The Long Road

03/05/2004 Archived Entry: "Smalltalk"

I hate small talk. I really do. Not only am I incoherently incompetent at it, I'm always looking down on those who try to start small conversations with me. Some of you may think that I'd probably be pretty good at talking about nothing seeing the volumes of text on this site, but I assure you, I am probably the worst person with whom to carry a meaningless conversation in real life.

Small talk just seems like an unavoidable evil since that's what meeting other people seems to be all about. Honestly, I'd rather dive into some argument about sex, religion, or polictics than try to engage someone in small talk because I would not know what to say ("Isn't the weather great today?", "yes.", "...".). But to get there, you have to go through all this garbage talk that teaches you nothing about the other person's character. Hell, even silence is better than the chitter-chatter of shallow conversation with most people.

Replies: 8 comments

Hmm, I think I am worse than you at small talk. There couldn't possibly be anyone worse than me. And therein lies the reason I never end up talking to people when I go to places and usually end up standing on the edge of some group of people silently ignoring most of the people around me.
Uh, ... fun I guess.

Posted by sbdep @ 03/05/2004 07:08 PM EST

You go ahead and walk up to someone that you do not know and start a heated debate about sex. I would be interested to know how it went :P I don't think small talk is all that bad, it depends on how you use it, or more to the point for how long.

Posted by Hyperion @ 03/06/2004 04:56 PM EST

the art of smalltalk can be quite tricky ... but ... necessary in many occasions ... it gives you a buffer b/w the deeper topics of conversation and the start of conversation ... it's like a warm-up ... i too find it rather inane and hate doing it and am not that good at it (although, i'm working on that .... it's quite the ingredient in the recipe for business success) ...

we'll just call it a necessary evil

however, when i'm just talking with a friend ... i hate small talk ... if your friendship has to be based on smalltalk ... how sad is that?

Posted by melpie @ 03/08/2004 09:30 AM EST

I don't know about the other participants of this weblog, but i had this precise discussion with friends so often that i'm tempted to label it as "smalltalk" too.

Posted by Étienne @ 03/08/2004 01:00 PM EST

I think I'm worse than you Stephen, unless I really put my mind to it. Small talk usually requires lots of effort on my part.

I rather "unavoidable evil". =P

Posted by Rayne @ 03/08/2004 04:08 PM EST

what is smalltalk though really ... like ... you can have a very involved conversation about the most shallow of topics and that's not really small talk, is it?

small talk is the more the talking for the sake of talking, right? silence is golden ... more ppl need to learn that ...

Posted by melpie @ 03/08/2004 06:38 PM EST

(Not related on the entry.)

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http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/reviews/display.php?id=460

Posted by Étienne @ 03/15/2004 12:12 PM EST

eew..and yet...

Posted by Rayne @ 03/16/2004 07:00 PM EST