willem wrote:
I think "responding out of courtesy" is the normal level of caring for NT's, unless they have a close relationship with the person talking to them.
This is my point, these were not simply people I knew in passing. If I flat-out ignored them, they would have been offended. I didn't do anything more than saying hello if they said hello. Zero eye contact, since I'm not a fan and if I don't care I'm not going to punish myself for the sake of being nice to them. Again, from what I've witnessed in other people, this is not "normal" levels of caring, normal would be responding, asking some stupid question like "what's up," spending a minute talking about pointless things.
I'm not completely ignoring these people, that's childish, and that's not indifferent in that ignoring shows that you
do care, but merely in a negative way. I'm simply responding at the very minimal level. While NTs often irritate me, I'm well aware that for them indifference is not the same as ignoring.
Maybe I didn't explain it well. I don't care about how the person views me, but I'm not going to be a jerk. "Jerk" is not the normal level of caring for NTs....unless you hold the view that all NTs are jerks, which is in and of itself a pretty stupid view to take.