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I think you're projecting and making broad assumptions with no evidence, based on your feel and the ever present "back in my day" syndrome. People have been awkward and people have been sociable before the internet, and people are awkward and sociable after the internet. Today you have people with their heads buried in their phones, 100 years ago it was newspapers. There is no qualitative shift, at least I will not proclaim so without evidence.

And yes, this article is patently ridiculous. Way to overthink something that should be about relaxing and having fun.

>Today you have people with their heads buried in their phones, 100 years ago it was newspapers.

However, there is also no evidence that people 20 years ago were walking around all day with their heads buried in newspapers, reading them in grocery store lines, during walks in the park, and in class when they weren't really supposed to. Maybe on benches and on the bus.

Yes, I'm not saying I deny it either. I just say not to jump to conclusions based on gut feeling and "back in my day" arguments.

I agreed with you until the last paragraph. Parties "should" be relaxing and fun, but what if they aren't? Focusing on how you should feel a certain way when you don't isn't helpful, whereas making adjustments to how you act or think about things can be.

I'm a senior millennial (mid-80s kid) but I can tell you, anecdotally, that younger generation is more addicted to their phones and devices than my gen ever was. There was a car accident in front of my younger cousins' house where a car hit a fence and literally flipped over. While me and my uncle/aunt and a few others called for help and chatted about the event...my younger cousins were busy texting the event to their friends. It was as if they were there, but not really there.

I'm not sure I agree with the distinction that talking about an event with people who are there is "chatting", but talking about it with people who aren't there is merely "texting".

> my younger cousins were busy texting the event to their friends. It was as if they were there, but not really there.

Sounds like they were meaningfully interacting with their friends.

Back before the internet, they'd have probably rushed inside and fought over who got to use the phone to call their friends first, and describe the incident outside over the phone to them.

Probably they'd be interacting with their fam who was there and in the moment and later they'd call up their friends about it.

> Sounds like they were meaningfully interacting with their friends.

That's a meaningful interaction to you - texting?

Why would you think it's not? What point are you trying to make? as it seems obviously a 'meaningful interaction' to communicate with someone. (disclosure: I don't have a mobile phone, have never sent a text)

Kids these days - texting, emailing, talking on the phone, writing letters, exchanging meaning through spoken words. Whatever happened to a good, clean round of picking bugs out of each other's fur?

One of my favorite "back in my day, grumble grumble" quotes, attributed to Socrates: https://www.bartleby.com/73/195.html If you sprinkle "cell phone" in, you can't tell that it wasn't written this week.

https://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/05/01/misbehaving-childre...

Most important part of the linked article so no one else has to pay the penalty of reading for my earlier misquote: "[Quote Investigator] has determined that the author of the quote is not someone famous or ancient.

It was crafted by a student, Kenneth John Freeman, for his Cambridge dissertation published in 1907. Freeman did not claim that the passage under analysis was a direct quotation of anyone; instead, he was presenting his own summary of the complaints directed against young people in ancient times. The words he used were later slightly altered to yield the modern version."

Thanks for sharing this the-dude, you've helped make me a little less misinformed, even though I'm sad to learn it's not a direct quote :)

>People have been awkward and people have been sociable before the internet, and people are awkward and sociable after the internet.

Yep. "How to Win Friends and Influence People" was published in 1937.

Through, that one is more advanced and about how to be skilled manipulator and sleezy.

You haven't read it at all, have you?

That book is the sales bible!

i've only skimmed parts of the book, but i recall the author explicitly saying multiple times that it is not a book of "tricks", but rather tactics that can only work if there is genuine interest behind them.

idk how much time you have spent being deliberately manipulative, but unfortunately i have in my earlier years. unless you are naturally this way, it takes a lot of work in the moment and people are not usually fooled.

I have read the book and that was my conclusion from it. That it is harder to pull that actually off is true, but it it being hard does not change much on my assessment of book.

I did not tried manipulate people much and hate a lot when people try to manipulate me. People in the past did that to me. Hence my distaste with the book.

He never made the claim "nobody before 1-Jan-2002 was ever socially deficient or withdrawn from society", which you appear to be responding to.

What social consequences (specifically pertaining to human behavior) do you concede computing has had, if any?

> And yes, this article is patently ridiculous. Way to overthink something that should be about relaxing and having fun.

Well, I found that article incredible useful.

Like, one of the main reasons I'm depressed right now is because I just can't relax. I'm away from family and friends and apparently don't know the basics of human interaction.

I'm just grateful that there are people overthinking simple things out there so I can catch up and fix some of my anxieties.

Glad it helped you then!

For reference here's a party guide from the 1950s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qA93BhDBskw

these things have been going on a while

On the one hand I see where you are going, but on the other hand, 100+ years ago there existed etiquette books and charm schools (aka finishing schools) and so on. In the middle ages noble children were sent off to be raised by allies and relatives where they would be trained in how to do court.

A staple plot of teen movies going back forever (to at least the 80s, but probably longer) is a kid who somehow makes friends with the cool kids and they actively teach the "loser" to be "cool".

Point being, sure there is maybe less chance of learning these skills organically, but I think that intentional learning of these skills is not a new thing that modern life has brought about.

I grew up before the internet and I never learned how to navigate parties. I think it depends more on being able to see somebody close to you to learn from.

Right, seeing by example is how we learn most basic soft skills. But if you're staring at your Nintendo 3DS (or Sega Game Gear like I was gifted as a 5 year old) when your parents drag you along to parties or to the grocery store or wherever, then you're not going to learn anything at all, except maybe how to beat level 2.

I still don't see this as a new phenomenon. Before Android phones there were Game Gears. Before those we had Tiger Electronics handhelds. Before those we had comic books.

The only major thing that seems to have changed are the names of the distractions.

Also how much content they contain. You could go through a new comic in 20 minutes flat. Game Gears could last a few hours. Android phones provide endless content.

> Android phones provide endless content

this is a true statement, but idk how different it really is for the kids. when i was a kid i would happily spend hours rereading the same garbage star wars expanded universe books over and over and over, even though i had basically memorized the plot. with the abundance of content, i doubt today's children would be as satisfied to revisit the same thing so many times, but i also doubt that they waste much more time than i did.

They provide endless _new_ content. I still don't see how the kids of today aren't learning social skills through observing their parents because mobile devices are sucking their attention away.

My point is that the nature of what kids do at parties hasn't changed in any significant way to support your original claim that there are "so many basic things we just don't learn how to do anymore".

This resonates with me. When growing up the 'parties' I went to or heard about were really just excuses to get drunk together, which, when you're not really into drinking culture, isn't very interesting. Actual gatherings where people came to talk and socialize were few and far between.

EDIT: I do have a different expectation for parties, but understand that parties have a spectrum, from people going to a party to drink/smoke/bump what have you to reach a point of near senselessness on one end of the spectrum, to perhaps a gathering of people in the same industry who are trying to "network" at the other. My expectation for informal parties is in the middle of this where people may drink but where it isn't their expectation that they will get drunk, and the discussions will be more intimate and not business related.

Were people not talking/socializing while drinking? It sounds like you have a nonstandard expectation for "parties".

People aren't as entertaining as they think they are when they're drinking, and not being drunk means you really need other aspects of the experience to fill in.

You also have the problem that people get suspicious of people hanging around not drinking alcohol.

I'm not making the claim that drunk people are equally fun for a sober person to hang out with as other sober people, which you seem to be responding to - I'm saying the majority of the population would expect there to be alcohol at a party (even the type of upper class New York party described in the linked article).

It sounds like they wanted a hobby meetup group or similar.

> You also have the problem that people get suspicious of people hanging around not drinking alcohol.

Once you're out of college I think this is mostly in your imagination. Nobody will judge you for drinking water or diet soda and you similarly shouldn't judge someone for enjoying a beer at a social event.

I think you have it backwards. In my experience, the "drinking culture" is the excuse to get together and even meet new people sometimes. Getting a beer at the bar is a cheap way to have a place to be and "activity" to do while talking freely. Same with the bottle and the living room at someone's place.

The actual alcoholics drink alone. (And that's essentially the problem.)

Some would say it's sad that we can't just gather around a table just to talk. But the advantage of the drink (not necessarily alcoholic), is you have to be there and not on the phone.

“drinking culture” is often the only way to socialize in groups, and not necessarily alcoholism. But it can very well be.

Compare it to other “drug cultures”, e.g. cocaine. Of course users socialize heavily, but that does not mean that they are not addicted or harming themselves.

But it also doesn’t mean that they are addicted, or that the social drinkers are just fine.

How to Win Friends and Influence People was published in 1936, and has a lot of similar advice about how to interact with people. Technology has clearly changed the contours of our interactions but I think it would be a stretch to assert that social awkwardness is a new phenomenon.

I don't know, I'm pretty sure parties have always been awful for some part of the population. Personally my solution is to never go to them.

I’ve always hated them, even before the Internet was huge. I’m a fairly social person and I’m okay in crowds, but once the number of people I’m trying to interact with exceeds ~10 it’s just too much for me.

The worst are work “parties” and happy hours where everyone feels forced to go, no meaningful team building really happens, and the cliques in a company become more evident and visible.

Plus I’ve lost some hearing due to one too many loud metal shows, so party conversation is pretty stressful.

>no meaningful team building really happens, and the cliques in a company become more evident and visible.

Are your work parties dry?

I work at BigCo we have a monthly "free beer and pizza" on our floor and it's the great at getting people to meet each other and de-siloing.

> Are your work parties dry?

They aren’t but it still ends up being the same people grouping up and talking to each other. Maybe it’s the company culture but it makes the whole affair feel pretty uninviting.

There are just many different types of party. The default is just bad, true.

In my youth it was common to drink at a "party", until it was fun. Then I decided that parties where I need to be drunk to enjoy, are not worth my time. But trust me, there are different ones ...

i don't genuinely enjoy most parties, but i do very much enjoy small gatherings of close friends. unfortunately, close friends do not grow on trees, and as an adult, i don't actually get that many opportunities to meet a broad range of new people. i find that parties are one of the few places in american society where it is acceptable to just approach people who seem interesting and start talking to them, so i see value in them even if i don't like them, per se.

People have been awkward at parties since there were three or more people gathering in a social setting.

Relevant:

> Texting is now the preferred form of communication [among teenagers], with 35 percent of teens saying that’s their favorite way to communicate, compared with in-person (32 percent), social media (16 percent) and video chatting (10 percent). In 2012, in-person communication was the most popular. (Emphasis mine)

Source: https://www.recode.net/2018/9/10/17826810/social-media-use-t...

No. It wasn't the internet or cellphones or gaming. This is a 20th century problem. Previous societies had rigid systems of etiquette. We don't.

One upon a time if someone wanted to start a conversation with a stranger there was a clear and practiced way of doing so. You could easily identify whether a person was of a similar class and background to yourself. Then there were acceptable and unacceptable times and places for such conversations. It was rigid, formal and often evil (racism etc) but it gave everyone guidelines.

Vestiges of this still exist today. Two doctors or lawyers know how to identify and address each other. Certainly the military has formal rules. It isn't about common backgrounds, it is about knowing exactly how the other person expects to be addressed and how they will respond to you. Such knowledge makes starting that first conversation easier.

Side note, if you are interested in skills that "everybody knew 100 years ago", there are much better books to be had. "The American boys Handy book" comes to mind. Popular Mechanic published a bunch of books back then (pre 1920, don't be confused with some of the latter stuff which isn't as good).

Of course those books assume that there are things like a junk model T in the backyard that you are free to take parts from or otherwise destroy. Just to name one change in circumstances.

I fucking hate parties, and never had a "real meaningful connection" at one. But that's not to say I've never had such connections. Attempting to do so just becomes more difficult when you're trying to raise your voice above ambient noise levels and listen to someone trying to do the same.

I certainly lost the illusion of online communities being like real communities. I mean, I certainly don't post to HN to feel socially competent.

> I certainly lost the illusion of online communities being like real communities

this was a really sad part of growing up for me.

Sometimes it's okay to evolve in the sense that average people forget how to do (now) unnecessary things.

I.E. Standard/Manual Transmissions

Socially, maybe not, but my example still stands.

"go out into the real world" screw parties (exchange screw for the f bomb). If you have any kind of convictions not a days its really difficult to go into crowds above 30. One person will be a complete idiot or disgusting and its either being able to enjoy the company of such a person or leave.

Im middle class (bachelors degree, not from a wealthy family) and the "medicore" , "average" person just talks so much shit out of their ass. Its like a public twitter forum where stupid cliches about "Trump is an idiot" or so much drugs and even orgies have become a not too crazy idea.

Can we have the 50s back without the racism. The people are not the same but parties are not the same either.

I wonder if the rich have stayed classy? Parties are like a rap video. Twerking being a phenomena should tell you all you need to know about the "party" culture in America.

There's a lot going on in that comment... You need to sort that out.

I was being tongue and cheek for the most part.Is there really nothing in my previous comment that does not resonate with your juxtaposition on how the standard "party" has changed from previous generations.

Hell give me the 70s, at least the disco seemed fun. But I guess thats where the drugs started too.

Anyways I would appreciate just ignoring the comment instead of being snarky. This board has standard I hope it strives to keep.

> This board has standard I hope it strives to keep.

It seems to have done its best to downvote you.

kinda reminds me of ajit pai going off on why he hates america. [0]

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nNR3Z6hWTvg

It sounds like you have a lasting impression about what a party is like based on movies or TV shows. My experiences at parties are very different from what you've described.

On that same note:

I think we're seeing 2 problems:

1. People really don't want to get together due to the consequence of callout culture/(PCism/SJWism). This has caused people (I'm seeing the effects with the communities I currently and have previously maintained) to be less likely to share, be willing to meet with people, and even branch out their friend circles. Censorship/Censorship has been the conservative "let's all get along" response.

2. Technology has become a detriment, I'm not sure when we're going to have our WWI for personal technology. (WWI introduced the concept that all of these improvements in technology may also bring death and destruction) Given the hooks of technology, we're going to get to a really nastic predicament here. I'm not sure how to describe what it will be, or how we can fix it. But we're losing valuable communication skills and we're making things worse for society. (That has been an ongoing thing for a while) My theory: We're going to go into a dark age.

----

Lastly: If you found this article somewhat helpful, I would suggest reading Captivate by Vanessa Williams/Edwards?

For some counter perspective to point 1, I'm a white male in the Bay Area whose interests often place me in diverse groups, some of whom advocate social justice policies. I haven't noticed SJW/PC culture as an actual barrier to socializing and no one I maintain contact with has ever mentioned it as a problem.

Anecdotally, SJW/PC call-out culture appears to have a much more depressing effect on public discourse over the internet where posting opens you to criticism from anyone on the internet.

Are those groups focused on sj polices? If they're groups where that's not the focus, and they've injected those policies. (I.e. let's say a HN user group) That's a problem. How comfortable would you feel stating a disagreement without even mentioning your identity or status? How comfortable would you be in stating the disagreement if you weren't 100% confident on what you were saying?

For communities not focused on policies there's a certain amount of fragmentation along what I would call sj/pc social norms. In my boardgame group, for example, if you intentionally refer to someone using pronouns they do not like you get ejected; in which case you could leave our regular meeting place and walk 4 blocks down to another gathering where that sort of behavior is tolerated.

As far as expressing disagreement goes, the rule is the same as it's always been as far as I can tell: The degree to which a view outside the local Overton Window is expressible is directly proportional to how much the listeners respect your politics/thought process/moral grounding and how far outside the Overton Window the view is. The more the listener respects your politics/thought process/moral grounding, the more radical the idea you can argue to them without being dismissed. Go too radical for someone who doesn't know you well and you lose the listener.

So in direct response to your question, I'm very comfortable stating disagreement on topics that it's socially acceptable to disagree about generally and am comfortable disagreeing about anything with certain specific groups of people. This is, as far as I can tell, the most any society has ever achieved. A Bay Area neoreactionary will be shunned by most for expressing their belief that a woman's place is in the home just as a progressive in Birmingham, Alabama would be shunned for suggesting there's nothing wrong with abortion.

I would go so far as to say that if this level of self-censorship is new to someone then they have been fortunate to spend much of their life in communities in which their views fit comfortably inside the local Overton Window; for everyone else this is normal.

Having the rule about pronouns is what I was referring to. Just having that rule makes people afraid of being rejected from the group from a slip up like that. (Thus creating censorship) Personally, I avoid groups that mandiate things like that or I'll aggressively reject that rule. (I'll let them know that it's a bad rule and I will speak up on it frequently.. will I intentionally treat the people who feel the need to have a different pronoun than what they're percieved badly.. no) However, I realize that I'm different and I don't tolerate bullies.

So I would say first, respecting pronouns is not a rule unto itself, it's encompassed in a more general "be respectful" rule, whose interpretation is informed by our social norms.

Second, for a group seeking social cohesion a certain amount of censorship is desirable. We also don't allow people to casually disparage people of color because if we do those members of our community who are people of color would either leave or cause a ruckus, neither of which we want.

Third and lastly, mistakes are tolerated, we're people not caricatures and know that the pronoun stuff can be difficult to track. If you slip up you'll be given a "look" and a chance to correct yourself. If you don't correct yourself, and continue to slip, interventions slowly escalate from friendly reminders of the form, "hey, please watch what pronouns you use" to longer discussions about why your behavior is not acceptable in this context. We use this same approach for people who use unacceptable language, or have trouble controlling their volume when speaking, it's the only way to keep a group of random people tolerable to be around.

As I stated, you are immediately shown the door if you are intentionally misgendering someone. So if someone tells you they want to be called she/her/hers and you very emphatically refer to them as he/him/his a dozen times in three minutes you get the boot. Just as we'd throw out someone who was being extremely rude to our members in a more conventional manner.

I feel that we're getting down in the dirt with one particular groups' conventions.

On an interpersonal level, I respect the overton window. On a group level, I'm highly concerned with it. It caters too much to the needs of the over sensitive.

I'm on the level of if you're abusive towards other members, you've lost the support of the group and a rule about that is fine. Setting the line at "don't abuse other people" is generic and supported to all people.

But when you codify a rule about pronouns, you're just giving an endorsement to the most oversensitive member that would be 'victimized' by that 'crime.' (Are they going to be easily set off by mistakes?, unintentional misusages during excitement) It also communicates to everyone that it's something you will be rejected and ostrisized from the group over. (That's where the silencing effect comes in).

Anyways, that's my 2c and what I've seen about some groups and how I run my groups to be inclusive.

re: 1 -- i've yet to see this ever happen to anyone I know. In fact, i've seen a handful of sketchy situations where it might even be warranted, and it still hasn't happened.

The thing I see all the time, online and off? Comments like yours where people (mostly guys) self censor out of fear of this hypothetical life catastrophy.

I think we dudes are hurting ourselves here. Far more than PC culture wants to harm us (which seems on the internet like a lot, but in reality, is effectively nil)