I can see that if you’re an Orthodox Jew, but otherwise . . . I really don’t think this is how Americans “assert dominance.” It’s just a social custom. Sort of like acknowledging in some way (smile, hello, eye contact) someone you know when you run into them at the grocery store or out somewhere.
It can be used as a way of asserting dominance but does not need to be.
In sales it can be a foot in the door technique to get someone to stop long enough to let them talk to you for instance.
Otara
Dominance? If anything it is a way of assuring the equality of the individuals involved. To shake hands means you are equals and is a sign of respect between two people.
Oh cmon now, you’ve never had or seen someone try to do the ‘Im stronger than you’ shtick by how hard they can squeeze? Or seen them move into personal space while doing the shake so the other person backs away?
It shouldnt be used as such, but these things most certainly do happen.
Otara
Yes, you do. A handshake is about as impersonal as it gets. Get over it.
Shaking hands is a way of saying “Hey, I trust you enough to touch you in the most basic, non-threatening, non-dangerous way, with a body part that I routinely use to touch all kinds of things.”
Not shaking hands is like saying “I touch stairwells, food, my dick, telephones, bus seats…all kinds of stuff with this hand. But I’m not touching you.”
I disagree as long as there are people that don’t like to touch other people whether for religious or personal reasons shaking hands will always be a way somone more powerful can trample on the rights, dignity, and emotions of someone less powerfull. Too me there is no equality unless you have the freedom to say “Don’t touch me” and have it respected.
So if you had a business meeting with someone and they said, “Don’t look at me, please. It violates my cultural norms and my sense of personal space,” you’d be all like, “Yay for acknowledging diversity!”
I would have no problem with that as long as I could hear their voice or breathing or examine their handwriting. In fact, I have made quite a few business deals where for reasons of security or because of cultural sexual norms about opposite genders mixing we have talked with a screen between us or low lights or other facial obscuring devices. If you ever do business in parts of the Mid East or former Soviet Union, you may very well speak with a business woman who covers large portions of her face and if you are a man would not be pleased if you tried to make eye contact with her.
The purpose of shaking hands is not to exert dominance. Shaking hands can be used to exert dominance, but then so can speech. If you really don’t like to touch people, you can always just decline to shake hands and explain why. Other people will think you’re abnormal and they’d be right. You have the right to reject social customs but you must be prepared to accept that this makes you a social outsider.
When someone plays silly power games with their handshake it is only a sign of dominance if you are playing the same silly power games and lose. For example if you shake hands with someone and they turn their hand so it’s on top, that’s only dominating if you fight back and lose, it’s not dominating if you accept it, file away in your brain that the guy is a dickhead, and avoid socialising with him in the future. That’s you gaining information on someone and using it to your own advantage.
I had a neighbor lady nearly drop her newborn trying to shake hands with me; I could not think of a graceful way out of it, though I tried. We were being introduced for the first time <I work with her husband, and it was the first time I’d met her, and seen their newborn> and I didn’t want to seem stand-offish by refusing to shake since she initiated.
But don’t drop the baby over social conventions 
Trampling on rights and emotions? Asserting dominance? Jesus Christ.
I tell people I’m carrying an excitingly infectious disease. The ones who insist they will shake my hand anyway I am likely to hate.
It’s a common social convention. Or some other form of greeting depending on who happens to be the client.
You know what I like? Working in industries that require social skills and where precious daisies and religious zealots looking to be offended constantly and push their extreme social codes (like of the rapiness of hand shakes) just self select out through their lack of flexibility.
Somebody needs a big hug!
Because it’s an expected part of socializing in certain situations and this is most especially true of formal situations.
You know what, others might pooh pooh this statement but I think it’s essentially correct. When you shake hands with another person you’re not only entering their personal space but you are in physical contact with them. This is certainly a higher level of intimacy than we find in a wave, a bow, or a simple hello.
We violate social conventions at our own peril. I wouldn’t hire you if you refused to shake my hand. If you have an inability to master a basic social custom like shaking hands then I would doubt your ability to perform other basic social rituals necessary in the work place.
My mother has an immune disorder*, which she very nicely explains when she meets new people. So it’s she who can catch an excitingly infectious disease from a handshake. Nobody has taken offense so far, though.
*Common Variable Immune Deficiency. Not as common as the name implies.
I may have issues, but this isn’t really one of them.
Yeah, but think what chain mail gloves would do for my sweating problem!
But all of that stuff is inanimate (except for one thing, and I don’t have one of those). I don’t see how it’s relevant. That’s like saying, “well you undress in front of your bed and your dresser and your lamp, so why won’t you undress in front of me?”
THANK YOU. This is really what I’ve been trying to say, I just haven’t been able to put into words.
See, this is what I’m talking about. I’m not offended when someone puts out their hand to shake. I don’t make a fuss. When I shake hands, I don’t feel violated or raped. However, we all have slightly different boundaries of our personal space that we don’t like people invading. Mine are different than yours. I’m not saying “I don’t think you are worthy of my touch.” I’m not saying “I don’t think you are clean.” I’m saying, “I would like to refrain from an action that strains my own specific personal boundary.” Why is this so upsetting? Why does it make people so angry to know that there are other people who prefer not to shake hands? Clearly I’m talking about a personal preference that doesn’t have anything to do with the particular person standing there with their hand sticking out. I also never said shaking hands is wrong or obscene for anyone. I just want to know why the idea of NOT shaking hands is treated as wrong and obscene.
As quoted above, Odesio points out that physical contact is a higher level of physical intimacy than say, waving or bowing. I’m curious if other people either think this distinction is baloney, or think that there is a different level of intimacy, but this type of physical contact is just so benign that it is reasonable for society to require it.
For those who said they wouldn’t hire someone who doesn’t shake hands: just out of curiosity, do you have hard-and-fast rules about other social faux-pas? If a candidate comes 15 minutes late to an interview, do you automatically decide not to hire them? What about if they have very clear views on politics and insult the opposition, not knowing what the views are of others in the room?
My OP was something of a rant, and I did exaggerate. After reading and thinking about these responses, I have a more clear understanding of my own dislike of shaking hands. Still, I’m sure many of us will have to agree to disagree about the this topic.
There is no way to be more clear than I was in my comment, dude. Certain social mores set the tone for interaction between parties, in the workplace as well as society in general. In the Western world, things like shaking hands, making eye contact and smiling are the norm-they have pre-assigned connotations like “I’m being friendly” or “I’m paying attention to what you’re saying” and “this is a sign of my respect for you” or whatever. There are certain places in the world where you have to bow or where you don’t make as much eye contact or don’t speak as aggressively or whatever. When Americans go to those places, they should try to adhere to those standards. But in the US a handshake is not equivalent to the rape and de-virginization of a woman, no matter how zpg zealot would like to frame men who would like to shake her gloved hand as evidence of their burgeoning serial killerdom.
And you know what? It’s irritating to work with people who nitpick, bitch and are too sensitive for the very simplest forms of social etiquette in the culture in which they choose to live and work. Because they are almost invariably troublemakers, neurotic recluses and/or prone to emotional outbursts. They require an unbelievable level of coddling and are just resource sucks wherever they go.
I’ve worked with and gone to school with people from all over the world-yes you can cut people some slack when they’re not super focused on eye contact and their handshake is a little weak because they’ve been raised in foreign cultures. Going as far as refusing to shake hands is just ridiculous-before I quit my job I was a corporate lawyer and frequently conducted business with bankers. Are you really suggesting my office should have hired employees who think handshakes are a form of physical assault? That means we offend nearly every single person who walks through our doors.
Unless the individual in question is the wealthy, eccentric client or Bjork, people are going to offended when he/she snots and cries sodomy over a handshake. No one wants to break boundaries or gang rape them-the poor handshake offerer is probably just confused about why the individual in question is so unpleasant, grim and weird.
Huh? You spent a couple of lines in your OP complaining about not knowing where people’s hands had been, sweat, and “swapping bodily fluids” 
. Now you’re saying refusing to shake hands has nothing to do with these things but instead some BS about “personal boundaries”? Then why did you mention them?