# Should you care what other people think of you? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 8, 2018, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-you-care-what-other-people-think-of-you/806157 "2018-01-08T20:00:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2018, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-you-care-what-other-people-think-of-you/806157/41 "2018-01-09T21:45:19Z")
If the feedback is about something important to me, like being trustworthy and polite, then yes. If it is not, like being a high status person with flashy clothes and an expensive, late model car, then no. ---
**Author:** ![gytalf2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ac91a4/32.png) [@gytalf2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gytalf2000)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2018, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-you-care-what-other-people-think-of-you/806157/42 "2018-01-09T21:47:01Z")
> [@begbert2](#): > > My previous posts in this thread were pretty flippant - you _have_ to care about what other people think at least enough to avoid being killed, tortured, incarcerated, or having your netflix cut off. This is of course absolutely true - if you just do whatever the hell you want with no consideration for the opinions and laws of society, then you will be severely boned. > > Of course, this is just the start of it, and in fact if you dig into this far enough you find yourself actually constructing a semi-decent moral system. From an absolutely selfish perspective, it’s beneficial when other people treat you nicely. And from a cost-benefit perspective, it’s often the case that the easiest/cheapest way to get other people to be nice to you is to be nice to them first. Again, from the completely self-centered perspective acting nice is often the best way to go, so a completely selfish person might quite reasonably choose to act quite nice in a lot of situations, making a point to care what people think in order to get people to think nicely about them and treat them accordingly. > > Of course, if a person does this enough, they might develop actual empathy, just out of habit. Escalating it from a semi-decent moral system to full-on secular humanism. > > (Unfortunately this whole system breaks down when you have a lot of money or power - you don’t gotta be nice when you can slap people around with wads of hundred dollar bills. As we’ve seen in numerous real-world cases.) I was a bit flippant, myself. Caring a little bit is fine if that helps you to lead a good life. The thing is, I do know people who worry way too much about what others may think about them, and I think that can easily lead to utter insanity. In my opinion, at least. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2018, 2:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-you-care-what-other-people-think-of-you/806157/43 "2018-01-10T02:31:02Z")
> [@Projammer](#): > > Random stranger… Walk away and don’t even acknowledge them. One or two? Yeah, if they throw stones at you for that, _they’ll_ be the ones going to prison, sure. Whole town? You really, truly have a problem. Shunning works the same way: If one shop bans you, or simply refuses to acknowledge you when you try to buy something, you can probably survive that. If every shop in the region does it? You’re really in for it. It’s part of the reason I like big chain stores and other impersonal marketplaces: The “shopkeeper” of a Walmart doesn’t have any specific reason to consider me subhuman, and even if they did, Walmart corporate isn’t going to be too happy about them trying to get all their minimum-wage employees to ignore me utterly and, uh, block my access to the self-checkout, I guess. It’s interesting how far we’ve come from the traditional human way of life: Small communities, where everyone knew everyone, and once someone was on the outs, they could be ignored to death, because everyone knew why. ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2018, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-you-care-what-other-people-think-of-you/806157/44 "2018-01-10T17:31:37Z")
Yes. If you want to be a productive member of society, you need to have people think you are personable and honest. You might get by without the personable part, but you will never succeed without honor and integrity. ---
**Author:** ![Doctor\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doctor_jackson/32/32_2.png) [@Doctor\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doctor_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [January 10, 2018, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-you-care-what-other-people-think-of-you/806157/45 "2018-01-10T20:30:24Z")
> [@Clothahump](#): > > Yes.If you want to be a productive member of society, you need to have people think you are personable and honest. You might get by without the personable part, but you will never succeed without honor and integrity… …outside of politics. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [January 11, 2018, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-you-care-what-other-people-think-of-you/806157/46 "2018-01-11T14:45:12Z")
I learned as a child that the best response to negative criticism is “It’s a good thing I don’t give a damn\* about your opinion of me.” (\*Back then, “damn” was considered a very bad word. Today I say “fuck.”) ---
**Author:** ![brujaja](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@brujaja](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brujaja)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2018, 6:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-you-care-what-other-people-think-of-you/806157/47 "2018-01-12T06:48:43Z")
This is a topic, to me, where semantics comes very much into play. Ultimately, I do not care if others dislike me, think I’m weird, have moral judgements about my lifestyle or politics, etc. I don’t care if they don’t like the way I dress, or think I’m not acting my age or am unladylike, or if they disapprove of me because I am poor. I **do** care if I hurt someone’s feelings, treat someone unfairly, break a promise, let someone down, say something offensive, etc. I try very hard not to do these things. I **do** care if I behave unethically, do not tell the truth, do not stand up for what I believe in when warranted, am impolite or disrespectful etc. Basically, of course I want people to like me, but pretty much just as I am. It is my nature to accept others as they are and welcome everyone who is compatible with me. If they’re not, I don’t hang around them. But opinions? The only person’s opinion of me that matters to me, is my own. ---
**Author:** ![WordMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e8c25b/32.png) [@WordMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WordMan)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2018, 11:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-you-care-what-other-people-think-of-you/806157/48 "2018-01-12T11:04:14Z")
The OP is the wrong question. It should be: given that Humans _do_ care what other people think and that it plays an important role is a community’s moral system, how should we manage it in our lives? I just read a great book I heard about on NPR. The author **Jonathan Haidt** , is an evolutionary psychologist and the book is **The Righteous Mind**. It breaks down how moral systems evolve in Humans and communities, the components of a moral system, etc. If you like books like **Sapiens** , you’d likely find it really interesting. ---
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2018, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-you-care-what-other-people-think-of-you/806157/49 "2018-01-12T12:28:42Z")
No you shouldn’t care what other people think of you. You should conduct yourself in a way that gives other people no reason to think ill of you. However you have no control over how they do choose to think about you even if you conduct yourself like a saint. There are plenty of people around that I wouldn’t care if they think well of me, people that I would prefer, if anything, to have dislike me. ---
**Author:** ![Cardigan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cardigan/32/187_2.png) [@Cardigan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cardigan)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2018, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-you-care-what-other-people-think-of-you/806157/50 "2018-01-12T13:11:44Z")
> [@WordMan](#): > > The OP is the wrong question. It should be: given that Humans _do_ care what other people think and that it plays an important role is a community’s moral system, how should we manage it in our lives? > > I just read a great book I heard about on NPR. The author **Jonathan Haidt** , is an evolutionary psychologist and the book is **The Righteous Mind**. It breaks down how moral systems evolve in Humans and communities, the components of a moral system, etc. If you like books like **Sapiens** , you’d likely find it really interesting. I’ll have to read that book, it sounds very interesting. I recall studying about [guilt-based](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guilt_society) and [shame-based](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shame_society)societies back in my anthropology undergrad days. The general idea being that cultures use emotions to control human behavior with the primary difference between the two being whether those feelings are internally driven or externally imposed. Haidt might have some insights into how those systems came to evolve. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2018, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-you-care-what-other-people-think-of-you/806157/51 "2018-01-12T15:27:45Z")
I don’t think people should care what _everyone_ thinks. “Everyone” is comprised of a lot stupid, mean, narrow-minded people. You’ll be wasting precious energy trying to appeal to them. Also, 99.9% of “everyone” is inconsequential to you. They don’t have any power over you and they don’t even know you exist. But just about everyone has at least one person in their lives whose opinions should carry some weight. Like, it should matter to a person what their significant other thinks about them. It should matter to a person what their boss thinks about them, to a certain extent. Social adept people generally do care how they come across, but they care to a reasonable degree. They don’t lose a whole lot of sleep over it, but they still care. ---
**Author:** ![WordMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e8c25b/32.png) [@WordMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WordMan)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2018, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-you-care-what-other-people-think-of-you/806157/52 "2018-01-12T16:49:11Z")
> [@Cardigan](#): > > I’ll have to read that book, it sounds very interesting. I recall studying about [guilt-based](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guilt_society) and [shame-based](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shame_society)societies back in my anthropology undergrad days. The general idea being that cultures use emotions to control human behavior with the primary difference between the two being whether those feelings are internally driven or externally imposed. Haidt might have some insights into how those systems came to evolve. You’d love the book. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-you-care-what-other-people-think-of-you/806157.md?page=2)