I could never understand the "boys" table at parties...

In all parties, there's always a group of men/boys who talk about politics, economics, and society.

Last night, I was at a family party.
There was, as per usual with all these parties, a "boys/men" table.

You know how it is, right?

I observed that my dad never joined in these conversations. That was always surprising to me because my dad was one of the smartest people I know.

At the very least, he had much to say about what “the boys” were talking about. 😆.

I only realized why, last night.

I was packing the leftover food (yes, I bring leftovers home, bite me!) and eavesdropping on their conversations.

There I was again, like all the parties before, confused, not so much about what they were saying but more about what the point was in having that conversation; why was one person talking about random statistics that were seemingly pulled out of thin air and another person talking anecdotally about something completely different while they all seemed to be in agreement, somehow????

Then it dawned on me…

Everyone must’ve encountered a person like this before.

Someone who, just for the sake of having something to say, will pull out a random fact about a topic, but when prompted to go deeper in that topic, pivots to another random fact about another random topic; never, EVER, diving deep into one topic and connecting dots from other topics.

THIS IS WHAT “THE BOYS” WERE DOING! No wonder my dad never liked talking with them; they never continued on one train of thought or at least connected one train cart to another. They were all in their own individual carts, choo-chooing to who knows where!

Which is completely antithetical to what my dad and I are like. When we have conversations, it typically goes like this:

Topic introduction > point reinforcement > question points if there’s a disagreement > deeper dive into the whys, hows, and the history behind the topic > repeat the previous 2-3 steps > possible intersection to another topic > repeat previous steps.

Yes, conversations can last hours and often involve multiple trips to the bathroom.

What’s my point…

HUGE strides in humanity’s progress have been made in conversations that take place at family parties, ideas, concepts, and whole ideologies have been born in occasions like this. Lives changed, lives saved, people pursued, people turned away. But to achieve that level of impact within a conversation, you must be willing to question ideas, think critically, and overcome the fear of offending the party's host.

This is what I think “the boys” table is, to entertain the host, which is fine but couldn’t it lead to something better than just hypothetical quagmires and privileged points of view?

It could lead to solutions, ACTUAL solutions, and not ivory tower band-aids that make you look interesting. Emphasis on look. Mind you, the table last night was filled with people who had connections, those connections had the power to change things. Ivory Tower is the perfect term.

Let me quit my yapping.
That’s just me, what do you think?