# How to Lose Friends and Alienate People

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-lose-friends-and-alienate-people/185395>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [June 30, 2003, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-lose-friends-and-alienate-people/185395 "2003-06-30T18:30:22Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Cat\_Fight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/90ced4/32.png) [@Cat\_Fight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Fight)\
**Post date:** [June 30, 2003, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-lose-friends-and-alienate-people/185395/1 "2003-06-30T18:30:22Z")

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While I’d buy it for the title alone (stolen, I’m convinced, from the pages of my diary, as was that book about a female-version of Lord of the Flies), has anyone read this? Good? Bad?

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**Author:** ![Briny\_Deep](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/briny_deep/32/17188_2.png) [@Briny\_Deep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Briny_Deep)\
**Post date:** [June 30, 2003, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-lose-friends-and-alienate-people/185395/2 "2003-06-30T19:13:28Z")

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The title was stolen (I think) from a chapter title in Dan Greenburg’s wonderful book “How To Make Yourself Miserable.”

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**Author:** ![Earl\_of\_Sandwhich](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/91b2a8/32.png) [@Earl\_of\_Sandwhich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_of_Sandwhich)\
**Post date:** [June 30, 2003, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-lose-friends-and-alienate-people/185395/3 "2003-06-30T19:29:30Z")

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> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by masonite \*  
> \*\*The title was stolen (I think) from a chapter title in Dan Greenburg’s wonderful book “How To Make Yourself Miserable.” \*\*

Masonite is correct. The entire fourth chapter is devoted to it.

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**Author:** ![Bill\_H](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a5b964/32.png) [@Bill\_H](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bill_H)\
**Post date:** [June 30, 2003, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-lose-friends-and-alienate-people/185395/4 "2003-06-30T22:26:52Z")

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Interesting. I opened this only because I thought it was a hilarious rebuttal to the famous book “How to Win Friends and Influence People” by Dale Carnegie. Gotta be from the fifties, the sixties at the latest.

Are you sure that’s not the reference?

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**Author:** ![Briny\_Deep](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/briny_deep/32/17188_2.png) [@Briny\_Deep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Briny_Deep)\
**Post date:** [June 30, 2003, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-lose-friends-and-alienate-people/185395/5 "2003-06-30T23:03:11Z")

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I’m sure that is the reference. But Greenburg thought of the parody phrase long before Toby did.