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> Left to your own devices, with no task demanding your immediate concentration, you tend to spend a good deal of time thinking about other people—your judgment

> Left to your own devices, with no task demanding your immediate concentration, you tend to spend a good deal of time thinking about other people—your judgments of them; their evaluations of you. This might be true for the author but is very presumptuous imo. I spend approximately no time per day judging others or interrogating my social status. I of course think about other people, but there are many ways to think about others. There are many ways to think about yourself. I guess it's not surprising the author of a piece on status has a highly status alined thought process, but it's not by a longshot the default mode for everyone. > But if you say you want to be promoted because you want respect, that’s often regarded as an appropriate desire. I would think the same in each case. If someone doesn't think they have respect because of their job title, or they think they have it for the inverse, I feel bad for them. If I meet you on a monday and you're an x, and tuesday you're an x+1, in my eyes you're the same person. Similarly if I meet people for the first time. I honestly don't think I'm being particularly contrarian on this. I know idiot ceos, intelligent homeless people, and some kind of everyone in between. This whole take strikes me as naive to the nature of people. Even the author of some other quoted book has weird priors I completely disagree with: > for many of us this price is simply too high; we’d rather be low on the totem pole than be perceived as arrogant and domineering If you're arrogant and domineering _you are low on the totem pole_. It's really interesting to see that this author is putting someone "high" on the totem pole because of some singular status markers like job title / situational power regardless of their behaviour. It says a lot. It's not that I don't think status is real. I just don't believe it can be gained by maxmimising any one or even some multiple of typical status markers. Idk. I just find this surreal.

not_alexb 3y ago
> I spend approximately no time per day judging others or interrogating my social status. I of course think about other people, but there are many ways to think about others. There are many ways to think about yourself. Agreed; I can't think of a more boring way to spend my time. However, their writing allowed me to finally model why overt racists might spend their time being racist: self-gratification. Either way, it honestly blows my mind to find out people spend their time thinking about social hierarchy this much; go use that time to create something instead ffs.
- snapcaster 3y ago
  This actually made something click for me, I had been observing a lot of drama recently related to one of my hobbies and i was confused by the "energy level" of racist people. Seemed hard to believe people were actually truly this upset over something so trivial. Your comment helped me realize it's actually about self gratification, the underlying issue barely matters
- toomuchtodo 3y ago
  The quote “Play wealth games, not status games.” comes to mind. https://twitter.com/naval/status/1002103627387813888 https://twitter.com/naval/status/1002103627387813888
  - jimbokun 3y ago
    > You must own equity - a piece of a business - to gain your financial freedom. But, unless you already have wealth, you need social status to get to a place of owning significant equity. You need peers willing to work with you as co-founders on a new venture. You need to impress investors, unless you're self sustaining from the start. Once you start to grow, your business needs to be a place employees want to work. Especially early on, your connection with customers and gaining their trust and enthusiasm will be a big part of convincing them to buy your product. Reputation for good customer service and quality products is also an aspect of social status. In other words, you need some forms of social status to bootstrap wealth accumulation.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
replete 3y ago
It's incredibly liberating to realize that you can stop caring what people think about you, it's like killing a long running rogue prices eating up your resources... We all have access to neuroplasticity if we can challenge the fixed mindset
- laeri 3y ago
  Not sure if this is true. If you are high status you can easily afford this as you don't feel any repercussions at all. If you are low social status you might feel the effects of being at that status and probably start caring greatly!
  - theelous3 3y ago
    What repercussions do you imagine for someone you wouldn't think is high status?
    - hotpotamus 3y ago
      That homeless man who was strangled to death on the NYC subway a few weeks ago comes to mind. I saw an incredible amount of argument that the strangling was justified based on assumptions likely due to his social status.
      - throwaway8582 3y ago
        I'm sure that had far more to do with the threats he was shouting at the other passengers than his social status
        hotpotamus 3y ago
        Do you think the propensity to shout threats at people would affect one's social status?
        FrustratedMonky 3y ago
        During recent protests in California, a white couple waved guns at the protestors. It was clearly, they had higher status, rich, white, and thus got a slap on the wrist. Black man on subway, yells, and dies. Very different outcomes. White, can wave guns around and make threats, its ok. Black, can raise voice, get killed, the killing is viewed as ok.
huijzer 3y ago
> I spend approximately no time per day judging others or interrogating my social status. Professional success, education, social skills, and hence money are also related to social status. I think only a few monks are not occupied with social status. (But probably not even them because I wouldn’t be surprised if they look to each other to see who is best in meditation.)
bena 3y ago
> Left to your own devices, with no task demanding your immediate concentration, you tend to spend a good deal of time thinking about other people—your judgments of them; their evaluations of you. That one kind of baffles me as well. Left to my own devices, I create more devices. I inspect things, I wonder about how things are made. And, yes, like you, there are times when I do think about other people. And also, like you, I am not intending on judging or interrogating my social status. But, I recognize that I likely have certain social behaviors that limit me professionally. And they are likely related to my lack of concern for the trappings of status. I've lived a good portion of my life believing that doing excellent work would bring excellent rewards. And for a good portion of my life, that has not been true. Status is not merit based. So I believe there is likely something to this. It's likely not the whole story, but it is at least a chapter. Maybe we should be thinking about status a little more.
- achenet 3y ago
  this is just my hugely biased opinion, but I honestly think the world might be a little nicer if more people were like you and less people spent a bunch of time thinking about status.
  - bena 3y ago
    That's probably because some status games are counter to cooperation and niceness. Because in some situations, the way to get or preserve status is to cause friction for others.

not_alexb 3y ago

> I spend approximately no time per day judging others or interrogating my social status. I of course think about other people, but there are many ways to think about others. There are many ways to think about yourself. Agreed; I can't think of a more boring way to spend my time. However, their writing allowed me to finally model why overt racists might spend their time being racist: self-gratification. Either way, it honestly blows my mind to find out people spend their time thinking about social hierarchy this much; go use that time to create something instead ffs.

snapcaster 3y ago
This actually made something click for me, I had been observing a lot of drama recently related to one of my hobbies and i was confused by the "energy level" of racist people. Seemed hard to believe people were actually truly this upset over something so trivial. Your comment helped me realize it's actually about self gratification, the underlying issue barely matters
toomuchtodo 3y ago
The quote “Play wealth games, not status games.” comes to mind. https://twitter.com/naval/status/1002103627387813888 https://twitter.com/naval/status/1002103627387813888
- jimbokun 3y ago
  > You must own equity - a piece of a business - to gain your financial freedom. But, unless you already have wealth, you need social status to get to a place of owning significant equity. You need peers willing to work with you as co-founders on a new venture. You need to impress investors, unless you're self sustaining from the start. Once you start to grow, your business needs to be a place employees want to work. Especially early on, your connection with customers and gaining their trust and enthusiasm will be a big part of convincing them to buy your product. Reputation for good customer service and quality products is also an aspect of social status. In other words, you need some forms of social status to bootstrap wealth accumulation.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]

replete 3y ago

It's incredibly liberating to realize that you can stop caring what people think about you, it's like killing a long running rogue prices eating up your resources... We all have access to neuroplasticity if we can challenge the fixed mindset

laeri 3y ago
Not sure if this is true. If you are high status you can easily afford this as you don't feel any repercussions at all. If you are low social status you might feel the effects of being at that status and probably start caring greatly!
- theelous3 3y ago
  What repercussions do you imagine for someone you wouldn't think is high status?
  - hotpotamus 3y ago
    That homeless man who was strangled to death on the NYC subway a few weeks ago comes to mind. I saw an incredible amount of argument that the strangling was justified based on assumptions likely due to his social status.
    - throwaway8582 3y ago
      I'm sure that had far more to do with the threats he was shouting at the other passengers than his social status
      - hotpotamus 3y ago
        Do you think the propensity to shout threats at people would affect one's social status?
      - FrustratedMonky 3y ago
        During recent protests in California, a white couple waved guns at the protestors. It was clearly, they had higher status, rich, white, and thus got a slap on the wrist. Black man on subway, yells, and dies. Very different outcomes. White, can wave guns around and make threats, its ok. Black, can raise voice, get killed, the killing is viewed as ok.

huijzer 3y ago

> I spend approximately no time per day judging others or interrogating my social status. Professional success, education, social skills, and hence money are also related to social status. I think only a few monks are not occupied with social status. (But probably not even them because I wouldn’t be surprised if they look to each other to see who is best in meditation.)

bena 3y ago

> Left to your own devices, with no task demanding your immediate concentration, you tend to spend a good deal of time thinking about other people—your judgments of them; their evaluations of you. That one kind of baffles me as well. Left to my own devices, I create more devices. I inspect things, I wonder about how things are made. And, yes, like you, there are times when I do think about other people. And also, like you, I am not intending on judging or interrogating my social status. But, I recognize that I likely have certain social behaviors that limit me professionally. And they are likely related to my lack of concern for the trappings of status. I've lived a good portion of my life believing that doing excellent work would bring excellent rewards. And for a good portion of my life, that has not been true. Status is not merit based. So I believe there is likely something to this. It's likely not the whole story, but it is at least a chapter. Maybe we should be thinking about status a little more.

achenet 3y ago
this is just my hugely biased opinion, but I honestly think the world might be a little nicer if more people were like you and less people spent a bunch of time thinking about status.
- bena 3y ago
  That's probably because some status games are counter to cooperation and niceness. Because in some situations, the way to get or preserve status is to cause friction for others.