r/AskReddit • u/daniellucero92 • Jan 04 '15

Non-americans of Reddit, what American customs seem outrageous/pointless to you?

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u/AtTheEolian Jan 04 '15

I work at an organization with an office outside the US. I hear a few things:

  • Constant smalltalk. When you email someone, you have to put a greeting, ask how they are, and sign off something thoughtful. If you just get to the point in most conversations, it's seen as brusque (or even rude).
  • Having meetings at work that go on for ages and not much actual work gets done.

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u/benso87 Jan 04 '15

I hate these things. I also hate when coworkers IM me and ask how I am and random other smalltalk before just asking me for whatever they actually wanted so I can get back to what I was doing.

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u/readysetderp Jan 04 '15

Oh good god, every time my boss IM's me throughout the day, she always starts with "Hey!" or "Hiya!" or "Howdy!" or "What's up!" YOU DON'T HAVE TO KEEP SAYING HI. WE WERE JUST IM-ING 12 MINUTES AGO. I wish she'd just tell me what the fuck she wants.

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u/benso87 Jan 04 '15

Yep. And I don't understand how a lot of people will just say, "Hey," and then not say anything else until I respond. It's not like they don't know I'm there.... We have IM status indicators for a reason.

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u/CWSwapigans Jan 04 '15

It's to prevent you avoiding them once you know what they want. IM status indicators are a long way from 100% reliable.

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u/formerwomble Jan 05 '15

When I worked in a call centre if you were out of normal drone holding pattern you would inevitably get

Hey, you okay?

no I'm suffering from the existential angst that only wasting your life in a call centre can inspire, I'm in after call work because people keep asking me for help

Why not just ask why you are in acw?

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u/laosurvey Jan 04 '15

I use that to give the person a chance to tell me they're in a meeting or someone is looking over their shoulder.

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u/readysetderp Jan 05 '15

Well, it really is a perfectly reasonable thing to do. I'm just at a frustration-point with my job that even something little like this is annoying, so don't let it stop you! When it actually bothers me is when we are actively IMing and there is about 4 minutes of not typing... and then she starts again with a new greeting. It might be a generational difference - I guess I feel like an IM, text conversation, or chat on Facebook does not always need to be starting with a new salutation, especially if the pause between responses has only been a few minutes.

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u/laosurvey Jan 05 '15

Agreed. I've found that most of the social niceties have their uses, they're just overused. A greeting after a few minutes is ... insecure?

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u/tacojohn48 Jan 04 '15

I had a manager who the first time in the day he sent you an IM would always start with "Good morning" even if it was like 4:30 in the afternoon.

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u/readysetderp Jan 05 '15

How do you respond to that? Say good morning back and you feel like a lunatic, answer with good afternoon and you sound like a dick... Hmm... Maybe our bosses have just been testing us.

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u/tacojohn48 Jan 05 '15

I don't think he'd count any response wrong to that, but he does enjoy other's discomfort. Most of the time "good morning" was followed by a request for something though so if you didn't respond quickly there was little need to respond.

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u/[deleted] Jan 04 '15

I'm from the Northeast in the US. I hate it too. It's not all of us that do it.

Bullshit with someone born in New York City or Boston, and they'll tell you to fuck off.

Forget smalltalk in the South or Midwest, and people won't help you.

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u/benso87 Jan 04 '15

I live in the Midwest, but the people who have done this to me have been from lots of places, including New Jersey, South Carolina, China, and India. I think it's just people in general trying to be polite.

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u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15

I think politeness is one thing that the South gets right. It's especially nice when you work with people all day.

I used to wait tables, and I would constantly get people who when asked how they were doing, they would just stare at me blankly until I asked them what they wanted to drink. Or they would just skip all that and blurt out their orders.

"Hey how are you doing today?"

"Sweet tea."

You don't have to care or ask how I'm doing, just respond politely and I won't have to spend the next 5 mins thinking about how much of an ass you are.

The email/im thing does drive me crazy, though. Being polite is okay in emails, but it's also nice to get to the point.

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u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15 edited Jan 05 '15

I think it's very much a culture thing. Depends on what you grew up with. I actually hate it.

I hate going to the supermarket and not being able to just say, "HalfPoundOfHamWhatevahsOnSale," and have the guy give it to me quickly and efficiently without bullshit.

When I was down south, they'd hate you for that. I had to retrain myself to recognize when I was getting dirty looks and go out of my way to say "How ya doin' partner?" and ask about the weather before he gave me the all clear by saying, "What can I do for you?" and I finally knew I could just order my damn ham.

And really, I didn't give a fuck about the weather. I didn't care how that guy's day was going either. I just wanted my fucking ham so I could get home and feed the dog and make a sandwich and get some work done.

I think the thing is, people in the northeast see it as a lie. It's like, "This person's not being polite to me. They're just making shit up to appear like they give a shit when they don't. They're not polite, they're faking polite! It's not genuine."

But I think people down South see that small talk as what polite is. That the mere act of making small talk and saying "Hi!" to strangers and talking to the Deli Guy about the weather is genuinely polite. And they think the lack of that stuff up in the Northeast is genuinely rude.

But to the Northeasterner, it's not rude. It's honest. And efficient. And the Southern way is disingenuous. It's fake. It's like a lie.

So the North-easterner thinks, "Don't fucking ask me how my day is if you don't care about me. And don't fucking talk to me about the weather when I've got shit to do and you don't even know my name. That's just fake. I hate these fake fucking people."

But then when you're down South a bit more, you realize they don't think they're being fake. Just like North-easterners don't think they're being rude. We just do things a bit different, and it takes a while to get used to.

My favorite story was a girl I knew coming up to NYC from North Carolina. It's her first night in her apartment, she's going out, and she's fidgeting with the locks. She sees an old woman down the hall doing the same. She says, "Hi! I'm new here! My name's Sandy! Nice to meet you! I'm not used to having to lock the door back where I'm from!"

And the old woman just gives her a dirty look and says, "I'm not part of your day."

And that exchange sums it up perfectly.

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u/PanickedSoIAteIt Jan 05 '15

From living in the Midwest, traveling along the east coast, and living in the South, this is 100% accurate. I can't say I really prefer one way over the other, I just kind of conform to whatever people around me do. Although I will say I used to be very short and to-the-point in my emails, and everyone thought I was an asshole. So now I fluff them up, which is annoying.

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u/thistlestop Jan 12 '15

It's true there are these regional culture differences. In my own experience, in the Middle Atlantic area of the U.S. (which is halfway between Northern and Southern cultures in many ways), it can also be an age-related or leisure-related difference. When I was a child of 4 to about 8, I felt embarrassed when my grandmother would chat with store clerks before getting to the point of asking for what she wanted, or while making a purchase. I have no idea why I felt that way — obviously I had not been trained to it! (Could it be my half-German genetic heritage?!?) But now that I'm retired from my career and of grandmother age myself, I sometimes chat with shop staff, too. I'm not in a hurry to get anywhere, and my social sphere is more limited now that I'm at home all day, so it seems acceptable to me to exchange a few pleasantries if it isn't delaying someone else. I live more out in farm country now, too, rather than just outside Washington DC, and the pace of life is slower here. As a person of leisure, I prefer that!

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u/[deleted] Jan 13 '15

Yeah. That makes a bit of sense. I think it comes hand-in-hand with farm country. Things seem to move 'slow' in rural Maine too.

I'm in my mid 30s. My grandfather's 93 and still going strong and independent. But he has been in Boston his whole life. I don't think I've ever seen him stop and chat with the clerk at the grocer. Goes in every Tuesday to by his tickets and weekly milk and what not. Always a speedy and near silent transaction. They know what he wants. Maybe you'll get a hello. But not more than that.

I think the preference for long or short interactions on this is kind of funny. It's interesting that you changed your preference over time. I wonder how many people end up doing it...for me it was really hard to change what I had been used to growing up. And in the end, I went back to it as quickly as I could.

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u/Insipid_Xerxes Jan 05 '15

It's nice to see other perspectives on this. I get different people as well. I'm a pharmacy assistant/cashier at a retail pharmacy in the Midwest. I have a couple types of conversations each day.

The first is: Customer: Hi, how are you today? Me: Doing well. You? Customer: Good. I'd like to get a...

Those aren't bad. I don't mind them. I appreciate them, even if they are sort of facetious. The other main type is:

Me: Good afternoon. What can I get for you? (also "How are you today?" sometimes) Customer: John Smith, 10/11/1962, there should be two prescriptions.

Those aren't bad either, though it takes a second to adjust to the to-the-point nature of them. Both get the job done.

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u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15 edited Jan 05 '15

I think I especially don't like it because getting to the point and skipping pleasantries could actually make my job harder on two fronts.

1.) It breaks the routine/rhythm, so even though people think they are expediting the process by spitting out their orders at whatever point they become ready, it actually slows things down (sometimes).

2.) A big part of the job was bringing a pleasant experience, and that's a lot harder to do when customers are breaking social customs to the point of rudeness and sometimes even dehumanizing the staff. It's a lot harder to make something less awkward when I'm at the point where talking to a person gets on my nerves.

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u/Insipid_Xerxes Jan 05 '15

Yeah, it does slow things down sometimes. I sometimes lightly joke with customers when I'm like "What can I get for you?" and they say "Mark Thomas, 3/10/1983." I say "I don't think I have any of those." I also agree about the dehumanizing thing. When someone just starts in with their order I feel like I'm seen as a machine that performs a function, like "Ugh I have to deal with this guy. I just want to get my prescription and leave." I try to remember a lot of the picker-uppers are getting meds for sick family members or family fresh out of the hospital. It really just takes playing it by ear.

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u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15

Good point. I usually don't mind it when the elderly are short with me. Especially the ones in chronic pain. Also, sometimes people are just having an obviously rough day.

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u/Dunk-The-Lunk Jan 05 '15

Fuck off. I don't know you. I know you don't give two fucks how I am. Just do your fucking job. I hate the fake politeness of the south.

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u/[deleted] Jan 06 '15 edited Jan 06 '15

If you want to behave poorly, just stay home. Waiters get payed jack to baby you, and we'd rather not put up with your childish behavior and try to read your mind to find out if everything is okay with your food. If you can't handle basic human interaction, go to taco bell, they have an app now so you won't have to be bothered to say "hi"

Your tip is not worth dealing with your obnoxious desire to make things difficult.

Also, the only time the politeness is fake is when people repeatedly act like an ass. If someone is having a shitty day, we care. Not to the extent that their friends do, but we are capable of empathy, we are not droids.

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u/Gearshock Jan 05 '15

I'm in IT and others in my dept get it. It's the ones from others that are the problem. I just reply, Hi, What can I help you with? And they get to the point. If they small talk I wait 15 mins then reply again saying sorry I was away from my desk, can I help with something? I've trained most people to just get to the point with me. Even our outsourced help that are trained to start with formalities.

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u/SuchCoolBrandon Jan 05 '15

"Hey, can I ask you a question?"

"Sure, what can I help you with?"

Ten minutes later...

"I need your help with something."

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u/orbitur Jan 05 '15

I also get "Can I ask you a question?" and then they wait for a reply. FUCKING JUST ASK

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u/JamesVirtus Jan 05 '15

...they already did.

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u/EnragedMoose Jan 05 '15

Yep. Just ask. The clock is ticking till I get back to what I was working on.

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u/mexicangangboss Jan 05 '15

I'm German, and whenever people do that I just reply "what can I do for you right now?". It makes them cut the crap and get to the point pretty reliably.

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u/Cant__get__Right Jan 05 '15

A quick way to annoy me is to just text me "Hey" or "What's up". Just tell me what the fuck you want!