denim

I'm seeing more happening in this thread than I expected when I started it. We're all saying real things, as the topic strikes us. It's all valid, though I really did mean more toward what Bill O'Rights, Xell101, and raeanna74 said than the rest.

Hadn't really thought of it as a numbers thing, but it likely is just that. Working at a WalMart, I expect the emphasis is on cost and convienience at the cost of personal service and caring. In other words, that's what part of the cost of driving down the prices is, for instance: higher buyer throughput, which means a lower amount of time spent with each person. The idea is simply to process the people STAT, rather than to chat witih them and have a social time as well.

And I find, if I think of it that way, that I'm guilty too, from the other side of the counter. I generally want to get in and out as fast as I can. I barely see the cashiers and other workers in a WalMart, let alone try to chat with them, especially when the place is busy, which it usually is when I go in.

Social reparte is not rewarded on either person's part by the other, at least often enough to make it worth the risk of an attempt. So, maybe we're "consumers" because that's all we usually want, and it becomes a habit. Price and convienience become more important than socializing, and we end up holding each other at arms length, at best.

At the worst, we do our socializing on-line. This keeps the risk at a minimum and the people at some large multiple of arm's length units.