That culture-wide, near impossible to appeal level of stuff you must care about or be an asshole is just the worst. You really lose something critical when you pretend, and everybody seems to be in a conspiracy to bust your hump if you don’t play along.

I don’t get all wrapped up in imagining sharing the experience or anything like that, but it’s always nice to get a factual update about the other person. And if they have something interesting to say about whatever it is, that’s good too.

I’m interested in parts of the trip. Mainly the foods and food markets. What they ate where. If they want to tell me about the views or the guy at that shop who said something, I’ll feign interest.

Anyone who has been on a “cruise holiday” eats on the ship, and the food may be good but it isn’t exciting or too exotic. I want to know how you ate a sausage and found out later it was an earthworm but it was really nice because they grilled it with lime and stuff and you couldn’t tell.

I am on the spectrum. And no, i don’t. And I don’t think of it as being an asshole, I simply don’t care about it because it just is something unimportant. I mean, if something bad happened to them, I’ll be the first one to ask, but if they are telling me how nice was their trip it’s like… well, yeah? It’s expected. You make a trip to have a good time, so of course you had a good time.

I guess i consider it innecessary because is the expected outcome.

With that said, I will listen to what they say and remember it, but that doesn’t mean I find it interesting unless there is something remarkable about it.

Autistic and I don’t care, but I do listen and I try to do it well.

I definately care some, although not enough that I want to sit through a photo slideshow or that. That said, if its just daily photos to a family group chat, or listening to them talk about a particular trip highlight, then I certainly enjoy it.

I care. Some people care more than others. That’s fine.

For some stuff I don’t care, some other makes me jealous and some other is actually cool to discover/learn (think of some new place to have lunch/dinner or some hobby you didn’t know about your friend).

But in general I am with you, and I also feel like most people liking and commenting are playing the social game.

I am not very active in social networks, though…

Yes I do care. The reason i care is because it makes me happy for them as a friend that they’re going through or went through an event that brought them joy or enriched their lives somehow.

If it’s a coworker then I’m usually doing it to be nice, but also because if you’re spending a considerable amount of time with your coworkers each day, you’ll probably have a more enjoyable work culture if you get to know your coworkers.

A baby and a vacation aren’t comparable.

Do I “care” about every little detail of their vacation? No, but I’m glad they are happy and had a good time.

People like to talk about their experiences, it’s not really a game.

It depends. Mostly I care, a new baby is a big deal, I think about how it will affect them, what the child might be like, the fact that I will probably still be spending time with that child in ten years.

Holidays I care if they’re interesting. If someone goes somewhere I’ve always wanted to go I might have questions, if they’ve been somewhere I’ve been I might chat about what I liked. But when people try to tell you a detailed recount of some trip, it can be very boring. My parents are particularly bad at reminiscing together while notionally telling me, so they keep going “where was it we ate the second day? No that was the other place” it’s awful. But it’s a chance for them to feel happy about their holiday again, so I try to be patient, and I remember how many times my parents pretended to be interested as I explained how I was doing at some computer game or whatever.

But to answer your question, it sounds like you care less than most. But everyone cares less than the people who’s life event it is. There’s lots of scenes in comedies about people hating hearing about new babies, or being forced to look at holiday photos. So you’re not alone!

Absolutely not. I’d be surprised if anybody actually cares.

As i got older, I cared more. I uses to listen politely, then I started to look forward to hearing about my friends and family lives. Now I’m one of those guys who calls to ask for updates. 😆

Even if you don’t care, it’s probably a good idea to at least pay attention to the announcement of a new baby, because this is a new person, who will be a significant influence on their life and may have some impact on your own. Later on, it’s considered polite to at least ask "and how’s (name of spouse) and (name of child or children, or you can say “the kids”). One isn’t expected to remember every detail, but at least acknowledge they exist.

It gets easier to ask relevant questions when you have some experience in those things.

Regarding vacations, I like to ask about the nature of sights in the area. I’m not interested in what food was in the buffet or how many pools were at the hotel, but I would like to know if the area has anything of interest.

For people having babies, I like to ask questions about how they’re going to handle it, just to check if they are on top of the situation or if they need help with anything.