Group Chat Strategies

It looks like a cabal of global elites has excluded us from a sick-ass group chat. I’m bummed, sure. I think I could throw down some heat in there. I could at least get Balaji to agree with me on something. I would steer clear of Marc Andreessen’s egghead until the perfect opportunity arose, and then I would copy and paste an imgflip image into the chat so devastating everyone would have no choice but to “haha” react. He’d get upset, probably. But I’d still have won.

Something like this, not married to it though

Now that I think about it, I’m pissed as fuck. I’m imagining how much I’d crush in this space. Here’s my general ethos when it comes to group chats:

Lay back in the cut for a while.

When someone (Ritam, usually) goes on a texting spree, and someone else is there to feed the beast, just lay back in the cut for a while. These high-energy spurts aren’t worth your time. Let everyone tire themselves out, and then pop in right at the end, after the dust has settled—even better if you give it all enough time to marinate so that the time appears in the iMessage thing. Then no one will respond and you’re good.

If You Have Heat, Cook. But You Must Be Sure.

Basketball, as they say, is a game of runs. And sometimes, the defense has no answer.

The rare “Triple Double”…

Did I wait for typed-out “Lmao” and “Hahahah” responses? No. I soldiered forward with confidence, never wavering in my conviction that I was throwing 96 mph on each one of these. Sometimes a man is in India and his mind is fertile.

Sometimes it’s best to ignore the planning of something.

Something I love to do is not respond when people are planning something and it’s actually crucial that I do. It’s ultimately annoying as fuck for your friends, but you spare yourself the mental taxation of thinking about logistics.

Leave the party before the devil gets there.

You must develop a a preternatural sense for when a group riff is coming to its natural end. I can’t teach this, really; either you got it or you don’t.

Usually it’s marked by an increasing number of “haha” reacts replacing typed-out “LMfaoooo” texts. Maybe you can sense the lag time between responses is lengthening. What matters is this: Being the last riff is, ultimately, deeply embarrassing. You’ll just have to look at it the next time the group chat gets activated—a B-tier response adorned by multiple “haha” reacts, all of them slowly lowering you into an early grave. This must be avoided at all costs.

Do NOT go Cuban Mode.

In any other context, I would be encouraging everyone to go Cuban Mode, in all aspects of their lives. Todos somos cubanos!

But in terms of responding to everyone in a group chat? Cringe as fuck. Lost so much respect for Cuban after reading that article—he was my idol before this; I looked up to him in every way possible, especially his reputation as a sensible centrist! Imagine being the interlocutor for every dumbass’ half-considered provocation 🤢🤢🤢

At the end of the day, it’s all about having fun.

If I got to send Ben Shapiro this meme, that would be awesome.

If I had the chance to respond to a pic of Larry Summers’ bum-ass lunch with an ironic

dayenu.

And at the end of the day? If I’m throwing around this emoji 😂😂😂 with reckless abandon? You know I’m being a little JOCUND with it!!! That’s all that matters.

Trust the process: most group chat arguments and disagreements and problems to work through will—much like those of this country, and the world at large!—solve themselves.

Ritam’s Footnote

Could not be further from my behavior. I’m responding to every text in a chat, adding riffs months after the original bit, going simpering pathetic low status, engaging earnestly with every single thought experiment, asking “deep questions” constantly, sending long meandering voice memos, starting new group chats for basically every single event so that the logistics are clear… but I posit that texting, and group texting, is much closer to the soul than other social media, and therefore polluting it with status games and other such trappings of social behavior corrupts and denatures the soul into a twisted, evil hunk of metal. Not you though bro. You’re cool