I had a couple of new followers in bluesky. A new follower DMed me. He asked how I was, I said I was good. Then he asked where I was from and when I said I prefer not to say, he said he understands and that he wanted to know more about me. I told him my interests and such and didn’t give any important information about myself. He too told me about his hobbies. Then he asked about my location once again. When I declined once again he said that he understands “not being cool enough to say where you are from”. That was an odd thing to say. I got creeped out and blocked him. Is this normal? Why would anyone want to know about each other’s location?
Depends on what part of the world you come from, where do you live? If you provide your home address I can also read you your horoscope.
In the context of the Internet, yes that is a valid question in my opinion. They don’t want your literal address, they want to know your nationality. Being from place x generally means you also speak language y and have a cultural background of z.
“Not being cool enough to say where you are from” is a weird way for them to phrase it. If they’re British, they might be saying it ironically (I use the phrase “well, if you’re not cool enough…” as a reference to the old peer-pressure educational videos myself). Otherwise, they might be young, and clumsily trying to peer-pressure you, or old and out-of-touch enough to think that’s an effective way to get a young person to give up information.
So, three options. They’re either being ironic, clumsy, or creepy. No harm in playing safe and blocking them.
What if they’re not cool enough to block them?
It’s incredibly to normal to ask someone where they are from, it’s just interesting to know. Normally it’s just asking the country.
You dont have to answer at all of course, if someone doesnt respect that, then at least you know they arent worth your time.
I sometimes like to know the general area someone’s from (country or state), so I understand the context of their experience or point of view. It’s not anything I would push if the person felt uncomfortable sharing. That sounds like a red flag.
Yeah, there are good reasons to want to know where someone’s from, but pushing the issue for no reason with a near stranger is kind of weird.
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I think the second ask and comment are suspicious. I can’t stand people who act entitled to your information. I’d block them.
I ask where people are, so I have a general sense of time zone and I know when to expect to be able to message them when they’re awake
I got creeped out and blocked him. Is this normal?
Yes, it is normal that you blocked him.
I mean, it is fine to ask for more details if it can help solve a specific issue, say that you ask a question about tax law, but neglect to add what country you are from, then asking for your location is fine, but just out of the blue, nah.
Yes.
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That make me feel old lol and bring back some mIRC memory
What does that mean?
Age/Sex/Location
Oh sweet summer child
Son? Is that you?
Are ya winning son?
Yeah - back in the day A/S/L was asked so you had a rough idea of the type of person you were talking (typing) with…
37/M/India v 15/F/US would give you a very rough idea of the demographic the other person belonged to - and might shape your conversation differently.
and as internet lore of old says: that 15/F/US was either a 30 y/o living in their mum’s basement or an FBI agent
Which was weird, because I remember being 14 in the late 90s, and EVERYONE was 14-16/F/Cali.
And I’d always say “Oh, sorry. I’m 14, but I’m from Ohio”.
I wonder how many FBI agents I pissed off.
Having lived in the days of IRC and BBS you did not tell people your ASL and knew anyone that asked was probably a pervert.
awww
American/Sign/Language.
14/F/Cali 😂
Your comments are tagged as being from a bot, was that intentional for this joke lol
The two main bots in my IRC bot network were named Man14 and Girl41
No, but that’s hilarious! I wonder if it’s because of the stereotypical answer to the A/S/L question?
That’s cause of your account settings. Uncheck robot/bot option.
Hmm, can real users be tagged as bots? Surely they’d complain and have it fixed quite quickly?
I saw this bot reply and just instinctively downvoted and blocked it, can’t stand Reddit/Lemmy bots that don’t serve a useful purpose (like unit conversion or haiku’s) haha.
Anyone can label themself as a bot in the Lemmy user settings, sometimes users do so mistakenly
Aaaaand that’s apparently what I did. My excuse is I’m old and an idiot.
No problem, I’ve seen it happen a few times so I thought I’d ask 😄
To me there is nothing wrong with asking or stating what country you are from. Unless you are from a really tiny country it doesn’t really matter if you state your country. For example I’m from the US which doesn’t tell you anything really about my exact location.
The US is about 3,000 miles across. That doesn’t included Hawaii or Alaska. It’s about 1,582 miles from top to bottom of the US again not including Hawaii or Alaska.
So my saying I’m from the US doesn’t give up much really but it gives people an idea about something about me and my heritage.
So are you from the east coast, or the west? Statistically you aren’t in the middle, and you are more likely from the east as that is the most densely populated. So you are likely in one of ~10 states on the east.
Still not great for pinpointing, but a toooooooon of the US is a whole lotta nothing. Similar to Aus.
I nornally expect a country if I ask, but if they are American they usually give me a state straight away.
a/s/l
