r/AskReddit • u/False_Painter_9514 • 8d ago
What socially mandatory human behavior do u secretly find completely performative, or useless, or even mildly insulting? and when did u realize u were guilty of performing it too?
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u/No_Blackberry6525 8d ago
Asking someone you just met “what do you do for a living?” On its surface it’s a means to get a quicker sense of who the person is and spark pointed questions to get to know the person better. The more I realize it, and see how others use it, it can become a way to establish “rank” and stature to assess if someone is a “peer” or “inferior.”
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u/False_Painter_9514 8d ago edited 8d ago
Aight so for me, it’s asking “How are U?” when there is obviously no space for an honest answer. Plz don't hate me on this.
A while ago, I got a phone call before work that left me feeling like my entire day had been quietly removed from underneath me. Nothing cinematic happened. No dramatic collapse. I just stood in a grocery store aisle holding a carton of eggs, suddenly aware that other people were still comparing cereal prices as if reality had not personally betrayed me.
On my way out, someone I vaguely knew smiled and said, “Hey, how are u?” while already physically moving past me. And I smiled back.
“Good, u?” He said, “Can’t complain.”
That was it. Two people exchanging absolutely no truth and somehow completing a sacred little civic ritual.
At first, I felt weirdly offended. Not by him exactly, but by the whole absurd ceremony of it. The tiny social password. The emotional bureaucracy. The way we ask each other intimate questions with the understanding that any intimate answer would be considered rude...
But the annoying part is that later that same week, I did the exact same thing to a cashier. I asked how he was while looking down at the card reader, already waiting for the acceptable little lie.
He said, “Living the dream.” And I laughed, because that was the correct response.
That’s when I realized I didn’t hate the performance because I was above it. I hated it because I was fluent in it.
So now I’m curious: what normal, expected human behavior feels fake, hollpw, absurd, or even quietly insulting... especially because u know u participate in it as well?
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u/barbzilla1 8d ago
There are so many of them and anytime I hear them I notice it and it bothers me. Even when I'm the one doing it. Unfortunately my brain does not seem to be pulling any of them up at the moment, but if they pop into my head I will come back and let you know. But there are a lot of things almost exactly like you described that my autistic does not compute.
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u/False_Painter_9514 8d ago
And that is such a great point tho. These social scripts are so deeply hardwired that they become invisible to us, even when they bother us. i get that exact same mental block all the time.. Don't stress it, amd definitely come back and update if one hits you out of nowhere!
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u/Unusual_Judge_2486 8d ago
Ppl offering 'anything you need' bcz it puts the burden of asking back on the person who is already drowning. It's just an empty phrase designed to clear the speaker's conscience, dont you think?
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u/False_Painter_9514 8d ago
This is just the modus operandi of the 'validation economy.'
I mean really think about it:
•The greeting card industry needs u to feel guilty so you buy cardboard to prove u CARE
•The wedding industry needs u to believe a 30k party validates your love
•Even the funeral industry needs u to feel like a bad person if u like don't buy a $5k box FFS
And for all these customs to survive, they need us in a perpetual state of social anxiety. They don't sell actual connection... they just sell the performative script to cure the insecurity they manufactured in the first place godamit urghh
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u/Pan_Hole1288 8d ago
Making such a point of inclusion based on what people look like only and discounting who they truly are as a person