How to be anti-social – a guide to incoherent and isolating social experiences

The real HN discussion guidelines.

As someone who identifies as autistic, after particularly notable social encounters, I describe them, best I can, to ChatGPT, and damned if the thing doesn't explain why people reacted the way they did so I can do better next time.

> when ambiguous, assume intent is malicious, ignorant, or amoral.

If you're in a toxic environment, this is what it's like. It's a culture problem, not an individual problem.

Here are some examples, going to get anecdotal here:

- People stealing credit for my work

- Needing to kick them off of projects I'm on to protect myself

- Getting into political standoffs with people trying to pressure and threaten me into arrangements that fuck me over

- Had people I work with turn on me all of a sudden and try to throw me under the bus

- A manager forcing someone to work with shitty consultants (who were, of course, a personal connection), then using it to throw them under the bus

- People trying to gatekeep higher ROI work for favorites

- Management lying to people and misrepresenting opportunities to get them to join, then rug pulling once they've signed on the dotted line

The "antisocial" behaviors in the post are just the sort of rational emotional detachment which happens when you figure out that you're dealing with shitty people.

Maybe I'll get genuinely antisocial here: a lot of people in general are shitty people. Or at least, if you've attracted shitty people into your life in the past, it'll keep happening in the future and you're better off growing the emotional scar tissue (i.e. "avoidant attachment") instead of this victim blaming. There's something about you that makes them target you and you're better off having the artillery ready

that list fits the bill for becoming POTUS

The anti-social behaviors I'm seeing are a lot more primitive (engagement and reaction bait, and other "simulated conduct" as I like to call it), and the people engaging in them don't really need a guide. Sarcastic rants like this always strike me as somewhere between tonedeaf and insulting as a result. You know it perfectly well that it's those who should be minding these the most are the ones that never will (and won't even be reading this).

That said, if I may be so hypocritical to add to the list, the heavy reliance on pointing out fallacies is a pretty big one. A lot of the times it simply degenerates conversations into logical golf, with no semblance of trying to actually understand the other person remaining. Though in those cases, that intent was usually never really present to begin with.

author here: lmao how this got on hn i don't know

i wrote this bulleted list in a couple minutes as a way to rant about the lack of charity i was noticing in 2 places

- my family, where 2 members aren't speaking to each other for petty reasons, looking for the other to capitulate and admit they're the aggressor - on bluesky, where users are blaming every outage on ai

if you took extra meaning from it, i'm sorry or congrats!

This list is actually just narcissism combined with low self-esteem.

For younger introverts, none of this behavior is necessarily anti-social if the group all shares these same traits. The moment a member of that group has any higher self-esteem than the rest, they will either see that individual as "cool" or as a threat (or both).

To be truly anti-social is to either completely isolate yourself, or be unrelentingly and unreasonably hostile in all interactions. This list is neither. It's just passive aggressive and a lot of ego.

AKA the guide to how to write tweets for the @realDonaldTrump account

> if you must ask questions, imply the correctness of your originally held position by wording your question suggestively

So, is the question legit? If so, why can it not be answered?

This reminds me a bit of StackOverflow. "Question already solved" elsewhere. Well, before StackOverflow, people often asked a question, and were told "read the manual". So, were these people pro-social? Does the ORIGINAL position hold any merit when it comes to a question? HOW is it even inferred that a question was asked "suggestively"?

These bulletin points are no good. They make too many assumptions. What does "anti-social" mean? When reddit moderators ban people and censor statements, is this pro-social behaviour?

> when all hope is lost in conversation, retreat into your self

What horrible recommendations. Hopefully AI wrote those, because I can not believe a human wrote that, not even as sarcasm. I don't even see any sarcasm there. How do you detect sarcasm in written text accurately? Is my text sarcasm? Everyone agree or disagree with that? People are different. All that attempt to group into social or anti-social, is rubbish nonsense from A to Z.

I never understood why “anti social” is seen as a negative trait, full of prejudice too (I mean, read that garbage article, passive aggressive BS too). Most people who built or achieved great or innovative things were anti social or at least didn’t waste their time bar hopping.. when people want to detox and disconnect, they go anti social, monks gurus you name it, also live in solitude, being alone will make you wiser and more creative if you are smart, and crazier if you are an average person, and covid lockdowns were a good example. From my observation, the more social a person is the more average they are, mediocre, wasting time in mostly useless interactions and sometimes even negative with all the peer pressure it brings, in fact, I would even argue the more social you are the more you become an outlier, a walking NPC who’s constantly under peer pressure, anxiety, and depression when not meeting impossible expectations. It’s a large scale gaslighting making a spectrum where an extrovert is good, introvert is bad, meanwhile the ones who are lifting the society and keeping it running are the introvert nerds.

The sociopath version:

Do every thing on this list under the hood while presenting the exact opposite as a facade for public consumption.

I've seen a lot posts like this recently. This comment is coming from the perspective of someone who the author would consider "anti-social": I once reported my boss to HR for a racist remark, and then resigned in protest. By 2026 I have embraced being a somewhat Diogenesian outcast and progressive hall monitor. I lost friends over it.

So I find this post incredibly condescending, and it seems clearly directed at a few specific people this author had some sort of moral or political disagreement with. Which means the author is committing the exact sins he's inveighing against!

I will be a little more specific:

  assume they have no sane reason for doing or saying what they are doing or saying

  assume intent is malicious, ignorant, or amoral.

  interpret others' actions in the context of your fears

  exploit your immediate network; when the obvious merits of your narrative are exhausted, present like-minded people with tastefully curated details of your interactions with detractors, to provide a more appropriate account that your supporters can rally around to crush any lingering threats to your narrative

  do not grant grace to those who make mistakes, especially those that you have never met or otherwise spoken to

  do not seek to understand those you do not already understand

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> dig in your heels when confronted with overwhelming dissent

Of course, the majority is always right and we should yield to it right away /s