I don’t know honestly at this point I’ve stopped asking questions
Lol … I’ve been chatting with a nice guy at the supermarket every time I go there. I don’t know him nor do I really want to … he’s just nice and I want to be nice back. I’m a guy, I’m not gay, I was just being nice and friendly. I’m brown indigenous, he’s Indian and I live in a mostly white area so I thought I’d take an extra step to be nice to someone who is different because I know what that feels like.
Last time I saw him, he answered me back with ‘Why?’ Every time I asked something about his life
I asked how
goodhis family was … has he been traveling anywhere special lately … what have you been up to?I don’t know him and I just wanted to chat about something, anything and at one point I felt strange.
But he was good about it … I told him I
wasjust wanted to chat … he laughed and said it was alright and we talked for a while.The world is getting weird I find and it’s getting harder to just talk to anyone without some form of suspicion between people.
It was always like that to a degree as far as I can remember (I’m on my 40s) … but I find it seems to be more so these days.
EDIT: typos
Keep being you. Fight that feeling one person at a time, we should all follow that example.
You’re not imagining things, the world is not just “getting weird” but division is sown our way from a multitude of places for their own profits and agendas.
Yet, we must be silenced. The people can not be allowed to speak. Even as dystopia gives the diseased members of the species ever more powerful and abstract tools to divide us, they still fear us talking.
That’s because what you’re doing is literally all it takes to begin eroding the artificial pen walls. We’re made to communicate and tell each other stories, that’s deeply ingrained.
What we’re losing slowly and globally is our sense of cohesion. Neighbor to neighborhood, resident to city, citizen to country, human to human.
All of our innate mental structures that trend towards “making it all work, no matter who is helped because it helps me too” are constantly being twisted and attacked. But we are what we are, so keep fighting the good fight.
Thanks for the encouragement and reassurance … I have a lot of dark ideas of the future of this world and a lot of anger, resentment and disappointment at humanity … but I do hold out hope, especially towards any human being near me.
I will keep fighting … I will keep holding on to connecting to my fellow man and woman … but at the same time I do remain pessimistic and disappointed. I like people … but I have a different view of society as a whole.
I think my version of hell is never ending small talk with distant relatives/acquaintances.
Before family events I grow a mustache, then I just get asked about the mustache the whole time.
Dude!! I’ve done this!! I shaved my beard except for my mustache for my cousins wedding, no one started a conversation with “how’s work”. Everyone wanted to talk about the stache lmao
Alternatively: Wear a new funny shirt.
Ohh, you made me remember that. And also never-ending flood of “Did you finally do your driving license?” is my personal hell
Well, did you?
Yeah, did you? I’m weirdly invested in this now.
We are the same person
Yep, I still work at the same job. Nope, I don’t have any new hobbies. Yep, my life is literally the exact same as the last time we talked two years ago. We have nothing in common, it’s fine if we just kinda stop talking now
OP how are you?
What’s new?
Why are you doing this to them?
It’s hard to get across “no really, I find predictability comforting and/or am not willing to share the personal projects I fill my time with for various reasons.”
“If I tell you that’ll make you an accessory.”
Great, we can be shovel buddies.
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Friend is trying to start a conversation and catch up, “Me” is being weirdly antisocial about the whole thing.
Like, if you dislike this person that much, tell them you don’t want to be their friend any more, instead of suffering inside at how much you hate interacting with them, and leading them on.
That’s a weird take on this. Not liking or being good at small talk does not equate with disliking the person. It certainly doesn’t mean you “hate interacting with them”.
Talking to a friend you haven’t seen in a while about what’s new in your life is basically the opposite of "small talk’. I can empathize with those kind of social interactions being hard for some people, but it’s a social skill that’s worth either practicing or finding alternative paths to accomplish if you want to make and keep friends.
Talking to a friend you haven’t seen in a while about what’s new in your life is basically the opposite of "small talk’.
Only if something unusual has happened. Otherwise it’s just small talk about work and your family’s health. By a certain age there’s basically never anything “new” in your life.
Sure, but I wouldn’t really find the process of starting the conversation to find that out “small talk”. Even if there’s not a lot new most of the time, to me small talk has to be the kind of banal and meaningless conversations that basically never lead into those ‘real’ ones. How’s the weather, what about that local sports team, did you see someone bought that house/building/store down the road, etc.
I think the complicated thing is there are people you don’t really know, acquaintances, where the generic “how’s the wife and kids” is small talk, because they don’t actually really care, it’s just a generic greeting thing. But a friend asking that is different, imo.
I’m very socially awkward, I don’t understand the issue here. No one’s going to be mad at you for saying “Meh, not really, what about you?”
The expectation that the answer will change over time wears one down when it doesn’t.
When you masturbate all day wearing a helmet, that simple “What’s up?” can be quite painful.
If it is small talk depends on your answers. If they are flippant like the examples given above, then they are small talk. But it can also give a jumping off point to talk about whatever you have on your mind.
I think the “Me” was saying that they’ve done literally nothing new or interesting and has nothing to answer the question with. The distress is from thinking about how little they are doing and feeling pressure to admit that to their friend, transforming a light conversation to a heavy one.
That our I’ve been up to nothing I’m willing to talk about or admit…
weirdly antisocial
Completely forgets (or ignores) the fact that some people just don’t like their lives and avoiding thinking about it is what helps them get through the day. And that others legitimately have nothing new going on that they can discuss with those outside their inner circles. Like, I’m not going to tell someone I haven’t seen in a couple years all about the adult novel I’m looking forward to releasing in December, or that time I moved and nothing about it went well to the point it was mildly traumatic, so yeah, they’re going to get a “meh, not much. keeping busy. work and stuff. you?” at the most generous.
Look small talk is all well and good but don’t keep pressing for info on what I’ve been up to because telling you all about how I’ve been spending most of my days as a puddle of self hatred on the couch doesn’t make for good small talk
Just start with the topic you want to talk about. I would never message someone with small talk nonsense like “what’s up” or “how’s it going”, etc, etc.
It’s none of your business!
Or, ok, hear me out now, you could have an actual conversation with someone. This whole trend of “I’m an introvert” is getting annoying
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