Comment by mrweasel

Danes are, according to the internet, in the "don't talk to me ever" group, but I don't think that true. Mostly I believe that's because the areas of the internet where people talk about the glory of self-checkout and the benefits of wearing big ass head phones are a little self-selective in their view of the world.

Obviously you should not bother people, but even in random encounters many people absolutely loves to talk. In many you can see their eyes light up if you talk to them of ask them a question. The internet has us so conditioned to believing that people just want to be left alone that we miss out on a ton of wonderful human interaction.

We honestly can't keep both talking about a loneliness epidemic and at the same time push the narrative "don't talk to me ever". We should absolutely respect e.g. people on the autism spectre or anxiety and their issues with talking to strangers, but I feel like we're allowing them to dictate a mode of interaction, or avoidance thereof, which isn't healthy for the rest of us.