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Ask vs. Guess Culture

jeanhsu.substack.com

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Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#261

Post by Cthulhu_ »

travem wrote: post #177
EGreg wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sometimes like to say the facts out loud and challenge people so here it goes. We live in the safest, least racist, least sexist, least antisemitic generation in history. At the same time, automation and productivity has reduced demand for human labor, and people increasingly can’t afford the rent. Perhaps the answer to many disparities isn’t systemic sexism, racism etc. but economic factors. Whatever you are worri…

> At the same time, automation and productivity has reduced demand for human labor, and people increasingly can’t afford the rent Given the juxtaposition of the claims above, I think it is useful to note that demand for labor is still relatively high (unemployment rate at ~3.5% in the US). The reason for unaffordable rents is driven more by the supply of housing not growing along with demand IMO.

And demand being artifically inflated by investors (ranging from boomers / gen-X ers who have extra money to Saudi oil barons) who buy up houses with the intent to rent them out or whatever.

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#262

Post by brazzledazzle »

watwut wrote: post #235
brazzledazzle wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think trauma is also a bit relative. If you grew up with bad physical and emotional abuse from one parent the emotional distance and isolation from another might not even be a blip on your radar, at least until you've worked through the other stuff. And on the flip side if you had a great childhood with stable housing, plenty of food/money then hitting rock bottom in adulthood might be pretty traumatic since you ne…

The thing is, kids who grew up in those good families are in fact more resilient then abused kids. Kids with bad childhood will not categorize semi bad childhood as trauma, but have worst interpersonal relationships, worst stress handling, abuse drugs or alcohol more often and display whole range of at risk behaviors It is simply not true that being poor or abused or neglected makes people resilient.

That's an excellent and fair point. Perhaps "resilience" is the wrong term for abused folks and it could be said as "ability to continue functioning at their usual level of dysfunction". I've seen enough examples of ostensibly well raised (typically younger) adults being hit really hard by adversity that I think there's something to it. Maybe confirmation bias or perhaps those individuals had overprotective parents that shielded them from developing a lot of skills. That sort of dysfunctional parenting can be harder to recognize in adults.

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#263

Post by [deleted] »

hinkley wrote: post #160
quacked wrote: post #7

I am from the northern US (Protestant Scandinavian/German) and my wife is from the southern US (Protestant English/German) [1]. In the first several years of our relationship, we had several big disputes about how to treat each other, and how to treat guests. After a while we realized that she had been brought up to feel extreme insecurity over responding to the needs of guests, and I had been brought up to be blithe…

This reminds me of John Mulaney’s bit about Jewish versus Catholic culture. He loved that he didn’t have to guess what his girlfriend was thinking, she would just tell him. No filter. For some people that can be rude or shocking. For others the opposite can be exhausting. The middle ground of mind games is the fucking worst. “Go do that thing I don’t like. It’s fine.” “Why did he go? He knew I was upset!” He answered…

[deleted]

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#264

Post by Cthulhu_ »

solarmist wrote: post #79
AndrewKemendo wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I’ve learned anything in my 20 year mental health journey, it’s that until you’ve addressed your childhood trauma, nothing you do will be a lasting fix for any interpersonal issues you may have.

I learned this this year. I'm in my 40s.

I think a lot of people would benefit from getting some counceling in their earlier adult years, although on the other hand they may not be ready yet / not see any issues yet.

I'm late 30's and same btw.

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#265

Post by Cthulhu_ »

lillecarl wrote: post #238
quacked wrote: post #7

I am from the northern US (Protestant Scandinavian/German) and my wife is from the southern US (Protestant English/German) [1]. In the first several years of our relationship, we had several big disputes about how to treat each other, and how to treat guests. After a while we realized that she had been brought up to feel extreme insecurity over responding to the needs of guests, and I had been brought up to be blithe…

> I am from the northern US (Protestant Scandinavian/German) and my wife is from the southern US (Protestant English/German) You're American, your wife is American.

You underestimate how vastly cultures can differ based on location or background. Also keep in mind the US is young and most of its inhabitants have a migrant background / family history.

The US is the opposite of a monolithic culture.

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#266

Post by nmstoker »

ketzo wrote: post #193
burlesona wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is fascinating to me, because I'm from the southern US and strongly align to "ask culture" and my wife is from the northwest and strongly aligns to "guess" culture. I wonder how much it's about individual family background and not strongly regional?

When you say that your experience in the south is more Ask -- who is usually doing the asking, host or guest? I said this down the thread but my experience (grew up in the south) has always been that Southerners are very up-front about trying to meet your needs before you can even ask for them. That was always how I was taught to host, anyway. And I think that weirdly, that's more aligned with Guess culture: the pers…

Yes, I'm with you on considering this to be a guess culture thing (since you have to be sensitive to what they might need, likely want)

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#267

Post by IshKebab »

caminante wrote: post #260
harrisi wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your link doesn't say "this whole dichotomy has been debunked." From one of the sources: But the fact that contexting has not been empirically validated should not necessarily be construed as a failure of the theory. ... Nonetheless, the contexting model simply cannot be described as an empirically validated model. Which explicitly does not debunk it, but states that it's not empirically validated. That doesn't mean…

Good point on nuance on a technical level, i.e., debunked != failure to support relationship. However, on a practical level, people throw this around as if it were empirically supported (which doesn't seem to be the case). If there have been hundreds of studies failing to make the connection, I won't take the bet that it will eventually get validated. On a meta-level, that's also a weird quote. > But the fact that co…

> Pick any theory. If you can't validate it, then that's a failure of the theory, right?

Definitely not. There are a ton of theories that are very difficult to validate because you simply can't run the experiment due to practical or ethical reasons. That doesn't mean they are invalid.

For example my theory that UBI is unworkable. Basically impossible to prove because it's just too expensive to ever run a real UBI experiment.

Or the theory that eugenics would decrease genetic illnesses. Good luck testing that!

Even a lot of basic and fairly self evident stuff is difficult to actually prove when it involves people. Are the gender biases of children (toy preferences etc) innate? They definitely are but it's very difficult to actually test.

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#268

Post by mgaunard »

quacked wrote: post #7

I am from the northern US (Protestant Scandinavian/German) and my wife is from the southern US (Protestant English/German) [1]. In the first several years of our relationship, we had several big disputes about how to treat each other, and how to treat guests. After a while we realized that she had been brought up to feel extreme insecurity over responding to the needs of guests, and I had been brought up to be blithe…

The American south always were the sophisticated ones, with proper etiquette.

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#269

Post by wwweston »

noahlt wrote: post #2

The "Ask vs Guess" name rhetorically frames it in favor of the Askers. Asking sounds reasonable, guessing does not! But really it's not about "Guessing", it's about understanding. It's about community, and relationship, and trust. What this culture really wants is for you to pay attention and understand the people around you, rather than treating everything as a transaction.

"Explicit vs Implicit" is more accurate and value neutral, and doesn't require anyone to load down the explicit side of the equation with generalized aspersions like "treating everything as a transaction."

There are advantages to explicit and implicit negotiation. There are situations in which either might be more graceful or necessary.

Most situations are probably best navigated with some degree of implicit negotiation first, paired with a layer of explicit interaction as a check.

> it's not about "Guessing", it's about understanding.

Asking is often a good way to make sure you actually understand.

"Guessing" may be an acceptable substitute to the extent your intuition doesn't have an error term.

Re: Ask vs. Guess Culture

#270

Post by poopsmithe »

I'm having trouble understanding the following sentence.

> People say yes to requests that you truly feel good about, say no to ones they don’t

Is this perhaps a typo? I can understand the sentence if I substitute 'you' with 'they'.

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