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Being Antisocial Rules
[robin whittle]


Being antisocial is highly underrated. No, really. Think about it.

Friends are expensive.
If you have friends, you have to go out and do things, and doing things costs money. Movies, lunch, shopping, athletic events – whatever your preferred social activity is, it costs money. And in order to get that money, you have to have a job, which is never good. Avoid the jobs.

Friends also take up plenty of valuable time.
Without friends, you never have to conform to anyone else’s schedule. You can do whatever you want whenever it is convenient for you. And no more waiting around for those friends who just can’t figure out that “noon” means “noon,” not “one thirty.”

Far too much memory is also necessary to maintain a friendship.
For each relationship, you have to remember a name, a face, a set of likes, a set of dislikes, and, in many cases, a birthday. And birthdays bring us right back to the money problem. I trust I don’t have to go over that one again.

Friends are stressful.
As anyone who has had any experience in moving can tell you, the process can be very stressful – unless you don’t worry about making friends. Meeting people takes a lot of time and energy, and the perception that everyone else has friends already leads to much unnecessary worrying. If you let go of the idea that you have to have friends, it no longer bothers you that you don’t.

But it is not just the process of finding friends that is stressful; it is often even more stressful to maintain them. Even the best friends have numerous fights, or worse, create tension by attempting to prevent a fight. These conflicts are inevitable when interpersonal relationships are formed, and the only way to avoid them is by avoiding people.

No one else is better company than you.
Who knows you better than you? 100% of people surveyed said they preferred staying in their rooms by themselves to going out with others.* When you are the only person you associate with, you experience no peer pressure. You don’t have to be mindful of anyone else’s feelings, and you don’t have to impress anyone. Your wardrobe is as simple as you want it to be, since you never have to get dressed up to go anywhere. You don’t have to put up with anyone’s annoying habits, and you don’t have to censure your own. Your taste is far better than anyone else’s, and you never have to listen to another bad song again. By and large, you do what you want when you want, and don’t concern yourself with anything else.

In this day and age, it is far easier to be antisocial. The vast majority of necessary purchases can be made online and delivered to your home without any human contact at all. More and more, it is possible to work from home or attend classes online, drastically decreasing the time spent in the presence of others.

For many, the transition from the socially acceptable “norm” to the antisocial lifestyle may be difficult initially, but the benefits clearly outweigh any cost. In the end, any residual desire for companionship will be alleviated when you begin attributing personalities to the inanimate objects you are closest to.


*The statistician in me demands a larger sample size, but that would require leaving my room and asking someone other than myself.

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