[DanBC]

I was being tongue in cheek, but there is a problem of sexism where a man will talk over women. If those women assert themselves they're often not seen as assertive or powerful, but pushy and bitchy and shrill. When black people do it they're seen as aggressive.

Stopping people talking over others makes life better for everyone - you don't want to exclude people (men or women) because they don't want to bother shouting down an over-confident asshat.

[LordKano]

When black people do it they're seen as aggressive.

Aggressive or "Angry". It takes a bit of conversational judo to avoid such an appearance. I'm a big black guy. (6'2", 255 pounds) It rarely goes well for men like me if we're perceived as angry or aggressive.

When someone starts talking over me, I become not only quiet but still. As close to motionless as possible. I even slow down my rate of blinking. Remaining silent and motionless forces all attention in the room onto the person who is speaking.

It makes them and anyone else in the room acutely aware that this person just cut you off and has breached standard etiquette. At that point, the pressure to be polite usually kicks in "Oh, I'm sorry. You were saying?"

[boothead]

This is a really great communication hack! It's a pretty poor comment on society at large that you've had to mitigate your communication based purely on how people judge your appearance, but thank you for sharing it.

[LordKano]

If one is aware of the biases of others, they can be used to one's advantage.

This happened a little over 20 years ago.

I was shopping at the mall, near Christmas and the place was packed. There were some really long lines and I said to my friend "Watch this", then walked over to some items that were near the item that I wanted to buy. I started picking up, examining and putting back small items that were on the shelf. I was sure to do it in a way that showed I was putting each item back in its original position before moving on to the next one.

In under 90 seconds, a salesperson approached me and asked if I needed help. I said "Yes, I'd like to buy this" and reached for the item I wanted. He proceeded to take the item, carry it to an unused register, ring me up and complete the sale. I was out of the story in 5 minutes while the other people in line had barely moved.

My friend (who is white) looked at me and asked "What just happened there?" and I explained to him that I was taking advantage of racist perceptions to improve my own shopping experience.

[tomp]

Can you explain to me what racist perceptions that were, and why you got what you wanted? I don't have experience that would help me decode that situation...

[DanBC]

Black people are seen as all being thieves. The shop keep assumes thief, goes to investigate, and is subverted to beat the queue.

There's a relevant recent article on HN:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10386387

http://m.eastbayexpress.com/oakland/racial-profiling-via-nex...

[tomp]

Yes, I've assumed as much, but I don't understand why would that make the assistant help him? To get him out of the store quicker?

Also, why was he doing what he was (taking stuff, looking at it, putting it back where it was)?

[BurningFrog]

He deliberately looked like a shop lifter, so someone came over and got him quickly out of the store, which made both of them feel better.

[harryjo]

Putting the item exactly back in place, is that to increase the clerk's suspicion of shoplifting, or defend against accusations of it?

[LordKano]

To draw attention to myself.

If the norm is for people to put it back close to the same spot, I make sure to do it precisely, because it's incongruous and will draw attention.

My goal was to make them think "What's that guy doing?" as opposed to "I think that guy is trying to seal something."

[pbhjpbhj]

You can pick 2 items if they're small, put one back to attempt to appear like you didn't take anything; works with clothing too. Suspicious behaviour looks suspicious.

[boothead]

That is truly amazing! Deren Brown would approve!

[harryjo]

It's not fair that you have to do this; yet I'm glad you have found a way to mitigate the cost of unfair treatment, and I hope people will curtail their biases in future.

About the not-blinking, though --- that seems like staring, which I would guess would get lumped in with the body language that gets called aggressive. (I'd guess that blinking more makes you look surprised and wounded, which is the effect you are going for in this scenario)

[LordKano]

I still blink but I do it at a slower rate and I deliberately slow the blinks.

I suppose it's more art than science to not appear to be staring but to be blinking less often.

[Kluny]

How often do you do that? Does it work consistently? I'd like to try it and see if it works - I have a problem where when I'm at dinner with my family, the two old men in the room (my dad and uncle) will shout over the other three people at the table, excluding us from the conversation. I wonder if this technique would work, but I have the feeling they wouldn't even notice.

[harryjo]

In an argument, a common technique when someone yells at you is to lower your own voice. It makes the other person angrier and look stupider.

[pbhjpbhj]

I thought the point was to demonstrate you're not being violently aggressive [with your voice at least] and to get the person to have to pay closer attention, ie move in, at which point they risk escalating too much if they continue being very loud.

This to me is a defusing technique rather than an attempt to increase the other persons anger and to humiliate them.

Guess it depends on what you want to get out of the situation: you could adopt a quiet voice and non-threatening demeanour but be highly offensive with your language and probably achieve the ends you mention quite well.

[LordKano]

It doesn't happen often and consequently, I don't have to do it often. I doubt that it would work on family.

[zo1]

I do the same thing. There really isn't any point escalating the situation when someone is clearly being out of line and unfairly interrupting you. It almost always devolves into a shouting match. And then drama ensues, and someone has to mediate to resolve, and so on, etc.

I've also seen others that react in different ways. Some of them react a little too-hastily to being interrupted with some sort of hostile comment (even after doing it others), and don't adapt to the situation. There are some discussions that are lively and very back and forth.

Really, at the end of the day we're all just there to solve problems with good solutions. If you have a good idea, as long as no one is actively blocking/ignoring it, it needs to be considered.

[pbhjpbhj]

I have a problem of talking over friends [in two-part conversation]; primarily because I've already established what they're saying and so I skip to my turn - mostly I can catch it and slow down the conversation on my end to match their pace of delivery.

It's kinda like when I can't remember a word, or a person, usually my wife - or a close friend - will have established who it is or what I'm talking about, the word doesn't need filling in to convey the meaning to that particular person.

It also turns up with acquaintances who might broach a topic I'm familiar with, they take a slow pace to allow me to follow - but interrupting demonstrates I know what they're on about and allows them to up the density of the conversation. I see this as beneficial; others detest it I'm sure.

>Stopping people talking over others makes life better for everyone //

Why let someone gabble on if the whole group already is at that level of understanding on the subject though; is that really better?

[pluma]

Thinking and vocalizing being asynchronous processes, "people talking over others" isn't always as straightforward as it may seem.

At what point do you determine that someone is talking over someone or that the person being talked over just attempts to dominate the entire conversation?

I think both behaviours are problematic.

[JoeAltmaier]

I understand this is a problem. But any unassertive person has these problems. And being called 'shrill' or 'aggressive' can be fine at work.

Shouting down is not the solution. Its better done by expressing annoyance, immediately, when talked over. Maybe white males learn this early on the playground. But anybody can learn this.

[DanBC]

"we promoted Bob because he's assertive. We didn't promote Ann because she's shrill."

[tomp]

"we promoted Bob because he makes good decisions and motivates others to follow him. We didn't promote Ann because she's trying to enforce her suboptimal decisions by using her authority"

[harryjo]

Your quotation is less faithful to what actually shows up in performance evaluation than the comment you responded to.

[tomp]

Maybe, but DanBC is likewise only highlighting one option.

In my experience, that is by far the less likely. Leaders are called leaders because they lead people who choose to follow. If you're forcing others to follow, you're not a leader, you're an authoritarian. I haven't met many of the latter, but plenty of the former, none of which I would describe as "assertive".

[nommm-nommm]

Here's some actual data on actual performance reviews.

http://fortune.com/2014/08/26/performance-review-gender-bias...

When breaking the reviews down by gender of the person evaluated, 58.9% of the reviews received by men contained critical feedback. 87.9% of the reviews received by women did.

Men are given constructive suggestions. Women are given constructive suggestions – and told to pipe down.

There’s a common perception that women in technology endure personality feedback that their male peers just don’t receive. Words like bossy, abrasive, strident, and aggressive are used to describe women’s behaviors when they lead; words like emotional and irrational describe their behaviors when they object. All of these words show up at least twice in the women’s review text I reviewed, some much more often. Abrasive alone is used 17 times to describe 13 different women. Among these words, only aggressive shows up in men’s reviews at all. It shows up three times, twice with an exhortation to be more of it.

>Maybe white males learn this early on the playground. But anybody can learn this.

You're missing the point. The point is the -exact- same behaviors are seen through a cultural lens.

[e40]

I understand this is a problem. But any unassertive person has these problems. And being called 'shrill' or 'aggressive' can be fine at work.

That works after you have the job, not before.

[tomp]

> but there is a problem of sexism where a man will talk over women. If those women assert themselves they're often not seen as assertive or powerful, but pushy and bitchy and shrill

I don't think that's a problem with sexism, but with how a person does it. If you're used to talking over others, you usually do it in a "smooth" way, when other people make pauses, or you say something very relevant. On the other hand, when someone gets annoyed that they can't finish, them being annoyed is off-putting, and they also often say things like "let me finish first" when you already know what they will say, so they come off as struggling to gain power and influence.

Edit: I think, on the other hand, that making people communicate faster and dynamically search for the optimal speaker makes communication more efficient and is better for everyone. No shouting needed.

[harryjo]

The rude behavior you describe is not intentionally sexist, but it has a disparate impact on women, who statistically tolerate interruptions more.

Often times when you think you know what they are going to say, you are wrong, putting words in their mouth.

[tomp]

If it's not intentionally sexist, it's not sexist at all. Sexism is discrimination because of someone's sex. Any other claim of sexism is irrelevant and a classic statistical error, the Simpson's paradox. It's as silly as saying that doctors are sexist because they prescribe more contraception pills to women than men.

> Often times when you think you know what they are going to say, you are wrong, putting words in their mouth.

Yes, sometimes, but in average the effect is positive (i.e. the communication is more efficient).

[kaitai]

Sexism has to be intentional? You're redefining the word simply so you never have to deal with it. It doesn't even jibe with your own definition ("Sexism is discrimination because of someone's sex."). People do many things unconsciously, and systems push people toward certain actions without engaging the conscious consent of those involved (a fancy way of saying we humans often take the easy path rather than the thoughtful path).

You can certainly be an asshole without being intentional about it :) Try and argue that's not possible!

[tomp]

Right, "intentional" was not the correct word. What I mean is that sex has to be the primary motivator/discriminator of the action (whether the motivation is conscious/intentional or subconscious), not just a statistical artifact, as in your example with interrupting people and women tolerating that more.