Cats, Dogs, and Jerks: a description of human social interaction

[nancylebov]

Do you think this is accurate?
[Note: this is going to sound at first like PUA advice, but is actually about general differences between the socially-typical and atypical in the sending and receiving of "status play" signals, using the current situation as an example

Comments

[chaosdancer]

Oh, that sounds so familiar! It used to be torture going to visit my cousins, because they would (in my interpretation) taunt me unmercifully...it took me years to figure out that they were just trying to play with me the way they played with each other, but I was an only child and didn't understand it. It still amazes me that they like me now that we're grown up - all those years I thought they hated me. They just didn't know what my deal was, being all uptight like that.

[ashnistrike]

I've learned to tease and be teased since high school, so this definitely rings true. I suppose I'm mostly bilingual now, though still a native cat speaker. I would say... if you tease back successfully, dogs will respond positively even as they continue to tease. Jerks will back off--it was a real dominance attempt, and they're upset that it didn't work

[dr_zrfq]

I *so* identify with a lot of this. It resonates rather much with the eventual result of my upbringing. I'm far more of a cat but my family are mostly canine in this regard. So I learned to speak dog -- better than I learned cat, early on! That got me in trouble once my classmates at school decided I wasn't part of their pack.

I'm okay with teasing as long as I know that you're in my pack. In fact, me teasing you is a major sign of acceptance. But with folks who aren't pack, I'm a cat... except that if you really push me, and the claws come out... so will the claws of my packmates.

[ashnistrike]

Hah! S agrees that teasing about the same topic can be dog-like or jerk-like depending on body language, and that there is a rule: across species, serious dominance body language is straight-on, and play body language is curvilinear.

The example we were discussing was my height--someone can tease me about being short in such a way that I won't mind, or in such a way that I will slap them down hard. Play teasing could involve pretending to loom over me, but bending the head in sort of a half-bow. Dominance teasing could involve standing as tall as possible and well within my personal space.

Proxemics and kinesics are fascinating. And for a poorly socialized geek, it's always reassuring to have an explicit rubric to fall back on.

[nellorat]

The stuff I've read that was most similar to this was in a book of a writing client of mine--she is an executive coach for women, and it was about how to break the glass ceiling by, in a way, selectively adopting some male traits in a female-compatible way. Based purely on what she wrote, I'd say two things

[supergee]

I have two reasons to hate teasing: I'm a nerd who finds it unacceptably nonliteral and ironic, and I'm a cat who comes from a family of cats, so I never developed antibodies against teasing. Fortunately, I started out not caring too much about status, and learned to care even less as I realized the kind of behavior that it required.

[tamnonlinear]

This feels about right, both in the pattern of interactions and your note that catlike people shouldn't have to adapt to doglike behavior. It has a lot of the same feel as introvert vs. extrovert interactions, where extroverts want to interact just for the sake of interacting and introverts are likely to look a little baffled and ask "why?". Being able to fake extroversion and understand extroverts has advantages and is a useful adulthood skill, but it doesn't mean I have to become one (they ought to have their adulthood skills as well). I also disagree that PUA tactics have their good points- the basic methodology is pointed at manipulating people, and I don't like the idea of interacting with people who want to manipulate me. I'll be occupying a windowsill by myself, and purring, if anyone needs me.

[supergee]

I agree on the connection to introversion/extroversion. Another reason I'm a cat.

[tamnonlinear]

I disagree with the implication that there's anything wrong with being a cat. I am not broken, low-powered, or in need of fixing. Not about this, at least.

[supergee]

I don't think of myself as anything worse than lacking a few skills it would be useful to have, and I'm sorry if I gave the impression that I think all cats are even that bad.

[noveldevice]

Total rubbish.

[nancylebov]

Would you care to expand on that?

[noveldevice]

Hahah, sorry--I'm staying with themikado and he's rubbing off on me.

First and foremost, I get really irritated at the attempted divide between geeks and non-geeks as "geeks" and "neurotypicals". I am a geek--not only do I fulfill the functions, I wear the uniform--but I don't think I'm particularly neurologically atypical, nor are a lot of the smartest, geekiest people I know. If you are neurologically atypical that's great, but we don't all have to be neurologically atypical to be geeks. (And in fact themikado questions the "neurologically typical/atypical" divide--but he literally is a brain scientist, so he has more rigourous standards for the use of such terms

[supergee]

I can be friends with people without engaging in dominance play with them, which is a good thing.