6 ms·

Kind of a rant, but if you hang out on places like Reddit, sometimes it feels like the whole world has crippling social anxiety and hates people. In real life,

by cglan 4y ago

Kind of a rant, but if you hang out on places like Reddit, sometimes it feels like the whole world has crippling social anxiety and hates people. In real life, everyone seems to be craving human interaction. It’s sad sometimes. Being afraid to have small talk with people isn’t introversion, it’s a mental problem. Places like NYC have completely popped off again and I think we’ll see more and more demand for walkable social areas

AnIdiotOnTheNet 4y ago
> Being afraid to have small talk with people isn’t introversion, it’s a mental problem. It's a societal problem. Too many people invade our attention constantly to try and sell us something, whether that be a product or service, a fad, or political bullshit. We have necessarily become defensive about people invading our attention uninvited.
- DangitBobby 4y ago
  I doubt people not liking small talk is a recent development. It's probably not fair to call it a mental problem, but the crippling anxiety some people experience around phone calls and simple conversations are absolutely mental problems and have nothing to do with advertisments.
  - 8n4vidtmkvmk 4y ago
    I used to be afraid of phone calls. I think I'm pretty much over it now. Not entirely sure what got me over it, probably joining a large company and being bombarded with 100s of people and meetings non stop. Eventually you stop worrying.
re-thc 4y ago
Agree with the other commenter that "small talk" has always been a problem. Just as a courtesy and trying to keep up with work appearances do many keep it up. Way before remote but outside of work in-person and in forums there have been lots of rants on "small talk". It's also very robotic. Small talk never want real responses. Oh like when you begin the conversation with "How was your day?" and the expectation is to say "fine thanks" or similar? What's the point? Are you sure everyone hates people or just those requesting things like "small talk" are the problem?
yucky 4y ago
You're right, but that's because Reddit is a place where people with crippling social anxiety who hate people, tend to hang out online. It wasn't always that way, but seems to have taken that turn around the time Yahoo neutered Tumblr, when they all seemed to have migrated over to Reddit and made it unusable.
- ramblerman 4y ago
  Subreddits are still pretty valuable, but agreed that the front page is hell. Its teenage angst, nihilism, and dangerous witch hunts. Like a kind of lord of the flies, but with “adults” in the mix.
silisili 4y ago
Have a browse at MildlyInfuriating sometime. 75% of those posts would be resolved just by talking to someone for 30 seconds. You hit the nail on the head, it's like everyone there is afraid to speak to another person.
vitehozonage 4y ago
Whether to define something like that as a mental problem is completely arbitrary and culturally defined by what is normal. Additionally, some people have no choice but to live with their mental problems or whatever you want to call them. I take issue with the idea that psychology, psychiatry and drugs are for the purpose of normalising everyone.
antibasilisk 4y ago
>In real life, everyone seems to be craving human interaction. It’s sad sometimes. Being afraid to have small talk with people isn’t introversion, it’s a mental problem. It's often disturbing how obvious it is. I can tell when someone is deeply lonely, and as much as I feel sorry for them, the lack of awareness they have about the way they're presenting themselves makes me feel overwhelmed and avoid interacting with them. Thankfully I invested a lot of time into reverse engineering how normal people behave in high school when I ran out of other things to do, so now when I meet people they think I'm well adjusted and charismatic instead of an extremely eccentric and unpredictable nerd.

by cglan 4y ago

AnIdiotOnTheNet 4y ago

> Being afraid to have small talk with people isn’t introversion, it’s a mental problem. It's a societal problem. Too many people invade our attention constantly to try and sell us something, whether that be a product or service, a fad, or political bullshit. We have necessarily become defensive about people invading our attention uninvited.

DangitBobby 4y ago
I doubt people not liking small talk is a recent development. It's probably not fair to call it a mental problem, but the crippling anxiety some people experience around phone calls and simple conversations are absolutely mental problems and have nothing to do with advertisments.
- 8n4vidtmkvmk 4y ago
  I used to be afraid of phone calls. I think I'm pretty much over it now. Not entirely sure what got me over it, probably joining a large company and being bombarded with 100s of people and meetings non stop. Eventually you stop worrying.

re-thc 4y ago

Agree with the other commenter that "small talk" has always been a problem. Just as a courtesy and trying to keep up with work appearances do many keep it up. Way before remote but outside of work in-person and in forums there have been lots of rants on "small talk". It's also very robotic. Small talk never want real responses. Oh like when you begin the conversation with "How was your day?" and the expectation is to say "fine thanks" or similar? What's the point? Are you sure everyone hates people or just those requesting things like "small talk" are the problem?

yucky 4y ago

You're right, but that's because Reddit is a place where people with crippling social anxiety who hate people, tend to hang out online. It wasn't always that way, but seems to have taken that turn around the time Yahoo neutered Tumblr, when they all seemed to have migrated over to Reddit and made it unusable.

ramblerman 4y ago
Subreddits are still pretty valuable, but agreed that the front page is hell. Its teenage angst, nihilism, and dangerous witch hunts. Like a kind of lord of the flies, but with “adults” in the mix.

silisili 4y ago

Have a browse at MildlyInfuriating sometime. 75% of those posts would be resolved just by talking to someone for 30 seconds. You hit the nail on the head, it's like everyone there is afraid to speak to another person.

vitehozonage 4y ago

Whether to define something like that as a mental problem is completely arbitrary and culturally defined by what is normal. Additionally, some people have no choice but to live with their mental problems or whatever you want to call them. I take issue with the idea that psychology, psychiatry and drugs are for the purpose of normalising everyone.

antibasilisk 4y ago

>In real life, everyone seems to be craving human interaction. It’s sad sometimes. Being afraid to have small talk with people isn’t introversion, it’s a mental problem. It's often disturbing how obvious it is. I can tell when someone is deeply lonely, and as much as I feel sorry for them, the lack of awareness they have about the way they're presenting themselves makes me feel overwhelmed and avoid interacting with them. Thankfully I invested a lot of time into reverse engineering how normal people behave in high school when I ran out of other things to do, so now when I meet people they think I'm well adjusted and charismatic instead of an extremely eccentric and unpredictable nerd.