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Comment by scottLobster | Hacker News Reader

Coddling social anxiety is not a good argument for WFH. There's a difference between introversion (needing time away from people to recharge) and social anxiety (not speaking up or interacting differently in person vs online). Unless you're banking on some cyberpunk future where people only ever interact online, social anxiety is a maladaptive disorder to be confronted, not a personality quirk.

And FYI there are plenty of extroverted engineers. Some of us actually enjoy team sports as well as technical problems.

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You could flip the script right back at the people afraid of interacting with people online.

> Unless you're banking on some cyberpunk future where people only ever interact online

...you're in one!

"Coddling?"

Social anxiety is a genuine mental illness, and a protected disability. This kind of arrogant, ableist crap is exactly why we need to destroy the cultural norm that everybody being in the office all the time is the only way to do work.

It sounds like you use "protected" here with the intention of forming part of an argument -- presumably that social anxiety should be protected? Isn't that circular?

I'm using "protected" in the sense that it is a genuine disability, recognized by modern medicine and law, and as such anyone who suffers from it is entitled to the full protection of the ADA in the US.

It also means that anyone disparaging it like that in the workplace is guilty of discrimination against a disabled person, just as if they had called someone with an amputated leg a "worthless cripple", or mocked a hearing-impaired person for not being able to hear them when they whisper in a meeting.

In the United States, 'protected" in this context means 'legally protected', in this case by the ADA. Employers are required to give reasonable accommodations to employees with disabilities.

Social anxiety is as much of a mental illness as the fear leaving a bad impression on a date, fear of spiders or fear of doing poorly at an interview and enjoys the same kinds of legal protections. Which is none.

...You do know that social anxiety disorder is a genuine and recognized mental illness, right?

Or are you just one of those people who thinks that all mental illness is just a lack of sufficient gumption?

SAD is not social anxiety, please pay attention to what you’re replying to.

Social anxiety and social anxiety disorder are different like rectangles and squares are different.

I'm inclined to ask what your qualifications for such an opinion are.

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