[derefr]

> “Maybe you keep the wrong company,” my mother suggests. Maybe. But I like my friends! We can sympathize with each other and feel reassured that we’re not alone in our overeager consumption, denigrated self-control, and anxiety masked as ambition.

This is Gametalk[1], and you are a Loser (a term from [1]: basically one who is not Playing to Win[2] in the game of life.) You are finding no meaning in what you see around you because the things you are likely surrounded with are not real, raw art with messages to communicate, but rather tranquilizers and peptics to calm mutual nerves.

Do not do for what will happen if you do not—acting in fear to return the dial from its painful drift back to the sacred reference point[3]; instead, simply do for what will happen if you do, moving the dial to a new place and observing the change.

[1] http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-o...

[2] http://www.sirlin.net/ptw

[3] http://lesswrong.com/lw/dj/what_is_control_theory_and_why_do...

[Ixiaus]

This is a great comment.

All of the tools, gadgetry, and connectivity referenced by the author as the harbinger of his decline from individuality (loss of personality) do indeed usher forth his dystopia because he is using them to fill the hole that was created by his leaving the stimulating environment of college. A place where learning is efficient and discovery nil (this is what college is good for, but it isn't the whole equation - I'm obviously leaving research an exception).

College is an intellectually artificial environment whose culture is curated by those who decide what should be taught about what. The ability to cultivate a stimulating life, a life rich in thought and contemplation, rich in actionable accomplishments (finishing that basement, building that open source project, etc...) is not something that can be taught! It is often a quiet and solitary road too - my mind, my books, my notes, and my Self are all I need to have a fulfilling and deep life. Friends make it better. But as the author noted, there are few "self aware" people in the world. That hole is filled by deliberately choosing your thoughts, by being firm with what you choose to believe, by transmuting information (lead) into knowledge (gold).

I hope to see another essay detailing his journey from the state conveyed in this piece to a state chosen of his free will (we all have free will but he's using technology as a scape goat); because, he is an excellent writer.

[jholman]

> his

her

If you can't check your sexist assumptions, then you could check the byline.

[jacoblyles]

As long as we are going to share the same internet, we can acknowledge that the use of the masculine as the default gender for an anonymous person is a longstanding tradition in the English language, and not every person checks every byline of every article she reads. Norms are changing, but I wouldn't call someone wrong or sexist for using a convenient idiom instead of more awkward and somewhat forced modern formulations (although in this case, she is indeed wrong).

[bouncingsoul]

Norms will only keep improving if people keep complaining.

Here's an article about the forgotten tradition of they as a singular pronoun: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=723184

Also, because of the he, I assumed Ixiaus was referring to Gary Shteyngart, the author being reviewed.

[lionhearted]

> Norms will only keep improving if people keep complaining.

This may be controversial or offensive, but it's the truth so I'll take the heat for saying it:

None of the most successful women I know really care or complain about things like he/she in the English language. For the most successful women I know - I'm thinking of an investment banker, lawyer, and chief editor of a magazine in particular - the idea of causing a fuss over pronouns is so low on their radar that it wouldn't happen.

Again, I'll take heat for this, and so be it - but I think people who complain about that sort of thing need to go do more relevant stuff in the real world. Most people who are actually hard working, enterprising, expansive and successful (professionally or in other worthy endeavors) simply don't have time to be upset and pedantic over this sort of thing.

Anyway, I'll take the heat for this now. It's not 100% the case, but the general pattern certainly holds.

[michael_dorfman]

We're drifting from the topic at hand, but None of the most successful women I know really care or complain about things like he/she in the English language misses the point completely. The effect of sexist language on successful women is not the source of people's concern. Rather, it is the (subtle) effect on women who are not yet successful, and the reinforcing effect on men.

Casual minor acts of racism probably have very little effect on Michael Jordan. That doesn't make them ok.

[bouncingsoul]

You're saying when people don't care about a particular issue they just follow the accepted norm and get on with their lives. And you applaud that. But I don't see how that's incompatible with others who do care making an attempt to improve that accepted norm.

[GeneralMaximus]

Forgotten? I still use it. I also like to refer to companies as groups of people rather than individual entities. I prefer "Apple are evil" over "Apple is evil", and "Google own you" over "Google owns you".

[mcantor]

Wouldn't it be just as sexist to assume that someone named "Alice" is a woman? Well, maybe not just as sexist. But at least a little bit sexist. I mean, for all we know, someone named "Alice" could be a male-to-female transgendered individual who still prefers to use the male pronoun. Or a female-to-male transgendered person who kept his original name to cut down confusion among friends, but switched pronouns.

I guess I shouldn't debate... I read the line about "... the hilarious moment 3 seconds into an intimate embrace when I realize that I'm literally rubbing the screen of my iPhone against his spine," and assumed the author was female because in my head, the "default" participants in an intimate embrace are a guy & a girl, since that's the one I'm most familiar with. So, negative points for me on the knee-jerk gender assumption front.

I thought that was a really great line, potential elicited sexism notwithstanding, by the way. I've had those moments myself. It took me a second to realize exactly what she was talking about, but once I did, I couldn't help but chortle at how much I've chided myself for the very same thing.

[Ixiaus]

I was referring to both the author and Shteyngart using the masculine pronoun to make what I had written, "more personal" (instead of using "they"); a bit loose, I know, but this is a casual discussion medium.

[jholman]

Wow. I've often heard people complain about using "they" as a non-gendered singular pronoun because it was inaccurate, but I've never before had someone argue against it because it was _too_ accurate. I guess what I'm saying is that the stylistic choice you say you made (to use a singular pronoun when referring to two people, one of whom was male), totally confused me.

I note that nothing in this piece discusses Shteyngart leaving college (where the college link was how I resolved the pronoun in your first paragraph), and that surely Shteyngart will not write a follow-up to "this piece", (which is how I resolved the pronoun reference in your last paragraph). I guess I just don't understand how the male pronouns in your comment refer to Shteyngart.