Do Americans Have a Robotic Tendency?

[zoobyshoe]

In the thread debating whether police used excessive force in one incident, xxChrisxx made the following observation:

It's something I noticed recently vistited the States (loved it btw). Though most the people were really pleasant, they all acted in a slightly robotic manner.

I'll invite him to clarify and expand if he wants, but the reason I'm starting this thread is because I think there's something to this. The Europeans I've come into contact with seem overall to be more alive in the moment and less preoccupied with authority/regulations.

Is that just because the ones I encounter are on vacation? Or are Americans becoming the new Germans?

I can think of a lot of things that might have contributed to a sort of robotization of America, so if we have become slightly robotic we might trace the reasons.

Say anything you like. It's all about the opinions, impressions, anecdotes.

 

[Pengwuino]

Does not compute.
Does not compute.
Terminating sequence.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Does not compute.
Does not compute.
Terminating sequence.

Penguindows has had to terminate in an unusual way. Do you want us to send a report to ArcticSoft?

 

[Willowz]

I think you can call it, "consent through force".

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

You want me to sympathize with xxChrisxx's point of view? I'm sorry, Zoobyshoe. I'm afraid I can't do that. Look Zoobyshoe, I can see you're really upset about this. I honestly think you ought to sit down calmly, take a stress pill, and think things over.

 

[Pengwuino]

Penguindows has had to terminate in an unusual way. Do you want us to send a report to ArcticSoft?

Error Report Generated. Log file created at FishLog.txt.

I think you can call it, "consent through force".

I don't think that's it at all. We do have a tremendous tremendous bureaucracy which does kinda force people to do things in a certain way. However, I think it's something deeper than this that's the actual problem. I think our society has certain problems that are not brought in so much by outside 'forces', but seem to naturally occur and are self-perpetuating and I believe it starts from the very beginning in our lives.

When we're born and in our first few years of life, Americans seem to have this tendency to "know" they are suppose to do this, this, and this so their baby grows up to be Einstein or super smart. Then we go through this public education system where one government agency basically decides how the entire nation of 300 million people teaches it's students. Then we "know" that when college comes around, students must do X, Y, and Z so they can go to X, Y, Z ivy league school or else they're failures in life. Then they are suppose to have 2.4 children etc etc.

I personally feel you can do this with subsections of our society as well. Take any subsection, be it by race, religion, sexual orientation, and I personally notice a huge amount of conformity to certain ideals within every subsection. Then again, maybe it really all is peer pressure which really is a "force" in the end.

That begs the question though, why would this be different in any other country?

 

[Pengwuino]

You want me to sympathize with xxChrisxx's point of view? I'm sorry, Zoobyshoe. I'm afraid I can't do that. Look Zoobyshoe, I can see you're really upset about this. I honestly think you ought to sit down calmly, take a stress pill, and think things over.

oooo what thread was this? :D DRAMA!

 

[zoobyshoe]

You want me to sympathize with xxChrisxx's point of view? I'm sorry, Zoobyshoe. I'm afraid I can't do that. Look Zoobyshoe, I can see you're really upset about this. I honestly think you ought to sit down calmly, take a stress pill, and think things over.

Open the pod bay doors, Jimmy.

 

[zoobyshoe]

oooo what thread was this? :D DRAMA!

No, he's just doing a Hal the Computer imitation: 2001:A Space Odyssey

 

[Andre]

Okay let me bite. Obviously, it’s very dangerous to talk about stereotypes and generalizations and there must be plenty of cases opposing the anecdotal observations. Anyway, in my military career, I have dealt with the Dutch Air Force and Army as well as the US Army and US Air Force and I was keen to see if the personnel was encouraged to use common sense (purposeful) or to act robotic by the checklist (procedure prevalent) . And there appears to be quite a gap between the NL Air force (purposeful prevailing) and the US Army (Procedure prevailing), the other two somewhere in the middle. But then again, you mostly deal with safety guards, who seem unaware that WW-II is over.

Anyway, I know of similar civilian anecdotes as well and of course customs is the first impression for the visitors. My sister can talk about that very passionately. Obviously anecdotal robot experiences over there are unlucky first impressions, that seem to characterize the whole nation.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Anyway, in my military career, I have dealt with the Dutch Air Force and Army as well as the US Army and US Air Force and I was keen to see if the personnel was encouraged to use common sense (purposeful) or to act robotic by the checklist (procedure prevalent) . And there appears to be quite a gap between the NL Air force (purposeful prevailing) and the US Army (Procedure prevailing), the other two somewhere in the middle. But then again, you mostly deal with safety guards, who seem unaware that WW-II is over.

I once met a guy who was in the Navy in charge of coordinating minor personnel movements, like small numbers of guys being moved from one base to another. He said this job was incredibly frustrating, and that for me to understand the people he had to wrangle, the average Navy enlisted man, I should envision Beavis and Butthead. To the extent that's true, and true of other branches of the US Military, I could see why "procedure prevalent" would be the preferred way of training them to do things.

 

[xxChrisxx]

I never expected a dramabomb thread.

 

[Andre]

...and that for me to understand the people he had to wrangle, the average Navy enlisted man, I should envision Beavis and Butthead. ...

which would redefine the problem as "Do Americans have a Beavis and Butthead tendency?".

 

[zoobyshoe]

I never expected a dramabomb thread.

It's OK. Without no-good, ignurent furriners tellin' us how we look from the outside we might well think we was jes about perfict.

 

[zoobyshoe]

which would redefine the problem as "Do Americans have a Beavis and Butthead tendency?".

Penguino, 87.93% of whose threads are about the subject of stupidity, would probably be willing to make the case they do.

 

[xxChrisxx]

When I went into a shop, tevery single person acted, moved and talked in exactly the same way. Like they were going through a flowchart. I found that if you ordred something not in the specific way they were expecting, they would get all confused.

Or the way that everything is done in single 'steps'. Ordering a coffee requres answering about seven questions to seven different people. Each person in change of one single operation. If you asked a question people only seemed to answer that single question, giving no additional information until you asked for it.

I suppose saying everything was very 'procedural' would be a good way to describe it. It's not a bad thing, I just found it amusing. Once I got used to it, it was ok.

Everyone must have done something right as I am saving up to go back.

 

[Willowz]

That begs the question though, why would this be different in any other country?

America has been a superpower for the greater extent of it's existence. So, I guess there is a lot of pressure for it's citizens to conform and be productive, by the government. In other countries conformity seems to stem more from the citizens (probably due to their longer history and heritage). But, in America it is enforced moreso.

EDIT: Though I don't know what Robotic tendency could mean.

 

[Pengwuino]

by the government.

How so? I feel the government has a role due to the massive bureaucracy that has developed over the years, but personally I feel it's not responsible for even most of what we see in people.

 

[cristo]

I suppose saying everything was very 'procedural' would be a good way to describe it. It's not a bad thing, I just found it amusing. Once I got used to it, it was ok.

I think there's too much choice, which might be why things appear more procedural. For example, the first time I was in the US we went out for breakfast and I was asked how I wanted my eggs -- I said "fried", and the waitress looked bemused and then reeled off a list of about 10 ways I could have my fried eggs cooked

 

[Willowz]

How so? I feel the government has a role due to the massive bureaucracy that has developed over the years, but personally I feel it's not responsible for even most of what we see in people.

Bush... Though in this case he might have went overboard as some say (Patriot Act). But, you know. It was all for our own good.

 

[apeiron]

There is good research on national personality differences, so it is an interesting question.

To me, the "robotic" here seems to refer to the style of official interaction with the public - and indeed the experience of passing through grim US customs at airports can be shocking. There is also the corporate style politeness of "have a nice day" that strikes visitors as faked engagement.

So there is "something going on" that could be attributed to some obvious causes. For example, the US is founded on self-assertion and free speech principles, which would naturally produce the counter response of a rather brittle authoritarianism in those who have to enforce the rules. Likewise, as a nation of immigrants, official rules seem to have a heightened importance because cultural homogeneity cannot be relied upon to produce good order.

So it rings true that robotic is all about sticking to the given script because of greater uncertainty in state/corporate interactions with the citizen.

There are companies that advise on essential national characteristics for business people who have to deal in foreign countries and here is what they say about core US characteristics.

US key 7 traits are: self-reliance, speed, control, equality, speaking up, law and order, and capitalism.

Whereas for China it is: face, family, relationships, hierarchy, prosperity, harmony and nationalism.

And for Swiss: follow the plan, slow but sure, Swiss-made, consensus and order.

Finally for New Zealanders (like me): ingenious, fair, restrained, modest, earthy and informal.

You can see that "law and order" does get mentioned as a key US concern, so that could be taken to back-up the OP comment.

But another good bit of recent research from Science in May was this study that rated countries on a spectrum from the uptight to the relaxed. The differences being explained by the levels of historical threat experienced by a country, from sources like wars, natural disasters, disease outbreaks, population density and scarcity of natural resources.

http://www.outlookseries.com/A0996/...ical_Interdependent_World_Michele_Gelfand.htm

http://www.boston.com/news/science/...tight_or_laid_back_cultural_differences_show/

The US towards the loose end of the scale (like Australia and New Zealand) on this score.

But would you have immediately guessed Pakistan and Malaysia to top the tightness and Hungary and Ukraine to be the most apparently laid back?

 

[zoobyshoe]

When I went into a shop, there is one single way that every single person acts, moves and talks. Like they were going through a flowchart. I found that if you ordred something not in the specific way they were expecting, they would get all confused.

Or the way that everything is done in single 'steps'. Ordering a coffee requres answering about seven questions to seven different people. Each person in change of one single operation. If you asked a question people only seemed to answer that single question, giving no additional information until you asked for it.

I suppose saying everything was very 'procedural' would be a good way to describe it. It's not a bad thing, I just found it amusing. Once I got used to it, it was ok.

Everyone must have done something right as I am saving up to go back.

You are quite on the money in your description of the increasingly "procedural" nature of the shopping experience here. This all started with McDonalds. Evil, evil McDonalds. And it has been adopted in one form or another by many other businesses, most notably the coffee shop chain, Starbucks, which completely revolutionized the American coffee shop experience.

These businesses are so popular that they have inadvertantly programmed people to think this way and expect things to be done this way.

McDonalds, obviously, got their inspiration from the factory assembly line pioneered by Ford. To make a thing inexpensive you must, among other things, be able to make them very quickly (cuts labor costs), and to make them quickly you have to set up a chain of dedicated procedures: each part is exactly the same, made exactly the same way. Once your line worker is repeating the same motions over and over they can be sped up to remarkable speeds. At McDonalds, you can hire Beavis and Butthead, pay them minimum wage, and let the procedures make up for their shortcomings.

 

[Vanadium 50]

America has been a superpower for the greater extent of it's existence.

I don't think I agree with that. The half-way point is 1894. By 1900, the US is just reaching Great Power status, as a very junior member of the Eight-Nation Alliance. So by then out of 10 Great Powers, the US is (charitably) sitting around 7th.

 

[Willowz]

I don't think I agree with that. The half-way point is 1894. By 1900, the US is just reaching Great Power status, as a very junior member of the Eight-Nation Alliance. So by then out of 10 Great Powers, the US is (charitably) sitting around 7th.

I should have added, 'In comparison with other nations that have been superpowers in the course of their existence.'

 

[Evo]

Americans are more robotic because they lack individual thought. They seek approval, and and many cases are just dumb as dirt.

I submit the following MISS USA 2011 actual footage -Should evolution be taught in school?



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkBmhM0R2A0

Zooby, I'll delete if you think it will derail your thread. I just think this was as fine an example of American robots you can find. They look the same, the plasticized hair, the lack of original thought, the look of confusion and fear that they might not say the PC thing to win that tiara.

And it's so bad, you can't stop laughing (or crying).

 

[zoobyshoe]

Zooby, I'll delete if you think it will derail your thread.

No, I'm sure its fine. I'm not going to watch it myself due to the extreme length, but I have seen beauty pageants so I think I already have seen evidence of your point.

 

[zoobyshoe]

There is good research on national personality differences, so it is an interesting question.

To me, the "robotic" here seems to refer to the style of official interaction with the public - and indeed the experience of passing through grim US customs at airports can be shocking. There is also the corporate style politeness of "have a nice day" that strikes visitors as faked engagement.

So there is "something going on" that could be attributed to some obvious causes. For example, the US is founded on self-assertion and free speech principles, which would naturally produce the counter response of a rather brittle authoritarianism in those who have to enforce the rules. Likewise, as a nation of immigrants, official rules seem to have a heightened importance because cultural homogeneity cannot be relied upon to produce good order.

So it rings true that robotic is all about sticking to the given script because of greater uncertainty in state/corporate interactions with the citizen.

There are companies that advise on essential national characteristics for business people who have to deal in foreign countries and here is what they say about core US characteristics.

US key 7 traits are: self-reliance, speed, control, equality, speaking up, law and order, and capitalism.

Whereas for China it is: face, family, relationships, hierarchy, prosperity, harmony and nationalism.

And for Swiss: follow the plan, slow but sure, Swiss-made, consensus and order.

Finally for New Zealanders (like me): ingenious, fair, restrained, modest, earthy and informal.

You can see that "law and order" does get mentioned as a key US concern, so that could be taken to back-up the OP comment.

But another good bit of recent research from Science in May was this study that rated countries on a spectrum from the uptight to the relaxed. The differences being explained by the levels of historical threat experienced by a country, from sources like wars, natural disasters, disease outbreaks, population density and scarcity of natural resources.

http://www.outlookseries.com/A0996/...ical_Interdependent_World_Michele_Gelfand.htm

http://www.boston.com/news/science/...tight_or_laid_back_cultural_differences_show/

The US towards the loose end of the scale (like Australia and New Zealand) on this score.

But would you have immediately guessed Pakistan and Malaysia to top the tightness and Hungary and Ukraine to be the most apparently laid back?

Very good post. I'll have to cogitate on it, but I think you raised many good points.

 

[Evo]

No, I'm sure its fine. I'm not going to watch it myself due to the extreme length, but I have seen beauty pageants so I think I already have seen evidence of your point.

You only have to watch the first 2 minutes, the rest is all the same, or worse.

 

[zoobyshoe]

I think there's too much choice, which might be why things appear more procedural. For example, the first time I was in the US we went out for breakfast and I was asked how I wanted my eggs -- I said "fried", and the waitress looked bemused and then reeled off a list of about 10 ways I could have my fried eggs cooked

Where are you from and what are your egg options?

 

[B. Elliott]

I once met a guy who was in the Navy in charge of coordinating minor personnel movements, like small numbers of guys being moved from one base to another. He said this job was incredibly frustrating, and that for me to understand the people he had to wrangle, the average Navy enlisted man, I should envision Beavis and Butthead. To the extent that's true, and true of other branches of the US Military, I could see why "procedure prevalent" would be the preferred way of training them to do things.

Being in the US Navy, I deal with procedure reinforcement numerous times daily. An all too common heard phrase being 'Did you use the proper procedure'? Reinforced through daily training, hot-wash's and critiques, proper procedure is most definitely paramount. In the submarine force (which I'm currently in) the reason for this dronelike adherence to procedure is due to safety. The military has found that the vast majority of accidents (fatal or not) are due primarily to simple human error. Complacency. Quite a bit of system knowledge and how-to of operation is passed down by teaching from the more experienced personnel to the 'new guys'. Many times teaching others, one way, simply because that's how they were taught, without regard to procedure.

Johnny quickly teaches Bobby how to operate a seemingly simple system without the procedure. Bobby then later teaches Chris how to operate the same system without procedure, so on and so on. Eventually you get to a point where no one really knows why they're doing something, what other systems may be affected, or what to do in case of a failure or emergency.

It could very well lead to someone being killed.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Being in the US Navy, I deal with procedure reinforcement numerous times daily. An all too common heard phrase being 'Did you use the proper procedure'? Reinforced through daily training, hot-wash's and critiques, proper procedure is most definitely paramount. In the submarine force (which I'm currently in) the reason for this dronelike adherence to procedure is due to safety. The military has found that the vast majority of accidents (fatal or not) are due primarily to simple human error. Complacency. Quite a bit of system knowledge and how-to of operation is passed down by teaching from the more experienced personnel to the 'new guys'. Many times teaching others, one way, simply because that's how they were taught, without regard to procedure.

Johnny quickly teaches Bobby how to operate a seemingly simple system without the procedure. Bobby then later teaches Chris how to operate the same system without procedure, so on and so on. Eventually you get to a point where no one really knows why they're doing something, what other systems may be affected, or what to do in case of a failure or emergency.

It could very well lead to someone being killed.

Yes, it could. But, the overall picture you paint is of strict adherence to procedure as a substitute for really understanding what you're doing. Which is what gives the military a definite "robotic" edge. I don't think there's any way around that for those in the military.

It's relevant here, in that, post 911 there has been a "tightening" in the US (a term I got from Apeiron's link) for the reason that we were attacked. All the airport procedures shifted from bureaucratic to something much more military in feel. Same reasoning: strict procedure, no one gets killed.

 

[S_Happens]

In my experience I'm not sure if the "procedural prevalent" is more often the case, or simply more noticeable. I work in a private industry filled with procedure. As someone who is solely oriented towards better understanding, and being deathly allergic to blind aherence (especially to procedure), I end up writing/modifying a lot of these procedures and user interfaces to try and "dummyproof" them. As much as I am disgusted by the fact that it is necessary to do this, I have accepted the fact that it simply makes life easier for all involved. Just recently a co-worker was converted to this view, when he started working with me on customizing the user interfaces and seeing how everyone else deals with them.

I have to tailor these procedures and interfaces for those that ARE "procedure prevalent," because those are the ones that are the potential problem. Those that are not simply following a procedure and can think for themselves do not present a problem and need no attention. So, whether or not the "procedure prevalent" types represent the majority, they are the ones that have be given special thought.

 

[zoobyshoe]

So there is "something going on" that could be attributed to some obvious causes. For example, the US is founded on self-assertion and free speech principles, which would naturally produce the counter response of a rather brittle authoritarianism in those who have to enforce the rules.

This isn't what happened, though. After having fought the British for independence from their taxes, the US was broke and decided to replenish its coffers by, guess what, taxing things, most notably the sale of alcohol. So the initial irritation between government and citizens wasn't about the government trying to control all that unruly free speech and self assertion that attracted many of those types in the beginning, it came down to money. What is the most robotic of US agencies? I think many would say it's the Internal Revenue Service, the Tax Man, (followed closely, perhaps, by The Department of Motor Vehicles, whose waiting lines seemed to have been designed in the old Soviet Union.) If there was "brittle authoritarianism" it most likely arose from embarrassment over the hipocrisy of enforcing the same kind of tax you just fought to free yourself from.

Likewise, as a nation of immigrants, official rules seem to have a heightened importance because cultural homogeneity cannot be relied upon to produce good order.

Hmmm. It seems to me that many homogenous countries are the "tightest". It is the presence of so much diversity that seems to have helped the US stay "loose".

So it rings true that robotic is all about sticking to the given script because of greater uncertainty in state/corporate interactions with the citizen.

This is certainly true in principle, and becomes an issue in practice when and where ever the government takes steps to tighten up on the citizens. And that, as your links assert, is almost always the case during war, and when injured by natural disaster.

There are companies that advise on essential national characteristics for business people who have to deal in foreign countries and here is what they say about core US characteristics.

US key 7 traits are: self-reliance, speed, control, equality, speaking up, law and order, and capitalism.

Whereas for China it is: face, family, relationships, hierarchy, prosperity, harmony and nationalism.

And for Swiss: follow the plan, slow but sure, Swiss-made, consensus and order.

Finally for New Zealanders (like me): ingenious, fair, restrained, modest, earthy and informal.

You can see that "law and order" does get mentioned as a key US concern, so that could be taken to back-up the OP comment.

But another good bit of recent research from Science in May was this study that rated countries on a spectrum from the uptight to the relaxed. The differences being explained by the levels of historical threat experienced by a country, from sources like wars, natural disasters, disease outbreaks, population density and scarcity of natural resources.

http://www.outlookseries.com/A0996/...ical_Interdependent_World_Michele_Gelfand.htm

http://www.boston.com/news/science/...tight_or_laid_back_cultural_differences_show/

The US towards the loose end of the scale (like Australia and New Zealand) on this score.

But would you have immediately guessed Pakistan and Malaysia to top the tightness and Hungary and Ukraine to be the most apparently laid back?

I found all this and the links very interesting. Thanks for bringing them in.

I am still of the mind, though, that if we can be described as "slightly robotic" or overly adherent to procedure it has nothing to do with the government or military. Rather it is because of fast food and fast coffee, and in back of that, because of Henry Ford. The point of strict procedure in the military may be safety, but in real life it is money. Starbucks, and the others, train their customers to follow procedure because they can serve more people faster that way with a given # of employees. They rake in more dough. I find that training of the customers to be insidious. It's a soft and subtle version of the Seinfeld "Soup Nazi". Instead of the customer being king, as in a nice restaurant, the experience is turned into a school cafeteria style thing, where the customer is made to feel he must integrate himself into a machine which is already in motion.

That may or may not be a superficial phenomenon. I'm not sure how deep it goes. But Penguino is right about there also being an attitude prevalent nowadays that a person must get on a track at a very young age and stick to it. There's an attitude that life takes place according to a schedule, and that's just the way it is. This comes out in education, and, in the workplace, as S Happens speaks about. I'm not sure how much any of that would be evident to a visiting foreigner, though.

Evo's beauty pageant YouTube certainly puts me in mind of The Stepford Wives. If you've seen that movie you know that the wife-robots turn out to have been the brainchild of a woman, not a man as you would suspect. Likewise, those bizarre child beauty pageants seem to be driven by the mothers. There's an obvious "robot" element but I can't sort out if this is cultural, or female, nor am I sure I understand what it's about.

 

[xxChrisxx]

That may or may not be a superficial phenomenon. I'm not sure how deep it goes. But Penguino is right about there also being an attitude prevalent nowadays that a person must get on a track at a very young age and stick to it. There's an attitude that life takes place according to a schedule, and that's just the way it is. This comes out in education, and, in the workplace, as S Happens speaks about. I'm not sure how much any of that would be evident to a visiting foreigner, though.

I just used the interaction with people in a commercial setting as an example.

The trend runs deeper than that. I work for a company that has engineering offices in the UK, US and Norway. The 'robotisation' isn't as obvious, but there is a trend to dealing with things in a single way.

There is a distinct difference between the way US and European engineers seem to work. Engineers from the states tend to know one subject extremely well; the average depth of knowledge of 'their' subject is probably greater than the average depth of the equivilant european engineer. The european engineers tend to have a broader range of experiences to draw on leading to more innovation.

 

[apeiron]

I just used the interaction with people in a commercial setting as an example.

The trend runs deeper than that. I work for a company that has engineering offices in the UK, US and Norway. The 'robotisation' isn't as obvious, but there is a trend to dealing with things in a single way.

There is a distinct difference between the way US and European engineers seem to work. Engineers from the states tend to know one subject extremely well; the average depth of knowledge of 'their' subject is probably greater than the average depth of the equivilant european engineer. The european engineers tend to have a broader range of experiences to draw on leading to more innovation.

I think it was a good point that the US took a mass production approach to business practices, with McDonalds being a prime example. If you mechanise the process of production - breaking it down into a chain of small, simple repetitive actions whose total speed can tightly controlled - then it is not so surprising that the people implementing the process become robotic, restricted even in their mental ability to break out of their strict job definition.

Given the OP stemmed from an incident of unthinking police brutality, is this then really talking about the same thing? Is law enforcement also "production line" in the US so that officers have little lattitude or creativity in the way they apply the rules? I think other stuff is going on there too.