You're looking at Less Wrong's discussion board. This includes all posts, including those that haven't been promoted to the front page yet. For more information, see About Less Wrong.

NancyLebovitz comments on Open thread, Mar. 16 - Mar. 22, 2015 - Less Wrong Discussion

6 Post author: MrMind 16 March 2015 08:13AM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Article Navigation

Comments (302)
Tags: open_thread

Comments (302)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: Lumifer 16 March 2015 04:29:18PM *  7 points [-]

and then she did it and acted hurt and told me she is tired of always needing to tell me

That's pretty classical passive-aggressive behaviour. I don't think it has much to do with guess-vs-ask cultures.

But I agree that there is probably some gender correlation.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 16 March 2015 05:17:06PM 5 points [-]

It seems plausible that Hint cultures lead to passive aggression-- if you can't be just plain aggressive, what have you got left?

Comment author: Lumifer 16 March 2015 05:25:16PM 8 points [-]

I think power imbalance leads to passive aggression much more than the Hint or Ask character of the culture.

Hint and Ask are basically preferred communication protocols and most Hint people I know will adjust if the hints are clearly not working. But there is a big difference between

  • Glance at garbage. Glance at garbage. Glance at garbage. Dear, can you please take out the garbage?

and

  • Glance at garbage. Glance at garbage. Glance at garbage. You never pay any attention to me and you screwed up my whole life, you ungrateful bastard!
Comment author: [deleted] 17 March 2015 08:55:58AM 0 points [-]

I think power imbalance leads to passive aggression much more than the Hint or Ask character of the culture.

But that is largely the same thing. The classical boss-subordinate relationship is ask (order) down, guess up. Passive-aggression is extreme (angry, upset) guess, active aggression is extreme (angry, upset) ask/order.

When whole cultures are all-ask or all-guess that is probably a sign of egalitarianism - within that subset.

Comment author: Lumifer 17 March 2015 02:50:09PM 1 point [-]

The classical boss-subordinate relationship is ask (order) down, guess up.

It's more complicated. Ask/tell is simpler, faster, and more efficient so in the workplace (where status and power relationships are largely formalized) it tends to dominate anyway.

Also, as anecdata, I know a girl who is a very pronounced Hint/Guess person, but she's a manager and has underlings. She quite successfully manages them mostly on the Hint/Guess basis (within reason, of course).

Powered by Reddit Powered by Reddit