"No."

It's a complete sentence.

Still AI.

One of the — admittedly many — things that irks me about American culture¹ is the assumption that complete strangers have the right to issues demands of other individuals.

I was talking about this subject with a dear friend of mine and Rita’s at FoolzCon, and while explaining this to him, I could feel myself getting angry. I come from an honour culture, and to be offered a demand by someone who has no right to do so is an impertinence, and an insulting one at that.

Gentlemen², y’all need to understand that there is a limited pool of people who have the right to make demands of you. And even in that pool, there is a significant portion of those people who only have the right to issue a demand under certain, limited circumstances.

Everyone has the right to *ask* things of you. Very few people have the right to *demand* things from you. And y’all need to learn this, and start practicing it.

Strangers never have the right to issue a private demand of you. Notice I said “private”: strangers who have been granted public authority by society have more powers to make demands — under limited circumstances, still.

I suspect — and the reason for this rambling article — that my antipathy regarding demands from strangers is probably due to the fact that a demand — especially a soft one — is a somewhat effective method for exerting some degree of psychological control over the subject.

We see this all the time with salesmen — especially used car salesmen — and in non-socially-sanctioned predators.

This is how an Army private walks into a dealership wanting to buy that used pick-up, and walks out with a brand-new Camaro at 24.99% APR.

“Oh, you want that clunker? Why don’t you sit in this sportscar while I talk to the manager.”

“I know you’re interested in that pick-up, but let’s take this little beauty for a spin.”

“What is keeping you from leaving in this Camaro?”

All soft demands. You know how to discern such? When you ask the private why he didn’t just walk the hell out, he responds, “Sarge, I couldn’t say ‘No’.”

Of course he could, but this idiot American custom of acquiescing to a demand from a stranger got him jammed up with payments that were a significant part of his salary.

Woman in a bar at closing time, her ride bails. Stranger offers to give her a ride. She says, “No”; he responds something along the lines of, “Oh, we’re strangers. Hi, I’m Frank. And your name is?” Soft demand.

She replies with her name, “We’re not strangers any more”, the patter starts — more soft demands — and next thing you know he’s giving her a ride to the scene of the sexual assault.

Lest you think this is an issue confined to the fair sex, a lot of muggings of men start off with, “Hey, buddy, can you give me a light?” “Hey, brother, I need change to eat,” and similar.

You need to learn that “No” is a complete sentence. And you need to start treating demands from complete strangers as the psychological ploy — and complete utter impertinence — that they are. You say, “No” to a request, and they continue to press — that’s an insult, a demand that you play their reindeer games, and should be regarded as such.

Yesterday I was on the front porch after work, sipping some tea, and watching a smartly-dressed young man work his patter on a lady of the house down the street. Her body language was obviously uncomfortable, but he was good at his con, and she finally wound up signing some paper he had on a clip-board. Satisfied, he came down the street and walked up to our porch. As he was smiling and reaching out his hand from the bottom of the steps, I said, “No.”

He blinked at me, turned up the wattage on his smile, and started, “Sir, I’m not selling …”

I swallowed the flash of annoyance, “‘No’ is a complete sentence, Zippy. Step off.”

He moved on to his next victim down the street.

Was my response rude? For Americans, probably. Did it cause him harm? Nope. Did it save me from him wasting my time? Hell, yes.

Urban Outdoorsman demands change in the parking lot? “No” is a complete sentence, and keep moving watchfully

Socially Disadvantaged Youth demands to come into your apartment to use the phone for an emergency? “No” is a complete sentence, shut and bar the door.

Salesman upselling … anything? “No” is a complete sentence, and walk away to find a purveyor of whatever who’ll listen to you.

Lot of people would be a lot happier, and safer, if they’d learn this.

Ian

1. And by extension Internet culture.

2. “Ian, what about the distaff side of the species?” I don’t know — I’ve never been female.