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Comment by kapp_in_life | Hacker News Reader

Yes, I think I'd be fine weeding out people who can't read a social situation and decide to traumadump to their future coworkers.

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So the interviewee is stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Between the need to have a job to survive, and the need to appease some self-important middle manager who took it upon them to perform a psych eval, with zero credentials, while controlling the future of the candidates, and their ability to put food on the table.

Kindly, make your self as visible as possible so that I know to avoid you.

Exactly. I felt intense revulsion reading GP’s comment. Collaborating in a team where there’s zero concern for people’s life circumstances is a no-go. It’s impossible to maintain work-life balance when life can’t even be acknowledged.

Like the interviewer probing private traumatic experiences in a largely one-sided interrogation?

Surely you can understand the difference between a voluntary interview and an involuntary interrogation? This is a pretty poor comparison, I think.

I agree, and personally would have no qualms about walking away from an interview I didn't like.

Would you choose to leave and walk out of an interview if you objected to something? how would you feel? Would you feel like you were walking away from an opportunity maybe? What if your situation was less than ideal?

I think you would find that many people don't feel the same independence or freedom that you and I seem to. Especially if they're not already comfortable financially.

"“Tell me about you. If your life was a book, give me the chapter titles from your birth till now.”"

Would you consider an accurate answer to that to be a traumadump? How quickly do you think people can make up happy childhood stories when put on the spot like this?

It is a completely inappropriate question in a job interview.

Nobody is asking anyone to do that. The bias here is that a person with a traumatic past might seem uninteresting precisely because they unlikely going to share as much detail as this interviewer might want.

Ok so how should someone with a traumatic childhood answer questions about their childhood?

You can change the subject or answer very surface-level and be labeled "unengaged" or "socially inept"

You can answer truthfully and be judged for traumadumping

You can make up a fake origin story that fits the interviewer's criteria and be disingenuous

Remember that we are talking about a job interview here.

Yes. Which is precisely why my childhood is irrelevant.

I agree. I misinterpreted your answer, sorry!

I don't know about you or your story. I hope you're doing well.

I've learned that the majority of people just don't want to hear anything negative or anything that makes them feel sad. If I want to have social, casual friends, I have to wall off parts of my life story.

Thankfully, I have a couple of close friends and family who know the reality and that is enough for me.

I'm really glad I don't live in a country like this.

that's no country. you find these kind of people everywhere. my theory is that the people who don't want to hear those things have not yet dealt with their own traumas (which can take decades).

that's why i don't care about casual friends. i mean i do have some, but that's because we have some hobby that we share. the people in that group however are all replaceable.

what's not replaceable is deep friendships with people that do care and are open to listen.

Ok, you seem to have read this ‘social situation’ (more like economic extortion to me) differently to everyone else here.

How would you handle this?

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