I know of a set of norms where if you want to decline an invitation you can make up an excuse and if it is discovered that the excuse doesn’t hold water it’s no big deal. Additionally I have seen norms where just saying a flat unexplained “no” is seen as more erroneous than obviously false excuse. I am of personally the inclination that if I don’t have conflicting plans I won’t fabricate them and it making the “unwillingness” more bare seems to get under some peoples nerves. This might be that some people value “keeping face” more than honesty. But there is a funny effect in that if somebody has just announced that they have an excuse not to go at some specific time and you make a suggestion for another actvity for exact same time they might declare to be free to do that. If everybody is “in on the game” that it’s all “face” this doesn’t seem to cause problems.
I do have a problem where if somebody makes what seems like english level claim of fact I tend to favour it being a claim of fact and having trouble when it’s infact something else like invitation rejection. I also have bad understanding why people value “face-culture” and have trouble imagining what kinds of things would go wrong in a “faceless” dystopia.
I know of a set of norms where if you want to decline an invitation you can make up an excuse and if it is discovered that the excuse doesn’t hold water it’s no big deal. Additionally I have seen norms where just saying a flat unexplained “no” is seen as more erroneous than obviously false excuse. I am of personally the inclination that if I don’t have conflicting plans I won’t fabricate them and it making the “unwillingness” more bare seems to get under some peoples nerves. This might be that some people value “keeping face” more than honesty. But there is a funny effect in that if somebody has just announced that they have an excuse not to go at some specific time and you make a suggestion for another actvity for exact same time they might declare to be free to do that. If everybody is “in on the game” that it’s all “face” this doesn’t seem to cause problems.
I do have a problem where if somebody makes what seems like english level claim of fact I tend to favour it being a claim of fact and having trouble when it’s infact something else like invitation rejection. I also have bad understanding why people value “face-culture” and have trouble imagining what kinds of things would go wrong in a “faceless” dystopia.