Why bother making 'friends'?

[Mikodite]

Of anything I've learned in my short stay on this planet its that people are temporary, disposable, and possibly garbage. Knowing this makes it hard for me to want to bond with people knowing that given a few months to a couple of years I will never see or hear from them again. I wish it wasn't this way, but I've learned though pattern recognition that making friends is pointless, to the point where 'friend' becomes a misnomer.

I'm wondering what others think about this (and I know I'm going to get a shit-storm of people who are going to be all 'you socially-misaligned misanthrope' on this.) I admit that I sometimes feel lonely and I do have a few people I hang around with, but I'm not friends with them: I just hang around them. There is no sense of comradely or connection, and I don't think I fit in with them anyways. There will be no hard feelings when it comes that I never see them again. I have formed emotional bonds with people before, and at best I had to feel the heartache of never seeing someone I was close to again, and a worst had this relationship betrayed, so why bother anymore if its just going to end in pain?

 

[kouriichi]

Honestly, im in the same place as you.

I really have 2 people i would call "friends".
Not to come off mean or anything, but i find alot of people to be..... >.> idiots. And i cant stand idiots.
Call me anti-social, a hermit, and troll, but in all honesty, i cant stand the general IQ of the population. The rapidly declining IQ at that.,

I think thats one reason im so attracted to the Escapist though. Most of the people were are.... Smart. They dont sit there and derp believing the goverment is always trying to do whats best for its people.

So for me, its less about the headaches and heartbreaks, but more about how FRIGGAN INEPT the general population can be. I never wanted to fit in during my years in school. Because fitting in would mean being an idiot >.>;

 

[Headdrivehardscrew]

Making friends and entertaining meaningful relationships with creatures sharing time and space with you, offering approximately the same intellect or at least some shared interests is essential to being alive. It's a rather short ride, so why not do your best to make it fun.

Even dogs and monkeys and cockroaches do it, even though they are intellectually somewhat handicapped by human standards, and since we lug around a significantly larger brain, we also get significantly more funky if we skip the social bit.

I'm in IT, been in that special drawer for roughly twenty years and counting now. In our trade, we embrace new technology, new means of communicating efficiently. We all were quick to have our own, private email adresses. We all jumped onto all those chat platforms, FAX, SMS and whatnot. We felt super smart adopting early to some of those, and then the kids took over and generated huge bills that made us look pretty stupid and useless.

We all got facebook. Most of us hate most of these privacy-invading debilitators. Take facebook, for one. Yes, it does allow me to stay in touch with people who live on the other side of the planet, and that makes perfect sense. However, it does not make much sense to "facebook with" your friends and family who live in the same city or even the same house/flat. But people are lazy, and the only thing that can be triggered in even the laziest and most useless are the very basic functions of our root system. Collect things, feel better. A number of people I know personally seem to collect "friends" on facebook. Most of the "friends" they've collected so far are complete strangers to them and could just as well be bots or fake marketing vehicles. To me, that notion is not really scary, for there are people faking it in real life on a daily basis. What bothers me is that people collectors simply don't seem to care whether their plethora of contacts is made up of real people, aliens, organ harvesters or marketing folks.

Your notion of not wanting to form emotional bonds with people anymore deserves some professional attention, though. People suck, yet worthwile discussions and carnal pleasures should really be limited to your own species, which brings most misanthropes back on track before they turn into the hag in the cave or the Unabomber.