Hacker News Reader

Comment by devy | Hacker News Reader

21 pointsdevy6 comments

I look forward to the author's next article, "Joining a Gang is Good."

(I don't know if it is something he will write, but I think the reasoning would be similar)

If someone gossips to you, you can safely assume they are also gossiping about you. Knowing this about them is valuable.

>>Researchers at the University of Texas and the University of Oklahoma found that if two people share negative feelings about a third person, they are likely to feel closer to each other than they would if they both felt positively about him or her.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two_Minutes_Hate

What's with all this hate on gossipers, HN?

You could argue most conversations are gossip (two people talking about an absent third). How many of you have talked about Donald Trump or Barack Obama? Did you politely wait for them to come to dinner before discussing whether you like or dislike them? Obviously not.

Would you still apply the term "gossip" to talking about celebrities or politicians? When you are talking about people in their professional capacities (talking about the politics of the politicians, and talking about the pastimes of the celebrities), you can discuss substantive concepts. Gossip typically refers to discuss the character of the absent party - discussing software written by your friend isn't gossip if the focus of the conversation is the software, not the friend.

>Researchers at the University of Texas and the University of Oklahoma found that if two people share negative feelings about a third person, they are likely to feel closer to each other than they would if they both felt positively about him or her.

no duh. gossip is evil because of the risk to the third person. that the participants strengthen their bonds is obvious.

>positive gossip inspired self-improvement efforts, and negative gossip made people prouder of themselves

lol. is this fake news or something: how do you put a positive spin on "gossiping about more successful people makes one feel bad about oneself" and "gossiping about less successful people makes one feel good about oneself".

Reply on news.ycombinator.com