Drive-By Compliments - Violating the Social Norm?

Hello ATS'ers,

To begin I chose Social Issues as the forum to place this in due to..well..it is a Social Issue, albeit one that is not as prevalent as it should be. R.A.K's (random acts of kindness) come in many forms. Compliments I feel, rank right at the top of random acts of kindness. Complimenting complete strangers, even more so imho.

I was browsing youtube and came across this fella, user name TimothyDeLaGhetto2. Although his youtube channel has an eclectic blend of videos, there was one he did that stood out and thus has gotten a few other people to mimic this R.A.K.

Here is the video that I first watched. The interesting thing (and as he points out in the video) people are seemingly bewildered that they're being given compliments completely at random and for no rhyme or reason other than because this guy felt like spreading some good. This particular video has over 2 million views so the chance is good a few of you have already seen it.



I thought to myself after viewing this, I don't compliment people enough and i am more apt to criticize someone than I am compliment them. Which is peculiar because I feel people are so easily able to criticize someone else and seemingly cannot muster the wherewithal to simply give a compliment. How often does one actually have the urge to compliment someone for no reason other than to just try and brighten someone's day?

Here are a couple more videos that are by others attempting to do the same good deed in the same fashion, this particular one directly as a result of the fella's above, to spread the good intention in Vancouver.



..and here is another group spreading the good in Calgary.



...and here is a group of girls (her words) spreading the good in Vancouver as well. Interesting, not everyone responds with a thank you in this one.



So there you have it, if this trend catches on, you could be the unwitting receiver of a drive-by compliment in a town near you. I can say it has inspired me and I hope it does others too. Although I don't think I will go out and attach a PA system to my vehicle to compliment people at random per se, but I will make a conscious effort to start randomly complimenting people more with this inspiration. R.A.K's come in many forms and we should try to commit to practicing them more, on a daily basis.

This violation of the current social norm in this case is well overdue. The social norm this day and age as we are out and about are far from what they should be imho.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you have a great day/night!

Most of the vid's were good but I found the last lot of people a little condescending.
But If people do this and mean it I'am sure it will brighten up peoples day
S&F.
In fact If people do this and not film it I would believe their intentions are true.

Problem is law enforcement would look at is as disturbing the peace
It's a great concept tho

reply to post by boymonkey74


It's funny, because when I first started watching these and if I were the one being complimented, I would have immediately thought it was sarcasm. Perhaps this is my own insecurities showing, or perhaps it is how we're being conditioned throughout our social evolution to react.

reply to post by HomerinNC


You're probably right about the disturbing the peace (by definition). In reality though, it would technically be the opposite. A good enough lawyer and you could probably convince the judge of that lol

reply to post by UberL33t


Thing is I can tell when someone is giving me a real compliment and many of the compliments shown in the vid's just were not genuine and maybe the people knew that.
Not saying it isn't a great Idea and I may compliment more people because of the idea but it is purely to get hits on YouTube why these people have done it.
But I'am feeling cynical at the moment like you said

reply to post by boymonkey74


Wonder why it is so easy to be cynical? I find myself cynical about a lot of things unfortunately. However the world makes it rather simple to do...speaking for myself of course, but I am fairly observant so I know it's not just me.