I enjoyed the post and appreciate the additional links for reading.
The main character’s reaction is sort of unhealthy/fake—better would have been to clarify that you overheard them bantering earlier.
I did not feel that way at all, the reaction is simple and appropriate. Imagine how clunky and awkward it would be for the main character trying to explain that in fact you over heard the banter and that you don’t want the mom to think, that you think its OK for there to be rude things said about her son, in front of her. That would come off as weird.
it’s not so much that wearing a gold watch isn’t about knowing the time, it’s that the owner’s actual desires got distorted by the lens of common knowledge. Knowing that someone would be paying attention to them to infer their desires, they filtered their desires to focus on the ones they thought would make them look good. This also can easily come off as inauthentic, and it seems fairly clear why to me: if you’re filtering your desires to make yourself look good, then that’s a signal that you need to fake your desires or else you won’t look good.
The gold watch wearer does not come off as inauthentic to me. If I had more information, like that the person was not well off then I would. Just because the gold watch wearer wants to look good in front of me doesn’t make it inauthentic nor does it mean the wearer is faking it. There isn’t much difference between the fashion and hygiene example and the gold watch example. Putting in the effort to look good by being well dressed and clean (presuming that is in fact true, people might think you fail at both), is the same as using money to wear a gold watch to convey wealth. All three attempt to convey some information about the person, and nothing is inauthentic if it’s true. How else do you let people know you got money?
I enjoyed the post and appreciate the additional links for reading.
I did not feel that way at all, the reaction is simple and appropriate. Imagine how clunky and awkward it would be for the main character trying to explain that in fact you over heard the banter and that you don’t want the mom to think, that you think its OK for there to be rude things said about her son, in front of her. That would come off as weird.
The gold watch wearer does not come off as inauthentic to me. If I had more information, like that the person was not well off then I would. Just because the gold watch wearer wants to look good in front of me doesn’t make it inauthentic nor does it mean the wearer is faking it. There isn’t much difference between the fashion and hygiene example and the gold watch example. Putting in the effort to look good by being well dressed and clean (presuming that is in fact true, people might think you fail at both), is the same as using money to wear a gold watch to convey wealth. All three attempt to convey some information about the person, and nothing is inauthentic if it’s true. How else do you let people know you got money?