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Things You Can't Countersignal — LessWrong

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Countersignaling can backfire if your audience doesn't have enough information about you to start with. For some traits, it's especially dangerous, because you're likely to do it for traits you don't have the credibility to countersignal at all based on a misunderstanding of your relation to the general population. Countersignaling is "showing off by not showing off" - you understate, avoid drawing attention to, or otherwise downplay your communications of and about some valuable trait you have, because a) you are sure you won't be mistaken for someone with very poor characteristics in that area, and b) signaling could make you look like a merely medium-grade specimen. (Actual medium-grade specimens have to signal to distinguish themselves from low-quality ones.) For instance, if you are so obviously high-status that no one could possibly miss it, it may be both unnecessary and counterproductive to signal status, because this would let others conflate you with mid-status people. So

x Things You Can't Countersignal — LessWrong Signaling Frontpage 121 Things You Can't Countersignal by Alicorn 19th Feb 2010 4 min read 128 121 Countersignaling can backfire if your audience doesn't have enough information about you to start with. For some traits, it's especially dangerous, because you're likely to do it for traits you don't have the credibility to countersignal at all based on a misunderstanding of your relation to the general population. Countersignaling is "showing off by not showing off" - you understate, avoid drawing attention to, or otherwise downplay your communication

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