Do you actually care about your friend's new baby, vacation abroad or similar life events or are you just being nice?

Submitted ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨ContrarianTrail@lemm.ee⁩ to ⁨[deleted]⁩

Because I don’t, and pretending to feels dishonest. I’ll listen if they want to talk about it, but I’m not going to act interested, and I certainly won’t ask about it on my own. What I’m trying to figure out is whether people actually care, or if they’re just playing a social game that I’m simply not interested in.

I’m probably on the autistic spectrum, which likely explains this to some extent. But that’s not an excuse - being an asshole is perfectly compatible with autism, so before dunking on me, please realize I probably agree with your criticism.

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AbsoluteChicagoDog@lemm.ee ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
My friend? I care. Randos? Fuck no.

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Anticorp@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Yes, I do. Because I care about my friends. I’m eager to share in their excitement over their vacation or adventure. As far as their kids go, I don’t really care about a baby, but I do care about their toddlers on up. It’s really neat watching another sentient creature develop who is based off of someone you know and love, and to see what sort of person they turn into.

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KingThrillgore@lemmy.ml ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Most times, i’m being nice. But I do care about the moments that make my friends happy.

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frezik@midwest.social ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
For most people, yes.

For my best friend, no. The reason is that he and his wife really wanted a kid, and they got everything together and had one. He is the happiest new father I’ve ever seen.

My wife and I don’t want kids, and have taken permanent action to make sure we don’t. In part, this is because we understand the responsibility that would be carried for years. We have other things we want to do with our lives. So for someone else to have full knowledge of that responsibility and embrace it gets respect from me.

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SeanBrently@lemm.ee ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
The framing of this question is interesting. “…or are you just being nice?” Seems to assume that being nice is not a legitimate or authentic way of being, maybe unless it is a means of getting something you want.

A psychiatrist once told me “If I’ve learned anything over the years, it’s that people really do think differently from each other.” I can accept this as true but it really boggles my mind sometimes when I think I have caught a glimpse of someone’s fundamental assumptions that are so different from mine.

I have met a few people who have said things like “I don’t have time for small talk or chitchat, it is meaningless noise to me.” I thought to myself “OK, you’re not getting invited to my bar-b-que then.” Which was probably fine with them. Still, it’s hard for me to imagine having that mindset. Maybe when I was a teen it might have been said of me that I was self-absorbed and didn’t care about anyone else, but I certainly did care, more than I was able to express.

I occasionally encounter people -some way past their teen years- who have no interest in any of the things that I am into, but want to endlessly info-dump to me about My Little Pony or whatever their special interest is. I listen, not because I am particularly interested in My Little Pony, and not because I am “just being nice.” There is another reason, and I don’t think of it as transactional or “playing a social game.”

If there is any point to my rambling it is that I find the either/or thinking of the question reductionist and over simplified. I think this is one of the aspects of autism that makes it a disorder or disability for some people, because the very rigid black and white thinking can create a lot of frustration when reality doesn’t conform to their internal strict rules.

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- stinerman@midwest.social ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  
  The framing of this question is interesting. “…or are you just being nice?” Seems to assume that being nice is not a legitimate or authentic way of being, maybe unless it is a means of getting something you want.
  
  What the OP is saying is “do you really care” or are you feigning interest because it is the socially acceptable thing to do? That’s what “just being nice” means.
  
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  - SeanBrently@lemm.ee ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Yes, I get that, but it seems like for some people, possibly OP included, the socially acceptable thing to do is just an empty ritual, without meaning or purpose. That’s difficult for me to grasp, because it’s not meaningless empty ritual.
    
    And also it’s the either/or aspect of it that I don’t like. When my Neighbor Lady starts talking to me about quilting, I really have no interest in quilting, but Neighbor Lady is important to me, I like her and I want to maintain a relationship with her. I don’t feign intrest in quilting, but because I care about Neighbor Lady i do want to hear what she has to say. So it’s not a binary thing like deep fascination with quilting / just being polite but not actually giving a shit.
    
    I suppose I could have used less words to express that in my first post.
    
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- asdfasdfasdf@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  What’s the other reason why you listen to them?
  
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  - SeanBrently@lemm.ee ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    I explained it better in my other comment. In the case of Neighbor Lady, I like her and want to maintain a connection with her, even if I don’t have any real intrest in her quilting obsession.
    
    For other people I don’t already know and have a relationship with, it is the practice of developing good affinity with others that is important. The way we treat others is a reflection of the relationship we have with our self. Doesn’t it make sense to be kind and open to my own self? I think it does. It follows for me that I should also be kind and open with others. They are not just objects that move around and do things in my environment. My “self” and other “selves” are all fingers of the same hand, to make a funny metaphor. That’s the other reason.
    
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esc27@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Yes and no. For close friends, family, and long time coworkers. I care that you had a good trip, that mom and baby are healthy, and would not mind a few photos. But that’s it. I don’t need a 500 page travel album or daily baby pics.

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Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Vacations, you gotta treat like MySpace. Set your top 8, and make sure you choose your top 8 wisely.

8 photos I feel like can easily net you a good 25 minute conversation.

Babies/pets? Show me 1-2 photos. Don’t overdo it. You’re going to have more photos as time goes on. This isn’t a vacation where you have a finite amount of content. You’ll show me a photo of your baby being cute. Hey, that’s great. We’ll talk about it for a few minutes. But we’ll also talk about it for a few minutes next week when your baby is going to be cute again. So it’s not like I want to spend all day talking about your baby. Your baby is cute, I’m happy for you, but lets move on.

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AlecSadler@sh.itjust.works ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Absolutely not. I’d be surprised if anybody actually cares.

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TempermentalAnomaly@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I care about my friends. I care about the goals, concerns, trials, joys, and more. I listen and I dig deeper. If I don’t care about they did, I questions that reveal how it made them feel.

Now that’s a lot of emotional labor, but for a select few confidants, I am more than happy to that work. It bonds us and makes each other feel seen and connected.

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figjam@midwest.social ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I like seeing my friends happy. I like talking about my cats.

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gedhrel@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I care about my friends, and if they want to talk about it, I’m happy to listen.

Depending on what the thing is (eg, potential new person) they can be inherently interesting too.

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zeekaran@sopuli.xyz ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
If a friend goes on an international trip and takes five hundred photos, I’d look at them all.

I have no friends with babies. Hypothetically I wouldn’t care about seeing the baby except for making the parent feel better. I care about kids but not until they’re old enough to be interesting, and babies aren’t.

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BaldManGoomba@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Hmm. Being interested in what is going on in your friends or loved ones life is a way of caring about a person. Do you like to share any details about your life at all with friends or family? What connects you to these people? Or is it you just don’t care about these parts of others lives?

I wouldn’t call it dishonest it would call it caring for another human being doing things you don’t care for for another person builds closeness, familiarity, and tightens bonds. Knowing or listening to details of other people’s lifes just deepens lore and fills out things that are happening in someone’s life.

You are probably a bit autistic. As you see the world a bit as black and white and don’t understand why you do a thing you dont like. That or you don’t actually care about these other people and you are narcissistic and only using these people. The world is gray.

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Evil_incarnate@lemm.ee ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I’m interested in parts of the trip. Mainly the foods and food markets. What they ate where. If they want to tell me about the views or the guy at that shop who said something, I’ll feign interest.

Anyone who has been on a “cruise holiday” eats on the ship, and the food may be good but it isn’t exciting or too exotic. I want to know how you ate a sausage and found out later it was an earthworm but it was really nice because they grilled it with lime and stuff and you couldn’t tell.

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ASDraptor@lemmy.autism.place ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I am on the spectrum. And no, i don’t. And I don’t think of it as being an asshole, I simply don’t care about it because it just is something unimportant. I mean, if something bad happened to them, I’ll be the first one to ask, but if they are telling me how nice was their trip it’s like… well, yeah? It’s expected. You make a trip to have a good time, so of course you had a good time.

I guess i consider it innecessary because is the expected outcome.

With that said, I will listen to what they say and remember it, but that doesn’t mean I find it interesting unless there is something remarkable about it.

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- Countess425@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Do you think everyone you talk to enjoys every aspect of the things you have to talk about? Do you appreciate that they listen?
  
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  - ASDraptor@lemmy.autism.place ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Honestly, I am not very talkative. I am bad at small talk so I rarely speak unless asked directly about something specific.
    
    Because of this, I believe that if someone asks me about something, it’s because they are interested in what I have to say about it.
    
    To answer your question, I will not go to tell someone about my last trip unless they ask me about it because I consider that it’s not that interesting to the others if (like I do) they are not asking about it.
    
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olafurp@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I like stories of babies if they’re not complaints. Vacation I basically think of it as ideas for my next vacation where you can ask stuff like “how was public transport?” or whatever

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ZombiFrancis@sh.itjust.works ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Friends? Sure.

Coworkers? No.

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kent_eh@lemmy.ca ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I care for up to 10-15 minutes per topic.

If it turns into an hour long presentation, my level of caring drops off significantly.

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Adderbox76@lemmy.ca ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Yes. It’s called empathy.

You may not have a vested interest in the particular story, but the very act of someone that you care about (presumably) being excited about something should at least bring some sort of good feeling to you. When people I care about are enjoying something, it makes me happy. So while their kid pictures, or vacation pictures or whatever might not be interesting to me, the fact that they care enough about me to want to SHOW them to me, should give you a warm feeling.

That being said, no…I’m not going to dunk for not feeling that. It’s different from person to person certainly; and I (and here I’m going to revert to my “old man yells at clouds” mode) feel like modern friendships are just different. We are suddenly in an age where having a few close friends has been replaced with having a tonne of “shallow” friends that you meet online. They’re still “friends”, but beyond texting and playing together online, you never see each other, never get closer than that. And certainly it would be a different feeling entirely. But the cadre of close friends that I made while working at Sears in 1998, and who I still talk to almost every day and see regularly, of COURSE I’m going to care.

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Barzaria@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Well I look at it like this: I don’t really care that much personally about my friends mundane things, but I do care about mine. I think that there isn’t a reason for them to care about my mundane things, but I enjoy having my mundane things listened to. I like that reciprocity, so I made an effort to listen and ask questions that show I’m engaged in the conversation. I try to express empathy by saying when a situation sounds tough or fun. I have noticed that “showing up” for the conversation is what our friends want a lot of the time, and that’s what we want as well a lot of the time. I have also noticed that after a few sessions of “showing up”, I can actually get engaged and move beyond just showing up. I have a buddy who has a sick grandma, and the first few mentions of her I kinda had the same thoughts, like, I don’t care about this lady, why should I listen. I showed up anyways and it led to some interesting conversation about the nature of mental illness because she was remembering very vivid details from her past and that led to some interesting convos about all that. I think that being able to find the enjoyment in a small talk conversation is definitely a skill, but it is rewarding in both your interpersonal relationships and in learning new things through unexpected exposure to new concepts. As a fellow autist, I’m pretty information driven, but neurotypical people, I think, are more feelings driven. The small talk stuff is super important to them and they put that up front first, I guess to judge your character? I’m not sure why, but I have noticed better interactions after I have engaged in small talk. It really is a trainable skill and when you get good at small talk, it can be enjoyable!

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- ContrarianTrail@lemm.ee ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  The nature of my job is that I often listen to people tell me their life story while I’m replacing their kitchen faucet. It’s not that I can’t do small talk - I just find most of the topics incredibly uninteresting. Like I said earlier, I know how to play the game, I just find it mind-numbingly boring.
  
  This goes both ways, though. I’m acutely aware that most people aren’t interested in the things I’m most passionate about, so I don’t bring those up either. But when I do meet someone with similar interests, I could talk for hours. Those conversations are rarely about people or events - mostly about ideas.
  
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  - Snowman@lemm.ee ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Before you even mentioned autism I was thinking “I wonder if they might be autistic”, so with that in mind you may want to look up the double empathy problem. Basically, multiple studies have shown that autistic people find it easier to empathise with other autistic people and harder to empathise with allistic (non-autistic) people, whilst the exact opposite is true for allistic people. Importantly, contrary to what many previously believed, there is no difference in the overall level of empathy, it’s more a matter of compatibility.
    
    The point being, that the people in this thread who have implied that you lack empathy are probably wrong, and your above comment would seem to agree with this.
    
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NeoNachtwaechter@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
When it’s about good friends, then yes, I care a lot.

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OceanSoap@lemmy.ml ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Yes, I care about all of that, and I’ll ask regularly about them and what’s going on.

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GrayBackgroundMusic@lemm.ee ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I do care. It makes them happy, I want them to be happy, so transitively, yes.

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squid_slime@lemm.ee ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I find it interesting to hear about, was just talking to a somewhat stranger about his holiday today.

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shapis@lemmy.ml ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Yes I do care.

I don’t care about literally everything. But I do about most of it and love seeing it.

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Razzazzika@lemm.ee ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Depends how close i am to them. If it’s a passive acquaintance I’m like, happy for them but in a fleeting sort of way?

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Borger@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I am autistic, and honestly OP, I feel very similar. But based on the comments, I’m starting to think that we’re both narcissists haha

I have this particular issue with a house mate who is self-obsessed and wants to do nothing but brag about his charisma and intelligence to anyone who dares come downstairs for a split second. He’ll go on for hours, and re-tell everything if someone else comes in. He kind of caricature-ises this whole experience for me. He has trapped me in a convo for so long that I’ve had evening plans ruined, even after telling him multiple times that I’ve got to go. No point pretending with him, you literally have to just ignore his existence and leave. Grim.

With friends and family? It depends.

For friends, I care if they’re very close (1 of a handful of people), not because of the topic itself that I am listening out for but more how they have been affected by the experience.

For more distant friends, acquaintances, colleagues… generally no.

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Sir_Kevin@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
In general I don’t care. I too have come to realize that I’m autistic. It’s a shame that I didn’t understand this until my 40’s.

I have found though that I will care if it’s a topic I am also interested in. Babies don’t interest me, and in fact annoy me. So that one is out. Most life events, don’t care.

Vacation stuff? Ok now I’m listening because I do like to travel and I may learn something. Wanna discuss engineering? We could go for hours.

I guess the threshold is, will I get anything out of this conversation? Which, maybe is selfish, maybe it’s autism, I donno. I’m happy that you’re happy about the thing but if I’m being honest with myself I don’t care unless it effects me.

That’s specific to the topics OP is describing and not all conversations. If someone is in need of guidance of something I’m happy to share my knowledge. I am fortunately not a narcissist.

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Kit@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Absolutely I care, and I want all of the details and pictures. It brings me great joy to see my homies living exciting lives, and I’m thankful to be part of that. With children, especially - they feel like nieces and nephews and I am inherently invested in their wellbeing and success, even for long-distance friendships in which I’ve never met the kiddos.

I don’t have any family of my own, so my Will and estate is divided amongst my friends, and those with kids are allotted a bigger piece of the pie so they can put it towards their college or whatever when I die.

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14th_cylon@lemm.ee ⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
there is a difference between friends, as in people who went through significant part of your life together with you, and your 500 “friends” on facebook…

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