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Comment by _m8fo | Hacker News Reader

Ｉwonder if the existence of said "tips"ｉｓ　ｗｈｙ　ｍａｎｙ　ｐｅｏｐｌｅ　ｆｉｎｄ　ｏｔｈｅｒｓ　ｉｎｓｉｎｃｅｒｅ．　

People tend to find others insincere when it seems like the other person is trying or practicing rather than just acting naturally. Unfortunately, social interactions are a skill, and for many people this skill could use some work, so this becomes a catch-22. Trying or practicing is a prerequisite for getting better, but it seems unnatural and/or awkward at first.

Of course, some people just rattle off canned lines and don't pay attention to others. They're insincere, because they can't be bothered to give other people their attention and respect.

In my experience, people who are actively trying to get better at social situations are usually in the first category, but not always (read PUAs). And maybe there are other categories!

It’s really a question of intent. One of my favorite observations was a comment made by Day9 (a pro Starcraft commentator) on the topic of strategy. He said that, when he was younger, he used to think that strategy was just “whoever had the best trick.” But as he grew and improved at the game, he began to understand that strategy was more a matter of focus, consistently good decision-making, and occasionally some deep situational insight. I think working on your social skills is similar. If you are just trying to learn “one simple trick” to manipulate other people, you’re really missing the point and being kind of a bad human being to boot. You’ll almost certainly sabotage yourself and head down a bad path. But if you’re genuinely trying to improve your interactions with other people and to understand why conversations may not go as smoothly as you would think, and if you have good intent, I think these sorts of things can be very useful for people that are not intuitively skilled at meeting strangers.

Even "PUAs" are often in the first category. Many guys getting into the pickup scene tend to start off using these canned one-liners and being insincere. Often they are really uncomfortable with talking to anyone, much less the opposite sex, so these canned openers and lines sort of help them build some initial confidence in some cases even though they're super cheesy - they are used as a crutch. But as they get more comfortable they sort of realize that using someone else's lines to seem like an interesting person isn't an actual replacement for being a genuinely interesting person. Some of these guys continue relying on the cheesy canned openers, but quite a few move on to actually learning more genuine communication skills and working on improving themselves in the long run, becoming genuinely interesting people to talk to.

Exactly. This is one of the reasons I hate talking to salespeople, too many of their lines are just canned responses learned from books and seminars

Many Europeans regard Americans as insincere in social interactions. I suspect many of these "tips" would fall very flat outside the USA. Americans always want to be your best friend, then it becomes clear at the end of the conversation that it meant nothing to them. Kind of a shame as it masks genuine kindness.

I agree that there is something like an Overton window in social interactions and that it is centered at different points of the continuum in different cultures. Still, for some people at least (me!) thinking about where I sit in that window in my culture is interesting and I hope helpful.

Agreed but there is no shortcut around a culture fixated on personal gain for personal profit. This seems to be built into the framework of the USA instead of being an optional dependency! With outcomes like high inequality, huge divisions, fake politicians etc.

The driving ideology is in direct opposition to genuine, casual, unmotivated concern/interest.

No problem with people actively trying to be more confident or just practicing being more sociable etc, but the slightest scent of social manipulation, trying to get something out of me, or anything scripted borders on "pick-up artist" repulsion.

Being in the UK is particularly difficult and I get the impression eastern Europe is similar or the same. Getting an honest and authentic reply to every day questions seems impossible. But I also understand that there is some weird cultural requisite of toughness and not making a fuss getting in the way of authentic conversations with strangers.

To the contrary, I think people who put effort into their interpersonal interactions are not necessarily insincere at all. Unless they're sales people :)

There are now so many people who have read and taken to heart these types of tricks, that displaying that you've read them, even if you come across slighly insincere is itself sometimes a positive social signal (i.e. that you're trying to improve yourself).

Should people who aren't naturally gifted at interpersonal interaction simply accept their reduced prospects of social, romantic, career and business success? Try applying that logic to any other skill that doesn't come naturally.

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