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The heck is "flirting"?


Tarfeather

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Lord Jade Cross
Wait, dont people usually put up a persona in order to attract. That sounds like alot of concealing, at least initially.
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Telecaster68

We use personas in every situation. We're different versions of ourselves to parents, friends, colleagues. We choose what we reveal to different people. You can call it concealment, but we can't reveal all of ourselves to everyone (not enough time, apart from anything else), so we have choose what we to reveal and that means some things and not others.

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Lord Jade Cross
Yes but what I mean is that if you compare pre relationship conceal with post relationships (or in depending on you it goes) each person usually puts out what they consider to be the best attributes to attract, at times even resorting to using traits they normally dont do and even then, there are things that people keep from one another within a relationship.
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Telecaster68

But that's not flirting. Flirting is a kind of social interaction.

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We use personas in every situation. We're different versions of ourselves to parents, friends, colleagues. We choose what we reveal to different people. You can call it concealment, but we can't reveal all of ourselves to everyone (not enough time, apart from anything else), so we have choose what we to reveal and that means some things and not others.

Yeah, but as you say, those are personas. The core self stays the same throughout, and if you happen to be able to sense that aspect of a person, all the putting on a persona becomes sort of a side show to the real getting to know each other.

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Telecaster68

There's a good argument that the core self is in fact a set of personas...

But to apply that idea to flirting - why can't a 'core self' flirt? It's about communicating interest, not demonstrating some platonic version of yourself.

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There's a good argument that the core self is in fact a set of personas...

The contrary, it has no persona, and needs to make use of personas in order to interact with the world. Basically, the core self is like the hardware, and the persona is like the software. Even though a person might adapt a variety of personas, the hardware that those personas run on is limited, and understanding it will make you really understand the person, whereas understanding the personas will just help you understand how someone wants to be seen at a particular time.

But to apply that idea to flirting - why can't a 'core self' flirt? It's about communicating interest, not demonstrating some platonic version of yourself.

Well, I never claimed it couldn't, but to answer the question, it's because without persona there's no motivation to flirt. Any kind of interaction, on one hand you have your "projections" interacting with each other, like a theater, and then you have the "selves" interacting, but they're kind of detached and don't really inherently care about what's going on. Still, by understanding that "detached" level of the interaction, you can understand and model things that wouldn't make sense by just looking at the personas.

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Telecaster68
Basically, the core self is like the hardware, and the persona is like the software

Yeah, that's one version. There's another approach, beloved especially of French post modernist philosophers, that there is no core self, so all we are is a set of interactions in different contexts. Different contexts give us different versions of ourselves, which is basically the same as personas. I tend more towards your version, but this is all deeply speculative, subjective theory of mind stuff.

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Flirting is a way to move someone closer towards the center of your zone of intimacy, or maybe show them, that's what you want!! (Not necessary to the core=love/sex/partner) How you do it, is different, but teasing, humour and bodily contact is usually part of it!

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Yeah, that's one version. There's another approach, beloved especially of French post modernist philosophers, that there is no core self, so all we are is a set of interactions in different contexts. Different contexts give us different versions of ourselves, which is basically the same as personas. I tend more towards your version, but this is all deeply speculative, subjective theory of mind stuff.

Wouldn't this just mean that the only way to your core self is to be on your own, because your behaviour will be influenced as soon as you get in touch with others?

Besides that, by now I tend to think that "flirting" has to be mutual to work. If you're trying to flirt and it doesn't work because they're oblivious or not interested, it's not a flirt. If you're being friendly and it's considered to be a flirt, it's not a flirt.

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Telecaster68

Wouldn't this just mean that the only way to your core self is to be on your own, because your behaviour will be influenced as soon as you get in touch with others?

They'd say there is no core self, and I'd guess get into some complicated guff about how if you're on your own, your thought processes are still theoretically putting yourself in a given context, creating a 'self' still reliant on that context. That's just a guess though. And that kind of issue is why I think it's largely bollocks, or at least utterly pointless.

"flirting" has to be mutual to work

Well, yes. But one person can start flirting and see if the other responds.

If you're being friendly and it's considered to be a flirt, it's not a flirt.

That's one way to look at it. By the same token though, nobody could ever be considered 'friendly' if someone wasn't being friendly back at them.

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That's one way to look at it. By the same token though, nobody could ever be considered 'friendly' if someone wasn't being friendly back at them.

Have you ever worked in retail? :D

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Lord Jade Cross
I have. I have hated it too :p Especially when customers dont get that its part of the job and Im not looking for anything with them (except wanting them to leave but shhh dont let them hear that XD)
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