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Today you, tomorrow me

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Re: Today you, tomorrow me

#181

Post by vacri »

snth wrote: post #79
bmelton wrote: post #42

Perhaps my favorite good act to do is to help people push their car when they need it. It's dumb, really, but having grown up in the south, people are just hospitable that way. It generally doesn't take much to do, it helps traffic, and at least for me, it makes me feel good about myself. Besides, it always irks me when I see someone trying to push their car out of traffic and nobody else is helping. Especially consi…

Once, my car died near an intersection; as I jumped out to push, two guys appeared out of nowhere alongside me to help push. It took about 15 seconds, and they waved off my thanks and were gone again. It was shocking how unexpectedly helpful they were... I tend to expect no help in a situation like that.

I've pushed other folks' cars out of traffic or into a station before, and there's nothing like that sheepish smile you get as you wave them off and get on your way.

On the other hand, I've also had a borrowed, beaten-up car break down in peak hour in the inside lane and no-one is letting me push it over two more lanes to the plentiful parking on the side. I waited for about two minutes for someone to give me a gap before I realised "hey, car is beaten-up anyway, if it gets hit, it's just another scratch". Waited for a small gap and just started pushing. Not particularly suprising that people with their nice clean paintjobs don't want to plow into a beaten car just to prove a point :)

Re: Today you, tomorrow me

#182

Post by vacri »

heed wrote: post #136
colkassad wrote: post #32

That's a good story but a little over the top. If the author had dispensed with the $20 bill in the tamale the suspension of belief would have been a little more effective.

I think you're getting downvoted for snarkiness (as perceived by the downvoter), but there is a point to be made by your comment. That is, how is automatic disbelief in a story like this any less arbitrary than automatic belief? It's interesting to me that the majority of users on both reddit and HN choose to believe.

If you haven't encountered people like the ones in the story in your life, you need to get out more. They're as common as muck - absolutely zero disbelief is required.

While I don't personally help everyone I've come across, I have done exactly as in the story, as have many of my friends: helped someone, accepted a reward to stop them from making a big issue of it, then secretly returned the reward because it wasn't the point of helping in the first place. Sometimes the most fun part of the story is the acrobatics required in returning the reward before you part ways.

Requirement for suspension of disbelief: zero.

Re: Today you, tomorrow me

#183

Post by vacri »

hugh3 wrote: post #127
michael_dorfman wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seriously, did you read the anecdote? The point isn't the car trouble. The point is that nobody stopped to help him....except the poor, Mexican family, who had all the best reasons for not wanting to stop, who refused payment for their help, and then sent him on his way with a lesson about social responsibility.

It's a bit cheesy for my tastes, though.

So ask for a tamale with less cheese.

Re: Today you, tomorrow me

#184

Post by StavrosK »

kirse wrote: post #59
yellowbkpk wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On. The complete opposite end of the spectrum check out Top Gear's show where they visited the American South. Obviously it was meant to provoke but it does bring up a few good points. I'd link you but I'm on my phone.

Yea, and I also learned how to become a doctor by watching House and ER, fish for Alaskan crab by watching Deadliest Catch, and learned all about how to have relationships by closely studying Friends and Entourage! So no, that episode of Top Gear does not bring up any "good points" to draw legitimate conclusions about the American South. All it shows is that if you insult the average person enough, they'll get pissed…

Oh come on. Everyone here is offering their own positive anecdotes and people are all like "oh yeah, Americans are great, have an upvote" but when someone offers a negative data point he gets disparaged? Why is Dave Gorman's documentary comment upvoted to 93 and the Top Gear one is at 0?

This post looked like discussion until I reached this comment. Now it just looks like circlejerking.

Also, since I didn't see it mentioned anywhere, the guys in that Top Gear episode said that, when they tried to give away one of the three cars, the representative of a Christian mission threatened to sue them for misrepresentation because they told her the car was a year newer than it was, and then attempted to extort 20k out of them to make the lawsuit go away. I don't see what they did to provoke that.

Re: Today you, tomorrow me

#185

Post by pmjordan »

dfox wrote: post #22

And as for slighly offtopic comment: have you noticed how hard it is to get various road side assistance companies to actually do something useful? Few weeks ago slightly aged tire on my not so slightly aged car not only went flat but essentially disappeared on highway (in ~150 kph). As my car was recently broken into I did't have a spare (you are not required to carry spare in Czech Republic, but you are legally req…

You can't generalise from that, at least not internationally. I'm a member of the ÖAMTC (one of the road-side assistance non-profits in Austria) and I've had universally good experiences with them. They're very quick to arrive and know exactly what they're doing, and always friendly. And I've called them out for pretty minor things - I suck at fixing cars myself.

Re: Today you, tomorrow me

#186

Post by StavrosK »

smallblacksun wrote: post #141
kenjackson wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Weird. I had a two friends get spat on their first day in the South, and it went downhill from there. They were an interracial couple. The local sheriff asked them when they planned on leaving, as if they were the problem. This was 2010, not 1950. I'm sure the South is more welcoming for some people, but I wouldn't assume it to be the case for everybody. And I'm sure it depends on what areas of the south you go to (i…

You ever been with someone with a strong southern accent in the north? I heard them called "hick" and "redneck" any number of times, and a black man said (direct quote) "I ain't helping no racist" when he was asked (politely) for directions.

On a thread about how Americans are good and kind people, you attempt to justify the behaviour of the Southerners but only show that there are rotten Northerners as well.

In any case, these negative comments are a bit irrelevant, because it only takes one person who's willing to spit on you to say "we got spat on there, so people are rotten", but the vast majority has to be kind to you for you to say "we were treated well there, people are kind".

I went to San Francisco and saw many helpful people, I saw a few people who didn't care either way (the bus drivers didn't bother to reply to my "thank you"s or "hello"s) and a guy on the bus shoved me and shouted because he judged that I wasn't giving him enough space.

On average, people have been much nicer to me in London, but I wouldn't say people in SF suck because of that one guy on the bus. There were kind people there as well.

Re: Today you, tomorrow me

#187

Post by StavrosK »

mcepl wrote: post #98
noonespecial wrote: post #10

One of the first times I stopped to help what appeared to be a person with a flat, I got a good long (loud) lecture about how just because she was a woman, she wasn't helpless... how men should just ... if we'd all just... call the police if I don't ... Honestly, I couldn't tell by sight at 5 feet is she was male or female. To say this response caught me by surprise is an understatement. Over the long haul, this expe…

I am European as well, and although I completely agree that American people are the best part of the American experience (INS officials being an exceptions, because they are not humans, of course), there was this one exception the first week I came first time in my life to Boston. I was rushing to the revolving door and I saw a lady obviously some kind of professional who was rushing to the same doors. I have opened…

"In my country, we're polite, bitch."

Re: Today you, tomorrow me

#188

Post by StavrosK »

nagrom wrote: post #55
bobf wrote: post #3

The original Spanish expression is "Hoy por ti, mañana por mi", and I find the Golden Rule to be the closest direct application of the concept in a single expression. Interestingly, the three suggested translations of the expression I found were: "You scratch my back and I'll scratch yours", "What goes around, comes around", and "Tit for tat" ( http://www.proz.com/kudoz/spanish_to_english/idioms_maxims_s... ). Howeve…

There's a similar phrase that doesn't occur in your set of translations but accurately conveys the meaning: "Pay it forward".

Not really. All those phrases imply that the recipient should take action (except for "what goes around comes around"). "Today you, tomorrow me" means "Today I helped you, tomorrow I might need your help, so you don't need to repay me", but not exactly in a "what goes around comes around" way (it doesn't imply certainty or karma).

Basically, the equivalent is probably "it could have been me in your place", I guess.

Re: Today you, tomorrow me

#189

Post by StavrosK »

araneae wrote: post #48
maguay wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"You today ... me tomorrow" is my new favorite "Golden Rule" translation :)

It's really more a translation of karma. At any rate, I vastly prefer it to the "Golden Rule." Whenever anyone goes on about it, I always say, "what about masochists?" It may sound a trite response, but I think it's a really important aspect of a moral system that people are different, and you should think about what they want, not what you would want in that situation.

It's not really a translation of karma, nor is it a translation of the Golden Rule. It does mean "I do this in the hopes that you would do it for me if I were in your place", but not in a "$deity will reward you if you do this". Basically, it's the spirit, rather than the letter, of the Golden Rule.

Re: Today you, tomorrow me

#190

Post by StavrosK »

charliepark wrote: post #45
malbiniak wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you accomplish what you set out to do with your comment?

Seriously? What the fuck. His comment wasn't clear. Was his comment to distance the Golden Rule from Christianity? I'm having a hard time interpreting it otherwise, but that's an ignorant effort, as the "do unto others" concept predates Jesus of Nazareth by 1,000+ years. I'm still not clear on what the point of his comment was; all I did was ask for clarification, with NO commentary at all. Can you clarify his initia…

> Don't just downvote a comment on HN without explaining your beef. This isn't Reddit.

We try not to do that on reddit either. We also try to refrain from "this isn't Digg".

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