Prosocial mischief: gently fucking with social scripts via improv

Channeling your inner trickster energy in a benign pattern interrupt

Interactions in society are often transactional. We come to a store, we want something from strangers, so we give them some amount of money in exchange for goods and services, and then we leave. 

Many of these interactions are scripted and automatic. Hi–How-are-you–i'm-good-thanks–how-can-i-help-you? Please-give-me-seven-garlic-breads-twelve-candles-and-eleventeen-watermelons–i'm-paying-with-a-card–kthxbye

The form of prosocial mischief that's about slightly fucking with these predefined social scripts for the mutual enjoyment of every party involved is called benign pattern interrupt. It's all about slightly peering through the curtain of a transaction and explicitly recognizing the humanity in the situation. For a second putting away a mask of a customer or a sales-person you are wearing and winking at another person.

I like fucking with social scripts because it’s a bit like being an author of the social order rather than a mere subject of it. 

I am not saying that social scripts are necessarily bad: it’s good to come to a shop and be polite and respectful, pay money to oil the machinery of global capitalism and get something in return for this, instead of, like, shitting in the middle of a store for original artistic reasons.

Many social scripts are good. But it’s just fun to fuck with them. Who came up with them? Definitely not you, definitely not the person in front you. Societies colonize their minds, human minds execute culture. Unweaving the threads in the social fabric and re-weaving them in new ways lets your trickster spirit come out.

Break the routine

There’s a principle of improv that is illuminating here, which I originally discovered via Keith Johnstone’s book “Impro”: “Break the routine.”

I’ve been doing improv for a few months: I’ve taken a few levels of classes, had a couple end-of-course-shows and watched a lot of improv. I’ve seen many scenes happen with improvisers of different levels. There is little interesting in scenes where everything goes normally. Two scientists working in a lab is not unusual and not interesting to watch (until like something blows up). Two scientists working as janitors are interesting. A veterinarian who cures an imaginary dog on stage is not interesting, but a veterinarian who takes the dog from the owner and immediately euthanizes the dog without a second thought is interesting to watch (why did she do it?!).

Now, I am not advocating for killing innocent animals in real life. But breaking the routine of everyday interactions in small ways? That's just some harmless fun, and let me give you a few examples of this benign pattern interrupt fun.

Example 1. A conversation with a support person

One time I had to transfer a chunk of money from Schwab into my actual bank account. Doing this required a support person calling you for a confirmation. In Russia we go straight to business after saying hellos, but of course English-speaking people have to ask "how are you". And somehow "Thanks, I got fired from my job and I really really need this money" is not the answer they'd want to hear. 

The dialogue

So I got a phone call from their support person.

Me, answering the phone: Hello!

Support guy: Hello! How are you?

Me: Good, and how are you?

SG: I'm doing excellently, thank you. Is now a good time to talk?

Me: Now is an excellent time to talk.

The rest of the script proceeded completely normally, but I could hear a slight enjoyment in the voice that sounded like a chuckle-y undertone to the rest of the conversation. .

Example 2. A conversation with a girl working in an Apple store

One time I wanted to replace a keycap on my macbook's keyboard, so I went to an Apple Store. It was late in the day, I came 15 minutes before closing. The girl working there told me that they could replace my keycap easily for free, but I'd need to come back tomorrow. 

Rather than just walking away with a standard "bye" I wished her a happy end-of-workday. A short moment of recognition that she is not an iEmployee designed in California produced in China but someone who has a life outside of an Apple store she's looking forward to. 

She seemed to enjoy it.

Example 3. The defence against the dark arts

I went to Amsterdam for a week and I stayed in a hexagonal tiny house in a campground on the outskirts of the city. Staying there required giving the guy running it a deposit of €100 until the end of the stay.

When I was checking out, I went and asked for my deposit. The guy went to a locker ten meters away to get my cash and announced:

— I only have a hundred Euro in one Euro coins.

— So I'd get a hundred coins?

— Yeah. Would this work for you?

I contemplated for a moment because I assumed he would just keep the actual bills I gave to him, but "Yes, and"-ing ridiculous things becomes a second nature after you do Improv for a while:

— Yeah, absolutely!

The guy started laughing and proceeded to give me five twenty-euro bills saying:

— You are the first person who agreed to the conditions of this joke! It would be very heavy!

— It would be, I'd feel like a pirate!

He was beaming with positive energy and smiling broadly. 

In conclusion: hacking the social fabric

In programming we have the word “hacker” that means something different from what it means in the popular culture: a clever expert who out of playful curiosity beats the system at its own game. Slightly messing with these social scripts is social hacking in the purest form: playing the game is the reward itself. 

Asking "why" misses the point somewhat. The answer is "because". Because the system is there for you to hack on. Break the script while following the rules. Evade the expectations while mastering a game — executing a social script successfully while also twisting it ups the level of difficulty in the social game.

You never know what the true rules of the system are until you try to fuck with them. And once you do, the social reality changes somewhat. You get more comfortable and confident in social situations, your social thinking gets faster: you get more witty and your reaction time in normal conversations decreases. As a result, people get drawn to you more. 

A big part of it is regarding the world more positively and being less swayed by the currents of external events. In improv you are there to support another person and once you practice this enough, it becomes a habit even in day-to-day situations. 

As scientific papers write in the conclusion: "more research is needed" so will I. More research is needed into what social fabric is and how to build it better. Better communities, better events, better companies, better subcultures, being a better friend and a better guy-who buys-a-sandwich-at-a-bodega. 

There are latent potentials for new social technologies to be discovered. Improv gets you a set of skills to fuck around and find them out.