0] https://www.apa.org/ptsd-guideline/patients-and-families/exposure-therapy https://www.apa.org/ptsd-guideline/patients-and-families/exp...
  - GDC7 5y ago
    I don't think people would ever become accustomed to being losers. It might work for fear of flying or heights But being in a social setting and trying to penetrate into the "in crowd" and being rejected would only make things worse. You need a controlled environment to exogenously make the socially anxious person "in" so that they then have enough momentum and confidence to go out in the real world and go through an X amount of rejections on their way to thier first real win. If they lose confidence before achieving a real win because the X amount of rejections is too high , then you gotta go back to the controlled environment. It's basically like baseball with Major and Minor leagues. Minor league aces are way more confident than sluggish Major league players.

irrational 5y ago

> Most of us consider (or used to consider; and I'm not even old) that enjoyable. Eh, I’m 50 years old and don’t really use social media (certainly not Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, twitter, etc.). I don’t even really text other people. But, I don’t agree with your sentiment. I’ve never understood people who want to have small talk with strangers. It is the opposite of enjoyable.

cpach 5y ago
To each their own. To me it can definitely be enjoyable. Yes, I’m an extrovert (most of the time).
II2II 5y ago
Heck, I'm not even a fan of small talk. It's not as though I have an aversion to talking. Discussing things of mutual interest is fine. Listening to people who have interesting stories, or even need to get something off their chest, is fine. But small talk has always struck me as the means by which people fill silence. You don't really learn anything about each other.
- mmcdermott 5y ago
  Small talk can certainly be a vacuous attempt to fill the silence. It also seems to act as a social lubricant, moving with easy questions and accelerating into something more meaningful.
ipdashc 5y ago
That is completely fair. And I agree it doesn't have to be enjoyable, nor do we all have to specifically seek it out, or even engage in it when offered. But to call it "labor" or "a chore" or (I've even seen this once) an "attack" just seems... excessive, and indicative of an unhealthy mindset.
honkdaddy 5y ago
Someone complimented my hat in the subway today. I mentioned I got it back in Toronto, and we chatted about how disappointed we are in the Leafs. What is so unenjoyable about that? How can one spend 50 years on this earth and find human conversation, something we literally evolved to do, so uninviting? I just don't understand.

halfmatthalfcat 5y ago

I grew up in Midwest USA and lived for an extended period of time in NYC. "Small talk" is almost non-existent in NYC where it is very normal to stop on the street in the Midwest and converse with complete strangers. Just an anecdote for thought.

nobody9999 5y ago
>I grew up in Midwest USA and lived for an extended period of time in NYC. "Small talk" is almost non-existent in NYC where it is very normal to stop on the street in the Midwest and converse with complete strangers. I grew up in NYC and have lived in a variety of places around the US. To a certain extent, your observation about NYC is valid. But only to a point. In NYC, if you're walking down the (very crowded) streets or on the subway, since there's so little personal space, it's considered rude to just stop and start talking to someone. That said, if there's a reason to interact, most NYers are polite, pleasant, kind and helpful. What's more, if you're in a situation that calls for it, you can have wonderful conversations with New Yorkers. I do it all the time. I just try not to invade the limited personal space of other people. It's not that "small talk" doesn't exist in NYC, it's just that where and when such conversations happen differs from other places. I've lived a a bunch of different places around the US, and there are significant differences as to the etiquette surrounding interactions with strangers. It is a bit of culture shock though. I went to college in the midwest (Cleveland) and for the first month or so was quite taken aback by all the strangers who'd say hello as I walked by. I got used to it after a while. I think it's more about introverts vs. extroverts. As an extrovert, I'll pretty much talk to anyone, anytime. In fact, I pretty much never shut up. OTOH, a goodly number of those who spend a lot of time online are introverted or just misanthropic. As such, if you ask a lot of folks who are online, you're more likely to get responses like "Why would you want to talk to someone else?" because the folks who actually like interacting with other humans in person are doing that instead. That's more anecdotal experience and reasoning to consider. Edit: As tomjen3 pointed out[0], it's not just introverts and misanthropes who are uncomfortable talking to people IRL. Folks with social anxiety disorder and other issues are also in the mix too. Thanks for bringing that up, tomjen3! [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29151887 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29151887

jdavis703 5y ago

Think of it like this. I enjoy community clean up days. But if I had to do it every week it’d feel like a chore. Communicating is the same. It’s fun in small doses. But then by the time the evening or weekend rolls around the last thing I want is to talk with more people. Which is sad, because I’d really like to have a non-work, real-world social network. For sure talking in real life is not an attack (exempting folks with mental disabilities). But it’s something to think about. Especially as remote work makes our work relationships even more superficial.

adventured 5y ago

> Guys... we're humans. It isn't a crime to make small talk. It's not a chore to open your mouth. That's not uncommon in many parts of Europe, Germany for example. People in Germany are commonly rude (compared to American standards) in response to attempts at small talk (by strangers). Some cultures plainly frown upon small talk with strangers and in those cultures people find it uncomfortable at best.

raxxorrax 5y ago
That is a complete wrong stereotype in my opinion. While there are such people, there are as many that talk your ear off if you don't stop them. Perhaps I belong to the former group and perceive it this way, but it certainly isn't seen as rude or anything.

GDC7 5y ago

> Guys... we're humans. It isn't a crime to make small talk. It's not a chore to open your mouth. Most of us consider (or used to consider; and I'm not even old) that enjoyable. What happened? We are humans, but we are also ambitious. Most people have, in their mind, a clear idea of the profile and type of person they want to be having a conversation with. Inevitably the person making the small talk is never that type and profile of person. So there is the double whammy of the disappointment with one's social status and a feeling of missing out on something else (or in this case someone else) which kicks in . And with all this psychological shit going on in the mind of the person on the receiving end of the small talk....no wonder that a conversation doesn't organically ensue.

ketzo 5y ago
And, to wrap around to the original topic, I think social media can really enforce a particular vision of what that ideal conversational partner “”should”” be like, making the disappointment stronger.
- GDC7 5y ago
  Oh for sure, but social media doesn't enforce anything, it just shows rare shit that has always been there. Point is it was hidden or not as visible. It's a very rare thing for Victoria Secret's models to be the ones start making small talk, and yet Brad Pitt or Leonardo di Caprio are on the receiving end of that. That would happen regardless of social media, but somehow a paparazzi or a photographer is there to immortalize the moment and then the content gets on the platform which again makes money showing very rare shit to the public. The combination of rare shit being thrown in the public's face and the unprecedented amount of free time that the public has on their hands to absorb the aforementioned rare shit causes unhappiness with the not so rare shit happening during the mundane daily life of the populace, like Joe Average complimenting your hat at the gas station.
  - throwaway2037 5y ago
    Wow, this is such an eye opening post. Thank you. You specifically point out "rareness". I never considered how much of a draw is rareness to human beings. I admit that rareness is like catnip for my discovery-addicted science mind. ("How is that possible? What are the chances? etc.") On YouTube, there is a whole category of silly (but fun) videos that are nothing more than incredibly rare events (some funny, some scary) being caught on film. Example: Freak waves A more thoughtful version of this would be a "supercut" which was quite popular about 10 years ago. Someone with a LOT of free time would find a particular actor/actress or view or pose in 25 to 100 different films, then curate a very short, but impressive video. Wider: Many of the posts you have made here today are very thoughtful. Keep up the good work! :)

bally0241 5y ago

We all became Finnish?

tomjen3 5y ago

It is perhaps not a chore to you, but if you have social anxiety it can be a big deal. Social Anxiety isn't the same as being an introvert. For an introvert it can still be a great experience, it is just that it drains him of energy.

ipdashc 5y ago
My whole issue, however, is the glorification of social anxiety and the conflation of social anxiety with introversion - exactly as you said yourself, they are not the same thing. An introvert would probably avoid small talk and would quickly tire of it, yes. I'm definitely not the biggest chatterbox myself. But to see the simplest form of small talk as a "chore" or "labor" - like it's some kind of hostile attack - feels far more like social anxiety than introversion. And social anxiety is not a good thing. We shouldn't be glorifying it. It leads to unhappiness, and life problems, and is considered to fall under the umbrella of mental health for a good reason. As this thread implies, it's mostly social media, particularly the Reddit crowd, that is hell-bent on glorifying harmful social anxiety and making it out to be just as benevolent as simple introversion.

Teknoman117 5y ago

I love talking to strangers. I am just exceedingly anxious about initiating conversation. I’m always worried they’ll take offense or something (‘why is this fat dude talking to me’ kind of stuff)... Someone asks me something at a bar? I’m a total chatterbox, but I can’t recall a time where I ever started the conversation. The problem is, people don’t usually start conversations with me. I’m 6’4, huge, and a dude. I’ve non-ironically thought about getting a shirt made saying "ask me anything" and wearing it in a public setting. One of the most fun things I can recall doing in recent memory was going on a pub crawl in Japan in spring 2019 (feels like a lifetime ago). I was vacationing alone after a business trip, and I just decided to sign up for a foreigner-aimed outing. An "all pretenses dropped, you’re coming here to meet and chat with other people" kind of trip. I had an absolute blast. The mix of people was like 60% foreigners and 40% locals. Didn’t really meet anyone I continued further communication with after the event, but it’s a fond memory. Didn’t manage to work up the courage to do a US based one when I got home, and the pandemic started 8 months later. It really boils down to in my mind, where do I meet people around my age? All my current friends are people I knew in college and we all do a nearly-every-night discord meetup where we talk about life and play games. It certainly doesn’t provide the same happy brain chemicals that doing literally the same thing but in person did when we were all in college, buts it’s kept me sane for the last 5 years. College was such a different social experience. I wasn’t top of my class grades wise, but I always got top marks in computer science and computer engineering courses. I also had a healthy amount of personal projects on the side. I ended up with this reputation on campus for being able to help with any of the computing classes, and I was always a firm believer in ‘master through teaching". I considered helping other people as part of my own learning process. For anyone who seriously wanted help, you could always reach out to me. I even gave supplemental talks for particularly rough classes during our ACM weekly "coffee and code" meetings. Needless to say, this made me fairly popular on campus. I knew a lot of people and counted many of them as friends. The group was fairly diverse, both ethnically/culturally and by gender. We ate dinner together, met up and played games, built things, etc. it was a fantastic time of life. But there was one underlying thread - I had never actually initiated a random conversation. Every person I count as a friend today had either looked over my shoulder and was curious about what I was working on, was someone who asked for help in a class, was introduced by a mutual friend, etc. That period ended 5 and a half years ago when I graduated and started working for a tech company you’ve definitely heard of. Things have been rough since then. I moved to SoCal because of the office I was working in. Only two of the people I knew from college went to SoCal, some moved out of state, the others moved to the Bay Area. I’m about to lose the people in SoCal, as they’re moving out of state to further their careers elsewhere. Now I'm weighing whether or not I should quit a job I actually like in exchange for moving closer to the people I know and a job that's an unknown.

hackernews777 5y ago

It is a chore to open your mouth. A person shouldn't be subject to being prepared to engage in a 100 different conversations for the crime of walking outside their house. It also doesn't help that the vast majority of interactions are negative (pan handling, cat calling, sales pitches, political affiliations, religious evangelism, scams, asking for favors / free stuff, bullying, snooping, etc.)

kodah 5y ago
Doesn't this track with human existence? Most of my inbox is spam, even if I fight to control it. That doesn't mean I turn my email off or never use it. All of the activities you noted suck, but there's a lot more humans looking for something other than that. I ride my bike around town a lot and end up meeting a lot of strange people because of that. Some people think it's weird and obviously straight up other me if I say, "hi" -- but who would I be if I didn't? When I lived in San Diego a good number of these interactions ended up in me being able to get someone homeless water (fun fact, not all homeless people look what one might think is homeless.) One time, I ran across a guy who was clearly struggling with a very messy divorce and struggling to get back on his feet. I sat down and just listened for the better part of an hour. I shared my own story of struggle and loss, and at the end he seemed like a large weight had been lifted from his shoulders. Sometimes, all people need is a bit of connection to get through life. Someone to acknowledge their existence in a world that otherwise doesn't care about them or their story. I'm by no means a priest or hippie, just an average dude who rides a bike and likes to say, "hi".
- hackernews777 5y ago
  No it doesn't track with human existence. In the past such things lead to wars and large schisms in societies, it is completely abnormal for the vast majority of anything to be negative and the prevailing wisdom be just grin and bear it. The USA was founded on the idea of negative rights and an opt in culture, instead today we increasingly see a shift to people demanding positive rights and putting the burden on the individual to opt out. In the future I could totally see a market to have a robot buddy follow you around and have responses ready for all the things people want to pester you with.

mippenhappen 5y ago

>Where people consider talking to someone a chore. It is definitely chore to me. I'm however not claiming to be normal. I'm a hardcore misanthropist and overall pessimist. I have never in my 32 years of life enjoyed talking to people, and I have never been active on social media either (other than posting an extremely rare comment like this).

raxxorrax 5y ago

Not a fan of small talk, especially while working (I differentiate conversation and small talk). But some people really go to extremes. Perhaps social media is the cause here because people are finally so afraid of each other that having to answer something feels like a terrorist attack. I do prefer the polite gesture of small talk to not saying anything in some cases and can understand that people generally think so as well. And in some instances you really meet a new friend. Unlikely in business environments and yes there are some people that do too much small talk. But that isn't really an imposition.