Quote of the Day

[andrewducker]

Small talk is the bane of the nerd’s existence because small talk is a combination of aspects of the world that your nerd hates. When your nerd is staring at a stranger, all he’s thinking is, “I have no system for understanding this messy person in front of me”. This is where the shy comes from. This is why nerds hate presenting to crowds.

The skills to interact with other people are there. They just lack a well-defined system.

From The Nerds Handbook
Which seems to be more of a handbook for dealing with nerds than one for nerds to read.

Comments

[andrewducker]

I've had to work hard on this one:

You’re giving your nerd the daily debrief. “Spent an hour at the post office trying to ship that package to your mom, and then I went down to that bistro — you know — the one next the flower shop, and it’s closed. Can you believe that?”

And your nerd says, “Cool”.

Cool? What’s cool? The business closing? The package? How is any of it cool? None of it’s cool. Actually, all of it might be cool, but your nerd doesn’t believe any of what you’re saying is relevant. This is what he heard, “Spent an hour at the post office blah blah blah…”

You can be rightfully pissed off by this behavior — it’s simply rude — but seriously, I’m trying to help here. Your nerd’s insatiable quest for information and The High has tweaked his brain in an interesting way. For any given piece of incoming information, your nerd is making a lightning fast assessment: relevant or not relevant? Relevance means that the incoming information fits into the system of things your nerd currently cares about. Expect active involvement from your nerd when you trip the relevance flag. If you trip the irrelevance flag, look for verbal punctuation announcing his judgment of irrelevance. It’s the word your nerd says when he’s not listening and it’s always the same. My word is “Cool”, and when you hear “Cool”, I’m not listening.

Information that your nerd is exposed to when the irrelevance flag is waving is forgotten almost immediately. I mean it. Next time you hear “Cool”, I want you to ask, “What’d I just say?” That awkward grin on your nerd’s face is the first step in getting him to acknowledge that he’s the problem in this particular conversation.

Because "Cool" may well be the word I use the most in this situation, and it's taken me a fair amount of effort to actually concentrate and engage. I think I'm getting there though.

[marrog.livejournal.com]

God, don't get me started on this. Shouldn't the book be called:

"Help your nerd to held themselves because God Knows they will otherwise do absolutely nothing about gaining subtle or even basic social skills, merely wallowing proudly in their own ineptitude while labouring under the misguided idea that it makes them smarter than everyone else."

Not you, Andy; you try very hard. Just, y'know. Almost everyone else.

I guess that title's a bit long, though.

[supergee.livejournal.com]

Most of us are smart enough to realize that our intellectual superiority and our lack of primate grooming skills are independent variables.

[marrog.livejournal.com]

You say 'most' - I say 'some'.

[supergee.livejournal.com]

That's plausible; I certainly haven't taken a survey.

[marrog.livejournal.com]

And if you did I doubt I'd trust it if it was self-assessed... *grin*

[marrog.livejournal.com]

I should also clarify that I'm at times painfully socially stupid myself. I'm just also obsessed with ridding myself of my social flaws.

[khbrown.livejournal.com]

But what would it mean to be rid of social flaws? I'm thinking of something like The Conformist, where the protagonist's desire to be normal and liked leads to his being a fascist agent, or the charming psychopath who knows how to push the right buttons to seem likeable.

[marrog.livejournal.com]

Well, you have to hit a balance. So for example I'm a very frank person, sometimes to the point of bluntness. The thing I'm always trying to do is hit the balance between my frankness and honesty with people, which I consider an admirable and desirable trait, and the tactlessness and unnecessary (ie serving no purpose other than to bruise) bluntness that comes with it, which I strive to overcome. I also attempt to offset my naturally critical nature by also being disarmingly free with compliment and approval where I feel it. I do okay, but it's an ongoing mission.

[meaningrequired.livejournal.com]

He does say "cool" when he's not listening! Although having not clicked on the link, I agree Andy undersells his social skills.

[marrog.livejournal.com]

Oh, he's made me cringe once or twice, but very rarely. The important thing with Andy is that he's very aware of what he should do, and completely sincere in his attempt to do so. He's also very good at cutting through the crap, distinguishing between pleasant nicities and insincere bollocks.

And after all, this is no different from what 'normal' people do - they don't listen to you talking about that package you mailed because they're interested. They do it because they know they should have a valid reaction for politeness' sake, and in turn, that you will then listen to them prattle on an validate them in turn. People like to feel that they're not alone, that their daily events are being tracked and acknowledged by someone other than themselves.

One might even suggest that Andy and his ilk are in fact extra good people because they strive to give their attention and validation to this daily grind information from other people while never obliging said people to listen to theirs in return. Also, because Andy is incapable of insincerity, he'll actually be genuinely finding a reason to care. Clearly a well-trained Aspie is a friend indeed!


Edited to add: This was all meant entirely honestly and should not be taken as intended to be either sarcastic or patronising.

[hirez.livejournal.com]

I fear I shall agree with that title.

Where do these idiot people come from? The ones that come striding into an industry that's been employing hackers (I am very much not at home to the terms nerd, geek or spod, if only because I fail at being an Aspie, don't think it's big or clever to aspire to the grim stereotype that ESR wrote about in the Hackers's Dictionary, yet still manage to hold down a job bothering Unix boxes. I must be some sort of impostor.) since the late thirties and are shocked and confused when confronted with a surly mob of technical types. I don't know what industry for which they'd be a better fit, mind.

[FX: Deep breath]

Sorry. I don't know what came over me.

[redshira.livejournal.com]

I just read this bit to James and his first response was "But what if what you're saying isn't relevant?" To which my response was "If I am speaking, it is relevant!"

Well. This is going to be an interesting evening in Beckett's House of Autistics.

[andrewducker]

I'm with you there - it's relevant because it helps the relationship and makes the other person feel appreciated and understood.

[redshira.livejournal.com]

Yes! Which James does get, now that I've pointed it out to him. I think he doesn't often categorise things I say as irrelevant because he knows that Aspie Wife also doesn't do small talk. I admit that I do the irrelevant/relevant categorising thing but if he's gone off on some long-winded thing and I'm failing to see the point, I will actually say "I'm not keeping up here, can you summarise what you're saying?" rather than pretending to listen. Because I do actually want to know what he's saying, and I want to have a conversation, but because I do my very best to pay attention to everything he says it's really easy for my brain to get bogged down in his techy/science details.

[supergee.livejournal.com]

Nerds for Dummies?

[bracknellexile.livejournal.com]

Probably need a Dummies for Nerds too.

[cdave]

I don't stare at people. Eye contact is difficult.

[pennski.livejournal.com]

A hint that was suggested to me was to look slightly above the eye level (where the 3rd eye would be). This is enough to make the person looking for eye contact feel validated without being too challenging.

[kurosau.livejournal.com]

Sounds less like a manual for nerds and more like an excuse to propagate the idea that being a nerd means being introverted and socially inept. For those nerds among us that are extroverted and socially capable, that's getting to be a really really tired old stereotype.

[andrewducker]

Sounds to me like you aren't a nerd, you're a geek.

To me "Nerd" means "someone who is introverted and socially inept", whereas "Geek" means "Someone who is incredibly fascinated by a particular subject"

[kurosau.livejournal.com]

It's that whole 'to me' thing that's also an irritation to me. Define what as you want however you want, it just comes down to stereotyping people, which is the root of my problem. A person is socially inept and introverted. People aren't.

[andrewducker]

Stereotyping introverted socially awkward people as being introverted and socially awkward is fine by me.

[interactiveleaf.livejournal.com]

"Nerd" doesn't have a universally accepted definition, and more than "geek" or "dork" has. *Any* honest definition of any of the above words is going to include the "to me" modifier, since they're all subjective terms.

[kurosau.livejournal.com]

I concur, and that's part of what I was trying to get at.

[interactiveleaf.livejournal.com]

Ah, OK, I misunderstood your point, but I get it on the re-read.

[redshira.livejournal.com]

I read this to James and confusion ensued. He said "I don't know smalltalk," and when I said "I don't know small talk either" he went *perplexed face* "I thought you were talking about smalltalk the programming language!" So his brain immediately zoomed off into "oh well yes I can see how it would be tricky trying to deal with your social interactions according to the neat framework of smalltalk" and we have just spent ten minutes trying to untangle what he said vs what he meant vs how I understand it.

Which is just a perfect example, really :)

[johnbobshaun.livejournal.com]

This was my train of thought when reading this post:

"Smalltalk? The bane of a nerds existence? Sure, there are probably better supported programming languages but... ooooh, right."

I may have a problem.

[johnbobshaun.livejournal.com]

Ah, and apparently I wasn't alone :-D