Comment by CGMthrowaway
Comment by CGMthrowaway 2 days ago
This. The selfish point (there are other points too) of "hi" is to confirm you have their attention and to remove plausible deniability of "oops I missed your message."
Comment by CGMthrowaway 2 days ago
This. The selfish point (there are other points too) of "hi" is to confirm you have their attention and to remove plausible deniability of "oops I missed your message."
This is such a ridiculously cynical interpretation. I'm sure there at least a few people out there who behave as you describe but that is not normal. Greeting people before launching into a topic is a social norm. Even if you make a reasonable case that it is outdated in the context of instant messaging that doesn't change the reality of it.
Someone doing something that you consider outdated or inefficient does not imply that he is malicious.
You specifically attributed malice and I'm responding to that.
As to these supposed harmful effects. If you find the most basic of social pleasantries to be such an unmanageable burden then I'm likely better off not associating with you. Do you get angry at people who greet you as you walk by on the street? Navigating that interaction similarly demands some small part of your attention after all, however brief it might be.
It's the confirmation of attention (the response to "hello") that removes the deniability of "I missed your message." In case that wasn't clear.
I would be okay with this if the conversation actually demanded a realtime response. But I can't know that until I see the actual first message, and they usually don't.
Weird subthread.
> The selfish point (there are other points too) of "hi" is to confirm you have their attention
No one is unsure of the selfish/self-serving motivation behind the lone "hello". The singleminded self-centeredness at the expense of others is the _entire_ basis of the criticism.
This response is like encountering in a thread about lunch theft in the workplace, "Some people take food that isn't theirs because they didn't bring anything for lunch, and they see food that someone else brought sitting there in the fridge." The power of this response to be able to explain something not already understood is nil—and so is its exculpatory power.
> to remove plausible deniability of "oops I missed your message."
I'll dispute this. The overwhelming purpose is so the sender can confirm they have the receiver's attention so the sender knows whether to bother themselves with typing out the rest of their inquiry. They're happy to trade the negative consequences on others for a minor convenience to themselves.