Choose your status game wisely • Hacker News Board

Re: Choose your status game wisely

#291

Post by AussieWog93 » Sat, Apr 02, 2022, 7:40 PM UTC

sombremesa wrote: post #247

AussieWog93 wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Don't take life so seriously and goof around a little more. Thats how you turn up interesting ideas anyway, not by playing status games. Reading your comment, it sounds like you've got a decent amount of social status without needing to explicitly pursue it. While that's great for you, don't forget that for others, increased status can mean: - No longer being treated like shit by people who get away with it - A soci…

This is a very interesting comment. At first I found myself in strong agreement with GP (believing people chasing status are probably misguided), but after reading your comment I realized that it might have to do with my current status (independently wealthy in a first world country). In places like China or India, there is indeed a very big difference in QoL between those who have status and/or social power and thos…

>Easier said than done when this involves changing countries, but it's a long-term strat.

Independent of changing countries, this can be hard to do. Changing peer groups means being accepted by the new group you want to join. For example (within a first-world country), a lower middle-class person looking to join an upper middle-class group will find that they have the wrong taste in clothes, food, books and films, live in the wrong postcode and most likely not have the economic means to "keep up with the Joneses" the way upper middle-class people do.

God knows what someone from, say, the tribal regions of Pakistan would need to do to be accepted as middle-class in a first-world country. It's more than a plane ticket - it's a complete lack of exposure to Western media/culture.

Re: Choose your status game wisely

#292

Post by AussieWog93 » Sat, Apr 02, 2022, 8:00 PM UTC

klyrs wrote: post #281

darkerside wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember the hysteria about vulture capitalism. Even vultures play a valuable role in their ecosystem. Companies don't sell themselves to a private equity shop because they are thriving and healthy. If they were more valuable in parts than their sum, it says something about the company. Can't say much about the hypothetical wealth stealing since it's completely hypothetical.

"It says something about the company" might be a moral salve in your eyes, but you have not established that they provide value to anybody but themselves. Specifically: how does pilfering pension funds, and then declaring bankruptcy provide "value" in any meaningful sense? It provides greater wealth to the already filthy-rich and destroys the considerable investment that life-long workers have earned, sending those w…

>pilfering pension funds, and then declaring bankruptcy

That's a bit of a straw man there.

The classic target for these corporate raiders is a business whose capital (real estate, equipment, IP etc.) is worth more than the total market cap of the business itself (which, for most established businesses is a proxy for profit).

In this way, the typical corporate raider buys up a business who is using a valuable asset inefficiently, sells their capital to other businesses who can make more productive use of it, and line their pockets with the value differential they created.

In the process, they'll generally fuck over a whole lot of workers, but there is real economic value (not necessarily social good) in this process of capital redistribution.

Re: Choose your status game wisely

#293

Post by keiran01 » Sat, Apr 02, 2022, 8:02 PM UTC

sidewndr46 wrote: post #228

VoodooJuJu wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>where even the wealthiest people are not allowed to move to because they don't have the right last name How is this carried out in practice?

I'm reasonably sure the author is just making this up. As a US citizen you have wide discretion on where you live, even extending to several other small nations that have signed agreements with the US. If you're renting or selling property, most of the discretion that used to be afforded to buyer's is now outlawed. But it would require someone willing to pursue a case if they felt they were not sold a home because of…

No, this is real. There are some small old money communities in the Northeast that behave in very unusual ways. I've spent time in one.

Re: Choose your status game wisely

#294

Post by epgui » Sat, Apr 02, 2022, 8:29 PM UTC

8n4vidtmkvmk wrote: post #124

sk1pper wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Me too. If I wear a simple blue button down, there’s a 100% chance it gets commented on. And I work full time remote… I feel like if I wore that to a software engineering interview I’d run the risk of being judged as just not really getting the culture.

lol, i think that's why i failed my first interview or two. dressed down for my last one and got hired no problem

Am I the only person who thinks it’s very plausible that that was indeed a factor, and also that it’s crazy for that to be the case?

Re: Choose your status game wisely

#295

Post by chillacy » Sat, Apr 02, 2022, 9:18 PM UTC

tomgp wrote: post #235

bsenftner wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So don't be an idiot and "worship", be a rational balanced human and as the OP says diversify your interests. DFW tends to exaggerate to make his points, and this is an example. Nice prose, be it describes idiots and implies to the reader that everyone are such idiots.

DFW concluded that if you don’t choose what to worship it gets chosen for you. What he’s saying is that one should be conscious and deliberate, self aware. Like much of DFW there’s a strong christian undercurrent to ‘this is water’. Far from being an argument against religion and worship the message i take is that the value of religion can be that it focuses one outward, towards community and so on.

DFW claims religion is immune to this effect but to me it seems like another statement to add could be: “worship god and you’ll feel like a sinner”

Re: Choose your status game wisely

#296

Post by chillacy » Sat, Apr 02, 2022, 9:20 PM UTC

dr_dshiv wrote: post #187

x3iv130f wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Being well dressed isn't about dressing in fancy or expensive clothes; It's about looking good in clothes.

So difficult. Used to be easy. Stopped caring. Want to care. But black tshirts and air force ones are just so easy.

There’s a status game for streetwear too but afaik it involves rare sneakers with expensive basics.

Re: Choose your status game wisely

#297

Post by linspace » Sat, Apr 02, 2022, 10:16 PM UTC

trh0awayman wrote: post #195

I think it's interesting how different people view status, like the "Harvard Professor or Homeless guy?" quiz that used to get passed around. I grew up in one of the last WASP strongholds in the US and the more money you had, the smaller the house you lived in (up to a point). People could afford insanely expensive cars, but would buy tasteful ones instead (excepting kids). Most people wouldn't be caught dead in a Ra…

Some people born with money don't like to think that the only thing that makes them special is the money they have, but didn't earn. Avoiding common endeavors, getting an engineering degree instead of being an artist or running a profitable company instead of a non-profit is a good way of not confronting the reality that in a competitive setting they would be crushed. I know it's a generalization as there are plenty of hard working people born in wealthy families that take advantage of it, as they should, without deluding themselves.

Re: Choose your status game wisely

#298

Post by leaflets2 » Sat, Apr 02, 2022, 11:30 PM UTC

contradistinct wrote: post #260

trh0awayman wrote: post #195

I think it's interesting how different people view status, like the "Harvard Professor or Homeless guy?" quiz that used to get passed around. I grew up in one of the last WASP strongholds in the US and the more money you had, the smaller the house you lived in (up to a point). People could afford insanely expensive cars, but would buy tasteful ones instead (excepting kids). Most people wouldn't be caught dead in a Ra…

> I think it's interesting how different people view status, like the "Harvard Professor or Homeless guy?" quiz that used to get passed around. This is counter-signalling. "I don't have to dress like a high-status individual, because I'm so high status that my high status is clear either way." It's why somewhat intelligent people use big words, but very intelligent people speak plainly: they are so intelligent their…

Or extra words and fancy words are just a waste of everyone's time.

What are some big words? I'm not a native speaker

Re: Choose your status game wisely

#299

Post by leaflets2 » Sat, Apr 02, 2022, 11:33 PM UTC

Leherenn wrote: post #209

trh0awayman wrote: post #195

I think it's interesting how different people view status, like the "Harvard Professor or Homeless guy?" quiz that used to get passed around. I grew up in one of the last WASP strongholds in the US and the more money you had, the smaller the house you lived in (up to a point). People could afford insanely expensive cars, but would buy tasteful ones instead (excepting kids). Most people wouldn't be caught dead in a Ra…

I don't know, I don't think they would appear low status. Your whole description screams wealth and aristocracy, just not the in your face kind. They probably wouldn't be liked, but I doubt they would appear low status elsewhere.

I guess they would soon adapt to fit in in the new place, and change their status games.

But just for a short while, maybe they'd give an unusual impression?

Re: Choose your status game wisely

#300

Post by leaflets2 » Sat, Apr 02, 2022, 11:43 PM UTC

Zababa wrote: post #273

xenocratus wrote: post #186

> Choose money and you’ll end up working all the time. Choose beauty and you’ll always want to look better. Choose fame and you’ll constantly be seeking attention. This is straight-up paraphrasing David Foster Wallace in This Is Water, just that DFW was talking about these things as de-facto personal religions that we're usually unconscious of. So the "choose" part isn't nearly that explicit in his view. The bit in T…

> Worship your intellect, being seen as smart, you will end up feeling stupid, a fraud, always on the verge of being found out. I wonder if this is an explanation for impostor syndrome. Every time I read about it, it comes from people working in intellectual professions. Those people probably value their intellect a lot, possibly more than money, status or things like that. Thus their insecurities manifest themselves…

Interesting thoughts.

I think the impostor syndrome is more related to fear of failing the others trust, regardless of what field we have in mind.

Let's say your friends want you in their ... volleyball team. They think you're good.

And now you start worrying about making them disappointed.

Although you're the best they know, for real.

That'd be the impostor syndrome, but in this case unrelated to intelligence. Instead, a social thing, related to ... Fear of losing some of one's status? (Whatever that status is about.)