[naikrovek]

As an American with autism, I see it too.

Small talk is all lies. Almost all praise is fake. And it all drives me insane. I can fit in at work just fine, I can appear joyful and excited to come to work, I have 30 years of practice with it. But I avoid it whenever possible because it is all lies.

Americans appear to oversell everything because people get mad if you don’t.

“Why can’t you just be positive?!”

Because I’m not going to lie. I can’t fake praise, and I won’t even try. Being positive while lying is immediately obvious and it undermines the positive attitude that you’ve painted on. If anything, I take a negative message when I see someone faking a positive manner of speech.

[jackp96]

So I'm not personally on the spectrum, but I definitely get the frustration with "this is so fake; why are we all pretending it's not?" experiences.

But "almost all praise is fake" and "small talk is all lies" feels like a pretty depressing place to end up?

Why do you feel like that's the case? How do you differentiate sincere praise from "fake" praise?

[naikrovek]

> But "almost all praise is fake" and "small talk is all lies" feels like a pretty depressing place to end up?

No, not really. I just see it as a tool that normal people use to keep themselves happy. And that's not depressing, to me. It's kind of ... annoying that people are so fragile that they have to do that in order to have a "normal" day, but I can't fault anyone for doing things that make them happy. I wasn't given that opportunity; I was weird and if I didn't conform then I got in trouble. Yet normal people LOSE THEIR FLIPPING MINDS when asked to consider my behaviors normal and to consider my various physical movements as normal and tolerable. You have never seen such orchestrated and immediate pushback in your life, I promise. But I was forced to do what they refuse to do, which is to accommodate the other side. So, if anything, I'm angry about it all. Not depressed.

I don't need those platitudes to feel happy or normal, I need to be alone to feel happy, most of the time.

Praise given in private is usually legitimate. I value that. I feel that. Praise given in front of others (like ceremonies and ritual award reception stuff) are the fakest fake activity known to humanity. The ceremonies are for normal people. People like me can simply be privately told "well done" and given a piece of paper that they can look at, and maybe a raise, and that's enough. And maybe a mention during the ceremony that I will not be attending so that people know about it, if they're interested.

[mft_]

Move to Europe, friend - a weight will be lifted.

[naikrovek]

I have wanted to for 20 years, but my children would not understand if I left them.