I'm a nice guy, but I am very hostile.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Spiffor
Yes, it's been my point all along

And you know that protocols are useful, since no meaningful communication would exist without them.

That's a terrible argument. Not all protocols are useful.

If businesses were less polite and more honest, they'd be more productive.

You would not believe how much time I spent writing passive-aggressive, extraordinarily polite emails to other companies in just the sixteen months I interned.

[Japher]

Asher is the type of person who would break a law and then argue the validity of the law... since he broke it, it can't be a good law afterall

[Asher]

Originally posted by Japher
Asher is the type of person who would break a law and then argue the validity of the law... since he broke it, it can't be a good law afterall

Where did this come from?

Are you taking a swipe at independent thinking? Not everybody has a desire to conform to be liked...

[Last Conformist]

Originally posted by Spiffor

Ask a robot "Could you help me?", and it will reply something like "yes, helping me would be in my abilities", and be done with your question.
Tell a robot "help me", and it will actually help you.

That would be badly programmed robot. Understanding lexicalized expressions is a core part of linguistic competence.


Outside of the lecture hall, very little of human communication is concerned witht he pure conveyance of information; most is about making people think, feel, or act as you want them to. Call it manipulation if you wish - at the end of the day it's what human society is about.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Last Conformist
Outside of the lecture hall, very little of human communication is concerned witht he pure conveyance of information; most is about making people think, feel, or act as you want them to. Call it manipulation if you wish - at the end of the day it's what human society is about.

Yeah, and politeness is one of the tools people use to that end.

[Last Conformist]

Of course. The odd thing is that you seem to have problem about it.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Last Conformist
Of course. The odd thing is that you seem to have problem about it.

Yes, because I find it to be manipulative. As I said before, I prefer honesty to scheming, deception, and obligation by social code.

[Last Conformist]

Then I suggest you head back to the jungle and leave civilization to us real people.

[Asher]

On the contrary, I think people like yourself are best fit for the wild. High School is the hell it is because of social protocols and codes. People grow up and become more honest with age, something you have yet to do.

Spiffor is making progress, apparently.

[lord of the mark]

Human beings need dignity. They need a sense of freedom, that they are not doing things cause someone else has power over them.

If someone says to me "Hold the door for me", hes treating me like a servant, implying he can give me an order. If someone says "please hold the door for me" hes acknowledging that he CANT order me, and must ask. Now sometimes someone who actually has power over me, and CAN order me says please. Sometimes this is to let me know its NOT an order, and can be refused. In which case its not manipulation, but conveys information. Sometimes it IS an order, but is disguised as a request, in order to hide the humiliating fact of unequal power. Note that we have here three usages of please, only one of which is false, and hence "manipulation". In some cases the latter is so false, as to elicit the reactions Asher mentions. In some cases it is not - in the cases, for example, when it is said in public, and the speaker is trying to protect me from the PUBLIC acknowledgement of unequal power - or in when the speaker clearly really wants to have a relationship of equals, despite unequal power, and the occasional necessity to actually give an order. OTOH if someone clearly enjoys and even abuses an unequal power relationship, but covers it with speech that implies an order is a request, THAT is discomforting (though im not sure its manipulative, as it rarely works - though i guess in some hands it works better than others)

Some folks have difficulties with these distinctions. Fortunately such people often have skills in other areas.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Asher
On the contrary, I think people like yourself are best fit for the wild. High School is the hell it is because of social protocols and codes. People grow up and become more honest with age, something you have yet to do.

Spiffor is making progress, apparently.

They do not generally become less polite however. And they generally have a far broader, and more subtle view of the usages of international personal relations. They are less reductionist, less literalist.

[Asher]

I get the distinction, and I can be polite. Doesn't mean I have to like it.

[Last Conformist]

Originally posted by Asher
On the contrary, I think people like yourself are best fit for the wild. High School is the hell it is because of social protocols and codes. People grow up and become more honest with age, something you have yet to do.

As anyone who actually knows me would tell you, I'm honest to a fault. That's half the reason I telling you you're being an idiot; the other half is that I plain enjoy it.


You're right about HS, tho. If there weren't social codes, HS would not be hell, because it wouldn't exist.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Asher
I get the distinction, and I can be polite. Doesn't mean I have to like it.

if theres someone over who you dont have power, and you dont say please, youre conveying false information. Why should someone over whom you dont have power do something for you, if you wont REQUEST, and persist in ordering? IS it that you dont like not having power over everyone you interact with?

Or perhaps you dont like saying please where you DO have power, and it IS an order. Why do you feel a need to rub your subordinates nose in the unequal power relationship? Do you dislike that such an unequal relationship is painful to them, at some level? Do you dislike the social pressures that deter from inflicting that pain?

[Asher]

Originally posted by lord of the mark
if theres someone over who you dont have power, and you dont say please, youre conveying false information. Why should someone over whom you dont have power do something for you, if you wont REQUEST, and persist in ordering? IS it that you dont like not having power over everyone you interact with?

Or perhaps you dont like saying please where you DO have power, and it IS an order. Why do you feel a need to rub your subordinates nose in the unequal power relationship? Do you dislike that such an unequal relationship is painful to them, at some level? Do you dislike the social pressures that deter from inflicting that pain?

I don't have subordinates, nor superiors.

Most of the times when your superior says "Can you do this for me?" it is, in fact, NOT a request...you're his employee.

I'll ask if people can do something for me, but politeness is not the only protocol for that. "Can you hold the door for me?" is asking somebody to hold the door.

You seem to believe that if you're not polite, all you do is command people...