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People Call Me Aaron

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Re: People Call Me Aaron

#41

Post by maceo »

nether wrote: post #9

SF tech party culture sounds awful. It sounds no less superficial and dehumanizing than the worst of celebrity adulation in Hollywood.

The comparison is apropos. I've lived in Hollywood most of my life and have to spend time in SF for work. The entertainment people get a bad rap for being superficial douchebags and chronic bullshitters, but it doesn't even compare to the SF scene. At least in Hollywood, if someone thinks they're hot shit, you can go on imdb and see if they're really as self-important as they think they are. In SF everyone is the best programmer, is working at the most important non-profit, is building the next huge app, and it's very difficult to tell if they're full of shit (hint: 99% of them are).

Re: People Call Me Aaron

#42

Post by gknoy »

lotharbot wrote: post #37
mej10 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is very common (especially as you get older) to mix up names for people that are in the same mental category while you are speaking. It isn't necessarily thoughtlessness. Sometimes our brains just don't work quite right.

My parents and several schoolteachers often called me by my older brother's name, or called my sisters by one anothers' names. It's not as though my parents couldn't tell their own children apart, it's just that sometimes saying a name is an autopilot thing. I recently took a friend to the grocery store, and called her son by my son's name when I wanted him to move out of the way of someone else's cart.

I often call my own kids by the wrong names, and they look nothing alike and one is half as hold as the other. I also tell them to wash their teeth and brush their hands on occasion, too. Frequency of these kinds of brain mistakes seem to correlate with stress or how much in a hurry I am.

Re: People Call Me Aaron

#43

Post by jkire »

mej10 wrote: post #18
Kluny wrote: post #12

How is it possible for anyone who knows who Aaron is to not know that he's dead? How could they possibly mistake his brother for him to the extent of thoughtlessly calling him the wrong name?

It is very common (especially as you get older) to mix up names for people that are in the same mental category while you are speaking. It isn't necessarily thoughtlessness. Sometimes our brains just don't work quite right.

My mother frequently has to cycle through my brothers/my fathers name before getting to mine.

Its the times when she starts using the cats name I get a little miffed.

Re: People Call Me Aaron

#44

Post by patcon »

jkire wrote: post #43
mej10 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is very common (especially as you get older) to mix up names for people that are in the same mental category while you are speaking. It isn't necessarily thoughtlessness. Sometimes our brains just don't work quite right.

My mother frequently has to cycle through my brothers/my fathers name before getting to mine. Its the times when she starts using the cats name I get a little miffed.

WHOA. I just wrote almost the same comment before seeing yours:

> My mother is known for cycling through names before hitting the right one.

>

> I was frequently addressed as "Hershey-Chris-Patrick" while living at home.

Re: People Call Me Aaron

#45

Post by irishcoffee »

lovemenot wrote: post #40
jere wrote: post #7

Whoa. I met Noah at a very small game dev conference last May. I had no idea who he was until this moment, nor was I aware that anyone else did, but I could be wrong. It's interesting to think how that interaction would have changed, probably for the worse, if I had known more about him beforehand.

>> I had no idea who he was until this moment The wording of this comment seems to be, in a very small way, symptomatic of the larger problem that Noah sometimes has with people he meets or knows well. To illustrate my point, here's another way to write the same thing: >> I had no idea that he was Aaron's brother until this moment The original wording seems to conflate the identity of Noah's brother with his own.

Hmm, to me it reads as: Having never seen and committed to memory the face of Aaron, I did not consider his brother as anything other than an individual whom I had interacted with for the first time.

Your comment (to me at least) seems to suggest Noah wanted everyone to associate Noah with Aaron, and in the same moment wanted to be unhappy by said association, which doesn't seem like a fair thing to say about Noah.

Re: People Call Me Aaron

#46

Post by [deleted] »

maceo wrote: post #41
nether wrote: post #9

SF tech party culture sounds awful. It sounds no less superficial and dehumanizing than the worst of celebrity adulation in Hollywood.

The comparison is apropos. I've lived in Hollywood most of my life and have to spend time in SF for work. The entertainment people get a bad rap for being superficial douchebags and chronic bullshitters, but it doesn't even compare to the SF scene. At least in Hollywood, if someone thinks they're hot shit, you can go on imdb and see if they're really as self-important as they think they are. In SF everyone is the bes…

[deleted]

Re: People Call Me Aaron

#47

Post by lovemenot »

irishcoffee wrote: post #45
lovemenot wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> I had no idea who he was until this moment The wording of this comment seems to be, in a very small way, symptomatic of the larger problem that Noah sometimes has with people he meets or knows well. To illustrate my point, here's another way to write the same thing: >> I had no idea that he was Aaron's brother until this moment The original wording seems to conflate the identity of Noah's brother with his own.

Hmm, to me it reads as: Having never seen and committed to memory the face of Aaron, I did not consider his brother as anything other than an individual whom I had interacted with for the first time. Your comment (to me at least) seems to suggest Noah wanted everyone to associate Noah with Aaron, and in the same moment wanted to be unhappy by said association, which doesn't seem like a fair thing to say about Noah.

>> ... I did not consider his brother as anything other than an individual whom I had interacted with for the first time...

Agreed. And to continue his/her presumed train of thought, in my own words:

" Whoah! ... but now I realise that the guy I met was really somebody. He was Aaron's brother."

>> Your comment (to me at least) seems to suggest Noah wanted everyone to associate Noah with Aaron ...

I have no idea how you arrived at this interpretation of my comment. Though I can agree that if I had been making such a suggestion it would have been unfair to Noah.

Anyway, I don't believe it is worth pursuing this further. We have at least demonstrated that, in all good faith, it is easy to interpret the same thing in different ways.

Re: People Call Me Aaron

#48

Post by panorama »

patcon wrote: post #44
jkire wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My mother frequently has to cycle through my brothers/my fathers name before getting to mine. Its the times when she starts using the cats name I get a little miffed.

WHOA. I just wrote almost the same comment before seeing yours: > My mother is known for cycling through names before hitting the right one. > > I was frequently addressed as "Hershey-Chris-Patrick" while living at home.

My parents will start with my brother's name first before getting to me, but I've also heard them make the same, inverse mistake with my brother. I have to imagine this is only a same-sex issue right? No one mixes up their daughter and son's names?

Re: People Call Me Aaron

#49

Post by 6stringmerc »

JohnBooty wrote: post #29
jamiepenney wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've often felt a bit abnormal for doing this. I guess I only ever see each person in one mode, so I had no idea if other people do it or not. Nice to know at least some other people do.

Yeah, totally normal, I think. I think that's just basic social mammal stuff - you calibrate your actions to your social surroundings. I mean even our dog has totally separate personalities when he's around us at home versus how he acts around other dogs. And it's not even the same personality for each of the other dogs - some dogs have calming effects on him, some make him hyperactive.

In the way you responded and described your experience, I think the term I should've included, at least from an academic basis, is that of "code switching" because it's a pretty interesting concept to me. The big key was the 'work' versus 'home' concept of self. It's totally reasonable to want to compartmentalize, I think it's pretty ingrained in our species, so talking about it as a fact of life is pretty useful.

Re: People Call Me Aaron

#50

Post by jkire »

panorama wrote: post #48
patcon wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

WHOA. I just wrote almost the same comment before seeing yours: > My mother is known for cycling through names before hitting the right one. > > I was frequently addressed as "Hershey-Chris-Patrick" while living at home.

My parents will start with my brother's name first before getting to me, but I've also heard them make the same, inverse mistake with my brother. I have to imagine this is only a same-sex issue right? No one mixes up their daughter and son's names?

My mother occasionally uses the cat's name. The cat's name! We're both male, but still
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